The genuine history of the Britons asserted against Mr. Macpherson ...

THE BRITONS ASSERTED. 141
'' Gadhel. The fubterfuge avails nothing, dh
" are univerfally quiefcent, or at moft found
" like a y, in every dialed! of the Celtic lan-
" guage.'*
The argument deduced from Gael may be
effectual againfl Mr. O'Connor's fyftem, but, as
I have already Ihewn, is of no force to eftablilh
Mr. Macpherfon's. The indigenous appellation
of Gael for the Irifli ferves ftrongly to evince
them, what hiilory demonftrates them to be, the
defcendants of the Britons. But it ferves not in
the leaft to point out the particular divifion of
Britain, from which they were immediately de-
rived.
Mr. Macpherfon^s intimate acquaintance with
the Celtic language, was fuch an advantage over
the body of our hiftorical writers, that he might
very juftly, as he does in p. 5 and 38, plume
himfelf confiderably upon it. But I have pre-
vioufly remarked, that his knowledge of the
Celtic appeared to be confined within the pale of
a fmgle dialed. And the prefent Extract con-
firms me in the opinion. Mr. Macpherfon In
p. 46 commends the author of the Critical Dif-
fertations, for his *' great knowledge of all the
" Ranches of the Celtic language." The know-
ledge of both, however, feems to me to have been
confined almofl entirely to the Irifli or Erfe. And
it particularly feems fo here. Mr. Macpherfon
could not otherwife have imagined, as he here
alTerts,