eral opinion is, that the Norman conquest was the immediate cause. Mr. Ellis says; "the establishment of our present mixed language, and indeed every link in the chain of its history, may, perhaps be traced to this important event, as its remote cause and origin. But the mode of its operation has not been, I think, satisfactorily explained; too much having been attributed to the supposed prejudices, and imaginary designs of the Conqueror, while the general circumstances in which he was placed, and the obvious tendency of his general policy, have been too much overlooked."— Vol. 3, p. 387.

"Before the Norman accession," says Mr. Warton, which succeeded to the Saxon government, we were an unformed and unsettled race. That mighty revolution obliterated almost all relation to the former inhabitants of this island; and produced that signal change in our policy, constitution, and public manners, the effects of which have reached modern times."

Preface to his Eng. Poetry.

In reply to the remark of Mr. Mitford; "that the dialect of Layamon has every appearance of a language thrown into confusion by the circumstances of those who spoke it,”—Mr. Price admits that a change had taken place in the language since the days of Alfred, but denies that it was in any way effected by the Norman Conquest, or by political revolutions of any kind.

"In the specimen published by Mr. Ellis, not a Gallicism is to be found, nor even a Norman term: and so far from exhibiting any "appearance of a language thrown into confusion by the circumstances of those who spoke it," nearly every important form of Anglo-Saxon grammar is rigidly adhered to; and so little was the language altered at this advanced period of Norman influence, that a few slight variations might convert it into genuine Anglo-Saxon. That some change had taken place in the style of composition, and general structure of the language, since the days of Alfred, is a matter beyond dispute; but that those mutations were a consequence of the Norman invasion, or were accelerated by that event, is wholly incapa

ble of proof; and nothing is supported upon a firmer principle of rational induction, than that the same effects would have ensued if William and his followers had remained in their native soil. The substance of the change is admitted on all hands to consist in the suppression of those grammatical intricacies, occasioned by the inflection of nouns, the seemingly arbitrary distinctions of gender, the government of prepositions, &c. How far this may be considered as the result of an innate law of the language, or some general law in the organization of those who spoke it we may leave for the present undecided: but that it was in no way dependent upon external circumstances, upon foreign influence or political disturbances, is established by this remarkable fact, that every branch of the Low German stock, from whence the Anglo Saxon sprang, displays the same simplification of grammar. In all these languages, there has been a constant tendency to relieve themselves of that precision which chooses a fresh symbol for every shade of meaning, to lessen the amount of nice distinctions, and detect as it were a royal road to the interchange of opinion. Yet in thus diminishing their grammatical forms, and simplifiying their rules, in this common effort to evince a striking contrast to the usual effects of civilization, all confusion has been prevented by the very manner in which the operation has been conducted; for the revolution produced has been so gradual in its progress, that it is only to be discovered on a comparison of the respective languages, at periods at a considerable interval."

Mr. Price's Preface to Warton's Hist. of Eng. Poetry, p. 87.