THE SOURCE OF THE NILE. 425 



ration of the Royal family, from their long banifhment in 

 Shoa, feven new characters were neceflarily added to anfwer 

 the pronunciation of this new language, but no book was 

 ever yet written in any other language except Geez. On the 

 contrary, there is an old law in this country, handed down by 

 tradition only, that whoever mould attempt to tranflate 

 the holy fcripture into Amharic, or any other language, 

 his throat mould be cut after the manner in which they 

 kill fheep, his family fold to ilavery, and his houfe razed to 

 the ground ; and, whether the fear of this law was true 

 or feigned, it was a great obitacle to me in getting thofe 

 tranflations of the Song of Solomon made which I intend 

 for fpecimens of the different languages of thofe diftincl: 

 nations. 



The Geez is exceedingly harfh. and unharmonious. It is 

 full of thefe two letters, D and T, on which an accent is put 

 that nearly refembles Hammering. Confidering the fmall 

 extent of fea that divides this country from Arabia, we are 

 not to wonder that it has great affinity to the Arabic. It is 

 not difficult to be acquired by thofe who underftand any o- 

 ther of the oriental languages ; and, for a reafon I have gi- 

 ven fome time ago, that the roots of many Hebrew words 

 are only to be found here, I think it abfolutely ncccfTary 

 to all thofe that would obtain a critical fkill in that lan- 

 guage. 



We m-mers, a Carmelite, has wrote a fmall Ethiopic dic- 

 tionary in thin quarto, which, as far as it goes, has confider- 

 able merit; and I am told there are others of the fame kind 

 extant, written chieflybyCatholic priefls. But by far the mofl 

 .copious, diftincl:, and beft-digefted work, is that of Job Lu- 



Vol. I. 3 H dolf, 



