Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1908-11-29

its spread was slow. and ii has not been
until within the present century that the
study has become at all general. Indeed,
the first Esperanto group was not formed
in England until 1906. although by that
time there were many clubs for its study
on the continent The invasion OF the
United States old not begin until 1905. but
since that time it has become very popu-
lar. Washington has had Esperanto en-
thusiaStS since 1905, and at present it is
estimated that there are over two hundred
people in this city actively interested in
this new tongue.
Esperanto attracts because of it's ex-
IRENE simplicity. Unlike any other Ian
guage. it is strictly phonetic-every letter
has constant value in the pronunciation
of words. Then its grammar is absurdly
simple To all those people who have
laboriously mastered the two thousand
different endings of the French verbs Es-
peranto, with only twelve endings, is d,
revelation and a delight. The student can
tell at a glance whether any particular
word is noun, adjective, or what not,
and wonder of wonders. there are no eX-
ceptionS to It's grammatical rules.
Miss Giffen quickly realized that Es-
peranto was going to be a great thing for
the blind. and decided on the formation Of
a class from those whose interest in the
language might be aroused. Her efforts
were SO enthusiastically seconded that
last year the Capitol Esperanto Club was
organized by her. 1t is not made up en-
trely of blind people, but has some other
seeing people among its members besides
Miss Giffen. who is a great believer in
not isolating the unseeing people. Under
her leadership the members made splendid
strides toward the mastery Of the new
language. However. there was only time
before the season closed for the taking
OF the preliminary steps.
x ::
This year the work has already been
resumed and the members are going en-
Enthusiastically about their studies. During
the summer Miss Giffen was in Europe
making a study of Esperanto.
The room where the club meets is a
kindergarten room in the day time. so
that it is fitting that Miss Giffen should
gather her beginners around kinder
garten table and there proceed to instill
into them the first principles of the new
universal language
This study has not been plain sailing
by any manner of means. To begin with
there was the handicap Of the too numer
Gus systems of finger print, as the rails
ed writing used by the blind is called.
There are five of these systems alto
gether the Oldest one of which dates
as far back as 17SA, and the newest of
which was invented in the centennial
year. 1876.
The first system is that which is known
as Zine type" invented in 1854 by VAL
entine Hauy a learned Frenchman. This,
type is nothing more less than the
ordinary Roman characters, given a more
than usually square form. The type is
pressed on soft pulpy paper. which
after hardening presents the raised letter
on its upper surface. OF course. the let
tiers are a great deal larger than ordi-
nary characters. but even then they are
extremely difficult to learn to read by
touch. Nevertheless for nearly half d
century there was no other system in ex-
istence and a. great many books for the
blind were written in this type and still
exist There are numbers on the shelves