< 
JULY — SEPT. 1857.] The Study of Living Languages^ S17 
simply because in general they had no distinct ideas at all on the 
matter, nor any solid reason for any thing they had done in their 
studies. He has however got various hints from observing what 
progress different men had made in such studies when using different 
means. On one occasion he met with a young man who had given 
his whole time to Arabic for three years, and could not then pro- 
duce a sentence in conversation, and soon after he was intimate 
with another w^ho in about 8 months and while loaded with other 
duties, had obtained, if not an accurate yet such an effective, collo- 
quial use of the same tongue, that he regularly transacted exten- 
sive business in jt»with strangers of all sorts without the least diffi- 
culty. Again, in lAdia one meets every day with men who have 
studied most diligently for one, two or three years, and yet all their 
life after speak a language, that both from pronunciation and ex- 
pression is almost, or quite, unintelligible to any Native, excepting 
those who from being about them constantly in an official capacity 
have learnt their language, (for what they used and called the Na- 
tive language was really a language of their own invention) and so 
have come to understand them. 
The writer cannot conclude these remarks without expressing 
his full assurance that the acquisition of a correct knowledge and 
perfectly ready colloquial use of such languages will be found to 
be a matter requiring very little time compared with what it does 
at present, in most cases, when a better mode of learning is adopt- 
ed. On one occasion he had an opportunity of observing the pro- 
gress made by children in acquiring a new language in a certain 
time. Out of a number that embarked in a ship in India many 
did not know a word of English, having previously used nothing 
but some Indian language, and they were of various ages. Dur- 
ing the four months of the voyage to England every one of them 
had so perfectly acquired the use of English that they never were 
at a loss, and latterly seemed to have as good a knowjedge of it 
as those who had always used it. Now if children of a few years 
old, without the slightest assistance from teachers or study, could 
thus pick up a colloquial use of a new language in four months 
and talk it exactly like one who had never talked any thing else, 
I 
