French became the foremost medium of communication in Europe in the 18th century. In Germany the most widely used French textbook was Johan Valentin Meidinger's "Practische Franzoesische Grammatik." This textbook was apparently a huge success from the pedagogical and the commerical points of view. With a few minor revisions, it would probably attract a fair share of the textbook market today. Meidinger claimed that adults could use the book and learn French on their own, although the task would be easier if a good instructor were available. The book includes a thorough treatment of the French phonetic system, basic vocabulary, grammar and translation exercises, reading lessons (140 short stories and anecdotes), idioms, lessons on orthography, punctuation, and the use of diacritical marks, extensive discussion of the nine parts of speech (the verb structure receives considerable attention), explanations of sentence structure and word order, word puzzles, and a glossary of over 10,000 items. (CFM)