G ABA US GAEL. 



originated ; hence it was called nova consonans by 

 Diomed, 1. 2, page 417, Putsch. The Romans 

 began to use it late, and, therefore, c and g are often 

 written for each other, as Gains for Caius. The 

 Romans also sometimes used it for n, before g, from 

 the Greek, as aggelus, for angelus, iggerunt for 

 ingerunt ; and even Ulphilas writes gg for ng, as, 

 for instance, figgr for finger, aivaggelgo for evange- 

 hum, tuggo for tongue. The sound of w, or v, very 

 nearly approaches that of gu, and we often find them 

 interchanged ; for instance, fPilliam or tVilhelm 

 into Guillaume or Guillielmo, fiasco into Gascon ; 

 and Spaniards, when they are unable to pronounce 

 the English ;, often use gu instead, and say guee for 

 we. We might add, that Wales is called, in French, 

 Galles. A numeral G was anciently used for 400, 

 and with a dash over it, for 40,000. G, in music, is 

 the nominal of the fifth note in the natural diatonic 

 scale of C, and to which Guido applied the mono- 

 syllable sol. It is also one of the names of the high- 

 est cliff. 



GABALIS (Comte de Gabalis, ou Entretiens sur 

 let Sciences secretes) ; a French romance of the last 

 part of the seventeenth century, the author of which, 

 the abbe de Villars, a relation of the antiquary Mont- 

 faucon, born in the year 1640, was shot in 1675, 

 while on a journey, by one of his relations. In this 

 romance, he exposed the cabala (q. v.) to ridicule, 

 the friends of which accused him of having attacked 

 holy subjects, and he was forbidden to enter the 

 pulpit. The romance was founded on the Chiave del 

 Gabinetto of Borry. A renowned adept, the count of 

 Gabalis, is represented as having found in the author 

 capacity to understand the secrets of the cabala, and 

 therefore explains to him the secret science, in five 

 conversations. This would, probably, be known only 

 to those who had occupied themselves with the history 

 of the mystical philosophy of the Cabalists, Gnostics, 

 and New Platonists, that mixture of Oriental poesy, 

 Greek philosophy, and Christian religion, if modern 

 poets had not drawn many of their fictions from the 

 demonology here set forth. "The immeasurable 

 space between the earth and the heavens," said the 

 count, " has many nobler inhabitants than birds and 

 bisects ; the wide-extended sea has other guests than 

 fishes ; the depths of the earth are not for the mole 

 alone ; and the element of fire, far nobler than the 

 three others, is not made to remain useless and unoc- 

 cupied." After this introduction comes the theory of 

 the four spirits of the elements, which are the Sylphs 

 (spirits of air), the Undines (spirits of water), the 

 Gnomes (spirits of earth), and the Salamanders 

 (spirits of fire). How welcome such a system of 

 pneumatology was to the poets, whom the Christian 

 religion had deprived of their mythological machin- 

 ery, without affording an adequate substitute in the 

 fairies and magicians, and how much romantic poetry 

 has gained by it, is evident. This system furnished 

 Pope with the machinery which he has employed with 

 so much elegance and effect in his Rape of the Lock. 



GABRES. See Guebres. 



GABRIEL (hero of God) ; according to the Jew- 

 ish mythology, one of the seven archangels who inter- 

 preted to the prophet Daniel his dreams. He is 

 introduced in the story of Tobias. According to the 

 Biblical history, he announced to Zacharias the birth 

 of John, and to Mary the birth of the Saviour. The 

 rabbins say, he is the angel of death for the Israel- 

 ites, and all the souls of that nation are delivered to 

 him by the inferior receivers of spirits, or angels 

 whose sole business it is to receive a certain spirit, 

 and who, after delivering it up, quit the world. Ac- 

 cording to the Talmud, Gabriel is a prince of fire, 

 who presides over thunder and the ripening of fruits. 

 By the command of Jehovah, he set fire to the 



temple, before it could be burnt by the soldiers of 

 Nebuchadnezzar, and the temple uttered its own 

 lament. He once hunted Leviathan, and, with the 

 assistance of God, conquered him. According to the 

 Mohammedan theology, he is one of the four angels 

 peculiarly favoured by the Deity, employed in writ- 

 ing the divine decrees, and the angel of revelation, 

 in which capacity he dictated the whole Koran to 

 Mohammed. He once caught away Mohammed, 

 and transported him so rapidly through the seven 

 heavens, that, on his return, he found a vessel yet in 

 the act of falling, which he liad overturned on his 

 departure. 



GADFLY. See (Estrus. 



GAEL. The Gael belonged to the great family 

 of Celts, a nation formerly inhabiting a great extent 

 of country, of uncertain origin. Their name is de- 

 rived, by some, from the Teutonic word Wallen, pro- 

 nounced Fallen, signifying to wander, as is also 

 Wallia or Gallia, Vandals, Walloons (g and w or v 

 are often exchanged for each other ; see the article 

 G). It is supposed to have been given them on ac- 

 count of their ancient emigrations in Asia and Italy. 

 (Livy, i, 33, 38, 16 ; Flor. 2, 11.) From Gaul, they 

 passed over into Britain and the adjacent islands. 

 The ancient Scots or Irish were of the same origin, 

 as were also the Welsh, as the name Wales (in 

 French, Galles) indicates. Upper Italy, part of 

 Germany, down along the Danube to Pannonia and 

 Illyricum, and Helvetia, were occupied by their 

 colonies. At the period when history first gives any 

 account of them, they were not without traces of 

 civilization, as appears from the singular religion of 

 the Druids, the songs of the bards, and a kind of civil 

 and religious organization existing among them, 

 which, in consequence of the disunion of their chiefs, 

 gave way before the Roman power. One tribe of 

 them advanced as far as Greece, Thrace, Asia Minor, 

 and made themselves formidable under the name of 

 Galatians. (Pans. Att. 3.) In France, probably, 

 but few of the ancient Gaels survived. At an early 

 period, they were pressed on one side by the Belgians 

 and Kymri ; on the other, by the Romans, and, finally, 

 overpowered by the German tribes. Traces of them 

 remained only in remote and retired districts, as in 

 Ireland, hi the Hebrides, and in the Highlands of 

 Scotland. See Gaul. 



Gaelic, or Erse, is the name of that dialect of the 

 ancient Celtic language, which is spoken in the 

 Highlands of Scotland. According to the opinion of 

 antiquarians, the Celtic, at the time of the Roman 

 invasion, was universally spoken over the west of 

 Europe. Though it is divided into a variety of dia- 

 lects, yet they all show the clearest proofs of a com- 

 mon origin. The most remarkable dialects of the 

 Celtic still in existence, are the Gaelic, the Welsh, 

 the Manks, the Irish. Another dialect, the Cornish, 

 was spoken within the memory of man. (See the 

 Introduction to Mackintosh's History of England.) 

 To this list may be added the dialect spoken by the 

 natives of the province of Bretagne, in France. The 

 Gaelic, which, from a variety of causes, has retained, 

 in a considerable degree, its original purity, is bold, 

 expressive, and copious. It derives no assistance 

 from the languages either of Greece or Rome, from 

 which it differs in its structure and formation. Hav- 

 ing affixes and prefixes, it greatly resembles the 

 Hebrew, particularly in the inflexions of its nouns 

 and verbs. Like the modern French, it knows only 

 two genders, masculine and feminine. If ever the 

 Gaelic possessed an alphabet peculiar to itself, no 

 traces of it now remain. Nor can it boast of any 

 original literary production, unless the poems of 

 Ossian be allowed to form an exception. The Scrip- 

 tures and other religious books have been translated 



