ciently qualified for such an undertaking, who, if encouragement were held out to them, would undertake it with an enthusiasm and ardour perhaps not inferior to that of Park. It appears by Capt. Lewis's account that the fur trade with these people is chiefly carried on in Canada. If, therefore, a direct mission through the savage parts of America should be deemed too hazardons, there are merchants resident in London, who are concerned in this trade, and who might be easily prevailed upon to employ a few intelligent young men, well versed in the language and history of Wales, and station them at the source of this traffic. Such an appointment, if it could lead to an intercourse with the White Hunters, would not be without its use. The fact with regard to their migration would, in the first place, be fully ascertained. It would likewise be ascertained whether the language is still intelligible to the natives of the parent country, or whether it is become to a certain degree unintelligible by an admixture with the jargon of their neighbours. If the former should prove to be the case, an intercourse of the firmest kind by means of this nationality might be established in the very centre of the American continent, and not only secure to us the fur trade in particular, but perhaps might be attended with some further advantages; and it would also be curious to know something of the manners, religious notions, traditions, the simple arts and sciences still retained by a people so long secluded from their parent state.

I have already said that the substitution of the P for the M in the name of this people must have arisen from the corrupt pronunciation of their neighbours. This has been the case with most foreign nations. A singular instance of this may be given, which, I believe, has not been attended to by our historians, in the name of the inhabitants of this island at the time of its invasion by the Romans. It is well known that the natives, then in a state of nature, scarified and painted their bodies in different colours, and with different figures, in order, as they thought, to render themselves more terrific to their enemies; and in consequence of this peculiarity and general custom amongst them, they denominated themselves Brithon, i. e. painted men. This is the name by which they designated themselves to the Romans upon their landing amongst them; but they not understanding the meaning of the word, and, as nearly as they could, imitating their pronunciation, called them Britannes, or rather Britanne, for I do not believe the s final was pronounced in the Latin by the Romans while it was a living language; and if this supposition be allowed, of which more hereafter, then Britanne for Brithonie, or Brithonwir, comes very nearly to the pronunciation of the natives. By what general name the inhabitants called their country is not now known; but the

Romans, finding the people to designate themselves Brithon, de termined to call their country Britannia; but no such name could have been given it by the inhabitants, for there can be no analogy between painted men and a painted country, such a name implying an absurdity. Things painted or striped with different colours are at this time called, by the Welsh, Brithon. Black cattle having any slips of white upon them, are still called Da Brithon; and Brith, in the singular, signifies any spotted or striped thing. Those Britons who submitted to the Roman yoke left off the custom of painting themselves, and conformed to the manners of their conquerors; but those who still resisted their power retained that ancient custom, and were afterwards, on that account, denominated by the Romans, according to their own language, Picti, i. e. painted men-not Brithon, their own ancient name; and these Picts, or the ancient Brithon, were the inveterate enemies both of their civilized countrymen who had given up that custom, and of the Romans.

Give me leave, Mr. Editor, to make one more observation. I have here observed that I do not believe, the s final in the Latin, and some other final letters, were pronounced by the Romans while a living language. I found my supposition upon this circumstance. The Romans were masters of this island for some centuries, and, consequently, their language was become not only familiar to the ancient inhabitants, but several words of it were adopted and interwoven with the British, and are still retained in it, and I make no doubt, in the very same pronunciation, or very nearly so, in which it was spoken, although at this time the orthography, as will happen with all languages, may be somewhat dif ferent and I am the more confident of this, as the Welsh is supposed to be at this day the least contaminated with foreign admixtures of any language in Europe. I will instance a few of them, agreeing in pronunciation, and differing only in orthography, remarking first of all, that the pronunciation is what ought to be chiefly attended to, not the orthography; for the latter will vary in all languages, and the alphabet of the Welsh in particular, being composed more of complete, or rather syllabic, than of simple sounds. The word Deus, God, bears the same signification in both languages, but is pronounced by the Welsh without the s final, Deu, or according to their orthography, Duw; and let it be remarked, that the same pronunciation in the French (the word being also retained in that language) is a strong corroborative proof of its being so pronounced by the Romans themselves. The word Taurus, a bull, is adopted by the Welsh from the Latin, and is pronounced, leaving out the final s, Taru, or rather Taroo, the a in the Welsh sounding as au in the Latin. Whether the final a

was pronounced, I am not confident; but Fenestra, a window, is still pronounced by the Welsh, Fenestur in the singular, and Fenestri, or rather Fenestre, in the plural, and indeed all the plurals ending in es in the Latin, are invariably pronounced in the British in i or e, without the s. In the word ovum, an egg, the m seems to be left out by the Welsh, and is pronounced as oi, or rather owi in the singular, and as oie or owie in the plural. What sound the letter v in this word had in the Latin it is difficult to say, as it is not retained in the Welsh, possibly somewhat like the w as pronounced for the v by the inhabitants of London and some parts of Kent in the words veal and vinegar.

Let it also be observed that the pronunciation of several Latin words still retained in the Spanish language, as quoted by the Rev. Mr. Townsend in the Univ. Mag. for Oct. 1809, who, however, does not advert to this circumstance, as a further corroborative proof of what I have here advanced as toro for taurus, the pronunciation of both, leaving out the s, being extremely similar; oro, which perhaps ought to have been written aru, for aurum ;torpe for turpis;-poco for paucus ;-mudo for mutus-and several other words which he quotes from that language agreeing exceedingly near in pronunciation on leaving out the finals.

Many more words might be selected from the Welsh by those who understand that language, which might be corroborated in their pronunciation by words of the same import both in the French and Spanish, all evidently derived from the Latin. I am not conversant in the language, or its orthography, and, consequently, my observations must be very limited; but if gentlemen who have a tolerable knowledge of the Welsh were to pay attention to this circumstance, which might be greatly accelerated by the assistance of a Welsh dictionary, it would be at least a pleasing, if not an instructive amusement.

Having, Mr. Editor, made these observations, I leave them to your consideration, and if upon perusal you shall think them deserving a place in your miscellany, so as to call forth attention, you may insert them; but if not, let them be suppressed, and committed to the flames.

I am, Sir,

June 28, 1813.

Your constant reader,

D. J.

414

DELLON'S ACCOUNT OF THE INQUISITION AT GOA.

[From the Literary Panorama.]

WE Conclude the perusal of this book with mingled sensations of horror and joy!-Horror, that the solemn and merciful name of Christ should be associated with the proceedings of a tribunal so inhuman; and joy, that at length the inquisition is suppressed in Spain, the strong hold of its authority, and is, by treaty with Britain, prohibited from accompanying the court of Portugal to the Brazils, the country in which that court is at present held. We repeat the information, that the Spanish Cortes have voted the abolition of this odious establishment. Henceforward we anticipate, with the privilege of religious freedom, a rapid progress of knowledge, wealth, commerce, and whatever depends on exertion of talent and ingenuity. Spain will rise to real grandeur; and having been the first scene of effectual resistance to the inroads of an insidious and barbarous enemy, that country will, we trust, vindicate its claims to liberty, public and private, personal and mental, civil and religious. The Spanish mind will display itself in proofs of energy, equally striking and patriotic, equally admirable and beneficial. The natives will value Spain, because of the enjoyments it affords them; and the memory of their triumph over the myrmidons of a sanguinary tyrant will be coupled with that of a much greater triumph over a still more sanguinary institution-the holy office.

The holy office is no more-in Spain! May the days be short in which its existence debases any part of the world! May Portugal soon know it only by remembrance: and the colonies of those countries be acquainted with it only as with a bloody scourge, formerly their terror and misery.

Dr. Buchanan, not long ago, visited Goa, and becoming somewhat intimate with one of the chiefs of the holy tribunal, he ventured to obtain information on the subject, while he also communicated some to the inquisitor. The means by which he communicated information were derived from Dellon's Account of the Inquisition. This he furnished the inquisitor for his perusal; and the acknowledgments of that officer, to the correctness of the account, has fixed the character of the work for authenticity. It was always esteemed a genuine work, and what it assumed to be. It has been appealed to as such by well instructed writers on the subject; nevertheless, this new testimony to its veracity has revived its reputation, and this edition of it is one of the con

sequences.

Dellon was, by birth, a Frenchman: he travelled into India, where (at Damaun, a Portuguese colony) he settled for a time. With the usual libertinage of his nation, and heedless gaieté de cœur, in matters of gallantry, he made himself enemies; his dan ger was converted into distress, by his garrulity and speculative discussions:-insomuch, that his real meaning, or his no-meaning, afforded evidence sufficiently presumptive against him to enable his enemies to accuse him of heresy. Such an accusation at Goa was equivalent to a long imprisonment, to repeated examinations, to tortures of different degrees of severity, to condemnation, and to the horrors of an auto da fé, or public execution by burning. It appears that when first committed to prison at Damaun, he was not deprived of all intercourse with friends. He received supplies, without interruption, from a benevolent lady. He had previously accused himself to the commissary, and professed contrition for his crimes, in hopes of avoiding the consequences; he received admonition, and considered himself as absolved. Being removed to Goa, he does not charge the holy office with neglecting its prisoners, by starving them, or otherwise misusing them. He details the particulars of his repeated examinations; the extremes to which he was reduced by his sufferings, and his attempts against his own life. He reports the extreme ignorance of his judges, not only in respect to the doctrines of the bible, but to those promulgated by the council of Trent. He states his condemnation to the flames; with the commutation of his sentence to death for that of a long destination to the galleys. The performance of the auto da fé, with its sanguinary rites, is described; not omitting four chests of bones of deceased persons, who had been tried after their decease, and condemned to the flames, in order that the holy office might seize their property. At length, this sufferer was sent to Europe;-he worked some time as a galleyslave at Lisbon; but was released before the full period of his sentence expired, and returned to France by the very first vessel that left the port for that country. To this history are added others of his fellow prisoners; and in an Appendix is given an account of the escape of Mr. Archibald Bower-(who wrote the history of the popes)-he was an inquisitor at Macerata, in Italy, as narrated by himself to a lady, from a copy of whose minutes the translation was made; but the editor observes, in his preface, "To pretend to vouch for the veracity of the relation would be too perilous an undertaking, in defiance of the generally received opinion of the narrator's character." This honest confession mars an interesting tale.

From this abridged sketch of the contents of the volume our readers will judge on its interest; they will assuredly congratulate the world on every blow struck at the holy inquisition.