the lovely Clara, with a young Clergyman, waiting for a living from an Irish Marquis, to whose whelphood he had been travelling tutor. "Three successive springs did Mrs. Kendal renew her tears on packing up the slender trousseaux of her misguided girls; when Captain and Mrs. Stretton set off for their quarters at Sunderland; when Mr. and Mrs. Madoc Williams departed for their cottage in Cardiganshire; when the Reverend Montagu and Mrs. Langston jingled off in a hack post-chaise to their curacy in Lincolnshire. She had very little patience with the merits of her three sons-in-law. It was enough for her that her graceful, gentle, lovely girls were gone to darn away their lives as she had done before them; to be sworn at on rainy days, and to bring forth unwelcome children. "Amelia!' she exclaimed, on more than one occasion, to her remaining girl (her favorite if the truth must be told, for her health had been more delicate than the rest, more resembling that of the consumptive little brother, than the robustness of Captain Kendal of the ―th, or Lieutenant Kendal of H. M. S. Orion, Bob the Lombard-Street Clerk, Henry the writer at Bombay, or Vavasor or Fred, the two grammar-school urchins still in leather caps and corduroys), 'Amelia! dearest, beware of letting your feelings run away with you as your sisters have done. My sweet child, you are not strong enough to rough it like the rest of them. You are not fit for privations and fatigue. Be wise in time; do not dance so often with Bob's friend, the young ensign of the Guards. Three times I have been tormented into giving my consent against my better judgment. Amelia, I will never, never sanction your marriage with a man unable to maintain you. Think better of it: consider what it is to consign your youth to drudgery and mortification, unsupported by the consent and blessing of a mother. Think better of it, dearest Amelia; and do not dance with Charles Beverley again.”” Vol. 1. p. 44. If, after so much deserved eulogy, a fault might be hinted, the authoress should be warned against an overstrained attempt at brilliancy. She need never apprehend being accused of the vice of dullness, the inexpiable crime of fashionable writing; but she may reasonably fear the depreciation of some of her best efforts by a constant pursuit of the dazzling, the pointed, and the elaborately gay. A little more quietness of purpose, a little less glare of effort, would indicate the consciousness of power which she is entitled to feel. [From "The Asiatic Journal, No. 36."] [We have always felt a strong distrust of the supposed discoveries of M. Champollion. There has been such a want of all clear explanation in the accounts of them, they have been described in so excited a style, his hypotheses have so evidently rested on very slight foundations when any were provided, and so much that seemed extravagant and utterly improbable has been affirmed, while the proofs, real or imaginary, have been kept back, that not being willing to suspect him of charlatanerie, we have regarded him as deluded by his enthusiasm in a study to which he had devoted himself. To the obvious objection, that, supposing the hieroglyphics could be read into the language of the Pharaohs, that language itself is unknown, and we have only the most inadequate and uncertain means of conjecturing the signification of its terms, there has been scarcely an attempt to give an answer. We are glad to see that the whole subject has been cleared up by a writer so eminently qualified as M. Klaproth.] ART. III. — Examen Critique des Travaux de feu M. CHAMPOLLION, sur les Hieroglyphes; par M. J. KLAPROTH. Ouvrage orné de trois planches. Paris, 1832. Dondey-Dupré. 1832. In this work M. Klaproth has investigated the results of the late M. Champollion's labours on Egyptian Hieroglyphics, in a manner so full, clear, and satisfactory, as to furnish a distinct view of the subject, and an accurate summary of what has been done in this matter, as well as an outline of what yet remains to be accomplished, in order that the progress already made in decyphering some of these signs may lead to a really useful result. The office could scarcely have fallen into more competent hands. The philological knowledge of M. Klaproth is so vast, the tongues he has mastered are so numerous, that the hyperbolical compliment bestowed by Cowley upon Wotton is almost the language of sober truth when applied to M. Klaproth : "Who had so many languages in store, That only Fame shall speak of him in more." The detection of errors and false notions, in any department of science, is so much knowledge actually gained; by divesting the subject of hieroglyphics of a prodigious mass of error, and presenting it in its true character and proportions, the author of the work under consideration may, therefore, be said to have added very materially to our stock of knowledge in this branch of archæology. In a paper printed in our sixth volume,* and which was furnished by M. Klaproth, this gentleman gave a sort of epitome of his present work, which is constructed on the principles there laid down its object being, as he states, "to fix the opinion of the learned upon the extent of the progress hitherto made in decyphering the graphic monuments of Egypt." M. Klaproth shows that, prior to the discovery by Dr. Young of what are termed the phonetic hieroglyphics, M. Champollion, like most persons who devoted their attention to the study of Egyptian cryptography, had no idea that the signs represented letters or sounds. Dr. Young's discovery, and the aid afforded by the Rosetta stone, diverted him, however, into a new course, which has enabled him to enlarge our means of interpreting the hieroglyphics to the utmost limit, we fear, which is practicable. The sanguine temper of M. Champollion hurried him, indeed, into the most extravagant notions as to the extent of his means of interpretation. He fancied that the major part of the hieroglyphical texts were phonetic, not ideographic; consequently, with the help of certain canons arbitrarily laid down he professed to give off * Asiatic Journal, Vol. vi. p. 273. hand translations of inscriptions and papyri; his discoveries were successively promulgated to the world, and received, we are sorry to say, in this country with greedy credulity. M. Klaproth palliates this eagerness to be deceived by observing, that although the authority for these readings was not given, they were eagerly assented to, because it was supposed that the author would not fail to justify them at a future period. This important point, however, namely, the phonetic or alphabetical character of the hieroglyphics, has never been demonstrated by M. Champollion; and if, as there is every reason to believe from ancient authorities, especially Clement of Alexandria, those signs are mostly ideographical symbols, we are as far off as ever from being in a condition to read "hieroglyphical texts." But supposing it could be clearly demonstrated that the texts consist of phonetic hieroglyphics, that is, that each sign stood for a letter or sound, it is necessary that the value of these signs should be ascertained and fixed; for as the vowels (in the cartouch proper names) are commonly omitted, and the letters are not always arranged in the same order, if a sign sometimes stands for B, sometimes for M, and sometimes for T, it is obvious that we should otherwise never be sure of the exact word. "there Supposing, however, all these difficulties to be got over, still remains," as our author observes, "and will always remain, a difficulty which genius itself cannot overcome," namely, to discover the meaning of the words when translated from the signs. The words belong, of course, to the ancient Egyptian language, and this language is unknown to us; the Coptic, which is a relic of the ancient Egyptian, adulterated with Greek and Arabic and vitiated by time, is itself a dead language, and exists only in some fragments of a translation of the Bible and lives of the saints. In these works, all pagan expressions relative to the ancient superstitions of the country, -the very terms necessary to elucidate the hieroglyphics, were, of course, carefully avoided by the pious editors of those Christian works. "Such is the Coptic language, the only resource we have to enable us to understand the hieroglyphic inscriptions, supposing them to be all phonetic, accurately read, and completely decyphered." The course which M. Champollion adopted, in translating texts, was this he rendered the signs into words, according to his table of values, which are by no means satisfactorily established, and which he varied arbitrarily; these words, furnished by him arbitrarily with vowels, were then translated through the medium of the Coptic language, and this last process, which, if fairly and scrupulously employed, would be wholly unsatisfactory, was managed in so loose and vague a manner, senses being attributed to Coptic words which they cannot bear, others being assigned to them conjecturally, that not the slightest confidence can be placed in the results he professed to deduce from his experiments, which by such a process might be made to yield any thing required. M. Klaproth, in fact, accuses M. Champollion, and distinctly proves his charge, of "giving to the unknown signs the value most convenient to himself, and of constructing the very language in which he wished the inscription should be written." In his "Observations on the Phonetic Alphabet," M. Klaproth shows the uncertainty which prevails throughout all the readings of M. Champollion, as well as certain liberties most unjustifiably taken with the text. The original hieroglyphics, which are exhibited in the work before us in very elegant types, are compared with the renderings, and it is clearly shown that M. Champollion has rendered them differently in different cases, often in opposition to his own laws; that the freedoms taken with the Coptic language are such as to make that language speak any meaning in short, that there is nothing certain, nothing credible, but the translations of the cartouches, the point from whence M. Champollion set out. As an example, not the strongest, of the vague manner in which this Egyptologist proceeded in his interpretations, we take, at random, his explanation of a group of four hieroglyphics, which, he says, denotes "king of an obedient people"; being an abbreviation of the phonetic group yielding stn, 'king,' and a character purely symbolical, the bee, a laborious insect. "The first objection," observes M. Klaproth, "which occurs to this specious demonstration is, that it nowhere appears that the word stn, which M. Champollion would have pronounced souten, ever had the signification of 'king' in the Egyptian language. Nothing like it is found in ancient authors; on the contrary, we know, from the historical books of the Hebrews, that Pharaoh was the title of the kings of Egypt. Syncellus likewise informs us that the general name of all the kings of that country was Pharaoh. Julius Africanus, cited by Eusebius, attests the same thing. The only term for king, in the Coptic language, is ouro, and with the article, piouro, pouro, or fouro.* Another difficulty which presents itself is this, that if the root stn signified 'king,' it could not be found in the group in question, which consists of s and t, but there is no trace of n." The Egyptian mythology of M. Champollion is of the vaguest and most uncertain character. We might perhaps expect that he would find in the hieroglyphics names of deities hitherto unknown to us, but we had a right to look for more correspondence between the hieroglyphical and recorded attributes of those we did know. M. Champollion was, we believe, but an indifferent classical scholar, and was even indebted to others for his translations from the Greek. A decided proof of the inefficacy of M. Champollion's reputed discoveries is, that he has been unable, with the help of them, and * In the translation of the N. T. the word Kairag is invariably rendered by pouro. Other Coptic words, belonging to the same root, are tiouro, 'queen '; ariouro, 'kingdoms;' erouro, to reign.' with the aid of the Greek and demotic translations, to make out the hieroglyphics on the Rosetta stone. He has merely cited a few groups and very short passages. If his system was a sound one, the Rosetta inscription would naturally be the first to the test of which he would be desirous of bringing it; if otherwise, he would naturally shun it. Upon the whole, without entering further into the subject, we recommend this volume strongly to the attention of English Egyptologists and antiquaries, as one which will afford them a firm footing for their future exertions. [From "The Asiatic Journal, No. 36."] ART. IV. - Oriental Scenes, Sketches, and Tales. By EMMA THE reputation of Miss Emma Roberts, as a poetess of very considerable taste and talent, is well-established throughout British India. The specimens we have occasionally seen of her compositions, in Anglo-Indian publications, have compelled us to admire the ease and gracefulness of her versification, and especially her powers in descriptive poetry. Bating the enfeebling influence of the climate, India is of all countries in the world the best-adapted to develope the seeds of poesy. The voluptuousness of the air, the rich and varied hues of vegetation, the local features of the country, grand, wild, terrific, or decked in all the luxuriant colors of a fairy landscape, the vast scale of objects there, the animals, the people, the costumes, the edifices, the very conflict of the elements, are poetry embodied into reality, and a portraiture of them, sketched from nature, in India, by the most matter-of-fact pencil, will rival the utmost stretch of a northern imagination, heated by an over-boiling enthusiasm. India is, therefore, a school for descriptive poets; and accordingly, most of the poetry of Anglo-Indians consists of descriptions of local scenery, with occasional sketches and tales borrowed from Eastern legends, or supplied from the fancy, which afford scope for the delineation of manners, customs, and what in other countries constitutes the subsidiary parts or costume of poetry. But we are not criticizing Anglo-Indian poetry, but that of Miss Emma Roberts, which is among the most advantageous specimens of it we have met with. The pieces, of which the volume consists, are stated by the authoress to have been written to illustrate scenes and incidents which, during her travels in India, struck her as particularly interesting and picturesque, and to amuse an idle hour or fill a niche in a periodical. Most of them, perhaps all, have |