“Well, what language do you think they spoke, Harry?” said Hugh.
“Why,” said Harry, hesitating, “I suppose—” then, as if a sudden light broke upon him—“Latin of course. How strange!”
“Why strange?”
“That such men should talk such a dry, unpleasant language.”
“I allow it is a difficult language, Harry; and very ponderous and mechanical; but not necessarily dry or unpleasant. The Romans, you know, were particularly fond of law in everything; and so they made a great many laws for their language; or rather, it grew so, because they were of that sort. It was like their swords and armour generally, not very graceful, but very strong;—like their architecture too, Harry. Nobody can ever understand what a people is, without knowing its language. It is not only that we find all these stories about them in their language, but the language itself is more like them than anything else can be. Besides, Harry, I don’t believe you know anything about Latin yet.”
“I know all the declensions and conjugations.”
“But don’t you think it must have been a very different thing to hear it spoken?”
“Yes, to be sure—and by such men. But how ever could they speak it?”
“They spoke it just as you do English. It was as natural to them. But you cannot say you know anything about it, till you read what they wrote in it; till your ears delight in the sound of their poetry;—”
“Poetry?”