y eksept for iksept 'except',
ekstr[e][o]:din[er]ri for ikstr[o]dnri 'extraordinary', often for
[o]:fn 'often'. We feel that such artificialities cannot but impair
the beauty of the language.' Dictionary, 1st edition, Preface, p.v.]

[Footnote 29: In the first edition of the Dictionary [1913] [e] has
only one interpretation, the illustration being the _a_ of _about_.
In the _Phonetic Transcriptions_ [1907] it was the _er_ of _over_,
but in the new Dictionary [1917] [e] has three interpretations with
the following explanation: '[e] varies noticeably according to its
position in the word and in the sentence. In final positions it is
often replaced (_sic_) by "[Greek: L]" [=_u_ of _up_], in other
positions its quality varies considerably according to the nature of
the surrounding sounds; the variations extend from almost "[Greek:
L]" to the half-close mixed position. Three different values may
be heard in the words _china_, _cathedral_: in the latter word the
second "[e]" has a lower and more retracted tongue-position than the
first [e].'

The value of [e] when Mr. Jones first substituted it for a disguised
unaccented vowel, was that the speaker might know what sound he had to
produce. It was wrong, but it was definite. Mr. Jones would now make
it less wrong by making it less definite. That is, in the place of
something distinctly wrong we are offered something which has an
offchance of being nearly right: but as it has entirely ousted and
supplanted the original vowel I do not see how there is any means of
interpreting it correctly. The _er_ of _over_ is a definite sound, and
to print it where it was out of place was a definite error--to give it
three interpretations makes it cover more ground: but its usurpations
are still indefensible.]

7. _ON THE CLAIM THAT SOUTHERN ENGLISH HAS TO REPRESENT ALL BRITISH
SPEECH._

On this head certainly I can write nothing worth reading. Whether
there is any one with so wide a knowledge of all the main different
forms of English now spoken, their historic development and
chief characteristics, as to be able to summarize the situation
convincingly, I do not know. I can only put a few of the most evident
phenomena in the relation in which they happen to affect my judgement.

And first of all I put the small local holding which the Southern
English dialect can claim on the map of the British Empire. It is
plain that with such a narrow habitat it must show proof that it
possesses ver