cience, we may remark in passing, quite distinct from the science of
language, it would be difficult to account for the Caucasian stamp
impressed on the Mongolian race in Hungary, or on the Tatar race in
Turkey, unless we knew from written documents the migrations and
settlements of the Mongolic and Tataric tribes in Europe. A botanist,
again, comparing several specimens of rye, would find it difficult to
account for their respective peculiarities, unless he knew that in some
parts of the world this plant has been cultivated for centuries, whereas
in other regions, as, for instance, in Mount Caucasus, it is still allowed
to grow wild. Plants have their own countries, like races, and the
presence of the cucumber in Greece, the orange and cherry in Italy, the
potatoe in England, and the vine at the Cape, can be fully explained by
the historian only. The more intimate relation, therefore, between the
history of language and the history of man is not sufficient to exclude
the science of language from the circle of the physical sciences.

Nay, it might be shown, that, if strictly defined, the science of language
can declare itself completely independent of history. If we speak of the
language of England, we ought, no doubt, to know something of the
political history of the British Isles, in order to understand the present
state of that language. Its history begins with the early Britons, who
spoke a Celtic dialect; it carries us on to the Saxon conquest, to the
Danish invasions, to the Norman conquest: and we see how each of these
political events contributed to the formation of the character of the
language. The language of England may be said to have been in succession
Celtic, Saxon, Norman, and English. But if we speak of the history of the
English language, we enter on totally different ground. The English
language was never Celtic, the Celtic never grew into Saxon, nor the Saxon
into Norman, nor the Norman into English. The history of the Celtic
language runs on to the present day. It matters not whether it be spoken
by all the inhabitants of the British Isles, or only by a small minority
in Wales, Ireland, and Scotland. A language, as long as it is spoken by
anybody, lives and has its substantive existence. The last old woman that
spoke Cornish, and to whose memory it is now intended to raise a monument,
represented by herself alone the ancient language of Cornwall. A Celt may
become an Englishman, Celtic and English blo