Page:Mion-Chaint - Ua Laoghaire (1899).djvu/9

Rh "rule," but there is danger of lock-jaw in trying to pronounce it, even for a habitual Irish speaker. Such writers have insisted upon observing the "rule" no matter how many consonants may come between the two vowels. They will, for example, write. I have never heard that word out of any person's mouth. I have always heard. But I have heard, not. I have never heard , but always.

It will not be easy to get rid of these incrustations all of a sudden. In fact it would be dangerous. All the pruning should not be done at once. Still there is no harm in making a beginning. That beginning should be made, taking the ear as guide. The principle in question belongs exclusively to the ear. It has nothing whatever to do with the orthography of the language.

There are several other things which require clipping. I have never heard =end, but always. I have never heard =mind, but always. Am I expected to go on writing what I have never heard? I have always heard distinctly the "" at the end of such words as =scarce, =weak, but I have never heard it at the end of the third person singular of a verb. Then why should I write into the word a sound which I have never heard there?

Then what of the authority of the past? In the first place I don't give much for the authority of people who turned a phonetic law into a spelling-rule. In the second place, if we go back as far as true authority we find that those double letters were then distinctly heard— and were written one for the