214 METHODS AND RESULTS OF ETHNOLOGY n 



Since the time of Leibnitz, and guided by such 

 men as Humboldt, Abel Remusat, and Klaproth, 

 Philology has taken far higher ground. Thus 

 Prichard affirms that " the history of nations, 

 termed Ethnology, must be mainly founded on 

 the relations of their languages." 



An eniment living philologer, August Schleicher, 

 in a recent essay, puts forward the claims of his 

 science still more forcibly : 



"If, however, language is the human /car* Qoxfo, the sug- 

 gestion arises whether it should not form the basis of any 

 scientific systematic arrangement of mankind ; whether the 

 foundation of the natural classification of the genus Homo 

 has not been discovered in it. 



" How little constant are cranial peculiarities and other so- 

 called race characters ! Language, on the other hand, is 

 always a perfectly constant diagnostic. A German may occa- 

 sionally compete in hair and prognathism with a negro, but a 

 negro language will never be his mother tongue. Of how little 

 importance for mankind the so-called race characters are, is 

 shown by the fact that speakers of languages belonging to one 

 and the same linguistic family may exhibit the peculiarities 

 of various races. Thus the settled Osmanli Turk exhibits 

 Caucasian characters, whilst other so-caUed Tartaric Turks 

 exemplify the Mongol type. On the other hand, the Magyar 

 and the Basque do not depart in any essential physical peculi- 

 arity from the Indo -Germans, whilst the Magyar, "Basque, and 

 Indo-Germanic tongues are widely different. Apart from their 

 inconstancy, again, the so-called race characters can hardly 

 yield a scientifically natural system. Languages, on the other 

 hand, readily fall into a natural arrangement, like that of whicli 

 other vital products are susceptible, especially when viewed 

 from their morphological side. . . . The externally visible 

 itructure of the cerebral and facial skeletons, and of the body 

 generally, is less important than that no less material but 



