Page:Lawrence E A-first reader,1907.pdf/57

 BIRTH OF ESPERANTO.

Printed, with the permission of both correspondents, in the year 1896.

Translated from the Russian by V.G.

(This English translation is not literal ; it aims to give only the general sense).

". . . You ask me how it was that the idea of creating an international language appeared to me, and what was the history of the Esperanto language from the moment of its birth till today? The whole public history of the language, that is to say, beginning from the day when I openly proclaimed it, is more or less known to yow; further, it is not opportune now, for many reasons, to touch upon this period ; I will therefore relate to you the common features alone of the history of the birth of the language.

«It would be difficult for me to tell you all this in detail, for much of it l have myself forgotten. The idea, to the realisation of which I have dedicated my whole life, appeared to me (it is ridiculous to say it) in my earliest childhood, and from that time never left me. This circumstance will partly explain to you why I have laboured upon the matter with so much obstinacy, and why, in spite of all difficulties and hardships, I have not abandoned this idea, as many others working in the same field have done.

“I was born in Bielstock, in the department of Grodno (Russia), in the year 1859. This place of my