RULES FOR SPELLING._

RULE I.--FINAL F, L, OR S.

Monosyllables ending in _f, l_, or _s_, preceded by a single vowel, double
the final consonant; as _staff, mill, pass--muff, knell, gloss--off, hiss,
puss_.

EXCEPTIONS.--The words _clef, if_, and _of_, are written with single _f_;
and _as, gas, has, was, yes, his, is, this, us, pus_, and _thus_, with
single _s_. So _bul_, for the flounder; _nul_, for _no_, in law; _sol_, for
_sou_ or _sun_; and _sal_, for _salt_, in chemistry, have but the single
_l_.

OBS.--Because _sal, salis_, in Latin, doubles not the _l_, the chemists
write _salify, salifiable, salification, saliferous, saline, salinous,
saliniform, salifying_, &c., with single _l_, contrary to Rule 3d. But in
_gas_ they ought to double the _s_; for this is a word of their own
inventing. Neither have they any plea for allowing it to form _gases_ and
_gaseous_ with the _s_ still single; for so they make it violate two
general rules at once. If the singular cannot now be written _gass_, the
plural should nevertheless be _gasses_, and the adjective should be
_gasseous_, according to Rule 3d.

RULE II.--OTHER FINALS.

Words ending in any other consonant than _f, l_, or _s_, do not double the
final letter; as, _mob, nod, dog, sum, sun, cup, cur, cut, fix, whiz_.

EXCEPTIONS.--We double the consonant in _abb, ebb, add, odd, egg, jagg,
ragg, inn, err, burr, purr, butt, buzz, fuzz, yarr_, and some proper names.
But we have also _ab_ (_from_) and _ad_ (_to_) for prefixes; and _jag, rag,
in, bur_, and _but_, are other words that conform to the rule.

RULE III.--DOUBLING.

Monosyllables, and words accented on the last syllable, when they end with
a single consonant preceded by a single vowel, or by a vowel after _qu_,
double their final consonant before an additional syllable that begins with
a vowel: as, _rob, robbed, robber; fop, foppish, foppery; squat, squatter,
squatting; thin, thinner, thinnest; swim, swimmer, swimming; commit,
committeth, committing, committed, committer, committees; acquit,
acquittal, acquittance, acquitted, acquitting, acquitteth_.

EXCEPTIONS.--1. X final, being equivalent to _ks_, is never doubled: thus,
from _mix_, we have _mixed, mixing_, and _mixer_. 2. When the derivative
retains not the accent of the root, the final consonant is not always
doubled: as, _prefer', pref'erence, pref'erable; refer', ref'erence,
ref'erable_, or _refer'rible; infer', in'ference, in'ferable_, or
_infer'ri