Evening star., 1923-01-28

clipping from OF the papers
which it's q cable dispatch
from London In regards to
how much dough Is wasted every yr.
printing English and French letters
which Is silent and don't mean moth
ing you night say. like for inst.
you take the English wd. write and
the w on the head end of it might
as well be dropped in the ash can
for all the good 1t does anu as a
matter Of fact might better be drop
ped In the ash can because write
Is a wd that, gets a whole lot of
use and by leaveing the W off. why
when ever the wd. was printed they
would be a saving of 20 per cent
in the cost of printing.
The party that got up this dope
has figured it out that 13 out of
every 100 letters in the French lam
guage Is silent and unnecessary and
the annual expenses of printing these
no good letters amounts to 2 anu
II million dollars per yr.
Personally I would estimate that
the useless French letters runs as
high as 80 per cent as far as I
am conserved and they has even been
whole yrs. when I have succeeded in
makeing myself understood around
the home without never resorting to
the native tongue Of Lafayette and
Descamps.
The dispatch goes on to say that
the wastage In England is IL per
cent, or l per cent less than French,
but on acct. of how many more Eng
lish wds. is printed than French.
why the cost of the letters that
runs up to the huje total of 81 and
1-2 million dollras per yr.
SO all and all the Englishmens and
Frenchmens and Americans and other
people that uses 1 of these Ian
guages pays 40 million dollars a yr.
for the printing of letters that is
as useless as a moustache cup at
wellesley.
NOV leave US see If they's any
~ bases for the above figure or If
they was arrived at by guest work
and the best way to find out would
be to LIST. write down a ordinary
business letter like a business man
would dictate same though of course
very few business men talks Eng
lish but any way we will write 1t
down and then we will write it again
with the silent letters left out and
see what the different amounts to.
Mr.. Cornelius McGillicuddy,
Manager, Philadelphia American
League Baseball Club.
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
Dear Sir:
You will be called on Wednes-
day afternoon by Miss Virginia
Knight who wishes a position as
stenoKrapher. l have known Miss
Knight many years and can
recommend her as industrious,
capable, experienced and quick.
Yours sincerely,
LLOYD GEORGE.
Now we will cut out the .etters
that amt needed in the above and
here Is your letter:
Connie Mack,
Phila-, Pa
Dear Sir:
Yu will be cald ION Wed. Pm.
by Mis- Va Kt. who wishs position
as stenog. Have nown Mis- Kt.
many yrs. and can recomend her
as o. x.
Yrs. sy.,
LLOYD GEO.
Well, according to my count the
document LIST. wrote down contains
2s8 letters. The I'd one contains 12S
letters, and they amt no change in
the meaning between the 2 of them
So 1t looks like who ever 1t was
that done the figuring in London, why
he was putting it mild when he says
the waste was only IL per cent as In
the samples which ! have wrote the
waste Is somewheres between SO and
80 per cent and might even be reck-
oned as high as 100 per cent, because
Connie Mack has all ready got a good
stenographer.
X X X n
nUT I don't want to dwell no longer
ID on the written language because
some of the smart Alex amongst my
readers is libel to figure out that
every letter in this here article could
be left imprinted and the . article
wouldn't loose nothing of its value,
but before closeing I would like to
say something in regards to the
spoken language and not only letters
In same is wasted but whole wds. and
svep whole septences