july — sept. 1857.] The Study of Living Languages. #17 



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 who 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 it with strangers of all sorts without the least diffi- 

 culty. Again, in India 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 knowledge 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, 



