THE EVOLUTION OF LANGUAGE. 159 



Language — a sign or gesture, a note or word, an in- 

 tonaticn. 



Down to this present hour these are still the 

 three great kinds of Language. The movement 

 of foot or ear has heen evolved into the modern 

 gesture or grimace ; the note or cry into a word, 

 and the intonation into an emphasis or inflection 

 of the voice. These are still, indeed, not only the 

 main elements in Language but the only elements. 

 The eloquence which enthralls the legislators of St. 

 Stephen's, or the appeal which melts the worshippers at 

 St. Paul's, originated in the voices of the forest and the 

 activities of the ant-hill. To those who have not 

 realized the exceeding smallness of the beginnings of 

 all new developments, the suggestion of science as to 

 the origin of Language, like many of its other sugges- 

 tions about early stages, will seem almost ludicrous. 

 But a knowledge of two things warns one not to look 

 for surprises at the beginning of Evolution but at the 

 end. In the first place, it is all but a cardinal principle 

 that developments are brought about by minute, slow 

 and insensible degrees. The second fact is even more 

 important. The theatre of change is the actual world, 

 and the exciting cause something really happening in 

 every-day life. 'New departures are not made in the 

 air. They arise in connection with some commonplace 

 event; and usually take the shape of some slightly 

 new response. In other connections, of course, the con- 

 verse is also true, but when a change occurs for the 

 first time in the life of an organism the exciting cause, 

 whatever the internal adaptation, or want of it, is 

 some change in the environment. Among the events 

 then, actually happening in the day's round, we are 



