154 Mr. planta’s Ac couni of 
is ffcill ufti ally called Romance ( m K Thefe circumftances 
confidereft, I am not fo much inclined to difcredit a fact 
related by mabillon^wIio lays, that in the eighth cen- 
tury a paralytic Spaniard, on paying his devotions at the 
tomb of a faint in the church of Fulda, converfed with a 
monk of that abbey, who, becaufe he was an Italian , un- 
derftood the language of the Spaniard. Neither does an 
oral tradition 1 heard fome time ago appear now fo ab- 
furd to me, as it did when it was fir ft related to me, which 
fays, that two Catalonians travelling over the Alps, were 
not a little furprized when they came into the Grifons, 
to find that their native tongue was underftood by the 
inhabitants, and that they could comprehend moft of the 
language of that country. 
The univerfality of the Romance in the French do- 
minions during the eleventh century, alfo accounts for 
its introduction in Paleftine and many other parts of the 
Levant by Godfrey de bouillon, and the multitude of 
adventurers who engaged under him in the Crufade. 
The aflizes or laws of Jerufalem, and thofe of Cyprus, 
are Handing monuments of the footing that language 
had obtained in thofe parts ; and if we may truft a Spanifh 
hiftorian of fome reputation (•) who refided in Greece in 
the thirteenth century, the Athenians and the inhabi- 
tants of Morea fpoke at that time the fame language that 
was ufed in France. And there is great reafon to ima- 
( m ) orozco, Tcf. Caftill. voce romance — Conf. crescimb. Volg. Pocf. 
1 * >'• c. i. ( n ) Ad. Ben. Saec. 3. p. 2. p. 25#. 
( 0 ) raym. montanero Chronica de JUAN I. 
gme. 
