1336.] 



Observations on Original, %c. 



121 



•X. — Observations on original and derived Languages.— - By the Kevd. 

 Bernhard Schmid. 



1. There is perhaps no country on earth, where so many indivi- 

 duals, of all ranks and ages, are busily engaged in learning languages, 

 as in India. Hindus and Mahomedans, from Cape Comorin to Cabul, 

 and from Bombay to Assam, are eager in the study of English, and 

 many of them acquire few or more vernacular dialects besides. Every 

 military gentleman, and many others, are in duty bound to learn, not 

 only Hindustani, but, frequently, Arabic and Persian also ; and every 

 gentleman of the Civil Service has to acquire the knowledge of some 

 Indian dialects, either branches, or sister-languages, of the Sanscrit. 

 Some remarks on the nature of languages will, therefore, it is pre- 

 sumed, not be wholly uninteresting or useless to the readers of the 

 Journal of Literature and Science. 



2. The languages of the earth are either original, i. e. formed by a 

 nation through their own mental exertion, — or derived, i. e. formed by 

 the violent interference and intermixture of one or more other lan- 

 guages. Hence original languages will always be found to be more 

 consistent with themselves, and logical, than derived languages, which 

 latter possess a great proportion of words, the various meanings and 

 application of which are arbitrary, and the arrangement of which is 

 either quite the reverse of the construction of an original language, or 

 quite undefined, and solely regulated, in each individual period, by 

 convenience and circumstances. 



3. From these observations it follows, that the expressions, mother 

 and daughter-languages, mark very different relationships. For, there 

 may exist original languages to which no language now existing owes 

 its origin, and which is, therefore, not a mother-tongue ; many a derived 

 language may be the mother of others, and is, consequently, a mother- 

 tongue ; and many a daughter-language is correctly classified under 

 the head of original languages, if such a language has not suffered 

 violent intrusion from the language of a conqueror, or from other cir- 

 cumstances. 



4. A striking mark of an original language is found in the construc- 

 tion : all words which modify, or more accurately describe, the subject, 

 stand before the word which is thus modified; consequently, the adjec- 

 tive and the genitive stand before their noun, the adverb before the 

 verb, the dative, accusative and ablative before their regimen, the 

 cause or instrument before its effect, the motive is mentioned before 

 the action, and the thing compared before that to which it is similar ; 

 whereas, in a derived language, the modifying words stand generally 

 after the words which are modified or defined. 



