the Lord's Supper, is indeed profoundly interesting, but there is not enough of it to allow open minds to decide whether it is anterior to those of St. Matthew and St. Mark, or merely a compendium drawn from them. For while it closely resembles both, it is identical with neither. The question is accordingly usually decided by the standpoint of each critic. If he be heterodox, he declares the fragment to be from a protoGospel, which our Evangelists copied ; if he be orthodox, he tells us it is a very early compendium from our four Gospels, made, perhaps, in the third century. Of the classical sort, a passage from the lost Hecale of Callimachus, which was an epic idyll of the kind that Tennyson has made so familiar, is the most interesting hitherto published. And this has been edited, with a facsimile, by Professor Gomperz, of Vienna, the foremost scholar in Europe in the matter of papyrus fragments. But the passage is disappointing. It is in no way remarkable, save that it points to a detailed treatment which we should hardly have thought possible in a short epic. In fact, it required no small acumen and insight to recognize its source and determine its author. Before we turn back to England, it may be well to cast a glance at the contributions to this field of scholarship made by Paris and Berlin. Both have acquired a considerable quantity of papyri during recent years, but there is no official pronouncement as to the amount, and only isolated specimens of their quality. We may be quite certain that with such specialists as M. Weil and M. Eugène Revillot at hand in Paris, nothing of capital importance can lie concealed. The latter has under his hand a periodical in which he gives us at intervals the results of his researches. But they are usually in Demotic literature, from which he has drawn invaluable aid in deciphering. and explaining the difficult private accounts in Greek which form so large a portion of every collection of papyri. A long and important passage from one of the lost speeches of Hypereides, who seems destined to be recovered piecemeal from the tombs or sands of Egypt, is the only considerable classical acquisition he has made for us. The Berlin collection, which is also under the eyes of several great specialists, has never yet been described as a whole. Many short texts, especially those concerned with accounts and with local administration, have been published and explained by Professor U. Wilcken, who has devoted his great talents to this branch of Greek philology; and he now promises us a corpus of all extant Greek papyri, a task so vast, and so constantly increasing, that it seems beyond the reach of any single man. The Berlin authorities should rather take heart at the example of the British Museum, and devote their energies to a complete publication of their own papyri, with adequate facsimiles. Of such publications we have several notable examples in the last generation. A. Peyron, in volumes never since surpassed for acuteness and sound learning, gave us the small but excellent collection at Turin. Leemans produced in a very similar way the collection of Leyden; and in the Notices et Extraits brought out forty years ago by Brunet de Presle from Letronne's papers we have a fine storehouse of these texts. All of them are given in facsimile, the last even in colors, so as to help further decipherment of the passages illegible to the editors. But these meritorious works were brought out before the days when photography began to lend its invaluable aid to the accurate reproduction of originals. The imitation by hand in copper-plates, however carefully done, must want the freedom of the original handwriting, and cannot possibly give us all the microscopic points which lead to the decipherment of a half-obliterated scrawl. Hence we find M. Revillot, in his recent admirable editions of the French papyri (in his Revue), always appealing for his new readings to the originals, which are inadequately rendered in the plates of the Notices et Extraits. Nowadays, no scholar feels perfectly satisfied with any transcription unless he has seen a copy taken by the faithful sun, which has no theories to support. From henceforth nobody will attempt any other sort of reproduction from these faint and worn fragments, for the sake of the scholars who cannot study the originals. Such are all the most recent publications of the kind-Gomperz's fragment of the Hecale, Wilcken's Tafeln, or specimens of early handwritings, and the magnificent volumes of the Palaeographical Society. The authorities of the British Museum, with that energy and liberality which have made it the noblest and best in Europe, have decided to reproduce with solar accuracy the MSS. long since published with facsimiles in copper-plate by the then Chief Librarian, J. Forshall, in its day an excellent and scholarly production. When we come to the quality of the reproduction, we find a signal superiority in the volume of the British Museum. For there are photographs and photographs; there are processes and processes. The cheaper and more ordinary are quite unable to reproduce for us the yellow wrinkled surface of these papyri. There are cheap processescollotype, or whatever they are calledwhich only produce blurred black surfaces, upon which very little can be deciphered. Such are, for example, the reproduction of the strange Etruscan book found by Krall at Agram, and that of the Hecale fragment (written on wood), to which the editor has been obliged to append a colored cut done with the hand. Professor Wilcken's plates are somewhat better, but still far from satisfactory.* Nowhere is the superiority of England plainer than in the quality of the plates now produced by the British Museum. They are the result of many trials by the Autotype Company with colored lenses, with electric lamps, of much consultation with Mr. Maunde Thompson, the well-known palæographer, whose services in the Museum are acknowledged by all Europe. The result in this great volume, as well as in the Petrie Papyri, of which the second volume is just being published by the Royal Irish Academy, is really all that can be desired. In the great majority of these cases these autotypes are quite as good as the originals; in a few they are even better, bringing out points more clearly than the origi *The only thoroughly satisfactory foreign reproduction is that of the Codex Marchalianus, an Egyptian sixth-century copy of the Gos pels, published two years ago at Rome. nal; in some, of course, especially with very wrinkled surfaces, they cannot but he inferior. The only objection to this truly brilliant and artistic work is its great expense. The large plates in the folio of the Museum may have cost £20 apiece; for the quarto plates in the Petrie Papyri cost £12. This is the reason why none but wealthy editors can indulge in the luxury, and in the case of the Petrie collection the learned are already regretting that more of its curious and unique documents have not been reproduced. If this collection. passes, as is not improbable, into the hands of the Museum, we may hope that in a new volume it will complete the work of the Irish Academy, and give the whole of the Petrie treasures in plates to the public. But it is high time to turn from this external history of the publication of papyri to the contents of the new volume. In doing so it will be well to notice the various analogies in the parallel publication of Vol. II. of the Petrie Papyri, brought out this month by the Royal Irish Academy. Everybody knows that during the last three years the British Museum has been astonishing the world with new classical texts, notably the Constitution of Athens, by Aristotle, and the Mimiamboi (character sketches) of Herondas-they might be called idylls, were the treatment not so homely and coarse. Both these new texts, not to speak of a volume of pages from the Iliad and from Demosthenes, have been given to the world in complete autotype facsimile, and have excited a perfect deluge of critical literature. The new quarto, with its atlas of plates, is of a very different kind. It contains no purely literary or classical texts. It contains not even much newly discovered matter. But it professes to reproduce more accurately the fragments already printed by Forshall, with so many improvements as to supersede the older book. A considerable part of these texts is from a treasure which was divided among the finders, and sold to divers hands, from whence portions have come to Leyden, Rome, Turin, Paris, as well as London. Thus legal documents, consisting of complaints, replies, minutes, receipts, can be explained by compari son of the collections in various mu seums. Such is the case with the long series of documents concerning the claims of the twin female acolytes, Thaes and Thaous, who were appointed to offer daily services at the Serapeum of Memphis, with a monthly allowance of bread and oil. This salary had fallen into arrears, and the Twins, who assert that they are starving, besiege the authorities with petitions. Their case, however, was conducted for them by a certain Ptolemy, son of Glaucias, a Macedonian, who had retired into the temple for ten years as a recluse under vows which prevented his leaving its precincts. This Ptolemy was evidently a ready writer, and we have from his hand many personal complaints, as well as those in behalf of the Twins. So far as the issue is known to us, the Twins recovered their arrears of oil and bread in the end. But the pursuit of each required a long series of papers, including first on their part an application to the Governor of Memphis, and when that failed an appeal to the King, who happened to pay an official visit to Memphis during the dispute. But these appeals have to pass through the hands of so many officials, even after the King had ordered the payment, that we are quite bewildered by the crowd of bureaus and clerks, and come to wonder how any business of the kind was ever completed. Every device of our War Office clerks seems fully anticipated. The Egyptian officials had learned perfectly how to ignore, to postpone, to resent as impertinence, to shunt responsibility on another department. Red tape was already rampant. All this went on in the days of the Seventh Ptolemy, about 160 B.C. But even then it was not new, for the Petrie Papyri, which date from the Second and Third Ptolemies-many of them a full century earlier-show the same exuberance of officialdom. It is likely that the natural consequences, oppression and corruption, were also prevalent. The acharnement of the Twins in their complaints is clearly owing to the conviction, openly expressed (Pap. XXXV.), that while the Crown had honestly paid the salary, the head officials of the temple had embez zled it, and so, when two years' arrears were paid to them, the third year was withheld and required a new series of applications. The arrear of bread requires also a separate set of applications, etc., from that of oil.* The Petrie Papyri show that in addition to this oppression of delay-a real weapon of torture in the hands of a bureaucracythere was also imprisonment pending trial, or without trial, for we find there several petitions from prisoners to high officials to get them released, and save them from rotting in jail." This had been specially forbidden by the old Egyptian law, which was now overridden by the new dynasty with GræcoMacedonian traditions. 66 We have been drifting naturally into the inferences concerning life and manners to be drawn from these tedious minutes and claims about a petty affair if, indeed, any affair can be called petty which can be raked up and discussed after more than two thousand years. For such antiquity, especially when we possess the original documents, lends interest to every triviality of human affairs. It seems that when an Egyptian mother had twins, she gave them names not more easy to distinguish than the children themselves; the various spellings of Thaons and Thaes are such that if we met either by itself we should with difficulty say which of them was meant. These girls were members of the crowd of priests and acolytes who were attached to the great group of temples of which the Serapeum was but one. From the high priest to the hanger-on there was a descending hierarchy of the same complication which we find in the public offices. But in addition to these salarybearing officials, we have revealed to us a fact which we never could have guessed the existence of monastic ideas, of the presence of voluntary recluses who escaped from the world to the protection and peace of the temple. Ptolemy does not tell us what his duties were. They certainly allowed him time to take interest in worldly affairs. He for burning, and sesemine, for we know that olive oil was only produced by the Greek colony in the Fayyum. *The oil is of two kinds, kiki (castor oil) not only conducts this complicated case for the Twins, whose interest he espoused from pure benevolence (or officiousness?), for they were no relations of his, but he also manages his property through a younger brother, for whom he begs a commission in the army. But his seclusion within the temple precincts was evidently imperative. We are not told of the causes which induced him to adopt this life, but there is extant in the collection another document, which shows that a man would suddenly desert his home and family and take refuge in the Serapeum without letting them know of his intentions or even of his whereabouts, till perhaps his conscience sinote him. In the face of such a document we imagine ourselves in the Middle Ages. Here is the text (Pap. XLII.) :— "Isias to her brother Hephaestion. If you are in good health and in other respects satisfied, you are as I constantly pray the gods that you should be. I too am well, and the child, and all the household, all constantly thinking of you. When I received your letter by the hands of Horos announcing that you were in retreat at the Serapeum at Memphis, I forthwith thanked the gods that you were safe and well, but I am vexed that you did not come home with all the rest who were arrested there [the place and occasion of this arrest or detainment is assumed as familiar], because that all through such a crisis, having managed for myself and for your child, and being in great straits owing to the high price of food, and expecting some relief when you returned, I find that you never thought of coming home or considering our difficulties. And yet even while you were here we were in great need, not to say after the additional lapse of time, and the bad times, and your having sent us nothing. And now that Horos, who brought your letter, also told us that you had been completely released from your vows, I am quite annoyed. But since your mother happens to be in very bad health you will do well, on her account as well as ours, to come home to this city, if not absolutely prevented. Farewell, and take care of your health." The date appended corresponds to 172 B.C. How many similar letters must dis tracted wives and sisters have written to men who fled from the world and the terrible prospect of eternal torments, to the deserts and the forests, to save their souls by anchorite asceticism! There is a companion letter from this man's brother preserved in the Vatican, which speaks still more strongly concerning his neglect of duty; but I will not dwell upon a single case longer. It is to be remarked that even in such letters of angry complaint the forms of politeness are strictly observed, as strictly as our Dear sir and your obedient servant, even when we mean nothing of the kind. Such is also the character of the letters in the Petrie Papyri, from which I may quote one from a son to his father, which is well enough preserved to show its extreme courtesy or filial affection. The date is about 250 B.C. and the heading is lost, but it must have commenced: [" Philonides to his father (Kleon), greeting. . . .] For thus will you find the King favorable to you for the future. Surely nothing is to me more vital than to protect you for the rest of your life in a manner worthy of you, worthy of myself; and should any mortal chance befall you, that you should receive every attention [he means a stately funeral]; for it is my whole object to stand by you well, both while you live and when you depart to the gods. Above all things, then, make every effort to be relieved finally of your duties [he was Commissioner of Public Works in the Fayyûm], but if this be impossible, make an effort when the river falls, and there is no danger [to dykes and sluices], and when Theodoros can act as your deputy, to take ship, so as to spend that season at least with us. Keep this before you, that you may avoid vexation, and remember that I have used every forethought to keep you free from trouble-" The conclusion is lost. The handwriting is very large and clear, and evidently written with peculiar care by way of respect to his correspondent. But I must return again to the British Museum vol ume. Among the miscellaneous papers which are printed after the Serapeum papers, there are assessments of taxes, descriptions of property, and other 1894. business documents which are only of interest to specialists. Unfortunately, there are but few private letters. Here is one, which we may take to be from a daughter to her father (Pap. XLIII.): "Hearing that you are learning the Egyptian language, I was glad both for you and for myself, since now you can come to the city and teach children at the school of and so you will obThe tain a support for your old age." Petrie Papyri have many more such papers. Here is a specimen: "Dorotheos to Theodoros, greeting. Take notice that I am going to have my vinYou will do well, tage on the 9th inst. therefore, to send some one here on the 8th, who may superintend the pouring out of the must which comes to you, or if you like to manage the thing some other way, let me know by letter. Good-bye.-4th Payni, year 7 [which means B.C. 240]." Isolated letters of this kind are, however, not nearly so interesting as the various letters sent by or to a single man, such as Kleon, the Commissioner of Works already mentioned, from whose correspondence we have in the Petrie Papyri at least twenty-five letters more or less well preserved, which are given in the second volume of the Irish Academy's publication. The two other large sections of the London collection are magical papers, and accounts-two very contrasted subjects, seeing that vagueness is the leading feature of the former, accuracy of the latter. The editors in the Museum are bold enough to call the collection of magical conundrums and recipes interesting; to the ordinary person of common-sense they will seem an extraordinary mass of gibberish. There are horoscopes, divination formulæ, recipes for love charms, mystic diagrains, all the paraphernalia of a false science, which could hardly interest any society of modern men, save, perhaps, the Psychical Society of Cambridge. To them we commend the Egyptian forerunners of the modern spiritualist, who sought by vain formula to penetrate the secrets and influence the conduct of unseen powers. If any sense whatever is extracted from these magical formulæ, of which Dr. Wessely at Vienna has published a whole volume, 29 and the Leyden editors another, I am Very different is the catalogue of accounts, which are indeed most difficult to decipher, but which, when once understood, at least give us the symbols for figures, the prices of ordinary things, the methods of business among the Greeks of Egypt. Among the Petrie Papyri there are also a large number of such pieces in Greek, many more in Demotic, very dry and repulsive to decipher, but yielding to such men as M. Eugène Revillot most important results. These, too, are strictly technical results, and have by no means reached the point where they can be put in an easy form and explained to the public. The whole result is, however, broadly this, that these recent discoveries, especially those of Mr. Petrie in the Fayyûm, have opened up to us the ordinary life of Egypt, both private and official, with a wealth of detail which we seek in vain from the centuries following upon the second before Christ. The latter half of the third B.C. is, perhaps, the best represented; then we have from monkish times (sixth and seventh centuries of our era) a good many contracts of sale, etc., drawn up with curious and suspicious minuteness. The monks seem to have been as anxious to guard themselves from the claims of brother monks as if they had been horse-dealers. Of these papers also there are specimens in the British Museum publication. But they tell us little of real life; little of the disputes, the interests, the anxieties of men and women of like passions with ourselves, such as the natives and settlers in the Egypt of the Ptolemies. This latter has, indeed, up to our own generation been a mere valley of dry bones, like the vision of the prophet; but now bone is joining bone, the flesh is coming upon them, and the men of that day are taking form and color. It but requires the breath of the historian to breathe upon them, and they will live. Then we shall see into another episode of that eternal process by which foreign nations subdue Egypt, regenerate her resources, develop and appropriate her wealth, and yet, when they |