[248] Fresnal, Hist. des Arabes avant l’Islomism—Introduction.
[249] At Tangier the idea of an affinity between the Brebers and the Celts is commonly entertained. Mr. Hay and others mentioned to me, that Highland soldiers coming over from Gibraltar, could understand the natives. He points out in his work the coincidence of Breber and Gaelic words; but when these resemblances are found, they are of words borrowed, and not from any affinity between the languages.
[250] Scou in Arabic means hot, as they ought to be eaten, and the expression “hot scous” is a pleonasm.
[251] Melcarth, from Mel and Cardt, Prince of the City (Carteia), was the title of Hercules. The Jewish word was Malik. The title proper of the Sultan of Morocco is Muley; thence Molla of the Turks.
[252] One side is gored out like the mouth of a sack: by this you enter, dropping all clothes outside, and the sack’s mouth is then tied round with a cord.
[253] A remarkable conversation is given in Wilson’s “Lands of the Bible,” vol. i. p. 330, with the sheik of a tribe which he found among the ruins of Petra, and who recounted the story of his lineage and the place.
[254] Also “perfect” and “seven,” the perfect number completing the “planets” and the “week.” The nasal sound gave zebon, whence some derive our word seven, also the σέζας of the Greeks.
[255] Hottinger, De Reb. Sab. l. i. c. 8.
[256] Landseer, Sabæan Res.
[257] “Perhaps the most perfect, and certainly the most widely extended religious system which was ever invented by the unassisted reason of man.”—Drummond’s Origines, iii. 431.