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DELPHOS

TO-DAY AND TO-MORROW

For the Contents of this Series see the end of
the Book.

DELPHOS

THE FUTURE OF INTERNATIONAL
LANGUAGE

BY
E. SYLVIA PANKHURST

London

KEGAN PAUL. TRENCH, TRUBNER & Co., Ltd.

New York: E. P. Button & Co.

Made and Printed in Great Britain by
The Bowering Press, Plymouth.

THE LOGICAL NECESSITY
OF INTERLANGUAGE

ILJAVING failed to achieve a general means
,-*■•*• of communication, mankind, in the
realm of language, has permitted itself to
rest internationally upon the level of the
dumb animalsT)

The horses whinney by the road-side, the
dogs exchange the courtesies of nose and tail.
Human mothers of different nationalities
know only the dumb language of tear-filled
eyes and clasping hands, when they meet by
the bedside of an ailing child ; (^nd, with a
smile and shrug of inept apology, powerful
industriahsts, famous statesmen, and learned
savants confess their inabiUty to exchange
with each other the simplest of ideasTl

^et in other provinces mankind is knitting
the globe to a remarkable unity^ The inter-
change of materials between distant coun-
tries has led to an interdependence of peoples
undreamt of in earUer times. World activities
and needs are, and will be, ever more and
more co-ordinated. (Sanitation, food, fuel,
communications, transport, and education
must be regarded from world standpoints)^

6 DELPHOS

The aeroplane, the telegraph, the telephone ;
of late wireless telegraphy and photographic
telegraphy ; and now television, allow us to
maintain a rich and constant communication
with every part of the globe. It is not too
much to prophesy that sensations other than
those of hearing and sight will soon be trans-
mitted by similar methods : we shall not only
see, but smell, the flowers in the old home-
garden ; the ozone of the seaside and the
latest electric and sunbath-treatment will
reach us as readily as the broadcasted
concert. By some allied means we may even
feel the touch of distant hands.

To-day everyone shares in such develop-
ments. The youth of the poorest homes are
able to install the wireless. IRadio-broadcast-
ing thus becomes a great force, making towards
the adoption of an international auxihary
language.^ The British Broadcasting Com-
pany is attempting to standardize the pro-
nunciation of English ; but the wireless set
carries the people far beyond the confines of
their native tongue. The spoken word to-day
encircles the globe and can be stored up for
future generations. Our children's children
will hear the singing of Nellie Melba, and, if
they should think worth while, the speeches
of this year's statesmen. \Yet language-
barriers deprive the far-sent 'word of the
universal comprehension given to musicl

NECESSITY OF INTERLANGUAGE 7

(jOf the influences urging towards Inter-
language, stronger than all is the desire for
world-friendship long latent amongst the
kindher and wiser people of all nations, and
now quickened to an ardent flame by the
agonies of the World-war r\ With all its faults,
the so-caUed League of Nations is the
response of governments to this deep and
ever-growing sentiment.

Apart from its intrinsic difficulties of
pohtical and economic rivahy, the mechanical
business of the League is rendered tedious and
costly by lack of a common medium. Corres-
pondence in aU languages is received by the
secretariat in Geneva. The adoption of two
official languages causes the duplication of all
official documents. Headway, the organ of
the League of Nations Union, announced that
during 1926 the League's Geneva staff would
include 29 translators and interpreters at
salaries amounting to £19,800, and, in
addition to secretary shorthand typists,
sixty-one other typists at salaries amounting
to £18,300.

International Congresses of all sorts are
similarly impeded. Impromptu translations,
by which the business is delayed, provide, at
best, only a summarized paraphrase of the
speeches, which are often garbled beyond the
recognition of their authors, as we can
personally testify from experience.

8 DELPHOS

Though prejudice and inertia have deferred
the estabUshment of a world-language, means
of international communication have been
devised, of necessity, to meet many claimant
needs. Such include the Morse Code, in-
vented in 1832 (but foreshadowed in method
by Bacon's cipher so early as the sixteenth
century) ; the maritime signal code adopted
by England and France in 1862 and soon
after by all nations ; the Gregorian calendar ;
maps, and figures, the face of the clock ; the
measuration of time, and the notation of
music. Chemistry, botany, and other sciences
have their universal signs and nomenclature.
The "Formulario de Mathematica" of Peano,
1895-1908, has completed the elimination of
language from mathematics. Dewey's decimal
classification of books, invented in 1873,
meets no Hnguistic barriers. The civiUzed
world west of Germany has adopted the
Roman alphabet, which is always becoming
more widely used in printing German. The
Angora government has resolved to use it
instead of Arabic characters for the Turkish
language, and missionaries substitute it for
those of the Far Eastern tongues.

In default of a general international
auxiUary, composite languages have grown
up along frontiers and where, from conquest,
commerce, immigration, peoples of different
race have been long associated. These com-

NECESSITY OF INTERLANGUAGE g

promise-languages include the Benguela of
Portuguese East Africa and the Congo, the
Lingua Geral of South America, the Pidgin
Enghsh, French and Russian of the Far East,
Hindustani, the interlanguage of India, the
Lingua Franca of the Levant, and Chinook,
used by Europeans trading with the North
American Indians. A similar compromise-
jargon was employed by the Indians speaking
different languages before the advent of the
Europeans,f or interlanguage is, in the long run,
a human necessity and no mere modern fad.
The War and its settlements stimulated the
movement for nationhood amongst small
populations. Writers who hitherto would
have clothed their ideas in the language of
one of the great Empires, now employ the
speech of their own small people. Countries
that long slumbered in the stagnation of old
tradition are now being fired by the spirit of
scientific investigation ; from India comes
Jagadis Chunder Bose with his wonderful
researches into plant response and physiology.
The speed of scientific progress rushes far
ahead of the pace it displayed a generation
ago. Those who would keep abreast of the
times in any hne of investigation cannot wait
for translations and find a knowledge, even of
three or four languages, inadequate. A ready
means of placing theories and discoveries
before investigators is required.

10 DELPHOS

Within the frontiers, learning spreads from
class to class, ever more widely diffused
amongst the people. This is a genuine index
of progress, and indicates the possibility of
establishing an interlanguage which will
spread with the growth of education, and
assist in promoting that growth.

II

THE BEGINNING OF INTERLANGUAGE

TO .the educated world the present
international incomprehension is of
comparatively recent origin. From the time
of the Romans until the seventeenth century
Latin was the language of learning ; and
through it Newton, Kepler, Copernicus,
Grotius, Harvey the discoverer of the circula-
tion of the blood, gave their discoveries to the
world. Its decline was not due to any failure
in the language itself. Though confined to the
use of scholars, it was being modified by
usage, as all living languages must be, and in
harmony with the general trend of language,
it was becoming analytical. Remember that
classical Latin includes only 202 authors and
a number of inscriptions, — whilst medieval
Latin comprises many thousands of books.

whe fall of Latin came with the reaction
against scholasticism and the awaking of the
spirit of inquiry, which strives to ascertain
fact by experiment and rejects reliance upon
tradition.^ Bacon, a foremost leader in this
movement, wrote his greatest scientific works
in EngUsh, but translated them into Latin,
because of its wide currency. Even then he

12 DELPHOS

indicated the need for a new international
medium.

Another feature of the time which con-
tributed to the disuse of Latin was the then
new enthusiasm for nationaUty, which burst
forth during the ardent days of EHzabeth in
a wealth of creative exploits. The breaking
away from Roman Catholicism, which claimed
superiority to the national Kings and
Governments and made Latin its vehicle, had,
but a little earlier, shaken the fabric of
European society to its foundations. Indeed,
it was in the Church that the first blow at
Latin was delivered. The result was a
glorious enrichment of the national languages,
which were transcended by their use as
vehicles for the most splendid thoughts of the
day. Ceasing to be a medium for constructive
ideas, Latin became crystallized, like Irish or
any other language, left, as it were, in cold
storage.

In 1629 Descartes, ** the Father of Modern
Philosophy ", wrote to his friend Mersenne,
propounding the theory of a universal
language, so easy that :

" It will not be a marvel that uneducated
people should learn in less than six hours to
compose with the aid of a dictionary. ..."
** I believe that this language is possible,
and that one could discover the science on
which it depends, by means of which the

BEGINNING OF INTERLANGUAGE 13

peasants could better judge the truth of
things than do the philosophers at the
present time."

The creation of such a medium was the
subject of earnest speculation by many of
those powerful minds whose efforts laid the
foundations of modern science. Vieta,
Thomas Harriot, Oughtred, and Descartes
had collected and extended the mathematical
symbols. William Oughtred's Key to Mathe-
matics first popularized the use of decimals
in this country.

" When I first fell from that verbose way

of tradition of the mathematics used by the

ancients and of late by almost all . . . into

the symbohc way ... I was presently

greatly taken by it. . . . And I was put

upon an earnest desire that the same course

might be taken in other things."

Thus wrote Seth Ward,^ Bishop of SaUs-

bury, on reading Oughtred's work. Ward

was an enthusiast for symbohsm in language

and for the project of his learned colleague

John Wilkins, Bishop of Chester, Warden of

Wadham College, Oxford, Master of Trinity

College, Cambridge, and one of the founders

of the Royal Society. Wilkins defended the

Copemican Theory and declared that people

must not go to theological works for scientific

* Bishop Ward, Vindicics Academiarum, 4to,
Oxford, 1654.

14 DELPHOS

argument. He discussed the possibility of
visiting the moon in a flying machine. His
Mercury, or the Swift and Secret Messenger is
a cryptographic writing and his language
scheme, called an Essay towards a Real
Character and a Philosophical Language (1668)
was published by the Royal Society.

In 166 1 George Dalgarno published his
Ars signorum, which was submitted by
Charles II to four eminent persons, on whose
advice the author received a letter of royal
commendation. He also invented a method
of teaching the deaf-and-dumb, and an
alphabet of manual signs. These, with his
language, were reprinted by the Maitland
Society in 1834. Amongst other early
schemes were those of Herman Hugo, 1617,
Francis Lodowych, 1646, who used symbolic
signs between five lines, as in music, and
G. J. Vossius, one of the most learned men
of his time.

Already in 1650 Sir Thomas Urquhart, the
English translator of Rabelais, had written a
humorous parody of universal language-^a
sure sign that the subject was what is called
*' in the air ". Since that time there have
probably been thousands of attempts. Up-
wards of 300 examples are still in existence.

Pascal (1623-1662) advocated the universal
language, and Leibniz (1646-1716) occupied
himself with the idea from the age of eighteen

BEGINNING OF INTERLANGUAGE 15

to the end of his Hfe. He desired the creation
of a language which should be an instrument
of reason. The words must embody the
definition of ideas and reveal to the eyes the
verities relative to those ideas, so that they
might be deduced by algebraic transforma-
tion. He argued that all complex ideas are
the product of simple ideas, as is the case
with figures. If the letters of the alphabet
were made synonymous, on the one hand with
figures, on the other hand with ideas, the
composition of an idea and its decomposition
into its simple elements could be accom-
pHshed. The numbers i to 9 might be made
to indicate the nine first consonants ; the
vowels should be represented by the numbers
ten, a hundred, a thousand, ten thousand,
and a hundred thousand respectively. In
order to create his vocabulary of words which
would hold a mirror up to knowledge, he
proposed to analyse all human ideas and
reduce them to simple elements. To devise
a logical grammar, he decided to work out
his theories on the fabric of an existing
language — Latin^^ The analysis of ideas was
never reahzed. [His keen analysis of grammar
was the great Hnguistic contribution of
Leibniz. Determined to abohsh all non-
essentials, he declared that all verbs required
but one declension, and that it is useless for
them to indicate either person or number, as

i6 DELPHOS

this is done by the subject. Artificial gender
he discarded. Nouns need not indicate
number, as this can be done by a preceding
article or adjective. Adjectives require no
concordance, prepositions should show case,
conjunctions mood. There is no difference
between adverbs and adjectives, the adverb
being merely the adjective of the verb ; and
not much between the adjective and the noun,
the noun being merely an adjective joined to
the idea of a thing, or a state of being. The
verb, moreover, is often a noun or adjective
accompanying the verb to he, which he held
to be the only essential verb. In these ideas
Leibniz anticipated the most drastic an-
alytical grammarians of to-day?\

As Latin fell in the revolt against the
international control of the Papacy, so will
the international language ride forward to
world-usage on the flood-tide of inter-
na tionaUsm, now rising against the wars the
national governments have made. That a
common auxiliary language must accompany
the world-fraternity of peoples was recognized
during the French Revolution. Citizen
Delormel presented a Pro jet d'une Langue
Universelle to the National Convention of
1795, urging that men and peoples should be
met by the gentle guidance of fraternity.
Voltaire, de Brosses, President of the Bur-
gundy Parliament, and Condorcet, author of

BEGINNING OF INTERLANGUAGE 17

the Progres de VEsprit Humain, were ad-
vocates of universal language. Volney (1757-
1820), himself the author of works on the
philosophical study of language and the
application of the European alphabet to the
Asiatic tongues, estabUshed, through the
Institute of France, a prize to encourage
research into international grammar.

The same idea swayed EngHsh idealists of
the period. Francis Homer, sometime
Member of Parliament for St Ives, wrote in
1799:

" Lord Webb Seymour has come to me
with a plan which his brother the Duke has
for some time been attending to, of forming
a philological society with a view to the
invention of a real character^. . . Marsden,
Leyton, Boucher, and other philologists
have been spoken to. The project is a
grand one. . . ."

The learned Scott, Lord Monboddo (James
Burnett, 1714-1799), who was likened to
Dr Johnson and whose pre-Darwin contention
that man is a civiUzed species of monkey
was ridiculed in his day, was also a prophet
of Interlanguage.2
Nietzsche (1844-1900) in his Menschliches

* Real character was accepted at the time as
denoting the universal language of symbols.

* Dissertation on the Origin and Progress of
Language, Edinburgh, 1774.

i8 DELPHOS

Allzumenschliches, made a double prophecy :
" In some far off future there will be a
new language, used at first as a language
of commerce ; then for all, as surely as
some time or other there will be aviation.
Why else should philologists have studied
the laws of language for a whole century,
and have estimated the necessary, the
valuable, and the successful portion of
each separate language ? "
Max Miiller, that great student of com-
parative philology, ardently endorsed the
international language idea. Lecturing before
the Royal Institution of Great Britain in
1863, he made the following very important
pronouncement :

** To people acquainted with a real
language, the invention of an artificial
language is by no means an impossibility ;
nay, such a language might be more
perfect, more regular, more easy to learn
than any of the spoken tongues of man ".
Dr Henry Sweet, pre-eminent in the study
of English phonetics and comparative phil-
ology, contributed essays on international
language to the Encyclopcedia Britannica. He
urged that the inconvenience of linguistic
diversities had been felt since the dawn of
civihzation, and that the need for an inter-
national medium had now become urgent.
He rejected all the national languages as too

BEGINNING OF INTERLANGUAGE 19

difficult, pointing out that they are only in
part rational and contain multitudes of
irregularities. He charged the makers of
artificial languages with having copied the
worst faults of the national tongues.

Ill

THE A PRIORI LANGUAGES

THE artificial language-projects may be
divided into two categories : The
a priori, or purely invented, and the a
posteriori, which claims to be based on exist-
ing language. This classification cannot be
exact. Since all human expression is the
result of received impressions, those wljo have
desired to invent an altogether new language
have not entirely succeeded in ridding them-
selves of precedent. On the other hand, the
early attempts at a posteriori language were
largely a priori, their authors lacking the
knowledge and industry essential to the
building of a true a posteriori language.

Amongst the a priori languages may be
classed the systems of Pasigraphy, or
universal writing. In Pasigraphy each word
is given an equivalent sign, generally a
number, in each language. Thus if 2 is the
number internationally given to bread, it
will be inteUigible to all. The system is
already appUed in chemistry, the maritime
signal code, and for other practical purposes.
In deaUng with languages there is the
essential difficulty that they are not all

THE A PRIORI LANGUAGES 21

constructed in the same manner ; it would
be difficult to apply the same numeration to
idiomatic French and to idiomatic English.
Early attempts at Pasigraphy were those of
Hugo in 1617 and Kircher in 1655.

The earUer a priori languages were mainly
philosophical, aiming, as we have seen, at
creating an alphabet of human thought, and
expressing more by symbolism than could be
conveyed in the same compass by words.

Dalgarno, who wrote in Latin with sim-
pUfied spelling, gave a common form to the
name of individuals of the same genus,
varying only the last letter to denote the
different species, thus :

NrjksL = elephant. Nijkn = horse. Niyke
= donkey. N-r^ko = mule.

Bishop Wilkins placed ideas in forty classes,
each denoted by a sign within horizontal
lines : -a-. The classes he divided into
** differences ", denoted by signs on the left ;
and the differences into species, denoted by
signs on the right. The various pronouns
were indicated, each by groups of dots, the
past, the present, and the future by i, 2, and
3 ; can by 6 ; may by b.

Delormel classified ideas upon a decimal
basis, having ten vowels in his alphabet. The
Abbot Bonifacio Sotos Ochando, who was
professor of Madrid University and held
several other posts of learning, in 1845

22 DELPHOS

denoted inorganic objects by ab ; simple
objects or elements by aba, matter or bodies
in general by abe, dimensions by abi. From
aba were derived ababa = oxygen ; ababe —
hydrogen ; ababi — nitrogen. In the language
of Letellier (1850) a = animal; ab = mammal;
abo = carnivorous ; aboj = feline ; aboje =
cat ; abode = dog ; abiv = horse.

The primary difficulty facing all attempts
to devise a language of classification is that
in the world of ideas which language may be
called on to express we are not dealing with
a few simple elements, but with a fabric of
infinite complexity. Moreover, ideas, and
views as to their classification, are constantly
changing. As Dr Donnan, in an address to
the Royal Institution, pointed out, the
Aristotelian classification of the elements into
earth, air, fire, and water has long been dis-
carded, and the chemical elements accepted
at the beginning of the present century have
given place to theories of electrons, protons,
and neutrons, which may presently be
superceded in their turn. In a language of
classification a sHght vocaUc modification
might produce, not a mere mispronouncia-
tion, but the transference of a word to another
class. The relentless progress of science
might render great literature unintelUgible.

Despite such objections, there can be no
doubt that all natural languages grew up, in

THE A PRIORI LANGUAGES 23

part at least, as languages of classification.
Before gender was developed primitive
peoples classified their names for things
according to totemistic ideas. In one of the
African languages the substantives are still
divided into nine classes. In most languages
such classes have been gradually worn down
till they have come to indicate only the three
genders. The attribution of the masculine
or feminine gender to words denoting in-
animate objects, which occurs in many
languages, is a survival of totemistic classifi-
cation.

J. A. Decourdemanche, in his Grammatre
de Tchingane} argues that all language was
originally formed from the joining into words
of monosyllables, and even of simple letters,
each of which had a distinct value in the
meaning of the word. He presents an able
case for the beUef that, whatever its origin,
Gipsy speech in its present state is a practical
example of a language formed according to
the principles attempted in vain by the more
sophisticated seekers after the universal
philosophical language.

SymboHsm has estabUshed itself in the
representation of chemistry and mathematics,
and may triumph also in new directions.
Whilst it has many attractive features, it
must lack, until it has grown old in use, the

* Paul Geuthner, Paris, 1908.

24 DELPHOS

historic and social influences which belong to
a posteriori language. It would seem more
possible to adapt a system of symbols to
writing than to speech ; and for conveying
practical and scientific ideas than for Htera-
ture and the expression of emotion.

In spite of its difficulties, the philosophical
language of classification and symbolism has
proved a constant subject of attraction. New
schemes for it still appear, and even so late
a writer as Dr Henry Sweet admitted a
preference for such a medium.

In 1885 a committee appointed by the
French Society Internationale de Linguistique
reported that the universal language must
be philosophical and must have nothing in
common with any natural tongue.

The language of classification which re-
ceived the widest measure of popularity was
Sohesol, invented in 18 17 by Fran9ois Sudre,
a French music-master. Its vocabulary was
formed from the notes of the scale : do, re,
mi, fa, sol, la, si. By transferring the accent
from one syllable to another, verbs, adverbs,
adjectives, and nouns, personal and im-
personal, were formed from a single stem.
A Solresol message could be given in music,
coloured fights, or flags. It could be used for
communicating with ships at sea or for the
finger language of the blind. It was favour-
ably reported on by the French Institute on

THE A PRIORI LANGUAGES 25

four occasions, received a prize of ten thou-
sand francs at the Paris Exhibition of 1855
and a medal at the London Exhibition of
1862, and was endorsed by Victor Hugo. Its
author was invited to expound his method
before the Emperor Napoleon IIL

The Langue Blue of the Parisian, Leon
Bollack, emerged in 1899. His method was
to draw up a list of all the pronounceable
monosyllables he could discover containing
not more than five letters. It happened that
amongst the number were Pnabs, Kvaf,
Krelv, Mrolm, and Sparf. Langue Blue
became remarkably popular. How far it was
from likeness to any existing language may
be gathered from its rendering of the opening
words of the Lord's Prayer : Nea per, ev
ra seri in silu.

IV

THE A POSTERIORI LANGUAGES

' I ^HE a posteriori languages began later
-■- than the a priori, though some date
from an early period. The first was probably
CarpophorophiU, based on Latin and pub-
lished by an unknown author in Leipzig in
1734. A remarkable early sketch was the
Langue Nouvelle of Faiguet, Treasurer of the
Bureau des Finances, Chalons-sur-Marnes,
who proposed it for international use by the
academies of learning. It appeared in the
famous Encyclopedie of the eighteenth century
by Diderot and d'Alembert. It had no
article, no gender, no concordance of adjec-
tives ; its substantives formed their plural
in S., and were otherwise invariable, case
being shown by prepositions. The verbs had
but one conjugation, which was exceedingly
simple. Person and number were not in-
dicated by the verb. The vocabulary was
not worked out ; indeed, the philological
research requisite to the construction of a
true a posteriori vocabulary had not yet been
accomplished ; but the scheme was far in
advance of many later attempts.

Conununicationssprache, by J. Schipfer

A POSTERIORI LANGUAGES 27

(Wiesbaden), 1839, was an attempt to sim-
plify French. Pantos-dimou-glossa, by Lucien
de Rudelle (France, 1858) had a vocabulary
based on Greek, Latin and the neo-Latin
languages. Universal-sprache by Von Pirro
(Paris, 1868), an important effort, was based
on Latin, with widely known words from
Enghsh, ItaUan, and Spanish. Its grammar
was simple, and it was fairly inteUigible to
many nationahties at first sight : " Men
senior, I sende evos un gramatik, e un verb-
bibel de un nuov glot nomed universalglot."

VOLAPtJK

In 1879 Johann Martin Schleyer, a Roman
CathoUc priest, conceived the idea of a
universal language of peace and brotherhood.
In 1880 he completed his project, and
dedicated it to God. His effort was, indeed,
appropriate to the times. The German
Empire, having fought its way to existence
under the aggressive poHcy of the Prussian
Kings, inaugurated its rule by imposing
rapacious peace-terms upon France in 1871 ;
and then set itself to the methodical and
ruthless creation of an imperial army and
navy. The war of Turkey and Britain against
Russia, then raging, was an awful reminder
that the Great Powers might be d^a^vn into
conflict at any moment.

Schleyer called his new language Volapiik,

28 DELPHOS

meaning vocabulary world-speech. It was
a cumbrous monstrosity, but its success was
extraordinary. It far outstripped in popu-
larity all other projects. In 1886 Dr
Auguste Kerchhoffs, Professor of Languages
at the Paris School of Commercial Studies,
founded an Association for the promotion of
Volapiik, with a committee distinguished in
literature, science, industry, and commerce,
which held fourteen public Volapiik classes
simultaneously in Paris. Other bodies fol-
lowed suit, even the Grands Magazins du
Printemps ! In Italy the Minister of Public
Instruction authorized free classes at Turin
and Reggio EmiHa. By 1889, 283 Volapiik
Societies had been formed, including many
in the United States, in Sydney, Melbourne,
and Capetown ; ^,600 people had qualified
for the Volapiik diploma ; there were a
million Volapiikists, 316 text-books in twenty-
five languages, and twenty-five Volapiik
journals, seven printed whoUy in that
language. In 1889 the third Congress of
Volapiikists met in Paris, and the speeches
were delivered in Volapii2^

Two years earUer the American Philo-
sophical Society, founded by FrankHn in
1743, had proposed an international con-
ference in London or Paris, to consider a
world auxiUary language. Remarkable to
relate, the London Philological Society had

A POSTERIORI LANGUAGES 29

rejected the invitation of the American body,
on the grounds firstly, that there existed no
vocabulary common to the Aryan languages ;
secondly, and more remarkable still, that
Volapiik was already established in all coun-
tries and that it was now too late to improve
it!

In spite of such dicta many enthusiasts
were finding the project of Schley er too
cumbrous and difiicult. It has been said that
Volapiik was destroyed by ill-judged attempts
to improve it. Actually, it was incapable of
improvement. A candid analysis revealed
little, either in grammar or vocabulary,
worthy of preservation. Its death-blow was
struck at its second Congress in 1887, by the
formation of an Academy to give scholarly
advice upon its development. As con-
scientious people, the Academicians could
not fail to suggest alterations, but Schley er
refused amendment. The third and last
Congress supported the Academy in its
reform proposals. Eventually, in 1890,
Schleyer formed another Academy ; but his
language was already dead.

Schleyer and his language had served their
turn in creating a widespread interlanguage
movement. The original Volapiik Academy
passed on to unfettered study of the inter-
language problem from the standpoint of
etymology.

30 DELPHOS

Esperanto
Before considering the outcome of those
labours, we must turn aside to notice a
claimant star which appeared in the inter-
language firmament in 1887. This was
Esperanto, the creation of an ardent en-
thusiast and most capable organizer, Dr
Louis Lazarus Zamenhof, who, in 1887,
published his scheme under the pseudonym :
" Doktoro Esperanto " ; in other words
*' Dr Hopeful ". The name, understood in
aU European tongues, became attached to
the language and helped to make it popular.
Esperanto began to advance at the death
of Volapiik. Its first small periodical,
La Esperantisto, was founded at Niiremberg
in 1887 ; but it was not until 1902 that
Joseph Rhodes gathered the first EngHsh
group at Keighly. About 1896 the language
began to make progress in France. Nine
years later the French Government awarded
the membership of the Legion of Honour to
Zamenhof, to celebrate the first of the great
^mtemational Esperanto conferences, which,
except in the War-period, have followed
annually and have attracted up to 4,000
delegates. By 1926 the Universal Esperanto
Association laid claim to the support of
10,000 subscribers, to 12,000 delegates in
60 countries, to national associations in 32
countri^, and to many societies of railway

A POSTERIORI LANGUAGES 31

and postal workers, policemen, blind people,
youths. Socialists, Quakers, Roman CathoUcs,
and so on. Esperanto talks were being
broadcasted weekly from 30 stations in 13
countries, and the language was used for
broadcasting news from the Geneva radio-
station. The Universal Telegraphic Union
accorded it official recognition as a ** plain
language " for transmission in 1925. The
Union of Russian Soviet Repubhcs had issued
stamps and postcards with inscriptions
printed in it. The Chambers of Commerce of
Paris, New York, Washington, and Los
Angelos taught it in their commercial schools.
The London Chamber of Commerce granted
diplomas for it. The Spanish Government
made Zamenhof a Commander of the Order
of Isabella in 1909, and issued official invita-
tions to attend the Universal Esperanto
Congress in Barcelona. The Bulgarian
Government and the French Parliament have
voted subsidies. Esperanto is used for
advertising purposes by most of the trade-
fairs of Europe, and by the Governments of
some small nations. Some countries en-
courage its use by policemen and railway and
tram employees. The International Labour
Office of the League of Nations publishes a
monthly circular in it. In 1922 some primary
and secondary schools in 320 towns in 17
countries held classes in Esperanto, and

32 DELPHOS

evening classes were held in 1,200 towns in
39 countries. The British Board of Education
permitted its teaching in certain schools. In
April, 1922, it was taught in eleven English
primary schools to 881 pupils, in two secon-
dary schools to 43 children, in one private
school to 40 pupils, in ten evening schools
to 269 pupils ; in Scotland to 90 pupils in two
primary schools, and to 89 pupils in two
secondary schools. Though the teaching by
public authorities reached but a tiny pro-
portion of the populace, even this had been
obtained only by persistent lobbying.

The world congress of International As-
sociations in September, 1920, passed a
resolution recommending adherence to the
important Esperanto movement, " deferring
all improvements until the language ha4been
officially adopted by the governments j

Much of the support accorded to Esperanto
is undoubtedly prompted by desire for a
medium of international understanding, with-
out regard to its particular form. Esperanto
is simply " the international language " to
most of its enthusiasts ; yet to the devotees
of Volapiik, it seemed that the language of
Schleyer had been builded upon a rock.

At the first Assembly of the League of
Nations Senator Lafontaine of Belgium
moved a resolution welcoming the teaching
of Esperanto in the schools of some League

A POSTERIORI LANGUAGES 33

members, and instructing the Secretariat to
prepare a Report on the results obtained.
The resolution expressly asked for inf onnation
regarding Esperanto teaching, not for inquiry
into the merits of the various artificial
languages.

The Esperanto organization displayed, in
providing material for the Report, that great
efficiency which is habitual to it, and which
it had also employed in securing the passage
of the League resolution itself. An Esperanto
conference of Educationists was called in
Geneva, at the headquarters of the League of
Nations. The delegates included representa-
tives of sixteen governments, and were
welcomed by Sir Eric Drummond, Secretary
General of the League of Nations. The
Report of the League Secretariat was highly
favourable ; but the third Assembly referred
the question to its Commission for Intellectual
Co-operation. The Commission called for a
further Report, which was presented by
G. de Reynold^ on July 31st, 1923. This
report was hostile to Esperanto, declaring
that from the educational standpoint its
barbarity and lack of precision would tend
to destroy in pupils the sense of the meaning
and beauty of words, and that its employment
would be "at once an effect and a cause of

^ Published in the Revue de Geneve, May and June,
1925.

34 DELPHOS

intellectual decadence " ; and would be so
regarded in future times. In September,
1922, M. de Rio Branco, Brazilian Minister
at Berne, and a member of the League of
Nations Assembly also published a criticism
hostile to Esperanto.

Ido
The Paris Exhibition of 1900 was a
meeting-ground for people of advanced ideas
and international sympathies from all coun-
tries. A French professor of mathematics,
named Lean, rose to the practical possibihties
of the hour, by gathering a group of scientists
to form a " Delegation for the Adoption of
an AuxiUary Language ", which was to
secure the choice of an interlanguage by the
newly created International Association of
Academies. Three hundred and thirty-one
delegates of learned societies and 1,200
individual academicians were enhsted ; but
in 1907 the Association of Academies declared
itself incompetent to deal with the matter.
The Delegation, therefore, resolved to make
itself the adjudicating body, and offered to
recommend Esperanto provided it could be
modified in certain directions. Messrs Cou-
turat and Lean, Treasurer and Secretary of
the Delegation, Professors Jespersen of
Copenhagen, Ostwald of Leipzig, Baudoin
de Courtenay of St Petersburg, the Marquis

A POSTERIORI LANGUAGES 35

de Beaufront, and others were appointed to
act with the Esperantist Linguistic Com-
mittee ; but the Esperantist Committee
refused even to discuss the matter. The
Delegation then adopted a modification of
Esperanto, called Ido,^ the Esperanto word
for descendent. By this title it frankly con-
fessed itself a modified Esperanto. The two
versions are closely aUied. Each has its body
of supporters, but the Esperantists are by
far the larger group. Ido claims centres in
21 countries.

In 1894 Dr Zamenhof had himself proposed
modifications of Esperanto. These he sub-
mitted to the readers of the small magazine
Esperanto ; but, only a few votes being
recorded on either side, he decided to main-
tain the language as first pubhshed. Since
that time the Esperantists have resisted
alterations.

Variants of Esperanto include Ant ido,
Lingvo Kosmopolita, Esperantido, and Nov-
Esperanto by Dr Rene de Saussure of
Switzerland, for many years a member of the
Esperantist Academy, who works in harmony
with that body. Dr Max Talmey, in the
United States, has produced a variant of Ido,
called Ilo, which stands for the initial letters
of International Language, plus 0, the

^ Originally based on a project submitted by the
Marquis de Beaufront.

36 DELPHOS

inevitable Ido-Esperanto termination of the
substantive. Ilo, it appears, was the name
given to I do during the first two years of its
existence.

Idiom Neutral and Others
Whilst Esperanto was on the threshold of
its career, the perfect language was still being
sought by earnest students, who more and
more came to look for it amongst the elements
of the natural European languages. In this
country Mr George J. Henderson pubhshed
through Triibner in 1889, an attempt to
simpUfy Latin called Lingua, and followed
this with Langue Facile, Latinesce, and
Anglo-Franca, a rather grotesque amalgam of
Frerich and English. Amongst those who
preceded him were the Germans, E. Lauda
and J. Stempfl, whose attempts were based
on Latin, and Boltz, who tried to simplify
Greek. In 1890 Dr Rosa, of Turin, published
two projects for simplified Latin.

JuHus Lott, the constructor of the Vienna
railways, an old propagandist of Volapiik,
and Dr Albert Liptay, medical officer to the
naval commission of Chili stationed in France,
both endeavoured to inaugurate a more
scientific research into the international
elements of language. Lott published Mun-
dohngue in 1889, and wrote in it words
which are comprehensible to us all, and

A POSTERIORI LANGUAGES 37

reveal a great progress in intemationality :
" Le possibility de un universal lingua
pro le civilisat nations ne esse dubitabil,
nam noi ha tot elements pro un tal lingue
in nostre Ungues, sciences, etc ".
Liptay (Lengua Catolica, 1891) insisted
that the international language was not to
be invented, but discovered amid existing
language. He declared the creation of a
language beyond the power of an individual ;
and proposed general principles, to be sub-
mitted to the world of savants, in the form
of a plebiscite, open to all interested. The
efforts of Lott and Liptay mark a distinct
advance in the Interlanguage movement.

In 1893 Voldemar Rosenberger, a Russian
engineer, was elected director of the old
Volapiik Academy. He laid before it pro-
posals for a new language, including three
thousand international words. Thereafter a
language called Idiom Neutral, mainly the
creation of Rosenberger, was built up by the
Academy, and officially adopted by it in
1898. The vocabulary was selected on the
principle of greatest intemationality. Many
of the chosen words were international up to
seven languages. Only in 1902, after nearly
ten years' work, during which at least some
thirty new projects had appeared from other
sources, did the Academy authorize the
pubhcation of its language. It was more

38 DELPHOS

scientifically international than anything
that had gone before, and its grammar
contained several logical simpUfications. Yet
it had many faults, which resulted in the
distortion of carefully selected international
words.

Interlingua

" Interlingua is the standard of the insur-
rection against the routine of red tape and
the tyranny of the ancient grammarian '*,
thus wrote Kerchoffs, the first director of
the Volapiik Academy, in 1886. Giuseppe
Peano, the distinguished mathematician of
Turin, was presently to translate those words
into a language scheme, and to adopt Inter-
lingua as its title. Professor Peano is one
of the greatest authorities on the logical basis
of mathematics and on symbolic logic. His
ideographic system has reduced logic to
algebraic formulae, which dispense with
language. By similar methods he has created
a language which is intelligible without study
to all who know Latin, and almost without
study to those who know one European
language, although ignorant of Latin. He
writes :

*' Qui stude Interlingua stude etymologia

et valor e exacto de vocabulos in suo lingua."
The EngHsh of that is :

Who studies Interlingua studies the

V

A POSTERIORI LANGUAGES 39

etymology and exact meaning of the words

in his own language."

Peano's mathematical researches have
necessitated a wide international corres-
pondence. Already in the eight een-nineties
he was corresponding with his fellow mathe-
maticians of other nationahties in InterUngua,
then called " Latino sine flexione ". For the .
study of Chinese mathematics he induced his
friend and one-time pupil, Giovanni Vacca,
Professor of Mathematics in Genoa, to leam
Chinese.

Going later to Germany, to study un-
published manuscripts of Leibniz on the
infinitesimal calculus, Professor Vacca ob-
served certain pages devoted to interlanguage.
He saw that his friend was following on the
same Unes. This news encouraged Peano to
continue his system. Professor Vacca intro-
duced the manuscripts to Professor Louis
Couturat,^ of the Ido delegation, who
investigated them, with the aid of the French
Government, and arranged for their pub-
lication. On January 3rd, 1904, Professor
Peano read a paper^ before the Academia
delle Scienze di Torino, which began in

1 La Logique de Leibniz, Opuscules et fragments
inedits de Leibniz, Paris, Alcan ; with L. Leau,
Histoire de la Langue Universelle, Hachette, Paris.

* Published in the minutes of the Turin Academy
of Sciences.

40 DELPHOS

classical Latin and ended in Interlingua. He
there showed, according to the reasoning of
Leibniz supported by arguments of his own,
that declension, formal gender, and con-
jugation can be dispensed with. As he
discussed each simplification, he embodied it
in his text, which thus gradually passed into
InterHngua.

Originating in the desire of scientists to
overcome lingual barriers for practical
scientific purposes, InterHngua, from its
inception, became a vehicle of original
thought amongst people too much occupied
with constructive work to engage in pro-
paganda. The fifth edition of Peano's
important Formulario Mathematico, 1908,
was published in Interlingua. The inter-
national review of mathematics edited by
him has appeared in it since 1903. Fanti, a
member of the Academia, in 1925 used it for
a work on the principles of radio-telegraphy
and telephony. Such scientific publications
as the Acta Astronomica of the Cracow
Observatory, the Bollettino de Mathematica
of Florence, and the Russian Ruch Filozo-
ficzny already make constant or occasional use
of InterHngua ; Graphicus, the principal
organ of the Itahan printing trade, has a
regular technical article in Interlingua.

Interlingua marked a new stage in the
interlanguage movement, because it was the

A POSTERIORI LANGUAGES 41

first artificial language to be constructed, not
according to individual choice but upon
definite scientific principles.

In 1908 the old Volapiik Academy dis-
carded its later adoption, Rosenberger's
Idiom Neutral, and took InterUngua as its
official medium, at the same time appointing
Professor Peano its director. The Academy
is now the " Academia pro InterUngua ". It
continues studying the interlanguage pro-
blem, in the spirit of impartial inquiry. All
who are interested in the interlanguage
problem may join it and contribute to the
organ of the Academy in whatever artificial
language they may prefer.

Other Activities
Several more recent languages have arisen,
which share many of the neo-Latin char-
acteristics of InterUngua ; but stand midway
between it and Esperanto. These include
Romanal, Occidental, and Medial Europan,
Pan Roman, later called Universal, which
appeared in 1903, may be placed in a similar
class.

In 1911 a society for the creation of an
International Language Bureau was formed
at Berne. In 1920 a committee of Esperan-
tists, Idists, and others laid before the League
of Nations a petition, officially transmitted

42 DELPHOS

by the Swedish Government, urging that a
language, to be taught in all schools through-
out the world, should be adopted at an
international convention.

In 1 918 the British Government appointed
a Parliamentary Committee on modem
language, in view of post- War trading
and diplomatic conditions. This Committee
devoted a chapter to artificial language, and
recommended that a Commission should be
set up to study the question.

In 1919 the International Research Council
created a Committee to investigate the
problem. The Chairmanship was given to
Dr F. G. CottreU, of the American Research
Council, and its headquarters were established
in Washington, D.C. Co-operating com-
mittees were formed in several countries, one
of them being set up by the British Associa-
tion in 1919, with Mr W. B. Hardy, Secretary
of the Royal Society, and Dr E. A. Tripp, as
Chairman and Secretary. This committee
reported that neither Latin nor any existing
national language could supply the need for
an international auxiliary, which could be
met, it considered, either by Esperanto or by
Ido. Without examining the more modern
interlanguage projects, the committee finally
agreed to recommend Esperanto. The
decision was made before the appearance of
de Reynold's hostile report to the League of

A POSTERIORI LANGUAGES 43

Nations Commission for Intellectual Co-
operation.

In the United States an International
Auxiliary Language Association is at work.
Its Treasurer is Mr Dave H. Morris and its
Secretary Dr Shenton, of Columbia Univer-
sity. This organization aims at promoting
impartial study and experiment. It works
for the adoption of an auxiliary language by
the Governments of the world, and desires
the setting up of an International committee
of linguistic experts to advise them.

THE FUTURE INTERLANGUAGE :

SOME CONDITIONS IT MUST

SATISFY

LIKE the Committee of the British
Association, Hke Max Miiller, we are of
opinion that no national language, whether
living or dead, can serve as the world
auxiliary.

EngUsh is the most modern of the great
languages, the most widely spoken, and the
most international ; for it contains more
foreign words than any other. Yet, because
of its frequent lack of agreement between
speUing and pronunciation, its great variety
of vowel sounds, the idiomatic character it
shares with all natural tongues, and, above
all, its lack of political neutrality, English
would not be acceptable to all nations. On
the other hand, its logical and analytical
structure, its swiftness and transparent
accuracy of expression, and especially the
fact that it has shed most of the old gram-
matical forms which time has rendered useless
and scarcely intelhgible, have made EngUsh
a model, pointing the way which must be
followed in building the Interlanguage ; the

THE FUTURE INTERLANGUAGE 45

first language to be constructed deliberately
from its foundations by the trained intellects
of scholars, working on definite principles of
philological science. Such principles have
been gradually worked out by patient study,
since philology was placed upon firm founda-
tions by the inauguration of the study of
Sanskrit, which began with the founding of
the Royal Asiatic Society in 1784.^

As to French. It has had, and lost, a far
greater intemationaUty than it now possesses.
Though easier on first acquaintance than
many others, it is perhaps of all languages
the one of which the intonation and idiomatic
charm of phrase are least to be captured by
the foreigner. Even in Chaucer's time,
though a sort of French was widely spoken in
this country, it was by no means the French
of France, as he indicates in the prologue to
his Canterbury Tales :

" And French she spake ful fayre and
fetisely
After the scole of Stratford atte bowe.
For Frenche of Parys was to hire
unknowe."

That French has been chosen as the ofiicial

1 In 1786 Sir William Jones discovered that there
was a relationship between Sanskrit, German, and
Latin. In 1833 Francis Bopp, of Berlin, wrote the
first Comparative Grammar of Sanskrit, Zend,
^reek, Latin, Gothic, German, and Icelandic.

46 DELPHOS

language of the International Association of
Academies, and some other international
bodies, is evidence rather of the need for an
interlanguage than proof that French is the
most suitable medium. Such bodies, more-
over, consist of persons of more than average
education. "WTiilst the League of Nations
has made English and French its official
languages, the Spanish-speaking Govern-
ments clamour for equal treatment, and the
Italians threaten to make the same claim.

It is obviously Utopian to hope that, under
present conditions, the majority of mankind
will acquire two national foreign languages.
Such acquisition entails not merely the
memorizing of a certain number of words and
rules but the formation of new thought- and
speech-habits. The difficulty of learning a
national language, as compared with one of
the artificial schemes, in this case Esperanto,
is illustrated by the statement of a Chinese
delegate to the Educationists' Conference in
Geneva :

" In China we learn the English language
during at least six years ; French seven
years ; German eight years ; Russian ten
years ; but for Esperanto only two years
are required."

Latin, by reason of its political neutrality
as a dead language and its great cultural
gifts, has more to recommend it as the

THE FUTURE INTERLANGUAGE 47

common auxiliary than any other natural
language. Yet Classical Latin also has
difficulties of idiom and of irregularity, and
its inflected character is ahen to the ten-
dencies of modern thought.

The Inter] anguage must be expressly
created for international usage. Without
denying the possibiHty of a new language of
symbols in a more distant future, we may
postulate that it must satisfy the following
conditions :

It must he a posteriori. The traditional
forms have been gradually moulded by ages
of use. Deep echoes of meaning are folded
within them. They have become shaped to
facility of enunciation by long employment.
The incompleteness of all knowledge, and
even of research into philological origins, may
render it impracticable to realize the philo-
sopher's dream of a vocabulary that would
provide an enalysis of aU learning. Never-
theless, we can possess a world-auxiUary
which will largely serve as a master-key to
the most universally employed of the great
speech-famiUes, and wiU assist in a readier
and deeper understanding of the national
tongues. In order that the interlanguage
may thus serve us, its vocabulary must be
constructed on sound etymological principles.

Philologists must not stand aloof, reviewing
the existing interlanguage projects as cast-

48 DELPHOS

iron creations for which they have no sort of
responsibihty. They must regard the making
of the world-auxiUary as an essential part of
their work ; and must bring to this task the
same impartial inquiry, patient research, and
critical analysis that they have brought to
the study of philology itself.

The Inter language must provide the greatest
possible intelligibility : therefore it must reach
the widest possible internationality .

It will employ the Roman alphabet, the only
alphabet of printed characters which can
claim internationality ; for Chinese is a
pictured language, and the characters of
Arabic and Hindustani are essentially those
of handwriting ; both occupy too much space
on the printed or the written page.

The Vocabulary of the interlanguage ivill
consist mainly of words common to the Indo-
European speech-family, which comprise an
extensive dictionary. Words denoting what
is peculiar to their country of origin, like
Geysha, and newly-coined words of wide
acceptance, like " Robot ", will be retained
in their original form.

The vocabulary of modern Europe will be
chosen as the basis of the interlanguage ;
because that vocabulary has been created in
the development of modern science and
modern thought.

East will gain more than West by this

THE FUTURE INTERLANGUAGE 49

inevitable decision. An immensely larger
number of Eastern people learn the languages
of Europe than vice versa. An auxiliary
language will be of far greater use to the
Chinese if it introduce them to the vehicle
of Western science, than if allied to their own
tongue. Ultimately the value of the Inter-
language must be measured by its gifts, not
by the ease with which it can be acquired.

The world-auxiUary, used by everyone as
a second language, will obviate the general
need for any other language save the native
one. If it were in use to-day, it would be
employed by the League of Nations and by
the mandated territories. It would enable
small nations to meet the Great Powers on
equal linguistic terms.

Inter-European words will he used in their
Latin form, with the classical spelling and
pronunciation. Obviously so ; for the inter-
language which is already a giant growth in
our midst is the new Graeco-Latin, the
vocabulary of which is constantly accumu-
lating in the use of the young sciences — the
strongest unifying influence in the civiHzed
world.

Latin has largely contributed to the making
of all the other European languages. EngHsh
has been impregnated by Latin of the Roman
period ; of the Saxon period, which was
mainly ecclesiastical ; and of a third period,

50 DELPHOS

reaching from the time of the Battle of
Hastings to the present day. Webster's
English Dictionary gives 55,000 words of
Graeco-Latin origin and 22,000 from Teutonic
and other sources. Even in Russian, Mr
Kofman has found, under the letter A alone,
228 Graeco-Latin words. Actually only about
10 per cent of inter-European words are of
non-Latin origin. Any artificial language
which aims at internationality must contain
a majority of words derived from it.

To give to everybody's children, all over
the world, a language so much Uke Latin
that whoever knows it can read Latin with
little study would tremendously accelerate
the spread of learning and the breaking down
of social barriers. Latin, by international
agreement, is the universal medium for the
technical terms in medicine, anatomy, botany,
and zoology. It is essential to the lawyer,
and largely so to the historian.

The Interlanguage is unlikely to incorporate
Latin words which have passed out of current
usage. It will select those which, either as
root-words or derivatives, have survived in
modern speech or have been coined in modem
times.

The Interlanguage cannot successfully form
its vocabulary from different speech-families,
nor can it attempt an amalgam of the forms
existing in various branches of the European

THE FUTURE INTERLANGUAGE 51

speech-family. Either of these methods
leaves the student, whether a polyglot or a
monoglot, without a clue to the source from
which the word has been drawn. In a
language combining both Teutonic and Latin
word-forms, one is at a loss to know whether
the word alt signifies high, as in Latin and in
the English alt-itude ; or old, as in German.
In the formation of the sentence, subtly
interwoven as -it is with the processes of
thought, with euphony and phonetic evolu-
tion and decay, a wider intemationaUty
exists^ ; but, in the word itself, to strain
after a complete intemationaUty is to
achieve none.

The orthography of the Interlanguage must
be etymological. It cannot follow the false trail
of simplified spelling, which Bacon said
** belongs to the class of unprofitable sub-
tilities ", and which leads to deformation of
the word and the consequent obscuring of
meaning and origin. SpeUing Reform, in
reducing a minor obstacle, enhances the
difficulty of understanding the meaning of
the word, which is of more essential import-
ance. It must be remembered that Classical
Latin is pronounced as it is spelt, according
to the modem view that C should be pro-

^ Yoruba, one of the African languages, conju-
gates its verbs as in English, though its vocabulary
is entirely different.

52 DELPHOS

nounced like the English K and i like the
English e. Th, ph, and y, which duplicate
the sounds of t, f, and i, were imported from
the Greek, and retained to denote their
origin. Such words have found their way
into modern languages and their spelling
helps to indicate their meaning.

By adopting the Latin orthography, the
interlanguage will avoid the need for employ-
ing accents, diacritical marks, sibilants,
aspirates, or other localized or difi&cult
sounds.

In accord with modern tendencies, the
Interlanguage will he logical and analytical,
and will contain no more grammar than is
required to elucidate the meaning. Every word
will be found in the dictionary. Thirty years
hence the Interlanguage will be familiar as
the mother-tongue. Therefore simplification
will be motived, rather to secure logic,
swiftness, and emphasis than to ease the
memory of burdens.

Like other aspects of its civilization, the
language of a people passes through many
stages. Chinese, with its origins in the far
reaches of antiquity, is the most analytical
of languages. It has travelled still further
than EngUsh in minimizing grammar and
discarding inflections.

Sanskrit, the most primitive descendant of
the Ancient European has eight cases.

THE FUTURE INTERLANGUAGE 53

Russian and Lithuanian seven, Latin six,
Greek five, German four. Old-English had
six cases — now only the traces of three
remain to us. Modern Persian has no article,
no gender, no concordance, and replaces
inflexion by 25 auxiliary verbs. Its nouns
indicate the plural only where it is not other-
wise shown. In modem Arabic are similar
developments. Simplification is intensified
in the compromise frontier languages. In
the Lingua Franca of the Levant the verbs
have only one form, originally the infinitive.
Chinook, the North American trade-language,
has a small vocabulary ; but, according to
Dr Sapir,^ it is built on strictly analytical
lines.

In King Alfred's time Enghsh adjectives
had eleven forms ; now we have but one.
Our verbs also have had a drastic pruning.
Compare our few simple forms with the 1,400
of the ancient Greek verb, the 395 of the
Latin, and the 62 of the modern Spanish. In
English we produce 40 verb-forms by auxi-
liaries, only three by inflections. Indeed, the
whole tendency of modern language is to
discard mere grammatical forms, and to
replace inflections, where necessary, by
quahfying words. The language gains thereby
in clarity and strength.

^ Chief of the Anthropological Division of the
Canadian National Museum.

54 DELPHOS

Inflections (the conjugation of verbs, the
declension and concordance of nouns, pro-
nouns, and adjectives) are the result of the
melting together, or agglutination, of small
qualifying words the meaning of which is
becoming obscure, and which are but partially
if at all, required to convey the sense. They
are retained largely as a matter of tradition,
and their meaning tends to be duplicated by
the additional use of separate qualifying
words. Inflections produce endless irregu-
larities. When an arbitrary Ust of affixes is
attached to a large number of stems, some,
either of the stems or the affixes, become
modified : for example the French vivre,
[Je\ vi(v)s.

The Interlanguage will go even further than
EngUsh in discarding inflections. In the
verb comprehensibility can undoubtedly be
reached by one unvarying form, qualified by
other parts of speech. The modes and tenses
are often formed in this way and can thus be
more vividly and exactly indicated than by
inflections : I shall see you shortly and /
shall see you when I can have the same
verbal voice. Yesterday I sing could, with
usage, come to indicate the past as clearly
to us as yesterday I sang. The question
to be considered is whether the former sen-
tence would be equally satisfying to the mind,
and whether we should gain more in simpUcity

THE FUTURE INTERLANGUAGE 55

by abolishing the indication of the past tense
in the verb than we should lose in emphasis.

Obviously the analytical EngUsh infinitive
is more expressive than the inflectional form
of most European languages ; for other
languages frequently use a preposition before
the infinitive as well as the inflection. Thus
the French say : " De nen avoir qu'un k
apprendre". The prepositions de and a are
pleonastic.

The concordance of the verb with its subject,
in number and in case, has almost disappeared
in English : only the remnants remain, and,
being remnants, they have lost their logic.
We love is sufiicient to indicate that the
action love is predicated of we. The French
nous aimons is redundant. In Italian the
pronoun is often dropped.

In EngUsh we have not the passive form
of the verb, as it existed in Latin. Though
the verb taught, for example, has a passive
meaning, it is merely the past tense of the
active verb to teach. Some of the artificial
languages have been unnecessarily cumbered
by the obsolete passive form.

The agreement of adjectives with the nouns
they quaUfy and the declension of nouns, which
have departed from EngUsh, will find no
place in the Interlanguage.

For the sign of plurality we cannot look to
the Latin example ; for, being an inflected

56 DELPHOS

language, Latin (like Greek) has no uniform
sign. The final s has by far the greatest
internationality, and has the advantage of
being pronounceable after all vowels and
most consonants.

Articles will probably be discarded by the
Interlanguage. Their use is sometimes purely
euphonic ; sometimes they indicate number,
gender, and case. As these are generally also
shown by the noun, their indication by the
article is redundant. How conventional is
their use is well displayed by the fact that it
differs even in the closely alHed Romance lan-
guages ; the Italians saying : la Casa mia ;
the Spaniards mi casa. In Roumanian the
article follows the noun and is decHned.
Arabic has but one article, Chinese and
Persian none. In EngHsh we are more and
more discarding the article, and the Americans
have gone further than we in this direction.

The Interlanguage will not attach gender to
inanimate objects^ — only to those possessing
it in the actual world of nature, and only
where the sense requires it. When the
number of substantives indicating sex has
been reduced to the proportions dictated by

1 In Old-English every noun belonged to one of
three gender classes. The old equivalents of day,
end, and ehh were classed as mascuhne and referred
to as he ; those of pipe, glove, and sorrow were
feminine, and she was applied to them.

THE FUTURE INTERLANGUAGE 57

reason, the learning of the appropriate terms
for male and female will impose no great
burden on the memory. Moreover, it is
always possible to use a special adjective for
the purpose, as we frequently do in EngHsh :
he-goat and she-goat. Such words as actor and
actress, executor and executrix are common, in
but sUghtly modified form, to many languages.
They are more easily discernible by the ear
than the atonic vowel-endings adopted by
many of the artificial languages to denote
gender.

In syntax, the Interlanguage will follow the
order broadly common to the European
speech-family ; subject, verb, object, with
the qualifying words placed as near as possible
to the word they quaUfy.

This estimate of the probable structure of
the future-world Interlanguage has been
governed by observation of the evolution
apparent in natural language. It may be
summed up in the words uttered by a clever
Senegalese :

" What we want is a Latin vocabulary

and Chinese grammar."

" Chinese Grammar " may be taken to
signify the simplest grammar known, or the
virtual absence of formal grammar.

VI

ANALYSIS OF THE PRINCIPAL INTER-
LANGUAGE ATTEMPTS

VOLAPUK

HOW far do the principal modern attempts
at interlanguage conform to the evolu-
tionary trend of natural language, and to the
features here predicted for the coming world
auxiUary ?

Schleyer's Volapiik, was largely a priori.
Its author desired to make it more capable of
expressing every nuance of thought than any
other language. To this end, he copied many
complexities of the natural languages, and
added many more devised by his own fancy.
He created no fewer than fourteen personal
pronouns. These he post-fixed to the stem
of the verb, even where its subject was
already indicated : e.g. Mary lofoF = Mary
(she) loves.

Vowels were prefixed to the stem to express
all tenses other than the present : e.g. a for
the imperfect, dlofob = I loved. Mode was
expressed by sufiixes following the pronoun :
la for the subjunctive, dlofobLA = I might
have loved, on for the infinitive, and so on.
There were three forms of imperative mode

INTERLANGUAGE ATTEMPTS 59

each with its distinctive ending. Each mode
had as many tenses as the indicative. The
letter i, pronounced as a separate syllable and
placed immediately before the stem, signified
the habitual performance of an action, e.g.
ailofohod = / have to love constantly. The
initial p indicated the passive voice. A single
curious word could express many things, e.g.
peglidolod = you must be greeted. A Volapiik
verb could take 505,440 different forms. Its
author himself sometimes lost his way in its
mazes and felt the need for itaUcizing the
stem. Compound words, formed by juxta-
position, grew to enormous length, and
became the subject of ridicule.

The feminine was indicated by ji or of,
prefixed to the noun, the neuter by os.
Nouns were decHned. Adjectives ended in
ik, and adverbs in 0. R was usually excluded
from the alphabet, on the charge that it was
difficult to pronounce ; yet the EngHsh h
was admitted, also the Spanish, written
thus ' ; and the modified vowels a, 6, u.
Root-words were made as monosyllabic as
possible, as well they might be, considering
the number of affixes ! Conjugable words
might never end in c, i, s, x, or z.

Schleyer declared that he had based his
vocabulary mainly upon EngHsh, but he
made the stems unrecognizable. Rose,
stripped of its r and its s, was given an I at

6o DELPHOS

both ends, and became lol. Brother was
changed to blod ; sister to ji-hlod.

Root-words were capriciously chosen, with
so Uttle regard to the essential part of the
word that sincerity became rit, from which
was derived ritik = true. Origin became rig,
and original was rigud. Confusion was
invited by using the mere modification of a
single letter to denote large numbers of
different words. Thus to-day — adelo, yester-
day — adelo.

The popularity of Volapiik may be ascribed
to three causes. Its author was a capable
propagandist ; it caught the fervour of the
humanitarian and Socialist revival that
followed the Franco-German war. Its very
oddity was attractive to many seekers after
the universal language. To find it scholarly,
harmonious, and incorporating famiHar words
might have disappointed the quest for some-
thing unknown. It appealed to the taste that
revelled in Gtdliver's Travels without per-
ceiving its satire, and received with avidity
the spurious stories of Baron Munchausen.

Example :

0 Fat obas kel binol in siils paisaludomoz

nem ola ! Komomod monargdn ola ! — from

the Lord's Prayer in Volapiik.

Esperanto
Esperanto has the letters of the Roman

INTERLANGUAGE ATTEMPTS 6i

alphabet, with the exception of q, x, and v.
It has in addition one vowel with the breve

mark u, and five accented consonants, c, g,

h, J, s, not found in any natural language.
As these have to be specially cast, the
language cannot be set up from the ordinary
fount of printer's type.

The introduction of new letters and new
spelUngs transform the international words
adopted by Esperanto ; yet the pronuncia-
tion is not easy. There are many difficult
sounds, including kv, kn, sts.

Like that of Volapiik, the essential prin-
ciple of the Esperanto vocabulary is the
building of words by a priori affixes, attached
to a Hmited number of usually monosyllabic
stems. Volapiik had three hundred such
affixes. Esperanto has sixty-six. Aliformigilo
= transformator (in electricity), and tagnok-
tegaleco — equinox are grotesque examples
of Esperanto's so-called " autonomous word
building ".

Father Schleyer chose English as the main
source for his stems. Dr Zamenhof aimed at
a wider internationality ; but he did not
submit the words to the test of tracing them
through the various European languages to
discover which were in widest usage ; nor
does he appear to have followed any other
consistent method of selection.

62 DELPHOS

All Esperanto nouns end in o, adjectives
in a, adverbs in e, the personal pronouns and
the infinitive of the verb in i, impersonal
pronouns in u, prepositions in au. The
words are, in fact, classified, not, as in the
old philosophical languages, according to
their meaning but according to their tem-
porary grammatical role. Such grammatical
classification did not originate with Esperanto.
It occurred in many older systems. The
arbitrary endings perform the secondary
purpose of assisting the student to detect the
grammatical function of the word ; but they
obscure its etymology. He knows that the
word is a noun in that particular sentence ;
but its meaning he fails to recognize, for its
appearance has been changed. Boa, for
example, has become boao, and ros^ rozo.
People who lack a swift perception of
grammar will stumble and hesitate in speak-
ing, because, though aware of the meaning
of the word, its grammatical role in the
particular sentence is not clear to them.

Far less can be gained by emphasizing the
category in which a word is placed by
grammatical convention than is lost by the
resultant monotony of the word-endings.

The Esperanto plural is formed, not with
s, which has the widest internationaUty, but
with j pronounced as y in boy or in pay.
Critics are warned " to stop short of bias-

INTERLANGUAGE ATTEMPTS 63

phemy *' in recalling that some Greek plurals
occur in y. Greek being an inflected language,
had, however, many plurals. The sounds
of oy and eye did not recur with any approach
to the Esperanto frequency. Moreover, they
were in harmony with the vocalic structure
of ancient Greek and have disappeared from
the modem Greek pronunciation. Esperanto
stems, chosen now from one language, now
from another, have been subjected to no
harmonizing influence. Atonic vowel-endings,
recalling the Latin languages, are grafted on
to Teutonic and Slavonic roots, themselves
rendered wholly strange to the eye by
Esperanto spelling, and produce such curious
words as : Birdoy = birds, pronounced bear-
doy : rajdi = to ride ; havi = to have ;
rajfo = right ; limo = limit.

The Esperanto practice of placing the tonic
accent invariably on the penultimate syllable
also tends to disguise international words,

such as angelo = angel, and to increase the
monotony produced by its grammatical
endings. Esperantists protest that if Es-
peranto is monotonous, so also is French,
because its accent always falls on the last
syllable. In French, however, variety is
obtained by the admixture of vowel and
consonantal endings, and the mute e. In
Esperanto monotony is added to monotony.
When attempting verse, its votaries are

64 DELPHOS

obliged to lop off the endings. Thus they
re-distribute the tonic accents, and re-
establish variety.

The Esperanto feminine is formed by
interpolating in before the final o of the
substantive. Thus the old word mother,
traceable in every branch of the Indo-
European language family, becomes that
cold stranger, patrino.

Esperanto wisely avoids artificial gender.
It retains one case ending, the accusative.
This is claimed as a special virtue, because,
by its means, a sentence can be turned topsy-
turvy. An ardent Esperantist has done his
best to convince us that it is highly con-
venient to be able to say " Abebw killed
Caino ", without thereby controverting the
Bible story. The retention of the accusative
is, however, an illogical survival.

Another such feature is the agreement of
the adjectives with the nouns in number and
case. To compensate for this, there is a
drastic reduction of the adjectives, by the
unhappy expedient of prefixing the particle
mal to a quality, to form its opposite. The
result is unpleasant and inexact. Bona in
Esperanto is good ; malbona = bad. Not
good is by no means the equivalent of bad,
nor is not young the appropriate term for old.
Such clumsy and contradictory modes of
expression are alien to the spirit of Uterature.

INTERLANGUAGE ATTEMPTS 65

Suppose Herrick had written : " Not-young
Time is still a flying " ; or Blake : " Not big
lamb, who made thee ? " ! The particle mal,
in its wide international usage, denotes the
positive quaUty ill, not a mere negation.
Malfermi, which in Esperanto is to open,
conveys to every European the idea :
imperfectly closed.

The Esperanto verb admits of no irregu-
larities, and it has aboHshed the indication of
number ; but it indicates tense and mode by
inflections, instead of by the modem
analytical method. There is but one
auxiliary — the verb to he. This is a lack ;
for the two principal auxiUaries of being and
attribution certainly contribute different
shades of meaning, and the trend of modern
language is to make a greater use of auxilia-
ries. In seeking simpHfication, we should
be careful not to reduce the capacity of the
language for exact expression.

Dr Zamenhof invented for Esperanto a
table of forty-five much debated correlative
words, many of which are difficult to pro-
nounce ; i.e. Nen-i-es, ki-es, and Ti-u.

Esperanto is much more speedily learnt
than any natural language ; indeed there is
much less in it to learn. It is a great advance
upon Volapiik ; yet, in spite of its many
translations from the classics, it cannot
become an efficient medium for literature, or

66 DELPHOS

a genuine link in the European speech-family,
unless it is subjected to drastic and funda-
mental changes.

• Example :

Mi naskigis en Bjelostoko. Tiu ci loko de

mia naskigo kaj de miaj infanaj jaroj donis

la direkton al ciuj miaj estontaj celadoj —

from a letter of Dr Zamenhof.

Ido
Ido has adopted the main structure of
Esperanto. It has abohshed the special
accented letters ; but its own spelling,
together with the grammatical finals o, a, e,
i, which it has taken over from its parent,
frequently disguise international words.
Words which begin with ther, tur and ter, are
all spelt with ter. Thus the Ido word termo,
which might be taken for term, turns out to
mean thermal spring. Root-words are taken
from heterogeneous sources. A striking
example of Ido reasoning is given m relation
to the word home. Idists reject the Latin
words, domicilium, domus, and casa as giving
no true equivalent ; also the English home,
because, as it is a noun, the system would
require that a final o should be added to it,
and homo has akeady been appropriated as
the word for man. The German Heim is
excluded, because of its diphthongized pro-

INTERLANGUAGE ATTEMPTS 67

nunciation. Therefore Ido takes the Dutch
hem and makes it hemo, which, so far from
being the 6^a.v famihar term, from which
Enghsh Idists could not part, is unrecog-
nizable by any people. Another such word
is summer, which Ido makes somero. But
if home and summer can stand the test of
indispensability with cafe and maccaroni, let
them be adopted simply as home and summer.
Their origin will then be plain. Having no
guide to their source, one could not guess the
meaning of the following Ido words without
reference to the dictionary : skalo, from the
Latin scalae ; tualetar from the French
toilette ; tayo = waist from the French taille ;
shirmar = to shelter, from the German schir-
men ; torto (given the Ido noun-ending) one
would expect to signify tort, which in the
sense of wrong or injury has a wide inter-
nationality, and has produced in EngUsh the
well-known words tortuous and torture. In
Ido, however, torto stands for tart, because
German has torte for tart, though German has
also tort for wrong. Tro-uzar, which is Ido
for to use to excess, approximates closely to
nursery jargon. The international word
maritime becomes marala, in conformity with
the prescribed affixes.

Ido prides itself on its system of derivation,
which embodies what Dr Couturat described
as *' the principle of reversibility ".

68 DELPHOS

This must be explained. Esperanto nouns,
verbs, adjectives, and adverbs are formed
direct 1}^ from the stem, by adding the allotted
vowel-termination. Given the stem, it is
quite easy in Esperanto to say what the verb
or other part of speech shlU be. Ido, on the
contrary, has a dual method, which differs
according to whether the stem indicates :
(i) a state of being or an action ; (2) the
name of a person or thing. No verb can be
directly derived from an adjective, or from
a noun, unless the noun expresses an act or
condition ; no substantive from a verb, unless
the substantive expresses the state or action
denoted by the verb. In other cases an
intermediate affix is required, and this affix
must be chosen to fit the particular case.
Such compact English expressions as : To
crown and to ship Idists regard as " in-
admissible " in a " logically constructed
language to be used by diverse linguistic
groups ".^ Thus in Ido krono = crown, but
to crown is kronizar ; Paco = peace ; pacar =
to he at (or in) peace ; pacigar = to pacify or
appease ; paceskar = to make peace ; pacifar
= to make for peace ; pacala = relating to
peace ; pacema = pacific ; who likes peace ;
pacoza = peaceful or which is at peace ;
pacifanta, paciganta = pacifying ; pacigo —
pacification, or peace-making, appeasement.

^ Dyer's Ido Dictionary, 1924.

INTERLANGUAGE ATTEMPTS 69

All this is wandering towards the synthetic
mazes of Volapiik.

In its conjugation Ido is more synthetic
than Esperanto. We do not think the modern
mind, particularly that which employs
EngUsh speech, and the same may be said
with even greater reason of the Chinese, will
enchain its expression in such grammatical
exercises as on next page.^

In the third person plural of the pronouns
Ido has four forms — general, masculine,
feminine, and neuter ; redundances which
modern language finds unnecessary.

Ido has expunged some Esperanto crudi-
ties. It has also created some new ones. A
critical examination of its dictionary must
result in expelling a large proportion of its
words, if internationality is to be the test.

Example :

Nun la mondlingual movado avancas per

ke la unesna grupani, la reala idealisti,

esforcas ohjektale informar la lasta grupani.

— K. KozAVi in Ido.

* Dyer's Ido Dictionary, 1924.

70 DELPHOS

bo tuo

b 0) > > <i^ <i;

'^ ^ ^ rjO rTi

•"^ ""j I— I i-H rij "^

Vi Ui

o^

rQ

C«

•Vh

W

u

o

r«

l/i

o5

<D

1

^

<1^ S

a

^^

^

o-c

^

"•^ ►i

-M f^

>

3 "u

oJ

-Sf

^

s

rt CO c5 b 9

rt^ o ^

•J^ o ^ o

r^ CO O) Cf)

to <D <U <U

1

J-l CO

^ CO

•n: CO

-7^ ?

^ 9

^.-a

.r^

o ^

o *h

CO ^

CO CO

0) W

<U (V

^ ^ s 1 ^

INTERLANGUAGE ATTEMPTS 71

Interlingua

In its vocabulary Interlingua is the most
a posteriori of the a posteriori languages. It
goes furthest in eliminating grammar. It is
composed of International words, the Latin
form of such words being employed wherever
it exists. Otherwise either the most inter-
national form, or that of the language in
which the word originated is chosen. Only
those Latin words are used which have a
wide international] ty in the Uving languages
of to-day. All Anglo-Latin words and all
Greek stems which have produced inter-
national words are included. For these last
Interlingua does not simply employ the
Latin orthography, but writes the words
according to accepted philological methods
of transcribing Greek words in the Roman
alphabet. The classical Latin pronunciation
is recommended.

In the main, Interlingua can be read at
first sight by people of fair education who do
not know Latin. The meaning of most of its
words can be discovered from a good English
dictionary. Some of the small correlative
words, all of which are taken direct from the
Latin, will have to be learnt. Most of them,
however, are familiar to us as affixes, retain-
ing their original meaning even if not used as
separate words. These include ai = to^
which we know in adhere ; ante = hefore^

72 DELPHOS

which we have in antecedent ; contra —
against, occurring in contradict. Many others
are common also in Latin phrases which
appear frequently in English books, such as :
ut infra = as below ; ut supra = as above ;
idem = the same. Students who learn these
correlative words will not waste their time
even should they never make use of Inter-
lingua, because they need them for EngHsh
itself.

Peano's Vocabulario Commune (1915) con-
tains 14,000 Anglo-Latin words, 999 out of
every 1,000 of which are common also to
ItaUan and French, whilst the majority are
found also in Spanish and German, and many
in Russian. This work is valuable to all
students of comparative philology. Each
word is given in the Latin form chosen for
Interhngua, and in the forms it assumes in
the other languages. Thus the word is
clearly displayed for immediate comparison.
The chosen form is accompanied by the
endings given to it in the Latin dictionaries'
used in schools, that of the nominative of the
noun and the first person singular of the verb.
Post-classical Latin words are accompanied
by figures indicating the century to which
they belong. The meaning, derivation, and
derivatives of each word are also given. For
example, it is shown that the Interlingua
word machina, which, as in all cases, is the

INTERLANGUAGE ATTEMPTS 73

Latin stem according to Peano's method of
selection, is macchina in Italian, machine in
French and EngUsh, Maschine in German,
mdquina in Spanish, and machina in Portu-
guese. It is also shown that this word comes
from the ancient European magh, from which
are derived the EngUsh way. and the German
mogen and Macht. Derivatives are similarly
treated. The Interlingua Latin verb admira
= to admire is shown to produce admirahile,
which is the same in Italian, is admirable in
English and in French, and is admirahel in
German. It also produces in Latin and in
Interlingua admiratione = admiration, and
'admiratore = admirer.

A glance through the words thus displayed
convinces us that anyone possessing a good
knowledge either of English, French, or
German has the elements of Inter-European
communication. Even where a common
substantive or verb may be lacking, the
common stem will be found by turning to
one of the other parts of speech. Thus,
though in English we say wall, for what in
Latin and Italian is muro, in French mur, in
German Maur, we English use the same stem
in the adjective mural and in the verb
to immure.

Uninflected Latin words are regarded as
stems and retained intact. In the case of
inflected words, Peano takes as the stem,

74 DELPHOS

that is to say the essential part of the word,
the imperative of the verb, or the infinitive
without the suffix re, and the ablative case
of the noun. In this choice he differs from
the authors of most other artificial languages,
who divest the stem of all vocalic ending.
Thus, whilst Peano regards rosa, pede, sensu,
and libro as the stem of the words in question,
many others take ros, ped, sens, and libr,
which have a mutilated appearance, and are
often difficult to pronounce. Having thus
clipped the words, Volapiik, Esperanto, Ido,
Neutral, Romanal, and others add artificial
terminations to indicate the grammatical
parts of speech. Interlingua, on the contrary,
adds nothing to the stem (with the sole
exception of s to form the plural of nouns)
except such endings as actually occur in the
Latin form of the existing international word.
In other words Interlingua deletes existing
grammatical terminations which are held to
be unnecessary : it does not coin new ones :
nor does it take existing affixes and attach
them to any words to which they have not
hitherto been attached in Latin.

Peano' s Dictionary gives a list of suffixes,
but these are actual Latin suffixes, already
attached to international words. It is not
intended to change them about in an
arbitrary manner, but to retain them as they
have developed in usage.

INTERLANGUAGE ATTEMPTS 75

Those who have become accustomed to the
methods of the other artificial languages
often find this distinction difficult to grasp.
Thus, in his Short History of the International
Language Movement, Professor A. L. Gu6rard
criticizes Professor Peano's selection of the
stem, and urges that the supine is richer in
derivatives than the stem as defined in
Interhngua. He says :

" We have scribe, to describe, etc. ; but
we have script, scripture ; we have legible,
legend ; but we have lecture, lectern ; we
have agent, agenda ; but also act, action,
active ; in French, we find corriger by the
side of correct, correction, correcteur. It is
pretty safe to say that of the two forms the
supine is richer in modem derivatives."
Turning to Peano's Dictionary of Inter-
lingua, we find therein all the forms of the
supine indicated by Professor Guerard. The
Dictionary shows that Interhngua does not
merely use scribe = write, and describe =
describe, as Professor Guerard says ; but also
scripto = script and scriptura = scripture, as
well as all the other forms he has mentioned
as international. How is this ? The explana-
tion is that Interhngua regards each word
from the standpoint of its meaning and its
internationahty. The Latin past participle
ending in to (as in amato, scripto, and the
other forms mentioned) is used — but only

76 DELPHOS

where it occurs in international words.

The Academia in 1890 (during its Idiom
Neutral period) decided to regularize the
Latin passive participle, which is not uniform
in all verbs and sometimes modifies the stem.
In securing uniformity, the Academia created
a number of artificial words. This method,
the old method of Volapiik, was discarded
with the coming of Interlingua. In accord
with Peano's dictum that the minimum of
grammar is no grammar, inflections, as such,
are ruthlessly abolished. Person and number
are not indicated by the verb, as these are
shown by the noun or pronoun.

Tense is not indicated by the verb, but by
qualifying words : Hodie nos ES in Paris =
To-day we be in Paris ; Heri me ES in Roma =
yesterday we be in Rome ; Cras vos ES in
Torino — To-morrow we be in Turin. In
each case the verbal form es remains un-
changed. As in EngUsh tense can be indicated
by auxiUaries ; the past by e preceding the
Verb : Qui e bibe — who has drunk. Peano
shows that e in this sense is derived from the
ancient European, being so used in Greek
and in Latin. The future can be denoted
by i : Qui 1 bibe = who will drink, or, more
literally, who will go to drink, for i is the
stem of the verb to go. It occurs in Latin :
IS, ivi, itum, ire. Italian : andare, ire gire
iva, ito ; French = oiler, irais, iras, ira,

INTERLANGUAGE ATTEMPTS 77

irai ; Spanish, ir, iha, ido ; Portuguese, ir,
la, ido. The same stem is found in the
EngUsh words transitory and itinerant. Desire
and obUgation are indicated by the auxiUaries
vol, which we EngUsh find in voluntary, and
dehe, which has given us debit.

The modes of the verb are not indicated
by any change in its form, but by pre-
positions, as in EngUsh. The Latin phrase :
In dubio abstine = in doubt abstain is un-
changed in InterUngua, because, in this case,
the Latin phrase has no inflections to discard.

For the infinitive the stem alone is generaUy
used, adding, where necessary, the Latin
preposition ad, which has the same meaning
as the EngUsh to. I Study, I desire to study
is rendered Me stude, me vol stude. Me habe
libros AD stude = I have books to study.
When the infinitive is employed as an
abstract noun, the Greek article to = the,
which comes from the ancient European, can
be used, thus : To err is human — to erra es
humano. This expedient perhaps sUghtly
opens the door to the patchwork process of
combining diverse Unguistic elements accord-
ing to individual fancy, which has produced
a plethora of hybrid artificial languages.
Peano himself usually prefers to invert the
statement, and make it simply : hom^ erra =
man errs.

Adjectives are invariable. Nouns lose

78 DELPHOS

their case-endings. The genitive is expressed
by de as in French. The plural of nouns is
formed in s ; but only used where not other-
wise indicated. For instance : leones = lions,
but duo hone = two lions. Sex is indicated
only where the sense requires it, the existing
form of mascuHne and feminine being used,
or the noun followed by mas or femina, to
indicate the sex, as in the Latin canis mas,
cams femina. The article is completely
abolished.

The pronouns are the direct or indirect
case of the Latin pronouns, chosen again on
the principle of internationality and used
without indication of case. Me = me, I ;
te = thou ; illo = he, him ; nos = we, us ;
vos = you ; illos = they, them.

Interlingua is generally accepted as easier
to read at first sight than the other artificial
languages. Some critics object that its
retention of the Latin terminations makes
it less easy to write and speak correctly than
if it were to adopt a regular series of artificial
suffixes. Interlinguists reply that there is no
greater difficulty in remembering the end of
a word than any other part of it ; that
Interlingua words are already familiarized
by international usage ; and that to attach
to famiHar stems a set of arbitrary suffixes
would be to make them difficult and strange.

New Latin words are constantly made to

INTERLANGUAGE ATTEMPTS 79

fulfil new functions : largely for naming
inventions and discoveries. The coinage
proceeds upon established and well-known
principles. The general use of an inter-
language based on Latin would inevitably
increase it ; but the words would appear only
in response to need.
Example :

Tunc surge muUitudine de studios novo,
unde resuUa que linguas de Europa habe
numeroso vocahulo commune ; que vocahu-
lario internationale es in quasi totaUtate
latino, et que illo suffice pro construe lingua
toto naturale intelligible ad primo visu aut
quasi ab omni homo culto, et plus simpffc^
et regular e que Volapiik.

ROMANAL

Romanal is an attempt to combine the
intemationality and Latinity of Interlingua
with a grammatical structure similar to that
of Esperanto. Its author, Dr A. Michaux,
of Boulogne-sur-Mer, is a member of the
Academia pro InterUngua, which he has
followed in his wise choice of Latin surviving
in the living languages, as the basis of his
vocabulary. Like the Academia, he adopts
the Latin orthography and pronunciation ;
but, following Esperanto, he allots a special
letter to terminate each of the grammatical
parts of speech. Proper names (as in

8o DELPHOS

Esperanto) are made to conform to this
system, A merica becoming A merice. Volapiik,
Esperanto, and Ido are followed in word-
building by a series of affixes attachable to
any stem. In this manner regularity is
attained, but the familiar aspect of Latin
international words is sacrificed. Monte, for
instance, becomes Montasse.

Ignoring the modern trend towards the
analytical, Dr Michaux has invented a new
synthetic conjugation of the verb. He forms
the active voice, in all modes and tenses,
without an auxihary. He employs the
auxiliary to be for the passive voice ; but,
instead of the Latin esse, uses the Spanish
estar. His conjugation includes such forms
as me amaveran = I shall have loved ; me
amavun = I should have loved ; amavant =
having loved ; amerav = to have the duty to
love ; amerant = having the duty to love ;
amerat = having the duty to he loved. These
complicated forms are much nearer to
Volapiik than anything in Ido or in Esperanto.

The method of derivation is midway
between Esperanto and Ido. If the stem is
that of an object, the verb suffix can be
added, as in Esperanto, without an inter-
mediate affix. Thus coron-e = crown, coronar
= to crown^ ; but, if the stem indicates a

1 Compare with Ido : Kron-o = crown ; Kron-

iz-ir = to crown.

INTERLANGUAGE ATTEMPTS 8i

person, an intermediate affix is required. If
the stem is that of a verb, an intermediate
affix is required to form a substantive.

Romanal is an effort to combine two
mutually confficting policies.

Example :

Li Meliori lingue auxiUari est ille quel
possan facilim comprendar li americanos
del norde et illos del sude.

Universal

Universal (1903), later called Panroman
(1906), by Dr H. Molenaar, is another neo-
Latin language. Its vocabulary is formed
from words found in at least two of the
Romance languages. Dr Molenaar has made
the common mistake of attempting to
simplify international words in a haphazard
manner. Moreover, his choice of stems is
not reduced to rule. Etymology is obscured
in such words as Kan = dog ; Kar = dear ;
laser, from the French laisser.

Example :

Kommunikazioni internazional deven sem-
per plus grand. Un facil komprension
mutual es nezes in komerz, art, szienz, in
viagi kongresi e mil okasioni.
Universal has been put to practical use in
the Positivist quarterly Humanitat.

82 DELPHOS

Medial Europan
Joseph and Betti Weisbart have displayed
a charming ingenuity in the illustrated text-
book of their Lingue Medial Europan.
Europan attempts to provide a mean between
the Latin and the German and Slav languages.
To the difficulties produced by that attempt,
it adds its own method of spelling. Esperanto
is followed in the grammatical terminations,
though the endings are different. The verb
is synthetic.
Example :

Tuti es silent. Ni home es exier le domes
ultra le duktento del kaval-vagon, qui veha po
le voye via le ponte al vilaje. — Ilustrat
ABECEDARIE del Lingue Medial Europan.

Occidental
Occidental, by E. von Wahl (Reval), has
its circle of adherents and its monthly
magazine Kosmoglott. It is a partially
a priori amalgam, based on the principal
European languages. Curious features are
n' to indicate ny, and /' to indicate ly (as in
the EngHsh folio) ; also the use of double
consonants, for example : stopp = stop. The
juxtaposition of words from various lan-
guages sometimes modified according to the
fancy of the author, makes a discordant
impression ; for instance : along = along ;
alor — then ; alqual — somewhat ; chascun^^

INTERLANGUAGE ATTEMPTS 83

everyone ; nequi = no one ; necos = nothing ;
mem = even ; nyti = ninety.

The choice of auxihary verbs is whimsical.
Fe = did, which assists in forming the
preterite, is purely a priori, as is veil, the
auxiliary used to form the conditional. Fe,
by the way, is not the past tense of far = to
make or to do ; it is used only as auxiliary to
the formation of the preterite. Veil also has
only the one use. The same is true of va,
the auxihary used for the future tense, though
it is evidently drawn from the Latin vado =
to go. Pies in an adaptation of the Enghsh
please.

In a new language aiming at grammatical
simphcity, it is strange to introduce a syn-
thetic perfect, and also two auxiliaries to
indicate the past ; fe — did, and hav = to
have. Fe is in part used Hke the English did ;
but in English, of course, did is used correctly
only in the negative and interrogative. To
employ it in the affirmative is colloquial, if
not vulgar. Modem analytical language is
not content to divide tense into the old
grammatical categories. It calls for hmitless
shades of meaning. These must be conveyed
by appropriate words, not by a mere variety
of forms, which express no actual difference
in meaning. / sang and I did sing convey
nothing different, nor do their Occidental
equivalent me cantat, and me fe cantat.

84 DELPHOS

Example :

Mi constata ancor un vez, que Occidental
es un lingue occidental, e pro to usar anc un
occidental historic heredat transcription, e li
usationes del Arab Japanes etc, por nos ne
es obligativ. — E. von Wahl in Kosmoglott.

A Summarized View

The various auxiliary-language attempts
are tending towards a common goal : the
elimination of formal grammar and a vocabu-
lary of inter-European words with an over-
whelming preponderance of Latin. In spite
of the obdurates, philological discussions are
constantly proceeding between the various
schools ; and it becomes increasingly clear
that the creation of an acceptable medium
is a long task, in which the labour of many
minds must be combined.

The greater share of the first spade-work
for Interlanguage was done by the Sociahsts
and lovers of popular fraternity ; then came
the Pacifists and the humanitarians. To-day
science, commerce, diplomacy, sociology, and
the general world of public opinion begin to
recognize Interlanguage as a necessity.
^OT the ideal of a world medium of under-
standing and utility, of pacification and
fraternity, the work of the Esperantists has
been unrivalled. It is a great monument of
devotion and ability. The palm for linguistic

INTERLANGUAGE ATTEMPTS 85

excellence, amongst the existing inter-
languages, must, on the other hand, be
given to Peano's Interlingua, because it is
the first systematic attempt to build up an
inter-European vocabulary on a consistent
scientific basis ; because it goes furthest in
the elimination of grammar, under the
guidance of observed tendencies in natural
language ; above all, because it is a logical
etymological attempt to create the poor
man's simpHfied Latin, which will open to
him the nomenclature of the sciences, and will
enable him to understand the prescription of
his doctor and the legal phrases contained in
the lawyer's presentment of his case

:ainea

VII

THE GOVERNMENTS AND THE
INTERLANGUAGE

THE Interlanguage cannot be the crea-
tion of Governments. No Government
attempts to dictate in regard to the grammar
and syntax of the national tongue. Even in
France such matters are left to the Academic.
Government schools everywhere teach accord-
ing to the generally accepted canons estab-
lished by those who make a special study of
the given subject. So with the Interlanguage ;
it will develop with the general consensus of
world-opinion, led by the speciaUsts. Its
discovery and perfection must be mainly the
work of philologists, working, not as propa-
gandists and politicians, but as scientists and
students. After the philologists will come
the stylists ; the poets, and thinkers.

Even should all, or most. Governments,
perhaps through the medium of the League
of Nations, be induced to give official
recognition to one of the existing artificial
languages, the decision would be merely
formal. The real decision would rest, first
with savants, whose researches are con-
tinuous ; secondly with the mills of usage in

GOVERNMENTS & INTERLANGUAGE 87

which the interlanguage will become practical,
and in which, though in some aspects it may-
be vulgarized, in the large result it will be
beautified and enriched.

Unless the decision of Cabinets be in
harmony with social needs and fundamental
Unguistic tendencies, it will not stand. If
they reject the Interianguage it will never-
theless make progress,
governments desirous of furthering the
estabUshment of a world-auxiliary should
first endow interlanguage research. Chairs
of synthetic philology should be estabUshed
in all universities^ An Interlanguage In-
stitute should be created for comparative
inter-European philological research ; for
the study of compromise-languages, for the
classification and analysis of grammar and
phonetics, and for research into their
evolution in all parts of the world, viewed
from the interlanguage standpoint. This
Institute should be established in each
country and at an international centre. The
greatest philologists should be enhsted for
its work. Reports should be issued by it to
the Press, the Learned Societies, and educa-
tional institutions. Its function would be
advisory, but if it were an efficient body, it
would achieve a commanding influence.

Thus the Interlanguage would be estab-
lished by the development of a general

88 DELPHOS

consensus of world philological opinion. For
a period, the resultant language would
remain fluid. Various schools of thought
would adopt various modifications of the
general speech. Already, though they have
grown up haphazard, the existing competing
artificial languages have come to possess so
much in common that they have been
described as dialects of a common language.

The practical test of the Interlanguage
will be intelligibiUty. Men and women will
not cling to forms which do not convey their
meaning to others. Moreover, average people
readily accept the dicta of specialists in
matters of learning. Scientists are the most
harmonious section of humanity, and may
be trusted to assist the world in finding an
acceptable medium.

Interlanguage teaching in elementary and
secondary schools should at present be
frankly tentative. The wise teacher of
chemistry informs the pupils that the science
is in a state of flux, that the theories of
twenty years ago have been overturned, and
those of to-day may also in time be discarded.
So with Interlanguage : pupils should be
informed of the true position. Simple
courses in comparative philology should be
given. Children should be taught to trace
inter-European words in the forms they have
acquired in the various European languages,

GOVERNMENTS & INTERLANGUAGE 89

and to decompose and analyse words in their
native language which have come from Latin
or other foreign sources. Such instruction
is particularly valuable to children speaking
our h3^brid EngHsh. The course should
include a review of the grammatical changes
which have occurred in the native language
and of grammatical tendencies in other
languages. An account of the interlanguage
movement should also be given.

As speciaUzed philological opinion upon
the Interlanguage reaches a fairly general
consensus, it wiU be embodied in text-books
for use in the regular curricula of schools.

The Interlanguage will introduce new
social strata both to international communi-
cations and to culture. It wiU grow with
employment, as all other languages have
grown. Yet its basis will lie in the historical
accumulations of long ages. Like every
living language, it will provide for new
inventions and new ideas, new words built
in harmony with accepted standards, and
with affixes already in habitual use. In the
Interlanguage, no more than in other
languages, will there be many writers
desirous of achieving the creation of five
new words a year, as recommended by a
certain American writer.

The Interlanguage will provide a means by
which the thoughts and emotions of mankind,

90 DELPHOS

as expressed in language, may achieve a
world-comprehension, which is to-day possible
only in music.

There is work here for our teachers and
students, our pacifists, and our sociologists.
Let them rally to the standard of Inter-
language — to perfect it, and to advance it.

VIII
IN THE FUTURE

WE are looking towards a future in
which the procuring of mere food and
raiment and a modicum of shelter will not
monopoUze so large a share of the individual
life and energy as is now the case. The
present widespread material scarcity will
be replaced by abundance ; education and
culture will be widely diffused.

With economic problems and rivalries
largely swept away by the advent of plenty
for all ; and, consequently, with a healthier,
more contented, and more united world-
population, great cultural changes will take
place. These will enhance the utility of the
Interlanguage.

The newspapers will no longer fill their
columns with accounts of larceny and
intemperance, wars, industrial disputes, and
the speeches of party politicians. Science,
art, and Uterature will take first place. Only
the pages devoted wholly to Uterature
will be printed in the national language.
The news will appear in the Interlanguage.
Where thousands of people are to-day
interested in reading of what others have

92 DELPHOS

done in art and science, millions will then
delight in their actual pursuit. These
millions will be eager for news of the dis-
coveries of people engaged in similar activities
all over the globe. The frontiers will form
no barrier and insularity will be no more.

The mechanism of the Press will be
revolutionized. The news will be transmitted
by wireless telegraphy, and its impression
recorded on metal from which it may be
printed. No typesetting machine will be
required. The synchronized tape-machine
is the precursor of this development.

By using the Interlanguage it will be
possible to send all news to one world
receiving-station, for retransmission every-
where ; or to three, four, or five such stations,
if preferred. Events of universal importance
will be conveyed in concise words that will
require no re-writing. Much of to-day's
tedious sub-editing will disappear. Though
world-society will have become more homo-
geneous, certain news items will be of greater
interest to certain parts of the world than to
others. These may be supplemented by
special articles which may appear in the
Interlanguage. If they contain expert
information or important local opinion, they
will be copied by papers in other parts of
the world.

All scientific and technical books and

IN THE FUTURE 93

journals will be written in the Interlanguage.
During an interim period, before everyone
has a famiUar knowledge of it, some works
may be written in the native tongue of their
authors and pubUshed simultaneously with
an Interlanguage translation. Scientists
have such vital need of co-operation that
they will gladly clothe their thoughts in the
language that will be common to their
international fraternity, just as they did of
old in Latin. Based on Latin, the main
vehicle of their existing nomenclature, the
Interlanguage will prove no difficult barrier
to them.

Interlanguage will accelerate scientific
research and increase the speed of inter-
national communications. It will be used
for foreign correspondence, and conferences,
and for broadcasting ; always for trans-
frontier, and frequently for home telephonic
and telegraphic communications. It will be
displayed in street signs and public vehicles.
It will be as familiar to the eye as the national
language. No traveller will fail to under-
stand it.

Probably fifty (perhaps even thirty) years
hence no one will be troubled by learning the
Interlanguage. It will be acquired at the
toddling age, side by side with the mother-
tongue.

The schools will be wholly bi-Hngual. The

94 DELPHOS

Interlanguage and the native language will
be used in teaching children, who will enter
school with a famiUar-speaking knowledge
of both. For arithmetic, geometry, mathe-
matics, astronomy, chemistry, the geography
and history of foreign countries, the Inter-
language will be the vehicle of instruction,
the national language being employed for the
literature, history, and geography of the
native land. Elocution will be practised in
both tongues.

The children will correspond with school-
fellows and club-mates in distant countries.
Such international associations of the world's
youth as the boy and girl scouts, and the
present small scale organization of school-
journeys are mere tentative beginnings of
what is destined to be a great movement of
the young people of all countries — stretching
forth with the buoyant enthusiasm of youth
to learn the universe. To-day many a lad
joins the Army with the sole purpose of going
abroad. To-morrow, aided by radiophony,
television, the Interlanguage, and countless
enlarging means of education and travel, all
children will revel in finding the world open
to their adventure.

The Interlanguage wiU play its part in the
making of the future, in which the peoples
of the world shall be one people : a people
cultured and kind, and civilized beyond

IN THE FUTURE 95

to-day's conception, speaking a common
language, bound by common interests, when
the wars of class and of nations shall be
no more.

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QNv Ava-o

TO-DAY AND TO-MORROW

FROM THE REVIEWS

Times Literary Supplement : " An entertaining
series."

Spectator : " Scintillating monographs."

Observer : " There seems no reason why the
brilliant To-day and To-morrow Series should
come to an end for a century of to-morrows.
At first it seemed impossible for the publishers
to keep up the sport through a dozen volumes,
but the series already runs to more than two
score. A remarkable series . . ."

Nation : " We are able to peer into the future
by means of that brilliant series [which] will
constitute a precious document upon the
present time." — ^T. S. Eliot.

Manchester Dispatch : " The more one reads of
these pamphlets, the more avid becomes the
appetite . We hope the lis t is endless . ' '

Irish Statesman : " Full of lively controversy."

Daily Herald : " This series has given us many
monographs of brilliance and discernment. . . .
The stylistic excellences of this provocative
series."

Field : ' ' We have long desired to express the
deep admiration felt by every thinking
scholar and worker at the present day for this
series. We must pay tribute to the high
standard of thought and expression they
maintain. As small gift-books, austerely yet
prettily produced, they remain unequalled
of their kind. We can give but the briefest
suggestions of their value to the student,
the politician, and the voter. ..."

Japan Chronicle : " While cheap prophecy is
a futile thing, wisdom consists largely in look-
ing forward to consequences. It is this that
makes these books of considerable interest."

New York World : ' ' Holds the palm in the
speculative and interpretative thought of the
age."

[2]

TO-DAY AND TO-MORROW

VOLUMES READY

Daedalus, or Science and the Future.
By J. B. S. Haldane, Reader in
Biochemistry, University of Cambridge.
Seventh impression.

" A fascinating and daring little book."
— Westminster Gazette. ' ' The essay is brilliant,
sparkling with wit and bristling with
challenges." — British Medical Journal.

" Predicts the most startling changes."
— Morning Post.

Gallinicus, a Defence of Chemical War-
• fare. By J. B. S. Haldane. Second

impression.
"Mr. Haldane 's brilliant study." — Times

Leadins; Article. " A book to be read by every

intelligent adult." — Spectator. " This brilliant

little monograph." — Daily News.

Icarus, or the Future of Science. By
Bertrand Russell, f.r.s. Fourth
impression.

" Utter pessimism." — Observer. " Mr.
Russell refuses to beUeve that the progress of
Science must be a boon to mankind." —
Morning Post. ** A stimulating book, that
leaves one not at all discouraged." — Daily
Herald.

What I Believe. By Bertrand Russell,
F.R.S. Third impression.

" One of the most brilliant and thought-
stimulating little books 1 have read — a better
book even than Icarus." — Nation. " Simply
and brilliantly written." — Nature. " In
tabbing sentences he punctures the bubble of
cruelty, en\^, narrowness, and ill-will which
those in authority call their morals." — New
Leader.

[3]

TO-DAY AND TO-MORROW

Tantalus, or the Future of Man. By
F. C. S. Schiller, D.Sc, Fellow of
Corpus Christi College, Oxford. Second
impression.

" They are all {Daedalus, Icarus, and
Tantalus) brilliantly clever, and they supple-
ment or correct one another." — Dean Inge, in
Morning Post. " Immensely valuable and
infinitely readable." — Daily News. " The
book of the week." — Spectator.

Cassandra, or the Future of the British
Empire. By F. C. S. Schiller, D.Sc.

" We commend it to the complacent of all
parties." — Saturday Review. " The book is
small, but very, very weighty ; brilliantly
written, it ought to be read by all shades of
politicians and students of politics." — York-
shire Post. " Yet another addition to that
bright constellation of pamphlets." — Spectator.

Quo Vadimus ? Glimpses of the Future.
By E. E. FouRNiER d'Albe,D.Sc., author
of " Selenium, the Moon Element," etc.
" A wonderful vision of the future. A book
that will be talked about." — Daily Graphic.
" A remarkable contribution to a remarkable
series." — Manchester Dispatch. " Interesting
and singularly plausible." — Daily Telegraph.

Thrasymachus, the Future of Morals.
By C. E. M. JoAD, author of ''The
Babbitt Warren, "etc. Second impression.
" His provocative book." — Graphic.
"Written in a style of deliberate brilliance."
— Times Literary Supplement. " As outspoken
and unequivocal a contribution as could well
be imagined. Even those readers who dissent
will be forced to recognize the admirable
clarity with which he states his case. A book
that will startle." — Daily Chronicle.

U]

TO-DAY AND TO-MORROW

Lysistrata, or Woman's Future and
Future Woman. By Anthony M.
LuDOVici, author of "A Defence of
Aristocracy,'* etc. Second Impression.

" A stimulating book. Volumes would be
needed to deal, in the fullness his work pro-
vokes, with all the problems raised." — Sunday
Times. " Pro-feminine, but anti-feministic."
Scotsman. " Full of brilliant common-sense."
— Observer.

Hypatia, or Woman and Knowledge. By
Mrs Bertrand Russell. With a
frontispiece. Third impression.

An answer to Lysistrata. " A passionate
vindication of the rights of women." —
Manchester Guardian. " Says a number of
things that sensible women have been wanting
publicly said for a long time." — Daily Herald.

Hephaestus, the Soul of the Machine.
By E. E. Fournier d'Albe, D.Sc.

" A worthy contribution to this interesting
series. A delightful and thought-provoking
essay." — Birmingham Post. " There is a
special pleasure in meeting with a book like
Hephaestus. The author has the merit of really
understanding what he is talking about."
— Engineering. " An exceedingly clever
defence of machinery." — Architects' Journal.

The Passing of the Phantoms : a Study
of Evolutionary Psychology and Morals.
By C. J. Patten, Professor of Anatomy,
Sheffield University. With 4 Plates.

" Readers of Daedalus, Icarus and Tantalus,
will be grateful for an excellent presentation
of yet another point of view." — Yorkshire
Post. " This bright and bracing litcle book,"
Literary Guide. " Interesting and original."
— Medical Times.

[5]

TO-DAY AND TO-MORROW

The Mongol in our Midst : a Study of
Man and his Three Faces. By F. G.
CROOKSHANK, M.D., F.R.C.P. With 28
Plates. Second Edition, revised.

" A brilliant piece of speculative induction."
— Saturday Review. " An extremely interest-
ing and suggestive book, which will reward
careful reading." — Sunday Times. " The
pictures carry fearful conviction." — Daily
Herald.

The Conquest of Cancer. By H. W. S.

Wright, m.s., f.r.c.s. Introduction
by F. G. Crookshank, m.d.

" Eminently suitable for general reading.
The problem is fairly and lucidly presented.
One merit of Mr Wright's plan is that he tells
people what, in his judgment, they can best
do, here and now." — From the Introduction.

Pygmalion, or the Doctor of the Future.
By R. McNair Wilson, m.b.

" Dr Wilson has added a brilliant essay
to this series." — Times Literary Supplement.
" This is a very little book, but there is much
wisdom in it." — Evening Standard. " No
doctor worth his salt would venture to say that
Dr Wilson was wrong." — Daily Herald.
Prometheus, or Biology and the Ad-
vancement of Man. By H. S. Jennings,
Professor of Zoology, Johns Hopkins
University.

" This volume is one of the most remarkable
that has yet appeared in this series. Certainly
the information it contains will be new to most
educated laymen. It is essentially a discussion
of . . . heredity and environment, and it
clearly estabUshes the fact that the current
use of these terms has no scientific
justification." — Times Literary Supplement.
"An exceedingly brilliant book." — New Leader.

£6]

TO-DAY AND TO-MORROW

Narcissus : an Anatomy of Clothes. By
Gerald Heard. With 19 illustrations.

" A most suggestive book." — Nation
** Irresistible. Reading it is like a switchback
journey. Starting from prehistoric times we
rocket down the ages." — Daily Newi.
" Interesting, provocative, and entertaining."
— Queen.

Thamyris, or Is There a Future for
Poetry ? By R. C. Trevelyan.

" Learned, sensible, and very well- written."
— Affable Hawk, in New Statesman. " Very
suggestive." — /. C. Squire, in Observer.
" A very charming piece of work, I agree
with all, or at any rate, almost all its con-
clusions."— J. St. Loe Strachey, in Spectator.

Proteus, or the Future of Intelligence.
By Vernon Lee, author of ** Satan the
Waster," etc.

" We should like to follow the author's
suggestions as to the effect of intelligence on
the future of Ethics, Aesthetics, and Manners.
Her book is profoundly stimulating and should
be read by everyone." — Outlook. " A concise,
suggestive piece of work." — Saturday Review.

Timotheus, the Future of the Theatre.
By BoNAMY Dobr^e, author of *' Restor-
ation Drama," etc.

" A witty, mischievous little book, to be
read with deUght." — Times Literary Supple-
ment. " This is a delightfully witty book."
— Scotsman. " In a subtly satirical vein he
visuahzes various kinds of theatres in 200 years
time. His gay little book makes delightful
reading. ' ' — Nation .

[7]

TO-DAY AND TO-MORROW

Paris, or the Future of War. By Captain
B. H. LiDDELL Hart.

"A companion volume to Callinicus,
A gem of close thinking and deduction."
— Observer. " A noteworthy contribution to
a problem of concern to every citizen in this
country." — Daily Chronicle. " There is some
lively thinking about the future of war in
Paris, just added to this set of live- wire
pamphlets on big subjects." — Manchester
Guardian.

Wireless Possibilities. By Professor
A. M. Low. With 4 diagrams.

" As might be expected from an inventor
who is always so fresh, he has many inter-
esting things to say." — Evening Standard.
" The mantle of Blake has fallen upon the
physicists. To them we look for visions, and
we find them in this book." — New Statesman.

Perseus : of Dragons. By H. F. Scott
Stokes. With 2 illustrations.

•' A diverting little book, chock-full of ideas.
Mr Stokes' dragon-lore is both quaint and
various." — Morning Post. " Very amusingly
written, and a mine of curious knowledge for
which the discerning reader will i&nd many
uses." — Glasgow Herald.

Lycurgus, or the Future of Law. By
E. S. P. Haynes, author of " Concerning
Solicitors," etc.

"An interesting and concisely written book."
— Yorkshire Post. " He roundly declares that
English criminal law is a blend of barbaric
violence, medieval prejudices, and modern
fallacies. ... A humane and conscientious
investigation." — T.P.'s Weekly. " A thought-
ful book — deserves careful reading." — Law
Times.

[8]

TO-DAY AND TO-MORROW

Euterpe, or the Future of Art. By
Lionel R. McColvin, author of " The
Theory of Book-Selection/'

" Discusses briefly, but very suggestively,
the problem of the future of ait in relation to
the public." — Saturday Review. " Another
indictment of machinery as a soul-destroyer
. . . Mr Colvin has the courage to suggest
solutions." — Westminister Gazette. " This is
altogether a much-needed book." — New
Leader.

Pegasus, or Problems of Transport.
By Colonel J. F. C. Fuller, author of
" The Reformation of War," etc. With
8 Plates.

" The foremost military prophet of the day
propounds a solution for industrial and
unemployment problems. It is a bold essay
. . . and calls for the attention of all con-
cerned with imperial problems." — Daily
Telegraph. " Practical, timely, very inter-
esting and very important." — J. St. Loe
Strachey, in Spectator.

Atlantis, or America and the Future.
By Colonel J. F. C. Fuller.

" Candid and caustic." — Observer. " Many
hard things have been said about America,
but few quite so bitter and caustic as these."
— Daily Sketch. " He can conjure up possi-
bilities of a new Atlantis." — Clarion.
Midas, or the United States and the
Future. By C. H. Bretherton, author
of " The Real Ireland ", etc.

A companion volume to Atlantis. " Full of
astute observations and acute reflections . . .
this wise and witty pamphlet, a provocation
to the thought that is creative." — Morning
Post. " A punch in every paragraph. One could
hardly ask for rnore ' meat.' " — Spectator.

[9]

TO-DAY AND TO-MORROW

Nuntius, or Advertising and its Future.
By Gilbert Russell.

" Expresses the philosophy of advertising
concisely and well." — Observer. " It is doubt-
ful if a more straightforward exposition of
the part advertising plays in our public and
private life has been written." — Manchester
Guardian.

Birth Control and the State : a Plea
and a Forecast. By. C. P. Blacker,

M,C., M.A., M.R.C.S., L.R.C.P.

" A very careful summary." — Times Literary
Supplement. " A temperate and scholarly
survey of the arguments for and against the
encouragement of the practice of birth control."
— Lancet. " He writes lucidly, moderately,
and from wide knowledge ; his book un-
doubtedly gives a better understanding of the
subject than any other brief account we know.
It also suggests a pohcy." — Saturday Review.

Ouroboros, or the Mechanical Extension
of Mankind. By Caret Garrett.

" This brilHant and provoking little book."
— Observer. " A significant and thoughtful
essay, calculated in parts to make our flesh
creep." — Spectator. " A brilliant writer, Mr.
Garrett is a remarkable man. He explains
something of the enormous change the machine
has made in life," — Daily Express.

Artifex, or the Future of Craftsmanship.
By John Gloag, author of ** Time,
Taste, and Furniture."

" An able and interesting summary of the
history of craftsmanship in the past, a direct
criticism of the present, and at the end his
hopes for the future. Mr Gloag's real con-
tribution to the future of craftsmanship is
his discussion of the uses of machinery."
— Times Literary Supplement.
[lO]

TO-DAY AND TO-MORROW

Plato's American Republic. By J.

Douglas Woodruff. Third impression.

" Uses the form of the Socratic dialogue
with devastating success. A gently malicious
wit sparkles in every page." — Sunday Times.
" Having deliberately set himself an almost
impossible task, has succeeded beyond belief,"
— Saturday Review. " Quite the liveliest
even of this spirited series." — Observer.

Orpheus, or the Music of the Future. By
W. J. Turner, author of " Music and
Life."

" A book on music that we can read not
merely once, but twice or thrice. Mr Turner
has given us some of the finest thinking upon
Beethoven that I have ever met with." —
Ernest Newman in Sunday Times. " A
briUiant essay in contemporary philosophy."
— Outlook. " The fruit of real knowledge and
understanding. ' — New Statesman.

Terpander, or Music and the Future. By
E. J. Dent, author of "Mozart's Operas."

" In Orpheus Mr Turner made a brilliant
voyage in search of first principles. Mr Dent's
book is a skilful review of the development of
music. It is the most succinct and stimulating
essay on music I have found. . . ." — Musical
News. "Remarkably able and stimulating."
— Times Literary Supplement. "There is hardly
another critic alive who could sum up contem-
porary tendencies so neatly." — Spectator.

Sibylla, or the Revival of Prophecy. By
C. A. Mace, University of St. Andrew's.
"An entertaining and instructive pamphlet."
— Morning Post. " Places a nightmare before
us very ably and wittily." — Spectator.
" Passages in it are excellent satire, but on
the whole Mr Mace's speculations may be
taken as a trustworthy guide ... to modem
scientific thought." — Birmingham Post.

[II]

TO-DAY AND TO-MORROW

Lucullus, or the Food of the Future. By
Olga Hartley and Mrs C. F. Level,
authors of ' The Gentle Art of Cookery.'
" This is a clever and witty little volume
in an entertaining series, and it makes enchant-
ing reading." — Times Literary Supplement.
" Opens with a brilliant picture of modern
man, living in a vacuum-cleaned, steam-
heated, credit-furnished suburban mansion
* with a wolf in the basement ' — the wolf of
hunger. This banquet of epigrams." —
Spectator.

Procrustes, or the Future of EngUsh
Education. By M. Alderton Pink.

" Undoubtedly he makes out a very good
case." — Daily Herald. " This interesting
addition to the series." — Times Educational
Supplement. " Intends to be challenging and
succeeds in being so. All fit readers will find
it stimulating." — Northern Echo.

The Future of Futurism. By John

RODKER.

" Mr. Rodker is up-to-the-minute, and he
has accomplished a considerable feat in writing,
on such a vague subject, 92 extremely inter-
esting pages." — T. S. Eliot, in Nation.
" There are a good many things in this book
which are of interest." — Times Literary
Supplement.
Pomona, or the Future of EngUsh. By
Basil de Si^lincourt, author of ' The
English Secret ', etc.

" The future of English is discussed fully
and with fascinating interest." — Morning
Post. ' ' Has a refreshing air of the unexpected .
Full of wise thoughts and happy words."
— Times Literary Supplement. "Here is
suggestive thought, quite different from
most speculations on the destiny of our
language." — Journal of Education.
[12]

TO-DAY AND TO-MORROW

Balbus, or the Future of Architecture.
By Christian Barman, editor of ' The
Architect's Journal '.

" A really brilliant addition to this already-
distinguished series. The reading of Balbus
will give much data for intelligent prophecy,
and incidentally, an hour or so of excellent
entertainment." — Spectator. " Most readable
and reasonable. We can recommend it
warmly." — New Statesman. " This intriguing
little book." — Co7tnoisseur.

JUST PUBLISHED
Apella, or the Future of the Jews. By
A Quarterly Reviewer.

" Cogent, because of brevity and a magni-
ficent prose style, this book wins our quiet
praise. It is a fine pamphlet, adding to the
value of the series, and should not be missed."
— Spectator. " A notable addition to this
excellent series. His arguments are a provoca-
tion to fruitful thinking." — Morning Post.

The Dance of Qiva, or Life's Unity and
Rh5^hm. By Collum.

** It has substance and thought in it. The
author is very much alive and responsive to
the movements of to-day which seek to unite
the best thought of East and West, and dis-
cusses Mussolini and Jagadis Bose with
perspi en city . ' ' — Spectator .

Lars Porsena, or the Future of Swearing
and Improper Language. By Robert
Graves.

" An amusing little book." — Daily Mirror.
"It is to this subject [of swearing] that Mr.
Graves brings much erudition and not a little
irony." — Jofin O'London's Weekly. ** Not for
squeamish readers." — Spectator. " Too out-
spoken. The writer sails very near the wind,
but all the same has some sound constructive
things to say." — Manchester Dispatch.

[13]

TO-DAY AND TO-MORROW

Socrates, or the Emancipation of Man-
kind. By H. F. Carlill.

Sets out the new view of the nature of man,
to which the trend of modern psychology,
anthropology, and evolutionary theory has
led, shows the important consequences to
human behaviour and efficiency which are
bound to follow, and maintains that man is
at last conscious of his power to control his
biological inheritance.

Delphos, or the Future of International
Language. By E. Sylvia Pankhurst.

An inquiry into the possibility of a medium
of inter-communication, auxiliary to the
mother tongues. A survey of past attempts
from the sixteenth century to the present
day. A prophecy of the coming inter-
language, its form, its social and cultural
utility, and its influence on world peace.

Gallio, or the Tyranny of Science. By
J. W. N. Sullivan, author of "A
History of Mathematics."

Is the scientific universe the real universe ?
What is the character of the universe revealed
by modem science ? Are values inherent in
reality ? What is the function of the arts ?
In addition to answering these questions, the
author attacks the notion that science is
materialistic.

Apollonius, or the Future of Psychical
Research. By E. N. Bennett, author
of " Problems of Village Life," etc.

An attempt to summarize the results secured
by the scientific treatment of psychical pheno-
mena, to forecast the future developments of
such research, and to answer the familiar
question " What is the good of it all ? "

[14]

TO-DAY AND TO-MORROW

NEARLY READY

Janus, or the Conquest of War. By
William McDougall, M.B., F.R.S.,
Professor of Psychology, Harvard Uni-
versity, author of " The Group Mind,"
etc.

A volume of fundamental importance to all
those who would avoid future wars. Sections
are devoted to lessons of the Great War, the
Causes of War, Preventives of War, League
to Enforce Peace, and International Air Force
as a Prevention of War.

Rusticus, or the Future of the Country-
side. By Martin S. Briggs, F.R.I.B.A.,
author of "A Short History of the
Building Crafts," etc.

Attributes much of the blame for the dese-
cration of our countryside to the petrol engine,
though he recognizes other contributory causes .
He attempts to analyse the charm of our
counties before the Industrial Revolution
and shows how that movement influenced
their aspect. Finally he surveys the future,
making practical suggestions to avoid further
' uglification.'

Aeolus, or the Future of the Flying
Machine. By Oliver Stewart, author
of "Strategy and Tactics of Air
Fighting."

A picture of the air-vehicle and air-battle-
ship of the future, painted with colours from
the aeronautical research work of to-day.
The author foresees that the flying machine
will resist mass production. Aircraft will
be exalted as individual creations of the
Artist-Scientist rather than debased as tools
of the Commercialist.

[15]

TO-DAY AND TO-MORROW

Stentor, or the Future of the Press. By
David Ockham.

Shows how since the War the control of the
Press has passed into the hands of only five men .
The law is powerless, even if willing, to check
this justification. Now that independent
organs of opinion are almost eliminated, the
author discusses the danger to the community
unless the Public is made aware of the personal-
ities and policies behind the Trusts.

IN PREPARATION

The Future of India. By T. Earle

Welby.

An analysis of the spiritual and political
future of 320 million persons in the light of
present tendencies.

Mercurius, or the World on Wings.
By C. Thompson Walker.

A picture of the air- vehicle and the air-port
of to-morrow, and the influence aircraft will
have on our lives.

The Future of Films. By Ernest
Betts.

Vulcan, or Labour To-Day and To-
Morrow. By Cecil Chisholm.

[16]

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