As for the children--the 8,774 children--I lost my heart to them individually and collectively. But I received no encouragement. They are very shy, “ter’ble shoy,” in Mr. Brown’s dialect. In most schools they never see a stranger, except the inspector; and though by the desire of the Council we made a point of visiting every school twice a year, there was no time to establish an acquaintance, and the second visit was paid by a different official. In an oral examination it was most difficult to get an answer even from the boys: the girls sat mute, blushing, trembling. In Cheshire phrase, I “got no forrader.” The Manx language is almost extinct. At the last census 4,500 people, out of about 50,000, recorded themselves as Manx-speaking, but we must not suppose that anything like this number was monoglott. In the district between Peel and Port Erin on the west coast there is a school, where I was told that the children heard little but Manx at home; but I have never heard it spoken. On my first visit to Douglas I was under the impression that the children in the streets were talking Manx; but it turned out to be English with all the short syllables eliminated. This local variety is much in use in school. The children pitch their voices high, and rise by an imperfect fifth on the last word; thus they would chant on and around A, and would end on E flat. It is strange that a very similar inflexion is in use in parts of Norfolk. The Manx school recitation of poetry is conducted on this principle, and the effect is this--the italic representing the high note (_Merchant of Venice_; Trial Scene): Portia: Th’ qualt’ merc’s not _streen’d_: ’t droppth ’s gentl’ reen f’m _heav’n_ ’pon th’ pleece _b’neeth_: ’ts twice _bless’d_: ’t blessth him th’t gives, ’nim th’t _teeks_: ’s mightst ’n _mightst_. If I laughed, or remonstrated, however tenderly, the sensitive plant would shrivel up. Both in the island and in North Wales I have often been told that on a fishing fleet in the Irish Sea the Manx, the Irish, the Gaelic, and the Welsh fishermen could converse freely. It would be rash for a man who speaks none of those languages to lay down the law. But we know that they differ widely: the Welsh are Cymric, the other three are of the Gaelic branch of Celts; all four would have the Indo-European joint stock and the Celtic roots in common. But conversation cannot subsist on roots. Judging from the names of places in the island there is little kinship between Welsh and Manx. I do not remember any Manx place-name beginning with Llan, or Lan; there is no Welsh town or village beginning with Balla, the general Manx prefix; Bala, the nearest approach, is the name of a modern town on Llyn Tegid, and in the parish of Llanycil. But Bally is common enough in Scotland and Ireland. So with other names.