295 
ON ETHNOLOGY. 
another stock closely united, and that both these families are originally con¬ 
nected M-ith each other. These nations, who probably may be reduced to 
two families, one centring in tlie Altai and the pasture land towards the 
Himalaya, and the other having its centre in the Ural mountains, have acted 
in the history of civilisation a most powerful episode by conquest and de¬ 
struction. They appeared iu the fifth century as the Huns, a scourge to 
Romans and Gerraaus; they produced Djenghiskan, Tamerlan and Moham¬ 
med H.; they destroyed the Persian empire, subdued Hindustan, and they 
still sit upon the throne of Byzantium and upon that of China. They seem 
destined to partake only by conquest in the higher civilisation of the sur¬ 
rounding nations, older or younger ones, the Chinese presenting the one ex¬ 
treme, the Iranians the other. Little disposed to learn from theni as neigh¬ 
bours or subjects, they become more or less cIvIJuihI by being their masters. 
They cannot resist ihe Inward force of the civilisation of their subjects, 
although they repel it, as an outward power. 
These tribes appear also as the oucc subdued substratum of Iranian civi¬ 
lisation. So in the north of Europe, where the Finnic race preceded the 
Scandinavians. 
But the same great family appears also in Asia as tlie subdued or primary 
element. It seenw probable, that the aboriginal languages of Indi^ which 
attaiued their full development in the Dckhiut dialects, belong to this stock, 
not only by a general analogy of structure, but also by an original and 
traceable connexion. 
In a similar position m'd find another member of that family in western 
Europe. It. there preceded the Celts, in the Iberians or Cantabrians, whose 
language is preserved In the Basque (Biscayan). Those tribes were once 
prevalent in Fmnce and Spain, probably also iu ancient Italy. Their lan¬ 
guage has the same structure and certainly some signs or vestiges of a ma¬ 
terial connexion in roots with the AUai-Ural idioms. 
Our historical fonmila respecting this formation will therefore be this. 
All the nations, wliu in the history of Asia ami Europe occupy the second 
rank as to the civilising power they have hitherfa displayed, arc pj-obably as 
much of one Asiatie origin as iho Iranian nations are. They centre on the 
northern borders of the Himalaya, and everywhere in central Asia are the 
hostile, savage neighbours of the agricultural Iranian people, whom they have 
disturbed anil dispossessed in dilferent ages of history, having probably them¬ 
selves been primitively driven by them, as tiomades by agriculturists, from a 
more genial common home. 
We have now only to indicate, as suininarily as we can, the relation of this 
great family, with the three great families, into which the leading nations of 
civilisation, hs chiUlreii of one; stock, appeared to be divided. We found that 
the names of Cham, Sbem and JapUet (the latter name being adopted only 
provisionally as ei^uivalcnt with Indo-Germanio) represented to us scientifi¬ 
cally three steps ot development of one aiul the same stock. In applying the 
principles above established to that question, we ask, Is Uiat great Altai-Ural 
family originally connected with those leafling nations? and if so, to which 
of those three great divisions (Chamisni, Semitism, Japbetisra) do these se¬ 
condary families more particularly approach? We cannot hesitate for a mo¬ 
ment to say, that ihcro are too many positive and material vestiges of original 
connexion (although in a reraotn degree, according to the general principles 
we have laid down) already vUtble, to allow us to doubt the existence of such 
a connexion. At the same time we find these languages, although very in¬ 
ferior to those Indo-(iennanic longues, nearer allied to them, than to Cbam- 
isni and Semitism. They represent, like Cham and Shem, a lower degree of 
