io 4 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



love ; s&vinm&k, to love one's self ; and so on, in which the derivative 

 elements indicate, in the various forms, negation, causation, the reflex- 

 ive quality, and other ideas, which in our language have to be ex- 

 pressed by separate words. 



The larger number of languages are in the secondary or agglutina- 

 tive stage. Among them are the negro, Malay, Polynesian, Dra- 

 vidian, Altaic, Basque, and American languages or families of lan- 

 guages. But community of structure is no sign of relationship ; it 

 only indicates that two or more languages are in the same stage of 

 evolution. 



Some languages have made but little progress in agglutination, 

 while others have advanced a great way in it. Some of the Western 

 African negro languages still use, with agglutinative forms, processes 

 that appertain to the monosyllabic structure. These are not cases of 

 return to ancient forms, but are survivals of ancient forms in the 

 midst of more complex formations. Some idioms, also, perpetually 

 betray the evidences of the passage from monosyllablism to aggluti- 

 nation. Such languages have no literary value, and are not at all 

 prominent ; but they are like those obscure vegetable or animal spe- 

 cies which are frequently richer in facts for the botanist or zoologist 

 than other species that are usually esteemed much more useful or 

 beautiful. 



It is not quite so easy to explain the phenomena of the evolution 

 from agglutination to flexion. The principle by which the evolution 

 takes place is that of a phonic modification of the root. In the Indo- 

 European languages, among which are included the Sanskrit, Persian, 

 Greek, Latin, etc., evolution took place, according to M. Victor Henry, 

 not only in this way, but by an agglutination of infixes also. But this 

 point is not yet cleared up. 



If we consider the ancient languages of the Indo-European family 

 Sanskrit, Greek, and Latin we shall find that they are in different 

 degrees synthetic ; while, if we examine the characters of the modern 

 branches of the family, we shall discover that they are analytical. This 

 effect is the work of linguistic decadence, which has been less rapid 

 in the Slavic languages than in the Germanic, in the Germanic than 

 in the Romanic languages. 



This decadence, which constitutes a new phase of evolution, is not 

 brought about by chance. Regarding it phonetically, we see in it the 

 results of the least effort. Diphthongs are condensed, as when in Latin 

 veicos and cleivos become vicus and dens. Assimilation takes place 

 among the consonants, as when noctem, night, becomes notte, or sep- 

 tem, seven, sette, or when the earlier s-sound is softened into a simple 

 aspirate. A considerable number of phonetic variations, which baffle 

 persons not familiar with linguistic studies, are justified by comparison 

 with other words. 



Grammatical decadence also corresponds with a simplification. The 



