So you thought texting-speak was new

[David A. Daniel]

Text message from 1860.

Essay to Miss Catharine Jay

An S A now I mean 2 write
2 U sweet K T J,
The girl without a ||,
The belle of U T K.

I 1 der if U got that 1
I wrote 2 U B 4
I sailed in the R K D A,
And sent by L N Moore. . . .

This S A, until U I C
I pray U 2 X Q's
And do not burn in F E G
My young and wayward muse.

Now fare U well, dear K T J,
I trust that U R true--
When this U C, then you can say,
An S A I O U.
(Charles Carroll Bombaugh, Gleanings From the Harvest-Fields of Literature.,
2nd ed. Baltimore: T. Newton Kurtz, 1860)
DAD

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