end of that vast continent to the other. Thus the present progress of civilization tends to diminish the number of spoken languages, leaving the 5000 dialects of the Atlas as historical records, or consigning them to the museum of the antiquary, but banishing them from use as instruments of thought; as European muskets have superseded, even with the savage, the bow and the club, and as modern inventions in other arts (for it must never be forgotten that language is an art,) have superseded the rude instruments of our forefathers.

We have thought it right briefly to advert to this tendency of civilization to amalgamate languages, and diminish their number, because philosophers as well as statesmen are very apt to overlook all such present tendencies, though they carefully record the progress of past times. They seem in general too much disposed to imagine that their systems regulate the destinies of mankind; and they very often recommend or adopt a course which runs athwart the great stream of human affairs. If they would only see in this tendency, something arising naturally in the progress of society from the same general laws and the same faculties which have every where dictated speech to our race, and taught them the art of recording it, and which equally dictate its continual improvement-they would cease to pour out lamentations at the extinction of this or of that rude speech, and would probably endeavour to extract from this tendency as much benefit as possible. Language is not yet perfect. Men made it, as they established government, long before they inquired into the principles on which it ought to be made. Those principles must be the same, or nearly the same, for every language; but nothing can be more different than those which have been adopted. We would recommend philosophers, therefore, to keep those languages in view which are most likely to predominate; to ascertain, not so much the principles on which our ignorant forefathers constructed them, as those on which they ought to be constructed; and proceeding on with the great current of civilization, to endeavour to lead mankind, when they change their speech, to make every change an improvement.

It may also be objected, we think, to the principle adopted in this and all other similar works, of classifying languages according to the geographical divisions of the earth, that they, unlike plants and animals, most of which flourish only in particular climates, have no relation whatever to continents and places. The express object is to enable us to classify people, by classifying languages, and thereby trace their migrations from one part of the world to

In the brief account lately published of the communications of Captain N. King, R.N. with the natives of the coast of Patagonia, it is stated that they were all found to speak a corrupt Spanish, and the communication was carried on in this dialect.

another, which is incompatible with any limitations as to space. On this principle the affinities between several Asiatic and European languages-one of the most important points in the whole history of speech, are excluded from all notice, unless where they are so numerous that the author is compelled to depart from it. The Semitic family, for example, including the Hebrew, Syriac, Arabic, Pehlvi, &c. belongs incontestably to Asia, but it is made to include also the Gheez and the Amaharic, which are known only in Abyssinia, because the affinities between these latter and the Arabic cannot be overlooked. In this case the principle has been violated; in others it has been adhered to, so as to separate languages which perhaps ought to be placed together. The manner in which the civilized nations of Europe study the language, literature and histories of each other, together with the constant communication kept up between them, makes these subjects, and their dependencies, familiar to them all. Their moral and scientific terms, including the terms of grammar, are generally the same, and have been borrowed from the same sources. Making allowance for all these circumstances, particularly for what these languages have borrowed from one another within the period of ascertained history, it would yet appear that there is a greater affinity between the German, the Sanscrit, and the Persian, both in words and grammatical forms, than between the German, the French, and the Spanish. It is this affinity between the languages of distant nations, which the ethnographer is more particularly called on to notice, because that must furnish the clue to all those lost parts of history he expects to discover. In calling languages spoken in two continents, Asiatic or European, the author has been guided by the historical importance and relative number of the people that use them. Thus, the Malay, which is also spoken in Asia, is classed with the Oceanic family; and the language of the United States of America, though it promises to be the prevailing tongue over half that vast continent, is classed with European languages. We should suppose that if languages have any permanent characteristics, if any principles regulate and preside over their formation, if they are not wholly chance-begotten things, modelled by capricious fashion, and as changeable as the shape of our garments; if they are called into existence by the permanent wants of our species, and regulated by the laws to which our organs of speech are subjected, they may be classified by their own peculiarities, independently of geography. M. Balbi does allude to such a classification, which appears to correspond even with one particular division of the earth, though different from that adopted by himself. As this is almost the only general conclusion or novel theory we have ob

served in the book, and as the coincidence pointed out is somewhat remarkable, we shall give it in the author's own words.

"If it were wished to remark the nature of different languages, and to consider some of their principal characteristics, it would be found, perhaps, that they might all be reduced to the three following classes :1st, simple languages, which consist, so to speak, of a rough collection of small united words or particles; 2d, inflected languages, of which the grammatical forms, more complicated than those of the former, announce an interior developement by the inflection of the words; 3d, agglutinated languages, the grammatical forms of which being more complicated than the former, demonstrate a greater tendency to an external aggregation, or agglutination. It might, perhaps, also be said that these ethnographical classes correspond, up to a certain point, with the three great geographical divisions of the globe; for according to the facts hitherto collected concerning all the known languages of the globe, it seems demonstrated, that the old world, in which all the three classes are found, is the only part which possesses true inflected languages; that the new world, from one end to the other, contains only agglutinated languages; and that all the languages of the Maritime world, yet known, are simple languages. This conclusion, to which our researches on the ethnographical classification of nations have led us, suggests the remarkable reflection, that it is precisely in the ancient world, which we are informed by Moses was the original home of man, and the cradle of all the people of the earth, that we find the three essentially different classes to which Baron Humboldt thinks all the grammatical forms of the astonishing variety of all known languages may be reduced."

We shall not enter into the merits of the special classifications. Several of them appear to be formed on slight and superficial grounds, but they are all, at least when the languages to which they relate are of any importance, accompanied by the reasons which have determined the author to adopt them. The minute research into almost evanescent facts, necessary to justify or condemn the detailed part of the classification, is ill adapted to the pages of a popular journal, and we must resign this shadowy criticism to some of our more learned contemporaries. We differ from the author as to the possibility of our having any thing like a precise classification of languages; we differ from him as to the propriety of making the geographical divisions of the earth the basis of such classification; and we do not agree with him in thinking that languages deserve implicit confidence as the basis for a classification of nations. The physical characteristics of our race are at least as permanent as the characteristics of speech, and where the two do not correspond, the former must be considered as of equal importance with the latter, in guiding us to correct conclusions. Now, there are several instances of "lan

guages so similar, that they ought almost to be regarded as dialects of the same tongue;" particularly the Slavonic and Turkish, being spoken by nations possessing distinct physical and moral characteristics, and existing in almost every stage of civilization. History may inform us of the causes of such anomalies, but their existence is a proof that languages alone cannot explain the origin and migrations of different tribes.

Notwithstanding these leading differences of opinion, we are bound to state, that M. Balbi's work is an extremely useful one. He is not the only person who has followed the steps of Adelung, but, without being a slavish imitator, he has gone further than any other beyond his master. The work would have been more complete had it been accompanied by short specimens of different languages; and M. Balbi had actually intended to have given with it the two first tenses of the verb to be in 80 languages and 150 dialects, the personal pronouns of 300 different idioms, and the Lord's Prayer in 100 various tongues. The apprehension, however, of being forestalled in the market, by some German fellow-labourers in the same field, induced him to hasten to the press; but he still proposes to publish them in a separate work. As the "Mithridates" contains a large collection of such specimens, the two works complete the subject; but it might, without inconvenience, be compressed into one; and the present volumes afford so many proofs of M. Balbi's skill in the useful art of abridgement, that we should be sorry were he not to embrace the whole. His great merit, in truth, consists in condensing his materials, and his book is really the essence of all that is worth knowing on the subject. Except a few repetitions, to which we have already adverted, and too many compliments to his learned assistants, there is little we wish to see omitted. He is both an accurate and diligent compiler, having no favourite theories of his own to mislead his judgment, and close his mind against information. He seems to have carried no feeling nor passion into his labours, except the one desire of deserving, by extreme correctness, the approbation of scientific and literary men; and his production, as we might expect from such a disposition, is a well-wrought piece of art. To those who desire to know what has already been done in tracing the origin and affinities of languages it will be of signal utility.

VOL. I. NO. II.

DD

ART. V.-1. Memoires Anecdotiques sur l'Interieur du Palais, et sur quelques événemens de l'Empire, depuis 1805 jusq'au 1o Mai, 1814, pour servir à l'Histoire de Napoléon. Par L. F. J. de Bausset, ancien Préfet du Palais Imperial. Paris. 1827.

2 tom. 8vo.

2. Memoires historiques et secrets de l'Imperatrice Josephine, Marie Rose Tascher de la Pagerie; plus, l'interieur de la main de l'Homme extraordinaire, &c. Par Mademoiselle M. A. Le Normand. Second edition. Paris. 1827. 3 tom. 8vo. THE French press has for some time teemed with publications purporting to afford materials for the history of Napoleon. Some of these have undoubtedly opened new and valuable sources of information, but many of them have evidently been put forth with no other view than that of supplying the ordinary demand for light literature, to a class of readers who seek rather to be amused than instructed. Memoires pour servir à l'histoire have long been a staple commodity in the list of French literary manufactures, and may be said, for the most part, to be of service only to the speculators who are interested in their immediate circulation. Aid to the future historian seldom forms a part of the real design of these publications; they are got up for immediate consumption, and as they are generally produced with a rapidity proportioned to the appetite of the consumers, they are, like other fungous productions, composed of light but indigestible materials.

The work at the head of this article cannot be ranked among the best, though it is far from being one of the least respectable of the class to which it belongs. We believe the author to be an honest, but at the same time a very credulous collector of anecdotes; hence a distinction must be taken between such parts of the Memoirs as rest upon his own authority, and those which he has derived from more questionable sources. There is a legal maxim which ascribes to the testimony of all artists a superior degree of credibility in matters connected with their peculiar craft or calling; and it may be convenient to apply this test of the value of evidence even to some portions of the Memoirs, for the accuracy of which the author is himself responsible.

M. de Bausset was an officer of the household of Napoleon, having for ten years held the situation of prefect or superintendant of the imperial palace; and whenever he communicates any information in his official capacity, or states any facts which fell under his immediate observation, we are disposed to place great reliance upon his testimony. One important branch of the du