The Standard Alphabet Problem. A Contribution to Phonetic Philo- logy.
By Robert Moffat, jun. (Trubner and Co.)—The attempt to construct a universal alphabet, not, as heretofore, deductively from an examination of the physiology of the human voice, but inductively by observing the effects on the ear of the process of utterance and the various permutations in the elements of articulation, is at least ingenious. The attempt requires the study of unwritten tongues which alone possess the necessary phonic purity. Mr. Max Miller extols the Vaidik Sanscrit for this purpose. Mr. Moffat has studied the Sechwana language spoken by numerous degraded tribes on the south-eastern/ borders of the South African desert. The result is unhappily only a fragment. It treats only of the Sechwana consonants. The vowels were to have been the subject of a second part, and a third part would have been confined to what Mr. Muller names specific modifications. The author died without having corrected the proofs of the whole of this volume. Written amid the vicissitudes of colonial border life, the book is a remarkable instance of intellectual vigour. The scientific value of a mere torso can perhaps hardly be fairly estimated.
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