4 On the Inscription on the 



so that in fact, on the arrival of Messrs. Leake and Hamilton at 

 Alexandria, in March 1802, Colonel Squire had less knowledge 

 of the inscription than he might have obtained from Pococke, 

 whose work he, probably, had not with him. The expressions 

 used by him in his letter of Christmas-day 1801, when Messrs. 

 Leake and Hamilton had been absent three months, show 

 clearly how little had then been done. He then considered it 

 " as not impossible that part of the inscription might be read, 

 and that f perhaps, something satisfactory might be discovered;" 

 and he had then " determined to endeavour to make the ex- 

 periment." That he did any thing in the following two months 

 of January and February is no where asserted by him, but, on 

 the contrary, he declares in the letter published under his 

 signature and that of Colonel Leake, that the first discovery of 

 any word was made in March 1802, and in the same letter 

 he admits that Messrs. Leake and Hamilton had an equal share 

 in the meritorious and successful endeavour to decipher the 

 inscription. 



I should have been sorry that so respectable an officer as 

 Colonel Squire should have asserted any thing in a private 

 letter which was at variance with what he had published under 

 his hand, but this he has not done. He has not claimed for 

 himself the first idea of deciphering the inscription, or that he 

 had the greatest share in the execution. Had he done so, I 

 should still have given credit to the positive assertions of 

 Messrs. Leake * and Hamilton f, that they had a full share in 

 deciphering the inscription. I cannot therefore agree with 

 Dr. Clarke '* that all the information afforded by the inscription 

 would have been consigned to everlasting oblivion but for the 



, • Classical Journal, No. XXV., page 152, and No.^XXIX., page 161. 



t HLgyptiaca, page 403. In this place Mr. Hamilton expressly asserts 

 that he was a fellow-labourer in the deciphering of the inscription, and 

 adds that, " after visiting it for several days successively at the most fa- 

 vourable hour, when the rays of the sun first struck obliquely on the plane 

 of the letters, we obtained the following lines :" This passage Dr. Clarke 

 has quoted as his authority for asserting " that Mr. Hamilton arrived in 

 Alexandria, as it has been related by him, after the inscription had been found, 

 and the undertaking for copying it had been begun." 



