the Old Prussian, which was once spoken on the coast of the Baltic east of the Vistula, but became extinct in the seventeenth century. The connexion between this and the preceding branch is such that they are often classed together as the Letto-Slavic languages.

§ 9. VIII. The TEUTONIC. Here again the earliest monument is a version of the Bible, made by Ulfilas, an Arian bishop of the fourth century, into his native Gothic (or Moso-Gothic), the language spoken at that time by the Goths on the Lower Danube. This work is preserved only in fragments, but these are of considerable extent, and are of inestimable value to the philologist. Among the Teutonic languages we distinguish,

§ 10. 1. The High Germanic, in Upper or Southern Germany. The Old High German is seen in Otfrid's Krist, Notker's Translation of the Psalms, and other monuments, most of them in verse, from the eighth century to the end of the eleventh. The Middle High German, from the twelfth to the fifteenth century, has a rich poetical literature, including the Nibelungen. Nôt with its attendant epics, and the lyric poetry of the Minnesinger. The New High German is the language of Luther's Bible-version and of all German literature since the Reformation.

§ 11. 2. The Low Germanic, in Northern Germany and the Netherlands. Here belong, (a.) The Friesic, which was once spoken along the whole northern coast of Germany, from the Elbe westward. Its early monuments consist almost wholly of laws, beginning with the fourteenth century. For a long

time it has existed only as a popular idiom, and is now confined to a few small and scattered localities. (b.) The Anglo-Saxon (sometimes called simply Saxon), which in the fifth and sixth centuries was transplanted from North-eastern Germany to Britain, and has had its subsequent development and history in that island. (c.) The Old Saxon, which was spoken in Northern Germany between the Rhine and the Elbe, south of the narrow sea-coast region, which was occupied by the Friesic. It is known almost solely from the Heliand (i.e., Saviour), a metrical narration of the Gospel history, preserved in manuscripts of the ninth century. The language of the Netherlands in the same period cannot have differed much from the Old Saxon, which may be regarded as the common parent of the two following idioms. (d.) The Dutch, or Low Dutch, spoken in Holland, and used in literature since the latter part of the thirteenth century. The Flemish, spoken in Flanders, is a dialect of the Dutch. (e.) The Low German, strictly so called (or Plattdeutsch), the idiom of the common people in Northern Germany. In the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, it was used as a literary language; but political circumstances, giving ascendency to the High German, have reduced it to the inferior position of a popular dialect.

§ 12. 3. The Norse, or Scandinavian. The Old Norse is also called Old Icelandic, as most of its abundant literature (Eddas, Sagas, etc.) was composed in Iceland. The oldest manuscripts in which it is preserved are of the thirteenth century; but many of its productions are of earlier origin, going

back even to the heathen times of Scandinavia. The modern Icelandic has adhered with remarkable fidelity to the forms of the ancient language. But the modern idioms of the Scandinavian mainland, the Swedish, and, still more, the Danish (of which the Norwegian is only a dialect), have undergone extensive changes.

$13. Languages not kindred to the English. The Indo-European family has no isolated domain, but comes in contact with various other families of languages. It is bounded along its whole northern frontier by the Tartaric (or Tataric) family (called also the Turanian, or the Altaic), which includes the numerous and widely-different languages of the Manchoos, the Mongols, the Turks (in Asia and Europe), the Magyars (in Hungary), the Finns, and a multitude of other tribes. To the south-east, it touches on the so-called Dravidian family, the Tamil and its sister idioms in Ceylon and Southern India. In South-western Asia it is in contact with a more remarkable family, -the Semitic,-including the Hebrew, Syriac, Arabic, and Ethiopic, with their ancient and important literatures. Even in South-western Europe, it is doubtful whether the ancient Etruscan belonged to our family. It is perfectly clear that the ancient Iberian did not belong to it, which was once the prevailing language of the Spanish peninsula, and which still lives, on the two sides of the Pyrenees, in the strange language called Basque (Biscayan, or Euscarra). Whether the Indo-European has a primitive connexion with any of the adjacent families, is a question which has not been, and perhaps never will

be, decided by philological evidence. At all events, it is certain that between Welsh and Sanskrit, distant as they are in space and time, there is an infinitely closer connection than between the neighbouring pairs of Russian and Finnish, German and Hungarian, or Greek and Hebrew. It is true that some languages of our family have borrowed particular words from languages of other families. The English, for example, has taken from the Hebrew such words as shekel, cherub, seraph, jubilee, pharisee, cabala, etc.; and from some of them has formed derivatives, such as seraphic, jubilant, pharisaical, pharisaism, cabalist, cabalistical, etc. But this borrowing can only occur where there are historical conditions that favour it: even then it has its limits and its distinctive marks, and must not be confounded with a radical affinity between two languages. All etymologizing which assumes or implies a radical affinity between English and Hebrew, English and Finnish, or the like, is, in the present state of philology, unscientific and illusory.

GENERAL FEATURES OF THE TEUTONIC
LANGUAGES, PARTICULARLY THE

ANGLO-SAXON.

§14. Progression of Mutes. In examining the sounds of the Teutonic languages, we find that the primitive Indo-European mutes have undergone a remarkable series of changes. Thus, the rough mutes of the primitive language, bh, dh, gh (Greek 4, 9, x), have in the Gothic passed into the middle

mutes, b, d, g: the primitive middle mutes, b, d, g, into the smooth, p, t, k; and the primitive smooth mutes, p, t, k, into the rough, f, th (p), h. The other Teutonic languages agree in this respect with the Gothic. But the High German has gone one step farther. It has changed the Gothic b, d, g, into p, t, k; the Gothic p, t, k, into f, z (for th), ch; and the Gothic th (Þ) into d. But the Middle and New High German (as, in part, also the Old High German) have the Gothic b and g, without change. To these rules the exceptions are somewhat numerous: in part, they depend on special laws,-thus, after 8, the primitive smooth mutes remain unchanged,-but other cases still appear as anomalous. Yet the general validity of the rules admits of no doubt. The following examples will serve as illustrations :—

§ 15. Variation of Vowels. It is a thing of familiar occurrence in all the Teutonic languages, that the same root appears with a variety of vowelsounds, as in sing, sang, sung, song; bind, bound, band, bond. Similar variations of vowel-sound are met with in other languages. What is peculiar to