LANGUAGE AND RACE. 409 



dialects, each with a different word for ear, eye^ head, and 

 other equally common words. 



Pliny tells us that in Colchis there were more than 300 

 dialects. In 1630, Sagard found that among the Hurons 

 of North America there were hardly two villages with the 

 same speech ; while each of the numerous dialects was 

 changing from year to year. Captain Gordon records the 

 fact that some of the Manipuran dialects were spoken by 

 no more than thirty or forty families ; and the differences 

 between them were so great, that the speech of one group of 

 families was nearly unintelligible to the other groups around. 



As civilisation advances, the improved social conditions 

 tend to break down the differences, and a common medium 

 of intercourse spreads over large areas. 



Of the larger subdivisions of language, we are naturally 

 most concerned with the Semitic and Aryan groups. They 

 are both of the inflectional type ; but the character of their 

 inflection is very dissimilar. The Semitic is a small and 

 very compact family, and its members do not differ more 

 among themselves than do the Romance languages of 

 Western Europe. There is far greater variety in the Aryan 

 family ; but, nevertheless, if any one thing distinguishes 

 a member of it, it is the persistency of type, the general 

 fixity of grammatical form, and the common residuum of 

 roots, which at once enable its character to be seen. 



In both Aryan and Semitic the inflectional defining 

 element is most firmly united with the principal root, but 

 the mode of union is widely different. 



The Semitic tongues are known by the fact that their 

 radicals, or roots, consist of three consonants; though, in 

 some cases, the third is often barely represented. Vowels 

 which modify the meaning are placed before, between, or 



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