g the Etruscan _Aesar_ to be
a designation of the Deity, (_Aesar_ being also, as it is said, Irish for
the same,) gives the only ground on which Betham rests his extravagant
assertion, that the Eugubian inscriptions contain an account of the
discovery of Ireland by the Etruscan navigators, and with a pretended
version of which, through the medium of Irish, as he alleges, he has
filled the whole first volume of his book.

"In reading in Suetonius the life of Augustus," he says, "I found
that _Aesar in the Etruscan tongue_ signified _God_. The import in
Irish being the same, it struck me forcibly that this might not be
accidental, but that the Etruscan language might be essentially
Celtic, and therefore capable of interpretation by the Irish. On
examination, the conjecture proved well-founded. The results of the
investigation, consequent on the discovery of this clue, will be
found in the following pages."

It is true the Etruscan _Aesar_ is said to have a like meaning with an
alleged Irish word, coined and spelled by Vallancy _aosfhear_; but it has
also an identical meaning with the Indian _eswara_, and the Egyptian
_osiris_, and the Islandic _aesae_, which makes _aesar_ in the plural; and
it would be just as reasonable to infer, that therefore the Etruscans
spoke the Hindostanee, or the Coptic, or the Islandic language, as that
they spoke Irish.

All the nations of Christendom give God the name Christ; but he would be
justly deemed insane who would argue, that therefore English is the proper
medium of interpretation for a Russian ukase.

Common sense, without any further learning, might have told Sir William
Betham, that till he stood on some surer ground than the coincidence of a
single word, even supposing that word a genuine one, it would be the
excess of folly to venture on such an application of a modern language;
and further learning (if he had possessed it) would have confirmed the
suggestion of common sense. With a moderate amount of learning, he would
have known that, besides the names of known deities--_Kupra_, _Nyrtia_,
_Mantus_, _Aukelos_, _Camillus_, corresponding to the heathen Juno,
Fortuna, Pluto, Aurora, Mercury--there are also several other Etruscan
words of which we know the meanings, such as _faland_, the heavens;
_andras_, the north wind; _lucumo_, a king; _drouna_, a kingdom or
principality; _damnos_, a horse; _capra_, a goat; _agalletor_, a youth;
_verse