Though we repudiate phonography, so far as to deprecate its being applied to the English language, and reducing all our libraries to a dead language as it were, we are not insensible to the truth that phonography is the true principle of writing; and this method of ours takes advantage of it to a certain extent, as we shall proceed to show: for if we pronounce the vowel-characters as in the Italian language, and the letters c and g hard, it is a fact that the largest number of syllables in English will be found strictly phonographic. It was on this hint, given by a great philologist, that the "First Nursery Reading Book" was written, which has no word in it that makes an exception to the letters so sounded. In my own Kindergarten, where I began to teach reading when I was yet ignorant of the necessity for the previous training of which I have just given account, I began to teach on this method, reading and writing at the same time; thus:—
All the children were set before the black-board, with their slates and pencils; and I said, "What does the cat say?" The answer was immediately ready,—"mieaou." Now this sound goes from the highest to the lowest of the Italian vowels, beginning with the consonant m.
I said, "Now we will learn to print 'mieaou.' How does it begin?" I answered myself,—shutting my lips, and sounding m. They all imitated the sound, which, being a semi-vowel, was continuous.
I said, "We will write m," putting down three short perpendiculars, and joining them on top by a horizontal; and I made the letter myself, according to this direction, and they imitated with more or less success.
I then said, "mi," sounding the i as in machine; and adding, "Now we must write i,—and that is one little short perpendicular with a dot over it." I did it, and they imitated.
Then I said "mie," sounding e as in egg, only making it long; "and this e is made by a curve and straight line,"—at the same time making it on the black-board, which they imitated.
Then I said "miea," sounding a as in ah; and, as I made it on the black-board, I said, "We will make a little egg; and over the egg we will make a dot, and that is a snake's head; and this is the body," I continued, as I made the curve that completed the a. They imitated with indifferent success, but I did not criticise their scrawls.
Then I said, "miěao," and making the o, they imitated it easily.
Then I said, "mieaou," sounding the u not yu, but like u in Peru; and they imitated sound and character.
It proved quite an entertainment to repeat this lesson, till they were very expert. The next day I made them tell me the sounds, one by one, as I had done to them; and I wrote the letters. I also would write it, letter by letter; and they would sound first, m, then the syllable mi, then mie, then miea, then mieao, then mieaou. When they were perfectly familiar with these sounds and characters, I told them these letters were called vowels, or vocals, because they were the sounds of the voice.