‘Remember that craze a few years back in the BookWorld for sending chain letters ? Receive a letter and send one on to ten friends ? Well, someone has been over-enthusiastic with the letter “U”. I’ve got a report here from the Text Sea Environmental Protection Agency saying that reserves of the letter “U” have reached dangerously low levels - we need to decrease soncumption until stocks are brought back up. Any suggestion ?’

‘How about using a lower-case “N” upside down ?’ said Benedict.

‘We tried that with “M” and “W” during the Grat “M” Migration of ‘62; it never worked.’

‘How about respelling what, what?’ suggested King Pellinore, stroking his large white moustache. ‘Any word with the “our” ending could be spelt “or”, dontchaknow.’

‘Like neighbor instead of neighbour?’

‘It’s a good idea,’ put in Snell. ‘Labor, valor, flavor, harbor - there are hundreds. If we confine it to one gregraphical area we can claim it as a local spelling indiosyncrasy.’