Art. VI.—Remarks on the connection between the Indo-Chinese and the Indo-Germanic Languages, suggested by an Examination of the Sghā and Pghō Dialects of the Karens

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More than a quarter of a century has elapsed since Wilhelm von Humboldt, in the introduction to his immortal work Ueber die Kawi Sprache, impressed upon orientalists the high philological importance of the Indo-Chinese dialects, from an enlightened study of which that eminent scholar anticipated results of the highest value for the illustration of the philosophy of language in general. Since the death of that illustrious and lamented writer, although the extension of our political and commercial intercourse, and the untiring zeal of the Christian missionary among the tribes of the eastern peninsula have given rise to many excellent treatises upon their various dialects, among which I may mention in particular the admirable works of my friend Colonel Low, the Rev. F. Mason, and Captain Latter; yet there still seems wanting a comprehensive and philosophical survey of these tongues, not merely with reference to their own internal structure and the singular mental idiosyncrasies of which these peculiarities are the exponents, but with reference to the light they throw upon languages in general, even upon those from which they most widely diverge, and with which their connection is indeed very faint and indistinct. For while all the other nations of the earth are being gradually associated into one family by their linguistic affinities, and even the long-silent Egyptian has from many an ancient tomb and many, a mysterious epigraph put forth his claim to relationship with the Semitic stock, little or nothing has been done towards bridging over the cheerless gulf that still divorces philologically the simple-minded speakers of the intonated monosyllabic tongues from their Indo-Germanic brethren, whose copious and highly-polished languages constitute at once the proudest monument and the most efficient instrument of their civilization.