Note 132 — Chapter XV · THE DIFFERENT LANGUAGES ARE UNEQUAL, AND CORRESPOND PERFECTLY IN RELATIVE MERIT TO THE RACES THAT USE THEM

The way was not so long from rustic Latin, lingua rustica Romanorum, to the lingua romana and thence to corruption, as it was from the classical tongue, the precise and elaborate forms of which offered more resistance to decay. We may add that, as every foreign legionary brought his own provincial patois into the Gallic colonies, the advent of a common dialect was hastened, not merely by the Celts, but by the immigrants themselves.