"Families of Nations. 489 



lead they were fubfequent* I can only declare my belief, that the language 

 of Noah is loft irretrievably, and affure you, that, after a diligent fearch, 

 I cannnot find a fingle word ufed in common by the Arabian, Indian, and 

 Tartar families, before the intermixture of dialects occasioned by Moham- 

 medan conqueits. There are, indeed, very obvious traces of the Hamian 

 language, and fome hundreds of words might be produced, which were 

 formerly ufed promifcuoufly by mod nations of that race; but t beg 

 leave, as a philologer, to enter my proteft againil: conjectural etymology 

 in hiftorical refearchcs, and principally againft the licentioufnefs of etymo~ 

 logifts in tranfpofing and inferting letters, in fubftituting at pleafure any 

 confonant for another of the fame order, and in totally difregarding the 

 vowels: for fuch per mutitions. few radical words would be more conveni- 

 ent than Cus or -Gush, lince, dentals being changed for dentals-, and pa- 

 latials for palatials, it inftantly becomes coot, goofe t and, by tranfpofition, 

 duck-, all water-birds, and evidently fymbolicalj it next is the goat wormip~ 

 pe&in Egypt, and, by a metathefis, the dog adored as an emblem of Sirius, 

 or, more obvioufly, a cat, not the domeflick animal, but a fort of fhip, and 

 the Catos, or greatfea-fifh, of the Dorians. It will hardly be imagined, that 

 I mean by this irony to infult an author, whom I refpecT: and efteem ; but 

 no confederation mould induce me to affift t>y my fllence in the diffufion of 

 errour j and I contend, that almoft any word ©r nation might be derived 

 from any other, if fuch licences, as I am oppoflng, were permitted in ety- 

 mological hiftoriesrs ° when we find, indeed, the fame words, letter for let- 

 ter, .and in a fenfe precifely thefame, in difFerenflanguages, we can fcarce 

 heiitatein allowing them a common origin,- and, not to depart from the 

 example before us, when we fee Cush or Cus (for the Sanfcrit name alfo 

 is variously pronounced) among |the fons of Brahma\ that is, among the 

 progenitors of the Hindus* and at the head of an ancient pedigree preferved 



Ooo 



