THE chara the first syllab be always wri read separate lables; as wo m pire, empi with the ensu another word required; as separate, effe the character composition c ten separatel The charac the sound req them separat the character reader may s (as to 1, for in me?" The a ticle a, he wil tion of spelli ac; a t, at; a By writing syllable of a the vowel is s ter separatel yet if the vow also be take The omission

which occur as the first letters of words, is productive of the greatest confusion.

The character for im, am, &c. is placed above the line, to distinguish it from the character for me, which is even with the line. See Chap. IV.

The character for is is placed above the line, and that for us, under the line, i and u being the vowels which determine their position according to the rule in the preceding chapter; as is at the line, for the

same reason.

In the few instances to which the above mode (of expressing first syllables commencing with a vowel) may be found inapplicable, (as where a first syllable is composed of one long vowel, or of a vowel before two consonants, or a monosyllabic word begins with a long vowel,) i and u occurring as such first syllable (as in icy), or followed by only one consonant in a monosyllabic word (as in ides), may be represented in the mode pointed out in the beginning of Chap. I.

I and u, when commencing a first syllable, and followed by two consonants, a, e, ea, and ai, by joining a staccato mark to the succeeding character (see Fig. 4. Pl. II.) o or oa, by prefixing a curl to the characters which represent f, v, c hard, and k, g, j, n, m, w, to the left side of the characters for p, b, t and r (to distinguish such formation from the characters for th and qu), and to the upper side of the characters for 7 and s, (to distinguish such formations from the characters for oi and sh). See Fig. 5. Pl. II.

The initial syllables ad, ed, id, od, ud; at, et, it, ot, ut; ar, er, ir, or; as, es, is, os, may also, at the option of the writer, (instead of being represented by a separate character,) be expressed by the staccato mark joined to the characters for d, t, r and s; it being easy to join the staccato mark to those characters; not so to the others,

SECT. II.

The character for con descends on the line; the character for ac from it: ap descends on the line; pro from it; per is bisected by the line.

Only such prepositions in composition and terminations have been selected for separate characters, as it

would have taken more time to join at full length to the word. Ness is written separately, to distinguish it from ens.

SECT. III.

The character is applied to the first ten terminations, because they are of the most frequent occurrence, and is the easiest horizontal character: tion too is pronounced shon, of which s is the first and prevailing consonant. When ition, &c. succeeds a horizontal character, ition is written a little above; (see Fig. 6. Pl. II.). When a perpendicular or oblique character, near the top; (see Fig. 7. Pl. II.). When ution, &c. follows a horizontal character, ution is written a little under; when a perpendicular or oblique, near the bottom. When ation, &c. follow a horizontal character, ation is written on a line with it; when a perpendicular or oblique, near the middle. When the character for iety follows a horizontal character, it is commenced a little above; when a perpendicular or oblique, near the top. When the character for uate follows a horizontal character, it is commenced on a line with the horizontal character; when a perpendicular or oblique, near the bottom. Observe the three following rules:

1. Except when the whole of a word, independently of its termination, is represented by one of those characters which express first syllables by being written separately (as in country), the characters for trans, mony, and try may be joined to the body of the word; because, being compound characters, not existing in the shorthand alphabet, they cannot by their junction give any other signification than that which is set down above.

2. When any of the terminations are to be expressed in the plural number, or in the genitive case, write the character for the termination about half as large again as its usual size.

3. When a word (which, according to the rules in this chapter, ought to be written with a separate first syllable and a separate termination,) contains only a single consonant and no vowel, between the character for the first syllable, and that for the termination, the