he population of Gaul, would the keenest philologer
arrive at any other conclusion than that this population was
essentially and fundamentally a "Latin" race, which had had some
communication with Celts and Teutons? Would he so much as suspect the
former existence of the Aquitani?

Community of language testifies to close contact between the people
who speak the language, but to nothing else; philology has absolutely
nothing to do with ethnology, except so far as it suggests the
existence or the absence of such contact. The contrary assumption,
that language is a test of race, has introduced the utmost confusion
into ethnological speculation, and has nowhere worked greater
scientific and practical mischief than in the ethnology of the British
Islands.

What is known, for certain, about the languages spoken in these
islands and their affinities may, I believe, be summed up as
follows:--

I. _At the time of the Roman conquest, one language, the Celtic, under
two principal dialectical divisions, the Cymric and the Gaelic, was
spoken throughout the British Islands. Cymric was spoken in Britain,
Gaelic in Ireland._

If a language allied to Basque had in earlier times been spoken in
the British Islands, there is no evidence that any Euskarian-speaking
people remained at the time of the Roman conquest. The dark and the
fair population of Britain alike spoke Celtic tongues, and therefore
the name "Celt" is as applicable to the one as to the other.

What was spoken in Ireland can only be surmised by reasoning from the
knowledge of later times; but there seems to be no doubt that it was
Gaelic; and that the Gaelic dialect was introduced into the Western
Highlands by Irish invaders.

II. _The Belgae and the Celtae, with the offshoots of the latter in
Asia Minor, spoke dialects of the Cymric division of Celtic_.

The evidence of this proposition lies in the statement of St. Jerome
before cited; in the similarity of the names of places in Belgic Gaul
and in Britain; and in the direct comparison of sundry ancient Gaulish
and Belgic words which have been preserved, with the existing Cymric
dialects, for which I must refer to the learned work of Brandes.

Formerly, as at the present day, the Cymric dialects of Celtic were
spoken by both the fair and the dark stocks.

III. _There is no record of Gaelic being spoken anywhere save in
Ireland, Scotland, and the Isle of Man_.

This appears to be the final result of the long dis