ERRATA.

Page 95, $ 79, col. 7, for mûs read mys.

Page 128, footnote 1, dele from We to beyond, and add, arent = O.E. anefent on-efn, on-emn = even with, against, &c.

=

Page 171, footnote 1. The theory of Rückumlaut, or a return to an original sound which has undergone umlaut, though adopted by most German philologists, cannot be defended. Mr. Sweet has, in the Academy, very clearly explained the apparent vowel-change in such weak verbs as told, sold, &c.

The Gothic saljan, to sell, represents the primitive form of the verb in which umlaut has not taken place, as it has in O. Eng. sellan (= selian). In the infinitive mood and present tense the suffix i dropped out after umlaut had taken place; but in the preterite salde (= salide), sold, the i dropped out without causing umlaut, so that the root-vowel was thus preserved.

Page 176, line 12, for § 283 read 282.

Page 228, line 8, an-hungred is not found in the oldest English, but is met with in subsequent periods.

Page 229, line 11, for many read navy.

HISTORICAL OUTLINES

OF

ENGLISH ACCIDENCE.

CHAPTER I.

FAMILIES OF LANGUAGES.

1. WORDS are articulate sounds used to express perception and thought. The aggregate of these articulate sounds, accepted by and current among any community, we call speech or language.

2. The language of the same community often presents local varieties; to these varieties we give the name of dialects.

3. Grammar treats of the words of which language is composed, and of the laws by which it is governed.

4. The science of Grammar is of two kinds: (a) Descriptive Grammar, which classifies, arranges, and describes words as separate parts of speech, and notes the changes they undergo under certain conditions.

(6) Comparative Grammar, which is based on the study of words, goes beyond the limits of Descriptive Grammar; that is, beyond the mere statement of facts. It analyses words, accounts for the changes they have undergone, and endeavours to trace them back to their origin. It thus deals with the growth of language.

Descriptive Grammar teaches us that the word loveth is a verb, indicative mood, &c. Comparative Grammar informs us, (1) that the radical part of the verb is lov (or luf), denoting desire (cp. Lat. lubeo); (2) that the suffix -th is a remnant of a demonstrative pronoun signifying he, that, of the same origin as the -t in lube-t.

5. Comparative Grammar has shown us that languages may be classified in two ways: (1) According to the peculiarities of their grammatical structure, or the mode of denoting the relation of words to one another; (2) according to historical relationship.

6. The first mode of classification is called a morphological one. It divides languages into, (1) Monosyllabic or Isolating; (2) Agglutinative; (3) Inflectional or Polysyllabic.

These terms also represent three periods in the growth of languages -that is to say, that language, as an organism, may pass through three stages. (1) The monosyllabic period, in which roots are used as words, without any change of form.

In this stage there are no prefixes or suffixes, and no formally distinguished parts of speech.

The Chinese is the best example of a language in the isolating or monosyllabic stage.

"Every word in Chinese is monosyllabic; and the same word, without any change of form, may be used as a noun, a verb, an adjective, an adverb, or a particle. Thus ta, according to its position in a sentence, may mean great, greatness, to grow, very much, very.

"We cannot in Chinese (as in Latin) derive from ferrum, iron, a new substantive ferrarius, a man who works in iron, a blacksmith; ferraria, an iron mine, and again ferrariarius, a man who works in an iron mine; all this is possible only in an inflected language. --MAX MULLER.

(2) The agglutinative period. In this stage two unaltered roots are joined together to form words; in these compounds one root becomes subordinate to the other, and so loses its independence.1 Cf. man-kind, heir-loom, war-like, which are agglutinative compounds. The Finnish, Hungarian, Turkish, the Tamul, &c., are agglutinative languages.

The Basque and American languages are agglutinative, with this difference, that the roots which are joined together have been abbreviated, as in the Basque ilhun, "twilight," from hill, dead + egun, day. In the Mexican language their compound terms are equivalent to phrases and sentences, achichillacachocan, "the place where people weep because the water is red;" from alt, chichiltic, "red;" tlacatl, ". man ; " and chorea," weep."

"water;

It has been proposed to call these languages polysynthetic or incorporating. It is remarkable that most of these languages show that the people who speak them are deficient in the power of abstraction.

1 Cp. Hungarian var-at-andot-ta-tok (= wait-and-will-have-you)= you will have been waited for