preponderance. Thus, there is left in French only an insignificant
trace of the Celtic dialects of the predominant race constituent
of the French people; French is the speech of
the Latin conquerors of Gaul, mixed perceptibly with that
of its later Frankish conquerors; it was adopted in its integrity
by the Norse conquerors of a part of the land, then brought
into Britain by the same Norsemen in the course of their further
conquests, this time only as an element of mixture, and thence
carried with English speech to America, to be the language of
a still further mixed community. Almost every possible phase
of language-mixture is traceable in the history of the abundant
words of Latin origin used by American negroes. What events
of this character took place in prehistoric time we shall never
be able to tell. If any one chooses to assert the possibility that
even the completely isolated dialect of the little Basque community
may have been derived by the Iberian race from an intrusive
minority as small as that which made the Celts of Gaul speakers
of Latin, we should have to admit it as a possibility—yet
without detriment to the value of the dialect as indicating the
isolated race-position of its speakers. In strictness, language
is never a proof of race, either in an individual or in a community;
is only a probable indication of race, in the absence
of more authoritative opposing indications; it is one evidence,
to be combined with others, in the approach towards a solution
of the confessedly insoluble problems of human history. But
we must notice, as a most important circumstance, that its
degree of probability is greatest where its aid is most needed,
in prehistoric periods and among uncultivated races; since it
is mainly civilization that gives to language a propagative force
disproportionate to the number of its speakers. On the whole,
the contributions of language to ethnology are practically far
greater in amount and more distinct than those derived from
any other source.
The genetical classification of languages, then, is to be taken for just what it attempts to be, and no more: primarily as a classification of languages only; but secondarily as casting light, in varying manner and degree, on movements of community, which in their turn depend more or less upon movements of races. It is what Classification. the fates of men have left to represent the tongues of men—a record imperfect even to fragmentariness. Many a family once as important as some of those here set down has perhaps been wiped out of existence, or is left only in an inconspicuous fragment, one and another has perhaps been extended far beyond the limits of the race that shaped it—which, we can never tell to our satisfaction.
1. Indo-European (Indo-Germanic) Family.—To this family belongs incontestably the first place, and for many reasons: the historical position of the peoples speaking its dialects, who have now long been the leaders in the world's history; the abundance and variety and merit of its literature's, ancient and modern, which, especially the modern, are wholly u nap pro ached by those of any other division of mankind; the period covered by its records; and, most of all, the great variety and richness of its development. These advantages make of it an illustration of the history of human speech with which no other family can bear a moment's comparison as to value, however important various other families may be in their bearing on one and another point or department of history, and however necessary the combination of the testimony of all to a solution of the problems involved in speech. These advantages have made Indo-European language the training-ground of comparative philology, and its study will always remain the leading branch of that science. Many matters of importance in its history have been brought up and used as illustrations in the preceding discussion; but as its constitution and ascertained development call for a fuller and more systematic exposition than they have found here, a special section is devoted to the subject (see Part II. below, also Indo-European Language)
2. Semitic Family.—This family also is beyond all question the second in importance, on account of the part which its peoples (Hebrews, Phoenicians, Assyrians, Syrians, Arabs, Abyssinians, &c.) have played in history, and of the rank of its literature's. For a special treatment of it see Semitic Languages. Some of the peculiarities of the language have been alluded to above; in the monotony and rigidity of its trilateral roots, and in the extended use which it makes of internal vowel-change (“inflexion” in the special sense of that term) for the purposes of grammatical distinction, it is more peculiar and unlike all the other known families of language than these are unlike one another. There are, and perhaps will always be, those to whom the peculiarities just mentioned will seem original; but if the views of language and its history taken above are in the main true, then that opinion is untenable; Semitic language must have grown into its present forms out of beginnings accordant in kind, if not identical in substance, with those of other families; and the only question remaining to be solved is, through what processes and under what governing tendencies Semitic speech should have arrived at its present state. And with this solution is most obviously and incontestably bound up that of the other interesting and much discussed question, whether the Semitic family can be shown to be related with other families, especially with the Indo-European. To some the possession in common of grammatical gender, or of the classification of objects in general as masculine and feminine, is of itself enough to prove such relationship; but, though the fact is a striking one, and of no small importance as an indication, this degree of value can by no means be attributed to it in the present state of our knowledge-any more than to any other single item of structure among the infinite variety of such, distributed among the multitude of human tongues. Many others compare the Semitic and Indo-European “roots” with one another, and believe themselves to find there numerous indications of identity of material and signification; but these also must pass for insufficient, until it shall prove possible by their aid to work out an acceptable theory of how Semitic structure should have grown out of such radical elements as underlie Indo-European structure, or out of the accordant initial products of a structural growth that afterwards diverged into two so discordant forms. To show that, both the material and the method have been hitherto wanting, and any confident decision is at least premature; but present probabilities are strongly against the solubility of the question. While many general considerations favour the ultimate unity of these two great civilized and civilizing white races of neighbouring homes, and no discordance of speech (as was shown above) can ever be made to prove their diversity of origin, it seems in a high degree unlikely that the evidence of speech will ever be made to prove them one.
3. Hamitic Family.—The prominent importance of this family (see Hamitic Languages) is due to a single one of its members, the Egyptian. It occupies the north-eastern corner of Africa, with the border-lands of that continent stretching westward along the whole shore of the Mediterranean, and southward to beyond the equator. It falls into three principal divisions: (1) the ancient Egyptian, with its descendant, the more modern Coptic (itself now for some centuries extinct; see Egypt, Copts); (2) the Libyan or Berber languages of northern Africa; (3) the Ethiopic languages of eastern Africa. Its situation thus plainly suggests the theory of its intrusion from Asia, across the isthmus of Suez, and its gradual spread from that point; and the theory is strongly favoured by the physical character of the Hamites, and the historical position, especially of the Egyptians, so strikingly different from that of the African races in general. Linguistic evidences of the relationship of Hamite with Semite have also been sought, and by many believed to be found; but the maintenance of the two families in their separateness is an indication that those evidences have not yet been accepted as satisfactory; and such is indeed the case. The Egyptian is a language of extreme simplicity of structure, almost of no structure at all. Its radical words are partly monosyllabic, partly of more than one syllable, but not in the latter case any more than in the former showing traceable signs of extension by formative processes from simpler
