Blair Collection > History of the Celtic language

CELTIC LANGUAGE. 79
note when sick and unable to inspire and expire
with freedom ; nualy of a loud low three or four
times repeated ; thus, ua, ua, ua, and, JBruchd,
expressive of eructation in the process of rumina-
tion. This language can die but with Nature :
in the term bruchd, we have, perhaps, the primary
idea of the Arabic, nil nich, breath, and symboli-
cally, spirit, &c.
Caor, a sheep. This appellative is pronounced
with a tremulous voice, precisely, an echo to that
of the sheep ; the letter c being always pronounced
hard, like k in English. We now take whh us the
properties of this animal and call a meek inoffensive
person caor, a sheep : a bashful, pitiful, timid
manner, c«o/ail, sheepishness : the white breakers
of the ocean, c«o;-aich, sheep, from their resem-
blance to a common studded with white sheep.*
The Arabic kar, and the Welsh givr, are identical.
The Hebrew name r\W she, is from its panting
property in hot climates, which root we have pre-
served in Seid and seitil, to pant, to blow. Its
Greek name [jy/jXa, mela, is an echo of its bleating ;
nor do we want the term meilich : " melich nan
caoraich," the bleating of the sheep, 1 Sam. xv. 14.
* " Cha robh rif a stigh na h-aodach
'San caolus na chaora geala"
Literally — She, the vessel, deigned not to reef her sails,
although the channel was all white sliccp.