LANGUAGES OF THE WORLD 



3327 



LANIER 



is spoken in the most countries? Which is 

 spreading most rapidly? 



First of all, it is estimated that there are in 

 the world over 5,000 languages and dialects. 

 Certain of the dialects, to be sure, differ from 

 each other very slightly, but some of the lan- 

 guages are as far apart as is civilization from 

 savagery. And in all these tongues there are 

 no fewer than 300 different articulations 300 

 ways in which the vocal organs must be used 

 to produce sounds. Some of the more primi- 

 tive tongues make use of but a very few, 

 sounding to the unaccustomed ear almost like 

 a series of grunts; while English, on the other 

 hand, uses almost fifty. Probably no language, 

 unless it was the ancient Sanskrit, has ever 

 made use of more. 



The Chief Languages. As to the number of 

 people speaking the various important tongues, 

 and the countries in which they are spoken, 

 the table on page 3326 gives such information 

 in compact form. No account is taken of the 

 languages of savage tribes, whicfy have received 

 comparatively little study, and concerning 

 which no estimates can be given. 



From this table it may be seen that Chinese 

 is spoken by more people than any other lan- 

 guage in the world. English ranks next, and is 

 thus first among the European languages. Of 

 these Russian is second and German third, but 

 both of these are less widespread than Hindu- 

 stani. 



It is an interesting fact that the languages 

 of all the most important peoples of the world, 

 except the Chinese and Japanese, belong to one 

 great family, the Aryan or Indo-Germanic 

 group of languages. Tongues as different as 

 Hindustani, Russian and English are all mem- 

 bers of this group, which includes every tongue 

 of Europe except the Basque, which is unre- 

 lated, so far as anyone knows, to any other 

 language. Ex oriente lux, a popular saying 

 meaning Light out oj the East, may thus apply 

 not only to religion but to language as well, for 

 just as every great religion of the world origi- 

 nated in Asia, so, it is believed, did the one 

 parent tongue from which all the Aryan lan- 

 guages are sprung have its first home in Asia, 

 the continent of beginnings. A.MC c. 



Related Subjects. The important languages 

 of the world are treated in separate articles in 

 these volumes : 



Bengali 



English Language 

 Esperanto 

 Flemish Languages 

 and Literature 



French Language 

 German Language 

 Greek Language 

 Hebrew Language and 

 Literature 



Hieroglyphics Romance Languages 



Italian Language Sanskrit Language and 

 Latin Language Literature 



Plattdeutsch Sign Language 



ProvenQal Language Syriac 



and Literature Volaplik 



LANIER, laneer', SIDNEY (1842-1881), the 

 greatest poet of the South since Edgar Allen 

 Poe. He is called the "sunrise poet," so deeply 

 did he love and so truly did he interpret the 

 freshness, the hush, the misty twilight spell of 

 the early morning hours. His verse was the 

 product of his theory that poetry, like music, 

 should appeal to the ear, and like that of Poe 

 it represents a melodious blending of sound 

 and sense. He was a prose writer of note also, 

 and is known to children for his adaptation of 

 the Mabinogion, the chronicles of Froissart, 

 and the story of King Arthur, and for such 

 delightful sketches as Bob: The Story of Our 

 Mocking Bird and The Story of a Proverb. 

 His fame has grown steadily since his death, 

 and the North as well as the South honors his 

 genius. 



Lanier was born in Macon, Ga., and edu- 

 cated at Oglethorpe College, in that state. 

 During the War of Secession he fought on the 

 Confederate side, and while a prisoner he wrote 

 some of his first verses. From the exposures 

 and hardships of war he developed consump- 

 tion, which he fought heroically into middle 

 life, but it finally caused his death. 



His literary career began in 1867, with the 

 publishing of an unsuccessful novel, Tiger 

 Lilies, founded on his war experiences. One 

 of his first poems, Corn, appeared in Lip- 

 pincott's Magazine in 1875 and attracted so 

 much attention that he was asked to write the 

 words to a cantata composed by Dudley Buck 

 and sung at the Centennial Exposition. The 

 first complete edition of his poems appeared 

 in 1876. In 1879 he was appointed lecturer on 

 English literature at Johns Hopkins University, 

 and during his engagement there he published 

 two critical volumes of considerable impor- 

 tance: Science of English Verse (1880), and 

 The English Novel and the Principles of Its 

 Development (1883). The latter is composed 

 of lectures delivered at Johns Hopkins at a 

 time when he was so weak he had to sit during 

 his talks. 



Lanier's finest and most spiritual work is 

 the Hymns oj the Marshes, two of which, Sun- 

 rise and The Marshes of Glynn, are the won- 

 derful imaginative songs of a dying man. 

 These Hymns rank among the best productions 

 of American poetry. His Song of the Chatta- 



