652 ME small's BIOGEAPHICAL SKETCH OF PROF. ADAM FEEGUSON. 



as you will find under another cover, which goes by to-morrow's post. As my 

 friend has left little that is material for me to add, I shall not trouble you with a 

 long letter. 



" Our friend, Dr Blair, I perceive, labours under much want of information 

 on the subject ; for there is not one of the points on which he states his objections 

 founded in fact, and, that being the case, his arguments and reasons require no 

 answer. I cannot conceive what interest, except it was a silly degree of vanity, 

 to give themselves a consequence on account of their knowledge in the Gaelic, 

 those persons who gave the information had in deceiving our friend. 



" Mr Davidson writes rationally, but he seems not to know that there is scarce 

 any manuscript to be followed, except, indeed, a very few mutilated ones in a 

 kind of Saxon characters, which is as utterly unknown to the Highlanders as 

 either the Greek or Hebrew letters. With respect to the cheap copy he mentions, 

 if there should arise a wish for having a small edition, there is scarce any 

 common printer but can metamorphose the Greek character into something like 

 it in the Roman. With respect to the splendid edition now intended, it was 

 never my intention to put it up to sale, so that its grandeur will not keep it out 

 of the hands of those who would enjoy it most. I believe it will appear, from the 

 accompanying observations, that there are not many of those amateurs between 

 Glotta and Tarvisium. 



" Mr Davidson should be informed, that neither the Irish nor the Scotch High- 

 landers had ever any alphabet of their own. When they Avrote, or attempted to 

 write, they made use of the Saxon characters, which are much more confined than 

 even the Roman, from which they are derived. 



" As I have heard that Mr Davidson is an excellent Greek scholar, he may be 

 induced perhaps to try the effect of the specimen now sent on the Highland 

 porter or chairman, in the manner recommended in the accompanying observa- 

 tions. Our friend Mr Home, and even Dr Blair, who are both good Grecians, 

 will be able, I trust, to read the original of Ossian, as it is to be printed in Greek, 

 in a manner that will be intelligible to such Highlanders as understand their 

 native tongue. But these, I apprehend, are much more circumscribed in number 

 than is generally supposed. 



" The result of the whole is, that I have resolved to follow the example of the 

 old Druids, in writing the Celtic language in Greek characters. I shall not, there- 

 fore, with Dr Blair, agree, ' That it is the opinion of some of the learned in Earse 

 that must determine the point, and that to them it must he submitted.'' Where 

 those learned men are I have never been able to learn. With respect to the 

 clergy, I would rather take their ghostly advice on matters of religion than accept 

 of their opinion about the manner of printing profane poetry. I consequently 

 request, that instead of submitting the decision to them you will be pleased to 

 return to me the specimen, already in your hands, at your convenience. And 



