Principles of western civilisation

VI THE ASCENDENCY OF THE PRESENT 153

close detail the course of the process of conquest, of extermination, and of fusion which this long-drawnout conflict of peoples represents. Some faint idea of its duration, its intensity, and its magnitude may be obtained by the distribution, on the Eurasian continent of to-day, of the languages of a common or of nearly related stock which the ascendant peoples spread over the immense territories to which their activities and invasions extended.

Far away in the East, in the Indic branch, embracing Sanscrit with all its modern derivatives, we have the mark of the impact of the tide of invasion and conquest upon India. Farther west still in Asia, in the Iranic, Galchic, and Armenic branches—with their subordinate Zend and Afghan, Persian, Pamir, Hindu-Kush, Armenian, and other groups of languages—we have represented other lines of advance. Coming into Europe, the great Hellenic group of languages, with its ancient and modern derivatives, represents another area of conquest. Farther west we have marked the advance of the Italic branch with its ancient Oscan, Sabine, Umbrian, and kindred languages, of which we catch sight in history before they have yet gone down before the later world-subduing Latin. Farther north in Europe we have the region of the Lithuanic branch, and yet again the great area of conquest represented by the once widely-distributed Celtic tongues. And, last of all, we have the successive waves of advance and conquest which are marked by the present distribution of the representatives of the great Slavic and Teutonic divisions of speech. Even when all allowance is made for the extension of a language by other means than war, what a