have fought; in +a-yud-dha+, for +a-yudh-ta+, he fought. In the other Aryan languages this root has left hardly any traces; yet the Greek ὑσμῖν, and ὑσμίνη would be impossible without the root +yudh+. The only difference between Chinese and these Sanskrit forms which we have just examined, is that while in Chinese such a form as +yudh-i+, in the battle, would have for its last element a word clearly meaning middle, and having an independent accent, Sanskrit has lost the consciousness of the original material meaning of the _i_ of the locative, and uses it traditionally as an empty word, as a formal element, as a mere termination. I also agree with Curtius that during the earliest stage, not of Sanskrit, but of Aryan speech in general, we have to admit two classes of roots, the _predicative_ and _demonstrative_, and that what we now call the plural of +yudh+, +yudh-as+, fighters, was, or may have been, originally a compound consisting of the predicative root +yudh+, and the demonstrative root, +as+ or +sa+, possibly repeated twice, meaning “fight-he-he,” or “fight-there-there,” _i.e._, fighters. There is another point with regard to the character of this earliest radical stage of the Aryan language, on which formally I should have agreed with Curtius, but where now I begin to feel more doubtful,--I mean the necessarily monosyllabic form of all original roots. There is, no doubt, much to be said for this view. We always like to begin with what is simple. We imagine, as it has been said, that “the simple idea must break forth, like lightning, in a simple body of sound, to be perceived in one single moment.” But, on the other hand, the simple, so far as it is the general, is frequently, to us at least, the last result of repeated complex conceptions, and therefore there is at all events no _à priori_ argument against treating the simplest roots as the latest, rather than the earliest products of language. Languages in a low state of development are rich in words expressive of the most minute differences, they are poor in general expressions, a fact which ought to be taken into account as an important qualification of a remark made by Curtius that language supplies necessaries first, luxuries afterwards (p. 32). I quote the following excellent remarks from Mr. Sayce’s “Principles of comparative Philology” (p. 208): “Among modern savages the individual objects of sense have names enough, while general terms are very rare. The Mohicans have words for cutting various objects, but none to signify cutting simple.”[31] In taking this view we certainly are better able to explain the actual forms of the Aryan roots, viz., by _elimination_, rather than by _composition_. If we look for instance, as I did myself formerly, on such roots as +yudh+, +yuj+, and +yauṭ+, as developed from the simpler root +yu+, or on +mardh+, +marg+, +mark+, +marp+, +mard+, +smar+, as developed from +mar+, then we are bound to