242 
R. B. Shaw— A Grammar of the Language 
[No. 3, 
A Grammar of the Language of Eastern TurJcistan.—Bg R. B. Shaw, 
Eolitical Agent. 
Introductory. 
The Turkish tongues are of singular interest to the student of lan¬ 
guage. They are to him, what the mountains which surround their birth¬ 
place are to the geologist; who there can observe many of the vastest 
operations of nature and their results, naked as it were, and not veiled by 
the superficial covering which in other less barren countries makes the 
investigation and tracing out of the various formation so laborious a task. 
The Indo-European languages are like an ancient building, where 
frequent restorations have interfered with the original design, and where 
finally a universal coat of plaster has destroyed all outward distinction 
between old and new. In the Turanian structure, on the other hand 
every tool-mark is still fresh, the places where the scaffolding has rested,, 
are still visible, and we can almost trace each course of the stone-work to 
its origin in the quarry whence it was hewn. 
It may seem strange that a language developed by the rude and 
nomad tribes of Central Asia, who in their own home have never known 
how to reduce it to rule (or rather to distinguish the laws through which 
they themselves had unconsciously formed it), should present in fact an 
example of symmetry in complexity such as few of the more cultivated 
forms of speech exhibit. Although its own people would have one believe 
that it is subject to no rule and almost purely arbitrary (their only notion 
of grammar being that of Arabic and Persian with which the Turki cannot 
be made to fit) ; yet in reality a few sinrple and transparent rules suffice 
to account for all its permutations. These rules, possessing an accumulative 
power, are enough to produce the immense variety of forms noticeable in 
the Eastern Turki. 
We are now learning to believe that even in languages such as 
Greek, German, or even English, every seeming irregularity is really 
the result of laws, some of which we know and can trace in their 
action, and some of which are yet to be discovered. But in Turki we 
can see them; it is as if the centuries were to flow backwards, and we 
could watch the building of the Pyramids and solve by ocular demon¬ 
stration the doubts of the learned as to the method by which the vast 
blocks were transported from the quarries, and placed in their present 
positions. We can even detect in some instances a commencement in 
this Turanian tongue, of the process by which the Aryan languages 
have been polished down and enamelled, as it were, till they reached their 
present condition. 
