and after thousands and thousands and thousands of years, and after hieroglyphics and demotics, and nilotics, and cryptics, and cufics, and runics, and dorics, and ionics, and all sorts of other ricks and tricks (because the woons, and the neguses, and the akhoonds, and the repositories of tradition would never leave a good thing alone when they saw it), the fine old easy, understandable alphabet a, b, c, d, e, and the rest of ‘em got back into its proper shape again for all best beloveds to learn when they are old enough.