isolates a child from human speech, and draws the somewhat
large inference that its first attempt at language would show which was the primitive tongue of mankind. Benedetto, son of a deaf-and-dumb mother, is brought up by her tili lie is nineteen, and never hears the human voice. The child in Herodotus says Bekki, which, we are told, was Phrygian for " bread." Benedetto does what is far more interesting and wonderful ; he learns to
play the violin without a teacher. May we argue by analogy that the violin is the primitive instrument ? But the art so acquired
seems to be an unlubky gift. The lad puts his whole heart and soul into his music, making his violin say what ho thinks and what he wants ; and he is very unhappy because the world, or at
least such part of the world as comes within his ken, does not understand him. The story is a fine piece of writing, worthy of the " Pseudonym Library," to which it belongs ; but it has a very unreal, not to say impossible, look.
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