work on Aryan Mythology, I feel
that I must for once try to get angry, and return blow for blow. Professor
Blackie speaks of Mr. Cox as if he had done nothing beyond repeating what
I had said before. Nothing can be more unfair. My own work in Comparative
Mythology has consisted chiefly in laying down some of the general
principles of that science, and in the etymological interpretation of some
of the ancient names of gods, goddesses, and heroes. In fact, I have made
it a rule never to interpret or to compare the legends of India, Greece,
Italy, or Germany, except in cases where it was possible, first of all, to
show an identity or similarity in the Sanskrit, Greek, Latin, or German
names of the principal actors. Mr. Cox having convinced himself that the
method which I have followed in mythology rests on sound and truly
scientific principles, has adopted most, though by no means all, of my
etymological interpretations. Professor Blackie, on the contrary, without
attempting any explanation of the identity of mythological names in Greek
and Sanskrit which must be either disproved or explained, thunders forth
the following sentence of condemnation: "Even under the scientific
guidance of a Bopp, a Bott, a Grimm, and a Mueller, a sober man may
sometimes, even in the full blaze of the new sun of comparative philology,
allow himself to drink deep draughts, if not of _maundering madness_, at
least of _manifest hallucination_."

If such words are thrown at my head, I pick them up chiefly as
etymological curiosities, and as striking illustrations of what Mr. Tylor
calls "survivals in culture," showing how the most primitive implements of
warfare, rude stones and unpolished flints, which an ethnologist would
suppose to be confined to prehistoric races, to the red Indians of America
or the wild Picts of Caledonia, turn up again most unexpectedly at the
present day in the very centre of civilized life. All I can say is, that
if, as a student of Comparative Mythology, I have been drinking deep
draughts of maundering madness, I have been drinking in good company. In
this respect Mr. Cox has certainly given me far more credit than I
deserve. I am but one out of many laborers in this rich field of
scientific research, and he ought to have given far greater prominence to
the labors of Grimm, Burnouf, Bopp, and, before all, of my learned friend,
Professor Kuhn.

But while, with regard to etymology, Mr. Cox contents himself with
reporting