ON AFRICA. 473 last winter, of the most Reverend Doctor Giarve, Bishop of Jerusalem, who has given such incontestible proofs of his proficiency in the Arabic language, that his opinion on this important point cannot but be decisive ; accordingly, on presenting to the reverend Doctor some •letters from the Emperor of Marocco to me, desiring that he would oblige me with his opinion, whether the Arabic in those letters was the same with that spoken in Syria, the Rev. Doctor replied in the following perspicuous manner, which, I think, decides the question : " / can assure you, that the language and the idiom of the Arabic in these letters from the Emperor of Marocco to you, is precisely the same with that which is spoken in the East.''

It is, therefore, thus ascertained, that the Arabic language spoken in the kingdom of Tafilelt, of Fas, of Marocco, and in Suse or South Barbary, is precisely the same language with that which is now spoken in Syria, and Palestine in Asia ; countries distant from each other nearly 3000 miles, and from information since obtained, there appears to be no doubt that the Arabic language spoken by the Arabs in Arabia, by the Moors and Arabs in India and Madagascar, by the Moorish nations on the African shores of the Mediterranean, are one and the same language with that spoken in Marocco, subject only to certain provincial peculiarities, which by no means form impediments to the general understanding of the Ian-