whole volume, and the Leyden editors another, I am ready to retract my words, and confess that what I declared to be nonsense has turned out sense.

descriptions of property, and other | fluence the conduct of unseen powers. business documents which are only of If any sense whatever is extracted interest to specialists. Unfortunately, from these magical formulæ, of which there are but few private letters. Here Dr. Wessely at Vienna has published a 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 Very different is the catalogue of the school of and so you will ob- accounts, which are indeed most diffitain a support for your old age." The cult to decipher, but which, when once "Petrie Papyri" have many more such understood, at least give us the sympapers. Here is a specimen: "Doro- bols for figures, the prices of ordinary theos to Theodoros, greeting. Take things, the methods of business among notice that I am going to have my the Greeks of Egypt. Among the vintage on the 9th inst. You will do well, 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 let-plained to the public. ters sent by or to a single man, such The whole result is, however, broadly as Kleon, the commissioner of works this, that these recent discoveries, espealready 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.

"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 ex

cially 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 The two other large sections of the latter half of the third B.C. is, perhaps, London collection are magical papers, the best represented; then we have and accounts-two very contrasted from monkish times (sixth and seventh subjects, seeing that vagueness is the centuries of our era) a good many conleading feature of the former, accuracy tracts of sale, etc., drawn up with curiof the latter. The editors in the Mu- ous and suspicious minuteness. The seum are bold enough to call the collec- monks seem to have been as anxious tion of magical conundrums and recipes to guard themselves from the claims of interesting; to the ordinary person of brother monks as if they had been common sense they will seem an ex-horse-dealers. Of these papers also traordinary mass of gibberish. There there are specimens in the British Muare horoscopes, divination formulæ, seum publication. But they tell us recipes for love charms, mystic diagrams, 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 for mulæ to penetrate the secrets and in

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 began to ascend the slope that led and the men of that day are taking to "the Great Divide." Flowers still form and color. It but requires the blossomed for her. Friends met her breath of the historian to breathe upon and walked with her. Now and again them, and they will live. Then we one would slip from her side, and she shall see into another episode of that would call the friend by name, and eternal process by which foreign na- there was no answer. The word tions subdue Egypt, regenerate her "loss" had crept into her vocabulary resources, develop and appropriate her and stayed there. She had been learnwealth, and yet, when they have done ing a language all the way hitherto, all this, and are complete masters of in which the words "joy," "love," that patient land, pass away either by "life,' light," and their synonyms, absorption or decay, leaving the older were in daily use. She was aware of a race almost unchanged. Egypt has figure walking always just in front of forever, so far as history can reach, her, with buoyant step and smiling been the property of foreigners. The face. She loved the look on the face, oldest Egyptians of Meza's day were but she never asked who this pioneer plainly no Africans, but an immigrated could be. She was occupied in listenAsiatic people, as their type and lan- ing to the swish of the rustling grasses. guage betray. Ever since, the great as she trod upwards, and to the music rulers of the land have been invaders, of a rivulet which babbled down over or mules in descent. The occupation mossy stones. of the Macedonians has many points of There were times when the place likeness with that of the English. The whereon she stood became holy ground, Macedonians reformed the administra- and she talked with God on the Mount. tion, improved the irrigation, strength- There were moments when evil beasts ened the military defences, and occupied came out of the rocks and glared at the frontiers with their superior army. her. She found as she neared “the Yet they respected native law and na- Great Divide," that a new language tive traditions, and made no serious was spoken there. The commonest attempt to denationalize the adminis- words in this new language were tration. If the English control could" effort," "darkness,"" failure,' 99.66 801only be as successful as that of the row," "temptation." Yet the old Macedonians, our interference would words were still at times in use, and require no further justification. Love would show his face tip-tilted like a flower from out a brier bush. And Joy would toss himself laughing at her feet; but the laugh sounded like an echo, and seemed to come up from the path below, and not from where he lay.

J. P. MAHAFFY.

From Blackwood's Magazine.
THE GREAT DIVIDE.

SHE stepped out of the Imperial Pal- And now she was aware of a great ace into a garden full of roses and change in the figure before her. It mignonette. She never looked back at had shrouded itself in a cloak, and had the Imperial Palace. Youth's starlike drawn a cowl over its head. The face eyes look straight ahead, and she wore had grown grey and set, and now she no Mnemosyne face as yet. The bees stood at last on "the Great Divide,” hummed deliciously over the migno- and heard, as it were, a trumpet talknette. The scent of the roses crept ing. The summit was bare and windinto her blood. She flung herself swept. As she stood, the mountain among flowers. Something stung her, and she rose with a sharp cry. The word "pain" had crept for a moment into her vocabulary and out again. Moving on, she passed through a gate

gloom and the mountain glory strove for mastery over her, and in their conflict transfigured her now to the blackness of darkness and now to the brightness of day. She turned to take.

strange change had come over her Will be thought by some thinker next guide. The mantle and cowl had fallen

You may cling to this world of time and the means used are continuously controlled by that calm reason which is inseparable from the idea of justice.

sense,

You may think of another rarely;

You may sigh, ah! whither? and ask, ah! It is well known that certain members

whence?

And find life puzzling-fairly.

Yet life is sweet

We still repeat

On this dear old earth we were born in.

of the animal creation, from man to crustaceans, may be hypnotized — that is, have their consciousness placed in a condition which, in the higher animals,

Good bettered to best, best changed into and of course most evidently in man,

blest

resembles sleep or dream conscious

When we wake to God's cloudless "next ness. Abercrombie relates the case of

morning."

She fell asleep with the song in her ears, and the darkness covered her. She will lie there sleeping till "next O. J. morning."

a young man whose natural sleep was of such a character that he could be made in all things to follow the suggestions of companions who prompted him. The mind revolts from the thought-for which, nevertheless, there is some evidence that it is within the power of one human being From The Lancet. so to influence the consciousness of anHYPNOTISM IN CRIMINAL INVESTIGATION. other so to hypnotize him -as to It would appear from the latest par- cause him to perpetrate acts only posticulars of the case of De Jong that the sible in a condition of moral irresponsiDutch authorities have abandoned the bility. Is it more tolerable, we would intention they were at one time stated ask, that a fellow-creature accused of a to entertain of subjecting the accused crime, and who should be assumed to the process of hypnotization, with until convicted to be innocent, should the view of obtaining evidence from at such a crisis in his life be rendered him which might lead to his conviction. irresponsible for his thoughts and acIt would appear that such a method is tions ? It is doubtful, indeed, whether permitted by the law of Holland, al- under such circumstances an unwilling though, necessarily, information thus subject could be hypnotized; but, obtained cannot be made use of unless granting the success of the experiment otherwise corroborated. The Dutch and the necessarily inconclusive nature philosopher Spinoza defined the natural of the evidence, we ask our brother state of living creatures to be one in practitioners in Holland whether they which the big fish had been created to consider it calculated to enhance the swallow the little fish, and considered dignity and independence of the professociety to be an organization of little sion of medicine to lend themselves as fish to protect themselves against the the agents of an inquisitorial process big fish. In such an organization, the worthy of the days of Torquemada or of Dutch, tutored in the rough school of Alva. The intrusion of a period of their struggle for independence against irresponsibility into a legal process Philip of Spain and his merciless lieu- which may end in the forfeit of a life which is still a living memory is, to our minds, an invalidation of the — appear to have imbibed the idea that investigation and an offence against everything is permissible in defence of justice. To countenance, directly or the commonwealth. Salus populi su- indirectly, such a method we deem unprema lex. With such an argument we worthy of a calling which is nothing if are in the fullest sympathy, provided not rational, beneficent, and impartial.

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