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air or, if they persisted, were routed with a few hypodermic missiles containing a drug. The missiles were
not harmless; they struck with considerable impact and left great painful bruises and sometimes broke
ribs or arms. But they did not kill except once, when a hostile warrior, allergic to the drug, died in a
seizure a few minutes after being shot.
Gribardsun dissected the corpse thoroughly, taking photographs of every organ, analyzing the blood
and other tissues and studying the genetic structure. In the meantime, von Billmann recorded the speech
of three prisoners. By the time they were released, they had supplied him with a basic grammar and
about six thousand vocabulary items. One of the prisoners, however, died a few hours before his fellows
were given their freedom. He seemed to have nothing outwardly wrong with him; he just gave up the
ghost and died. Gribardsun thought that the death was the result of an alarm syndrome. His dissection
confirmed his diagnosis. The man had gone into a shock from which he could not recover. He had been
terrified from the time he woke up to find himself in the hands of alien peoples. And he had, unfortunately,
seen Gribardsun carry off parts of the first dissection into the woods where he left them for the wolves to
eat. He expected a similar fate, no doubt.
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Von Billmann, however, was rejoicing. He was sure that his prisoners spoke a language which just
might be the ancestor, or collateral ancestor, of Basque speech. It would be impossible to confirm it until
the scientists made an extensive study after the vessel returned. In addition, of course, the evidence
collected by the next expedition, planned for 8000 B.C., would have to be compared with von
Billmann's. The glottochronology of a language over many thousands of years would show a considerable
change. In fact, the stages of most languages separated by three thousand years would look like two
entirely unrelated tongues to the layman and, indeed, to all but the most astute linguists. There were some
tongues that resisted change more than others, such as Lithuanian and Russian; the stages of these did not
show nearly as much mutation as, say, that between vulgar Latin and modern French.
But 12,000 years changed any language so much that the untutored would doubt that there was any
relationship among the various branches which had evolved from it. Thus, the nonlinguist finds it difficult
to believe that English, Russian, and Hindustani sprang from the same parent tongue. And the parent was
only 3,500 years old. How much more degeneration in 12,000 years?
'The theory, which is entirely unbacked by evidence, is that the Basque tongues of our day are the
last descendants of a vast superfamily which once existed all over Europe and perhaps in North Africa
and parts of Asia,' Robert said. 'But the rise of Indo-Hittite speakers swept away most of the Ur-Basque
speakers. A small group, or small groups, of Indo-Hittites in the area near the Elbe River expanded. And
through conquest and absorption imposed their dialects on other areas. And these changed, in time, to
become the parents of the Germanic, Slavic, Baltic, Italic, Hellenic, Hittite, Tocharian, Armenian, and
Indie tongues, and God knows what others that history does not record. That is why I am so eager to go
to that area and determine if I can find languages which could be pre-Indo-Hittite. Then the expedition in
8000 B.C. can get later specimens. Then we can establish some sort of glottochronology!'
Von Billmann paced back and forth while his whole being glowed. His love for ancient languages was
far more passionate, and enduring than any he could have had for a woman. Or so it seemed to Rachel
who, however, was given to exaggeration. Von Billmann admitted that there were probably just as many
tribes in France, and perhaps in any section of Europe, which used the pre-Basque languages, as there
were in Iberia. But since one had been found here - or at least one had been found which might be
pre-Basque - then it was likely that there were others in this area. Therefore, more speakers should be
captured.
There was an ethical point to consider in his proposal. It was one thing to drug and capture men who
attacked. But did the scientists have the right to track down human beings and imprison them even if it
was only for a while? And for the sake of science, of course?
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