THE EVOLUTION OF LANGUAGE, 173 



finds in a fern or a cray-fish. A fern or a cray-fish 

 is the expression of an infinitely subtle and intricate 

 adaptation, while a word may be a mere caprice. 

 Perhaps, indeed, the greatest marvel about philology 

 is that there should be a philology at all — that 

 Languages should be so rich in association, so 

 pregnant with the history and poetry of the past. 

 Into the problem, therefore, of how the infinite 

 variety of words in a Language was acquired it is 

 unnecessary to enter at length. Once the idea 

 had dawned of expressing meaning by sounds, the 

 formation of words and even of Languages is a mere 

 detail. We have probably all invented words. Al- 

 most every family of children invents words of its 

 own, and cases are known where quite considerable 

 Languages have been manufactured in the nursery. 

 When boys play at brigands and pirates they invent 

 pass- words and names, and from mere love of secrets 

 and mysteries concoct vocabularies which no one can 

 understand but themselves. 



This simple fact indeed has been used with great 

 plausibility to account for differences in dialect among 

 different tribes, and even for the partial origin of new 

 Languages. Thus the structure of the Lidian lan- 

 guages has long puzzled philologists. Whitney in- 

 forms us that as regards the material of expression, 

 there is "irreconcilable diversity " among them. 

 "There are a very considerable number of groups 

 between whose significant signs exist no more appar- 

 ent correspondences than between those of English, 

 Hungarian, and Malay ; none namely which may not 

 be merely fortuitous." To account for these dialects 

 a suggestion, as interesting as it is ingenious, has been 



