knowledge on the good old plan of making it as dark and mysterious as
possible. There was, first, a long preface of twenty-two pages, in which
Mr. Lowe deprecated all other spelling-books whatever, especially those
of his very dear friends and fellow-teachers, Mr. Dixon, author of the
'English Instructor;' Mr. Kirkby, the learned writer of the 'Guide to the
English Tongue;' Mr. Newberry, creator of the 'Circle of the Sciences;'
Mr. Palairet, the famous compiler of the 'New English Spelling-book;' and
Mr. Pardon, author of 'Spelling New-Modelled.' Having gone through the
painful task of deprecating his friends, with the annexed modest
statement that the 'Critical Spelling-book' would be found superior to
any other work of the kind, past, present, or future, Mr. Lowe proceeded
to give his own rules, distinguished 'by the greatest simplicity. Through
the first chapter, treating of 'monosyllables,' John Clare made his way,
with some trouble; but the second, entering the field of 'polysyllables,'
brought him to a stop. Read as he might, poor John could not understand
the ever-changing value of 'oxytones,' 'penacutes,' 'ternacutes,'
'quartacutes,' and 'quintacutes,' and was still more bewildered when he
found that even after having got through all these hard words, there was
a still harder tail at the end of them, in the shape of 'exceptions from
the spelling-book--sounds of letters and syllables, some of which are
more simple, and may conveniently be learnt by a single direction, others
more complex, and may better be explained by being cast into phrases.'
Finding it absolutely impossible to get over the oxytones, he shrunk back
from the quartacutes and quintacutes as beyond the reach of an ordinary
human being, and gave up the study in despair. He next put 'Lowe's
Critical Spelling-book' into the old cupboard where his mother used to
look after his poems--for culinary purposes. But the good housewife never
burnt the 'Critical Spelling-book;' it being, probably, too tough for
her, in all its hide-bound solidity. As for John Clare, he entirely
failed in learning grammar and spelling, remaining ignorant of the sister