“Look near the end of the list,” said Alice.
Miss Merlin found the first word beginning with br. “Shall I find my word near the beginning of the br list?” she asked, holding the page toward the pupils.
They looked at the page and answered, “No, all the words on this page begin bra and you want a word beginning bro.”
“How shall I find my word?” asked Miss Merlin.
John turned over the pages slowly while the other pupils looked on. “Oh,” cried Alice, “the words are arranged in alphabetical order for the third letter, so you must look beyond the middle of the list!”
Miss Merlin asked Alice to find the first word beginning with bro. When it was found the children discovered that the alphabetical arrangement of letters extended to the fourth and fifth letters and even unto the end.
“Some job!” said John, moved by the efficiency of the arrangement as well as by the bigness of the task. “Now I know how I can find any word in the dictionary—just trail the alphabet from the first to the last letter of the word you are looking for.”
Miss Merlin laughed. “I don’t believe that I’ll try to improve upon your rule, John,” she said. “The Alphabet Trail is a pretty good one to follow in tracking any word to its dictionary den.”
Following John’s rule, the word sought—broccoli—was soon found. “So that you may all see exactly how the dictionary helps us pronounce this word, I will copy on the blackboard exactly what I find written here.”
Stepping to the board, Miss Merlin copied the word, divided into syllables and marked exactly as it appeared in the dictionary—(brǒk´ō-lǐ).