Leonard Gordon noted this interesting pattern in the May 1995 issue of Word Ways. The English names of the first eight positive integers (ONE, TWO, THREE, FOUR, FIVE, SIX, SEVEN, EIGHT) contain altogether 32 letters. The smallest rectangular grid into which they can all be packed, word-search fashion, is 5×5. Because some of the cells serve double duty, the 32 letters “fit” into 25 cells; the ratio of these values is 1.28. This ratio remains remarkably consistent as the list of numbers is extended — here are grids for the first 8, 9, 10, 11, and 12 numbers:

E I G H T   O N E E R H T   E I G H T F   E L E V E N S   S E V E N O W T
F O U R W   S E V E N I N   F   X   W O   I   F S O I E   F I V E E R H T
X I S   O   E I G H T W O   N I N E O U   G   O I T N V   O G X N E N I N
S E V E N   F O U R X I S   S E V E N R   H W U X V E E   U H E V L E W T
T H R E E                   T H R E E     T H R E E E N   R T N E V E L E
 8 words     9 words        10 words      11 words        12 words
32 letters  36 letters      39 letters    45 letters      51 letters
25 cells    28 cells        30 cells      35 cells        40 cells
(1.28)      (1.29)          (1.30)        (1.29)          (1.28)

Alas, the last one isn’t optimal, Gordon notes. The names ONE through TWELVE will fit into a more compact grid:

T W E L V E
F N E X S L
O F I V E E
U S G N V V
R T H R E E
O W T E N N

… and that raises the ratio to 1.42 letters per cell.

(Leonard Gordon, “Packing the Cardinals,” Word Ways 28:2 [May 1995], 116.)

In Aldiborontiphoskyphorniostikos, a Christmas party game from 1824, players had to take turns reading tongue-twisting passages as quickly as possible from a prepared list. Each passage represents a letter of the alphabet, and each builds on its forerunners. The worst is this:

TOBY PHILPOT sat tippling with UMPO, VUMPO, and WILLY WIDEMOUTH of Wolverhampton, when X and Y, two officers, brought in the culprit, while Saccharum Sweet Tooth said nothing, while Ramo Samee really swollowed a sword, while Sly Kia cried Quack! quack! quack! And turned into a duck, to escape from Poniatowsky, who said, To jail with the Juggler and Jade, as Mother Bunch on her broomstick cried, here’s a to-do! as Nicholas Hotch-potch said, Never were such times, as Muley Hassan, Mufti of Moldavia, put on his Barnacles, to see little Tweedle gobble them up, when Kia Khan Kreuse transmogrofied them into Pippins, because Snip’s wife cried, Illikipilliky! lass a-day! ’tis too bad to titter at a body, when Hamet el Mammet, the bottlenosed Barber of Balasora, laughed ha! ha! ha! on beholding the elephant spout mud over the ‘Prentice, who pricked his trunk with a needle, as Dicky Snip, the tailor, read the proclamation of Chrononhotonthologos, offering a thousand sequins for taking Bombardinian, Bashaw of three tails, who killed Aldiborontiphoskyphorniostikos.

A player who couldn’t pronounce a passage perfectly had to pay a penalty for each mistake. Here’s the whole list.

A poem by Susan Thorpe:

Bells tolled,
Abbot spoke.
Wooed Abbess.
Abbey woke!

The letters in each word appear in either alphabetical or reverse alphabetical order.

(Susan Thorpe, “Alphomes,” Word Ways 28:3 [August 1995], 136-139.)