IV. We can give them a knowledge of all the well-ascertained rules.

1st. We develop in our pupils the talent for spelling. It is certain that men differ as much in their natural gifts in this study as in any other; and it is as proper to say of a person, that he has a talent for spelling, as that he has a talent for painting, for language, or for mathematics. Teachers know this by experience. In every school there are dunces in this department who are good scholars in every other. Of two persons who are nearly equal in other departments, the one who is, on the whole, superior in every thing else, will be as apt to be inferior as superior in this. This is even the case where the same course of study has always been followed by both, and where no circumstances render difference probable.

We find great differences in fondness for the study among our pupils. It is pleasant to some, to others utterly devoid of interest.

As the subject is not adapted for show, a great orthographical gift, like a gift for music or for mathematics, would be apt to pass unobserved. Moreover, every body is expected to spell well, and it is negatively, in deficiency, instead of positively in excellence that we shall find natural differences in ability.

There is no family of children who have not one or more members distinguished for bad spelling. The talent runs in families even like music, painting, and mathematics, and descends from father to son through generations; and people sometimes excuse themselves for bad spelling, on the ground of hereditary deficiency. "Were you frightened when you made those mistakes?" asked one member of a Teacher's Insti

tute of another; "Not at all-none of my family ever spell well," was the self-congratulatory reply.

These facts are, I think, not to be explained except upon the supposition of a difference in mental constitution. This being the case, there must be the same difference between learning and ability in spelling that exists in other things. I suppose the talent for spelling to be like that which distinguished the first man who put into practice the idea of writing language. It depends on a discriminating ear, an accurate eye, and the power of analysis. Any course which tends to develop these, must conduce to the desired end. Music would be effective, because it would develop the power of discriminating between sounds. Drawing and writing, from a similar reason, in respect to the eye. Any thing would be useful which tends to promote order, accuracy, and the habit of close observation. Of the greatest use would be the practice of analyzing words into their component sounds; for this is the indispensable first step towards representing these sounds by written signs.

2d. We can correct the defects of mind, owing to which our pupils spell badly.

This is the same as the preceding proposition in its essence; but as it is stated negatively, it gives us some new practical points.

Mistakes in spelling can be classified; and the different classes will be found to belong, in the main, to as many different classes among those who spell.

First and most numerous are those, who spell by sound; this class may be divided into those who do not hear accurately, and those who, although they

hear the sounds, do not represent them by the proper signs.

Some habitually omit letters, which is the effect of carelessness. Some misplace the letters, though they write all of them; for instance, the word scold, they write sclod. I should never have imagined this error if I had not seen it. It arises from a want of connection between the perceptions of the form and sound of words. It may be remedied by practice in analyzing words into their component sounds. When writing rapidly, it sometimes happens that the mind outruns the pen, and a letter or syllable being written before its time, is mixed up with a preceding word. This may be remedied by inducing a more orderly habit of mind. Other defects, and the methods of correcting them, will occur to every practical teacher.

3d and 4th. We can give to our pupils mental pictures of all common words; and a knowledge of all the well-ascertained rules. We wish them to be able to write every common English word correctly, whenever or wherever it may be presented to them; and without being obliged to stop to remember the spelling; so that spelling may be no obstacle to their writing as rapidly as they can think. This is practical knowledge. Ability to call the letters of which words are made up, is not ability to spell; nor is it of any use whatever in itself; it is only useful so far as we can make it assist us in writing words accurately.

Let us analyze the process which we usually go through in writing words. A word presents itself to us as a member of a sentence which we have in our minds, and which we are in the course of putting on

paper. There is a picture of the word, latent in the mind; the occasion brings out this picture, and the hand puts it into shape by a simple exercise of the will. We write the word correctly or incorrectly, as we have been in the habit of writing it. If it looks wrong when it is done, or if we are not sure whether it is written correctly or not, our work stops, and we endeavor to remember the spelling. Now, in nine cases out of ten, if habit has not served us, memory will not aid us. This forgetfulness occurs not only where the usual spelling is not fixed by habit, that is, where there is no distinct picture of the word in the mind, but also when any accident disturbs the mind of the writer; if some one asks him a question, if he finds the inkstand out of place as he goes to fill his pen, or if the pen does not write easily, in all such cases disturbance of the attention destroys the picture of the word, and that no effort can restore.

There are two classes of words exempt from such liabilities, those with which we are very familiar, and whose picture no common circumstance can destroy; and those whose spelling follows rules with which we are acquainted. That must be the best way to teach spelling which makes these classes contain the greatest number of words.

Of systems of teaching spelling there are two, the oral system, and that which requires that the words. should be written; and these systems may each be followed by an indefinite number of different methods.

First in order comes oral spelling; first, because it is in most general use; last in the order of merit, for I think it can be demonstrated to be nearly useless:

Nearly, perhaps not quite. I suppose that a young person of good orthographical ability could, in time, learn to spell that way; not, however, directly by that system, but indirectly through it. It is the way in which most of us were taught; and though those who spell well owe their ability to do so more to the means they have taken since they left school, than to what we learned there, still the system deserves some credit.

When children begin to learn to spell orally, the exercise is merely one of memory: the child learns, when the teacher says cat, to say c-a-t; but without any conception of what c-a-t signifies. I remember being particularly struck, on visiting a school in which there were very young scholars, with one little child, who had to spell some word with a ff, or other double letter in it. The word was spelled over many times to the child, but the double letter was too great a difficulty to be got over, and the teacher sent him to his seat to study his lesson. He did not look at the book-evidently it could have benefitted him nothing if he had. Called up once more, and hearing the repeated again and again, at last he said it correctly; but he had no more idea of what ff signified than he had of the Binomial Theorem. I speak of this instance, as illustrative of what is generally the case. Young children have no conception whatever of the use of the names of the letters which they repeat oftentime so glibly. They learn these names always by a sheer effort of the verbal memory. They could learn as much Chinese with the same exertion, and with nearly the same advantage. The exercise is perfectly bald. It is connected with noth