5

NOTES. 379
fish language, sermo haud multum diverstti, i. e, " a language
nearly resembling the Gcdlie. But, (says Mr. Pinkarton), he
is here speaking of the Belgic Gauls, and the Belgae in Britain,
and means the German language. Be it so. But I suppose it
will be 'admitted Tacitus is the best judge of his own meaning.
Speaking of the jEstyi, a German nation, {De Morib, Germ. cap.
16. ad initium), he says. Ergo jam dextrO Suevici inaris littore
Mstyorum gentes alluuntur ; quibua ritus habitusgue suevorum,
lingua Britannicae propior, i. e. " The tribes of the ^styi are
next washed on the right hand shore of the Suevian sea ; they
have the religious rites and dress of the Suevi, but their language
approaches nearer to the Britannic. Tacitus here certainly
means to say, that the Mstii spoke the Britannic language, and
not the German; and hence it must also follow that the Britan.
nic language was not the German. Had there been different
languages in Britain, Tacitus would not have used the general
term Britannic language, (a term commensurate to the island
itself), to express the language of the JEstyi. This uniformity
of language, throughout the whole extent of the island, clearly
established by Tacitus, and contradicted by no tloman author
whatever, settles the important point, that the Belgae were
Celts—that they spoke the Celtic language—and that the inha.
tants of Britain, in toto (in Tacitus' time), were of the same
race, and spoke the same language, Mr. Pinkarton, taking his
leave of Tacitus, has a most tragi-comic encounter with Bede,
J'ornandes, Nennius, Samuel, £fc. hugging one, and buffeting
another, as they happen to favour, or thwart his purpose; but
the whole evidence be elicits from this arduous contest, is not
worth a penny. When Tacitus had oncie dropt the hint, that
the Caledonians might perhaps be GermSins, it was easy for these
fabulous writers, to contrive a method of ferrying them over
from Germany. But here too, they commit an egregious mis.
take ii^
bringing them over in a few Roman ships of war, longisnavibus
non multis. Every one knows that the Romans, and no
Aation else denominated their ships of war, Longne naves. This
blunder is the more unpardonable, because Tacitus, speaking of