Our author’s stay in England appears to have drawn his attention to the differences between the two languages of Scotland and England, which he distinguishes as North and South. He certainly shows, in some instances, the greater correctness of the Scotch with regard to the spelling of words derived from the Latin; as, retine instead of retain, corage instead of courage, etc. (p. [20]), in which words the redundant letters that we Southerners have introduced are thrown out. He is, however, by no means partial, and gives us praise when he thinks we deserve it.
Page [9]. The arguments in favour of the sound given by the English Universities to the Latin i are curious: it is stated to have its value in the Greek ει; but the author seems to have been in error as to the English sounding mihi and tibi alike, or our pronunciation must have changed since his time.
P. [10]. The author speaks of the letter y as being used by the South for the sound now symbolized by i with a final e following the succeeding consonant, as will with an i, and wile with a y in place of the i and final e; thus in the same way he spells write, wryt.
P. [11] (7). He gives food, good, blood, as examples of the same sound, thus inferring that the English pronounced the two latter so as to rhyme with food.
P. [11] (8). He objects to the use of w for u in the diphthongal sound of ou, and therefore spells how, now, etc., hou, nou.
P. [11] (10). It is difficult here to see what the pronunciation of buu would be, which the author gives as the sound of bow (to bow). Probably the sound he meant would be better represented by boo.
P. [13] (12). The author here recommends the distinction both of sound and symbol of j and v as consonants, and i and u as vowels, and proposes that we should call j jod or je, and v vau or ve, and not single u, “as now they doe” (p. [16]), and w he would call wau or we, and moreover he places them in his alphabet on the same page. If this proposal was originally his own, it is curious that the name ve should have been adopted, though not the we for w. Ben Jonson points out the double power of i and v as both consonant and vowel, but he does not attempt to make them into separate letters as Hume does.
P. [15] (12). He gives as an anomaly of the South that while the d is inserted before g in hedge, bridge, etc., it is omitted in age, suage, etc. He does not see that the short vowel requires a double consonant to prevent it from being pronounced long.
P. [21] (6). He disputes the possibility of a final e, separated from a preceding vowel by a consonant, having any effect whatever in altering the sound of the preceding vowel, and recommends the use of a diphthong to express the sound required; as, hoep for hope, fier for fire, bied for bide, befoer for before, maed for made, etc. He uniformly throughout follows this rule.
P. [22] (5). Hume here accents difficultie on the antepenultimate instead of the first syllable.