Esperanto, are based on Latin. Consequently also, the international language must be largely English, because mostly those Latin words will be chosen that are common at least to French and English. I have lectured to hundreds of English audiences, and I have given them numerous examples of Esperanto words in my lectures that could be easily understood by everybody. Take the words "skribi," to write; "lerni," to learn; "manĝi," to eat; "trinki," to drink; "tablo," a table; "glaso," a glass; "nazo," the nose, and "buŝo," the mouth; "mano," the hand; take the adjectives, bona, bela, granda, kapabla, etc. Few, indeed, are the Esperanto words that do not connect at all with the English; in most cases, in at least 87 cases out of 100, you will find those words connect with one or many English words.

Mr. Towner. You mean that 87 per cent of the words now in the Esperanto vocabulary are formative words?

Prof. Christen. Yes: they are connected with the English language, and from each Esperanto word you can form mechanically absolutely every word that sense and logic can possibly connect with the one and only meaning of the original Esperanto word. I am accustomed to lecturing before audiences and making this statement, which I make without fear of contradiction, that "if all of you were to take up Esperanto now and carry it on until you were as expert in it as I am, you would not in the whole of your studies come across more than 60 words, probably not more than 50 words, which are entirely new to you."

Mr. Towner. Of course, a vocabulary of 3,000 words is a very limited vocabulary; it is a primitive vocabulary?

Prof. Christen. Yes?

Mr. Towner. How are you going to increase it? For instance, how are you going to make it a literary language? How are you going to write poems?

Prof. Christen. Personally I should not want an international language for poetry, although Esperanto does in fact lend itself excellently to the purposes of the muses. But to answer your question: First of all, the Esperanto language does not contain any words at all; I think there are only 138 full-fledged words, prepositions, adverbs, and conjunctions, but the rest of the vocabulary is formed of roots only. Let us take the words "to sew," "to stitch." The root is "kudr." It is only a root, and that alone stands in the vocabulary. Now, if you want to make this root into a noun "o" is added to it, "kudro": if you want to make it an adjective, you add "a" to it, "kudra"; if you want to make it an adverb you add "e," kudre, which would mean by or through sewing, "sewingly," if it could be so expressed in English; and if you want to make it a verb it would

be "kudri," because every infinitive ends in "i." You see, with that root to begin with you can form four words, and you can express a great deal more in Esperanto than anybody can possibly imagine; in fact Esperanto is, on account of its perfect and absolutely complete flexibility, more precise and more comprehensive than any language under the sun. As I said before, you can form four words from every root at the start if sense allows it, and sense allows you a great deal more leeway in Esperanto than anybody can possibly know about, because in no language are you allowed to proceed by sense. The English language does not allow it, nor does any other, not oven German or Greek, but it is allowed in this most logical of all languages, Esperanto. (7)

Mr. Towner. Take the illustration you have just used. We say "The sewing is beautiful." and "We find her sewing assiduously." Now, we use the same word, but the formation of the sentence determines whether or not it is a noun or a verb.

Prof. Christen. You mean the distinction between the participle and the noun?

Mr. Towner. Yes.

Prof. Christen. With your permission I will not answer that particularly, but will deal with the whole subject. I want to say that from every root you form four words, the four principal parts of speech. And the first thing to remember is this positive stroke of genius—that every noun ends with "o," every adjective with "a," every derived adverb with "e," and every infinitive with "i."

Mr. Towner. How would you carry that to proper names?

Prof. Christen. London would be Londono; Robert is Roberto, but proper names you are at liberty to do with as you please; give them the Esperanto ending or leave them in the original form.

Mr. Towner. What about Washington?

Prof. Christen. Washingtono.

Mr. Towner. I mean, you would really change it?

Prof. Christen. Yes; if you prefer it; that is, if it sounds better.

Mr. Towner. In the language?

Prof. Christen. Yes.

Mr. Towner. For instance, if you were speaking about the city of Washington, you would not say Washington, but Washingtono?

Prof. Christen. You will find it frequently printed as Washingtono.

Mr. Towner. Why do you do that, because Washingtono

is not the name of the city?

Prof. Christen. Let me say that you say London in English, but that is not French.

Mr. Towner. But we always spell Paris the French way, although we do not pronounce it the same way; that is, "Paree."

Prof. Christen. But London is not London in French; it is "Londres" in French.

Mr. Towner. Do you mean to say that if a letter were addressed to London from Paris the Frenchman would not pronounce and write it London but Londres?

Prof. Christen. Yes.

Mr. Towner. He does not say London?

Prof. Christen. No, he says Londres. And the same is true with Dover; Dover is not French; The French would be Douvres. However,

I want to say this, that after the first three or four years after I took up Esperanto geographical or proper names were left optional and they were not given any particular spelling in the Esperanto language and are not now. Many Esperantists now would say Washington and London. But you can make the change if you want to.

Mr. Towner. Internationally, has not that come to be the custom, to pronounce the geographical names and proper names in the way they are pronounced in the country in which they originate?

Prof. Christen. I think so. As I said, there is no arbitrary rule about personal names or geographical names. Now, let me proceed with this marvelous scheme and repeat that every part of speech is distinctive in itself; that is the reason a child, when it follows Esperanto, will not find English so hard and will understand English better than in any other way. Such a child will understand English far better than if it did not understand Esperanto, and that is a statement I often make in my lectures.

Mr. Ripley. We had a man here the other day who has a language which he claims is an improvement on Esperanto.

Prof. Christen. Yes?

Mr.