It was only under their famous chieftain, George Castriote, or Scanderbeg, that the Skipetar played the part of a nation of any importance in European history, and here their actions were what we expect beforehand--those of brave mountaineers, to whom war is a habit, and with whom dependence has always been but nominal. To the intellectual and moral history of Europe they have contributed nothing. Their alphabet is the Greek, slightly modified, and their literature either unwritten, or confined to ecclesiastical subjects. Creeds sit easy upon them. Before the Ottoman conquest they were Christians, partly of the Greek, partly of the Roman church. At present they are divided between the three, the majority being Mahometans. The Skipetar language has long drawn the attention of philologists; for it has long been known to be as little like the Greek and Slavonic of the parts around, as it is to the Turkish. The notion that it was a mere medley of the three soon disappeared; and when the Albanian became recognised as a separate substantive language, its remarkable isolation was a source of great doubt and perplexity. The latest author who has investigated it, Xylander, considers it to be Indo-European, and in this Prichard agrees with him. I think, however, that it cannot be placed in that group without enlarging the extent of the class, _i.e._, without changing the meaning of the term. _Whatever it may be, it is not intermediate to the Latin and Greek_, a fact of which the import will be seen when we come to the ethnology of Greece and Italy. The Skipetar fall into the following divisions, clans, or tribes. 1. The Gheghides, containing-- _a._ The proper Gheghides, the most northern of the Skipetar, conterminous with the Slavonic countries of Montenegro, Bosnia, and Herzegovna, bounded on the south by the river Drin-- _b._ The Mirdites, south of the Drin, in the province of Croia, who like the Gheghides, are Christians. The Gheghides, as a class, are dark-skinned and black-eyed. 2. The Toskides of Toskuria, or the country between Croia and the Vojutza, the least mountainous part of Albania and containing the valleys of the Sternatza and the Beratina, are more light than dark, with blue or grey eyes. 3. The Liapides of Liapuria, or the valley and water-shed of the Deropuli and the parts about Delvinaki, are the worst-looking and most demoralized of the Skipetar. Such at least is their character. 4. The Dzhami of Dzhamuria are the most agricultural. They extend from the Liapides on the north, to the Greek frontier southward, Parga and Suli being two of their towns.