16 DAItWINISM TESTED BY 



coinciding in a remarkable degree with. 

 Darwin's views on " the struggle for life," 

 on the extinction of ancient forms, on the 

 widely-spread varieties of individual species 

 in the field of speech, as far back as the 

 year 1860 — that is to say, contempora- 

 neously v/ith the publication of the Ger- 

 man Darwin.* Can you wonder now that 

 the book has made so strong an im- 

 pression on me? 



If you further wish to know what kind 

 of an impression the " Origin of Species," 

 has made upon me, I am quite willing 

 to gratify your curiosity, and that of the 

 pnblic at large. To point out how the main 

 features of Darwin's theory are applicable 

 to the life of languages, or even, we might 



* Professor Schleicher states in a foot-note that the original 

 English edition, although published in November, 1859, was 

 still unknown to him when he published his " Deutsche 

 Sprache" (1860). The passage in his own work here alluded 

 to will be found translated in the Appendix. — T. 



