edge of the language."

Homer said, "So have the other members of my former Reunited Nations team.
That's where those books you found came from. Elmer, Bey, Kenny ... and
Abe ... and I used to play around with it when we were out in the desert,
just to kill time. We also used it as sort of a secret language when we
wanted to communicate and didn't know if those around us might understand
some English."

"I still don't get the picture," Cliff argued. "If we picked the most
common half a dozen languages in the territory we cover, then millions
of these people wouldn't have to study a second language. But if you
adapt Esperanto as an official language then _everybody_ is going to
have to learn something new. And that's not going to be easy for our
ninety-five per cent illiterate followers."

Isobel said thoughtfully, "Well, it's a darn sight easier to learn
Esperanto than any other language we decided to make official."

"Why?" Cliff said argumentatively.

* * * * *

Jack Peters took over. "Because it's almost unbelievably easy to
learn. English, by the way, is extremely difficult. For instance,
spelling and pronunciation are absolutely phonetic in Esperanto and
there are only five vowel sounds where most national languages have
twenty or so. And each sound in the alphabet has one sound only and
any sound is always rendered by the same letter."

Dave Moroka said, "Actually, I don't know anything at all about this
Esperanto."

The West Indian took him in, with a dominating glance. "Take grammar and
syntax which can take up volumes in other languages. Esperanto has exactly
sixteen short rules. And take vocabularies. For instance, in English we
often form the feminine of a noun by adding _ess--actor-actress_,
_tiger-tigress_. But not always. We don't say _bull-bulless_ or
_ghost-ghostess_. In Esperanto you simply add the feminine ending to any
noun--there's no exception to any rule."

Jack Peters was caught up in his subject. "Still comparing it to
English, realize that spelling and pronunciation in English are highly
irregular and one letter can have several different sounds, and one
sound may be represented by different letters. And there are even
silent letters which are written but not pronounced like the _ugh_ in
_though_. There are none of these irregularities in Esperanto. And the
sounds are all sharp with none of such subtle differences as, say,
_bed/bad/bard/bawd_, that sort