Before requiring the student to apply himself to a knowledge of the present forms and classifications of the letters of our alphabet, he should become familiar with their history and the primitive forms of writing. He should also note the important national changes that have caused a transition from one form into another, until our present advanced era has been reached with its great variety of styles, distinctively different in character one from another, and each arising from some important period in the world's history in which the funda mental or parent style was closely allied to a corresponding style of architecture.