the Romanfh Language. 141 
or the grey-ones(f). From this period nothing hath ever 
affected their freedom andabfolute independence; which 
they now enjoy in the molt unlimited fenfe, in fpite of 
the repeated efforts of the houle of Auitria to recover 
fome degree of alcendency over them. 
From this concife view of the hiftory of the Crifons, 
in which I have carefully guarded againlt favouring any 
particular hypothecs, it appears, that as no foreign na- 
tion ever gained any permanent footing in the molt 
mountainous parts of this country lince the eltablilh- 
ment of the Tufcans and Romans, the language now 
fpoken could never have fullered any conliderable alte- 
ration from extraneous mixtures of modern languages. 
And to thofe who may objecSt, that languages like all 
other human inliitutions will, though left to themfelves, 
be inevitably affected by the common revolutions of 
time, I lhall oblerve, that a language, in which no hooks 
are written, but which is only fpoken by a people chiefly 
devoted to arms and agriculture, and conlequently not 
cultivated by the criticilms of men of tafte and learning, 
is by no means expofed to the viciflitudes of thofe that 
are polilhed by refined nations (z)\ and that, however pa- 
radoxical it may appear, it is neverthelefs true, that the de- 
generacy of a language is more frequently to be attributed 
to an extravagant refinement than to the neglect of an 
(f) The following barbarous diftich is fometimes infcribed to the arms of 
the three Leagues, 
Foedera funt cana, cana fides, cana libertas : 
Heec tria fub uno continentur corpore Rhteto. 
(g) See Dr. Percy’s Preface to his Tranflation of mallet’s Northern 
Antiquities, p. xxii. where this queition is more amply difcuffed. 
7 illiterate 
