Particularly Designed For Persons Who Have Little Time To Study, Or Are Their Own Instructors.

Preface

Multum in parvo is the object of this small book; in which the student will find all the elements necessary to enable him in a very short time to enter into a conversation on the most usual topics.

For this purpose, and in order that he may understand the questions put, or the answers given to him, should they be expressed in words different in tense or number from those contained in the dialogues, and also to afford him the best means to vary them himself, it has been deemed expedient to prefix to the vocabularies a synopsis of the Spanish language. The learner is earnestly desired to study it attentively, so as to become perfectly familiar with the conjugation of the verbs; a thorough knowledge of which will render his progress easy, sure, and speedy.

Persons unaccustomed to commit tasks to memory, will do well to begin by learning daily a set number (say five) of nouns, adjectives, or verbs, and as many phrases as they can remember well; repeating always the English before the Spanish. Such exercise being steadily pursued for a month, the student will have acquired an aggregate of more than five hundred of the words most frequently used in common intercourse. This plan has been often tried, and its results have constantly exceeded the most sanguine expectations.

Should the student wish to acquire a thorough knowledge of the Spanish, even without the assistance of a teacher, he may do so by studying Ollendorff’s New Method, by M. Velazquez and T. Simonné, published by D. Appleton & Co., No. 443 Broadway.

This work will also be found very useful for the younger classes of learners, as an introduction to Ollendorff, or any other Spanish grammar, as it contains in a few pages, and exhibits in the plainest manner, the elements necessary to enable them to make a very easy and rapid progress in the study of this language.