proclamation in Egyptian and Greek. The Greek version of the decree supplied the equivalents of some of the Egyptian words, and a starting point was given for the deciphering of the entire inscription. Various Egyptologists have won distinction in the century now closing, by their industry and skill in extending the knowledge of Egyptian letters; and there are now translations into modern tongues of a very great number of Egyptian writings, which possess a high degree of interest for the student of history, literature, and folk-lore.

More than four thousand years ago the Egyptians wrote in hieroglyphics, or rude pictures. After many centuries the original characters were exchanged for a system largely phonetic but very imperfect. The golden age of Egyptian letters was the era of Moses and of Rameses II, the Pharaoh of Scripture. A great library of papyrus rolls was established at Thebes, the capital of the nation.

The Book of the Dead is one of the most famous works of ancient literature. It begins with a dialogue between the soul and its god, Osiris, immediately after death. It prescribes the funereal honors to be paid to the body of the deceased, which include the embalming of the flesh and its preservation for the future habitation of the departed soul. It follows the disembodied spirit through its supposed long journeys and vicissitudes in the lower world to the judgment-seat of Osiris, where the heart was weighed and the soul was approved or condemned. The Book of Phtah-hotep is believed to be the most ancient in existA copy of the work is to be found in the museum at Paris. It is a book of moral precepts for the government of human life.

ence.

There are many hymns to the gods of Egypt, and to illustrious mortals. An epic poem by Pentaour recites the triumphs of Rameses. There are books on medicine, and a very ancient work on geometry. There are romances and fairy tales.

Among the noted men whose labors have restored the long-hidden literature of the Egyptians, the most famous is the French savant, Jean François Champollion, whose interpretation of the Rosetta stone, described above, gave the first impetus to the modern study of Egyptian writings.

The great library at Alexandria,1 the destruction of which has been the regret of scholars for ages, was established by the Greek dynasty of

1 This was twice destroyed. When Julius Cæsar set fire to the city in his Alexandrian war, in the year 47 B. C., the library was consumed. Reestablished under Cleopatra, it again attained importance, and was preserved until the city was taken by the Mohammedans, in the year 640 A. D., when it was sacrificed to the bigotry of the victorious Caliph.

the Ptolemies, in the later centuries of Egyptian history, when Greek was the language predominant in letters. This library is said to have contained as many as seven hundred thousand books. Doubtless it included among its treasures the folk-lore as well as the history of many nations.

Herodotus, "the Father of History," who wrote (in Greek) about 450 B. C., visited Egypt and gathered from the priests the accounts which he gives of ancient Egyptian history and tradition. Rawlinson's translation of Herodotus, with notes, is of interest to students.

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An alleged history of Egypt, by Manetho, an Egyptian priest of the third century B. C., is of no value as a historical record, being a worthless list of gods, heroes, and kings."

The romantic career of the Egyptian Queen Cleopatra has been the theme of innumerable histories, romances, poems, and dramas. Among the latter are Shakespeare's Antony and Cleopatra, and Dryden's All for Love, in which may be found allusions to Egyptian divinities.

The splendid opera of Aïda was written about a quarter of a century ago, by Giuseppe Verdi, the Italian composer, at the request of the patriotic and ambitious Khedive, who strove in every way to cultivate among his subjects a national spirit. The scene of the opera is laid at Memphis and Thebes, in the time of the Pharaohs. Among the characters is Ramphis, a high priest of the Temple of Isis. The opera was first performed at Cairo, in 1870.

ADDRESS TO THE

MUMMY AT BELZONI'S
EXHIBITION.

BY HORACE SMITH.

AND thou hast walked about (how strange a story!)
In Thebes's streets three thousand years ago,
When the Memnonium was in all its glory,
And time had not begun to overthrow
Those temples, palaces, and piles stupendous,
Of which the very ruins are tremendous.

Speak! for thou long enough hast acted dummy;
Thou hast a tongue-come, let us hear its tune;
Thou'rt standing on thy legs, above ground, mummy,
Revisiting the glimpses of the moon-

Not like thin ghosts or disembodied creatures,

But with thy bones, and flesh, and limbs, and features.

Tell us for doubtless thou canst recollect

To whom should we assign the Sphinx's fame?
Was Cheops or Cephrenes architect

Of either pyramid that bears his name?
Is Pompey's Pillar really a misnomer?
Had Thebes a hundred gates, as sung by Homer?
Perhaps thou wert a Mason, and forbidden
By oath to tell the secrets of thy trade;
Then say, what secret melody was hidden

In Memnon's statue, which at sunrise played?
Perhaps thou wert a priest—if so, my struggles
Are vain, for priestcraft never owns its juggles.
Perhaps that very hand, now pinioned flat,

Has hob-a-nobbed with Pharaoh, glass to glass;
Or dropped a halfpenny in Homer's hat;

Or doffed thine own to let Queen Dido pass;
Or held, by Solomon's own invitation,
A torch at the great temple's dedication.

I need not ask thee if that hand, when armed,
Has any Roman soldier mauled and knuckled;
For thou wert dead, and buried, and embalmed,
Ere Romulus and Remus had been suckled:
Antiquity appears to have begun

Long after thy primeval race was run.

Thou couldst develop-if that withered tongue

Might tell us what those sightless orbs have seenHow the world looked when it was fresh and young, And the great deluge still had left it green; Or was it then so old that history's pages Contained no record of its early ages?

Still silent! incommunicative elf!

Art sworn to secrecy? Then keep thy vows;

But prithee tell us something of thyself—

Reveal the secrets of thy prison-house;

Since in the world of spirits thou hast slumbered,

What hast thou seen, what strange adventures numbered? Since first thy form was in this box extended,

We have, above ground, seen some strange mutations; The Roman Empire has begun and ended

New worlds have risen-we have lost old nations;
And countless kings have into dust been humbled,
While not a fragment of thy flesh has crumbled.

Didst thou not hear the pother o'er thy head,
When the great Persian conqueror, Cambyses,
Marched armies o'er thy tomb with thundering tread—
O'erthrew Osiris, Orus, Apis, Isis;

And shook the pyramids with fear and wonder,
When the gigantic Memnon fell asunder?

If the tomb's secrets may not be confessed,
The nature of thy private life unfold:

A heart has throbbed beneath that leathern breast,
And tears adown that dusty cheek have rolled;
Have children climbed those knees, and kissed that face?
What was thy name and station, age and race?

Statue of flesh-immortal of the dead!
Imperishable type of evanescence!

Posthumous man-who quit'st thy narrow bed,
And standest undecayed within our presence!
Thou wilt hear nothing till the judgment morning,
When the great trump shall thrill thee with its warning.
Why should this worthless tegument endure,
If its undying guest be lost forever?
Oh, let us keep the soul embalmed and pure

In living virtue-that when both must sever,
Although corruption may our frame consume,
Th' immortal spirit in the skies may bloom!

HYMN TO THE NILE.

(From the Egyptian of Enna.)

TRANSLATED BY F. C. COOK.

HAIL to thee, O Nile!

Thou shewest thyself in this land,
Coming in peace, giving life to Egypt:
O Ammon, thou leadest night unto day,
A leading that rejoices the heart!
Overflowing the gardens created by Ra;
Giving life to all animals;

Watering the land without ceasing;
The way of heaven descending:
Lover of food, bestower of corn,

Giving light to every home, O Ptah !

Bringer of food! Great lord of provisions!

Creator of all good things!

Lord of terrors and of choicest joys!

All are combined in him.

He produceth grass for the oxen;

Providing victims for every god.

The choice incense is that which he supplies.

Lord in both regions,

He filleth the granaries, enricheth the storehouses,

He careth for the state of the poor.

He causeth growth to fulfill all desires,
He never wearies of it.

He maketh his might a buckler.

He is not graven in marble,

As an image bearing the double crown.
He is not beheld:

He hath neither ministrants nor offerings: