It is somewhat of a novelty for an inventor with a commodity to sell to recommend it as being "'within the resource of the shallow brain and the light purse." That is what Mr. Cheung Man-ling, of the Chinese Post Office, Canton, has naive. ly said in the introduction to his newly invented system of Chinese stenography.
Many attempts have been made to create a satisfactory system, but inventors have naturally found the task of applying the principles of "the art" to the Chinese language almost impossible. Thr latest scheme is an ambitious one, The in-! venter has aimed not only at making a system of shorthand writing for reporters, but at providing the illiterate with a simple and easy mode of communicating thoughts chirography acquirable by Tom Noddy in a few months, he says. By means of this system it is suggested that the high percentage of illiteracy amongst the Chinese may be reduced, but if the language itself is so difficult of attainment by Chinese it is scarcely likely that a new form of writing based upon that language can make much pro-Brees.
It does not appear that "Tom Noddy" will greatly benefit by the new system, but it should be of much service to the Chinese reporter whose note-taking in the native style must be a continual wrestle with the ideographical character, with its lengthy and com. plicated combinations. For his system, the inventor ely indebted to Sir Isaac Pitm: There are forty-four phonetic signs to take the place of the 214 symbols of idea, or Radicals in the ideographic system, These forty-four 8 are sufficient to represent, by varying combinations of not more than three sign the spoken words in the Northern Mandarin and Cantonese dialects. The signs represent consonants, rhyming sy! lables, and tones, and upon these the system is built up in the style of the English model, It appears fairly simple, and the author givee his w that it is "accomplishable at the estimated cheap sacrifice" of an hour's study. day for three months.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.