Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 51.djvu/633

Rh principle of agglutination. The different meanings are expressed by the compounding of several words into one, a device not unknown, to be sure, in Aryan tongues; but in the Basque this is carried much further. The verb habitually includes all pronouns, adverbs, and other allied parts of speech. The noun comprehends the prepositions and adjectives in a like manner. As an example of the terrific complexity possible as a result, Bladé gives fifty forms in the third person singular of the present indicative of the regular verb to give alone. Another classical example of the effect of such agglutination occurs in the Basque word meaning "the lower field of the high hill of Azpicuelta," which runs

Azpilcuelagaraycosaroyarenberecolarrea.

This simple phrase is an even match for the Cherokee word instanced by Whitney:

"Winitawtigeginaliskawlungtanawneletisesti,"

meaning "they will by this time have come to the end of their (favorable) declaration to you and me." It justifies also the proverb among the French peasants that the devil studied the Basque language seven years and only learned two words. The problem is not rendered easier by the fact that very little Basque literature exists in the written form; that the pronunciation is peculiar; and that the language, being a spoken one, thereby varies from village to village. There are in the neighborhood of twenty-five distinct dialects in all. No wonder a certain traveler is said to have given up the study of it in despair, claiming that its words were all "written Solomon and pronounced Nebuchadnezzar."

Several features of this curious language psychologically denote a crudeness of intellectual power. The principle of abstraction or generalization is but slightly developed. The words have not become movable "type" or symbols, as the late Mr. Romanes expressed it. They are sounds for the expression of concrete ideas. Each word is intended for one specific object or concept. Thus there is said to be a lack of such simple generalized words as "tree" or "animal." There are complete vocabularies for each species of either, but none for the concept of tree or animal in the abstract. They can not express "sister" in general; it must be "sister of the man" or "sister of the woman." This is an unfailing characteristic of all undeveloped languages. It is paralleled by Spencer's instance of the Cherokee Indians, who have thirteen distinct words to signify the washing of as many different parts of the body, but none for the simple idea of "washing" by itself. The primitive mind finds it difficult to conceive of the act or attribute absolved from all connection with the material objects concerned. Perhaps this is why the verb in the