Year: 1875

prove unfortunate II not disastrous


Mark Twain ON Spelling.


There was spelling match at the
Congregational Church. Hartford
Conn, and Mr.. Samuel L. Clemens
Mark Twain) being called on for 9
few preliminary remarks. spoke as
follows:


Ladies and Gentlemen-I have
been honored with the Office of in.
Producing these approaching orthog,
raphical solemnities with a few re
marks. The temperance crusade
swept the land some time ago, that
is, that vast portion of the land were
it was needed, but it skipped Hart
ford. Now comes this new spelling
epidemic, and this time aUe are strick,
en-. So suppose we needed the
affiiction. / don't say we needed it.
For don't see any use in spelling
a word right and never did. / mean
don't see any use in having 8
uniform and arbitrary way of spell
ing words. We might as well make
all clothes alike and cook all dishes
alike. Sameness is tiresome verie-
ty is pleasing. / have a correspond
ent whose letters are always re-
freshment to me; there is such a
breezy, unfettered originality about
his photography. He spells Kow
with large K. Now that is just as
good as to spell it with it with a
small one. 1t is better. 1t gives
the imagination a broader field. q
wider scope. It suggests to the
mind grand, vague, impressive new
kind of cow. Superb effects can be
produced by variegated spelling
Now there is Blind Tom. the musical
prodigy. He always spells a word
according to the sound that is
carried to his ear. And he is an
enthusiast in photography. When
you give him word he shouts it out
puts all his soul into it. L once
heard him called upon to spell
orang-outang before an audience.
He said, go, rang, orang, ger,
ger, Granger tang, Granger tang r.
Now a body can respect an orang-
outang that spells his name in a
vigorous way like that. But the
feeble dictionary makes mere kitten
of him. In the old times people
spelled just as they pleased. That
was the right idea. You had two
chances at a stranger then. You
knew a strong man from a weak one
by his ironclad spelling, and his
handwriting helped you to verify
verdict. Some people have an idea
that correct spelling can be taught
and taught to any body. That is
u mistake. The spelling faculty is
born in a man, like poetry, music
and art. 1t is gift in high degree
only need to see word once in print
and it is forever photographed upon
their memory. They cannot forget
it. People who haven't it must be
content to spell more or less like
like thunder-and expect to splinter
the dictionary wherever their orthog-
raphical lightning happens to strike.
There are 114,000 words in the una
bridged dictionary / knew a lady
who can spell only $50 of them right.
She steers clear of all the rest.
She can't learn any more. So her
letters always consist of those con-
stantly recurring $50 words. Now
and then. when she finds herself
obliged to write upon subject which
necessitates the use of some other
word she-welI, she don't write on
that subject. l have a relative in
New York who is almost sublimely
gifted. She can't spell any word
right. There is game called Ver-
barium. A dozen people are each
provided with sheet of paper across
the top of which is written q long
word like kaleidoscopical, or some
thing like that. and the game is to
see who can make up the most words
out Of that in three minutes, always
beginning with the initial letter of
the word. Upon one occasion the
word chosen was cofferdam. When
time was called everybody had built
from five ITO twenty words except
this young lady. She had only one
word-calf. We all studied mo-
ment and then said, "Why, there is
no in cofferdam p Then we examin
ed her paper. To the eternal honor
of that uninspired, unconscious, sub
timely independent soul be it said
she had spelled the word ''caffl'' If
anybody here can spell calf any,
more sensibly then that let him step
to the front and take his milk. The
instruction wiH now begin.