246 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



the Himalayas and diverged into Thibet, and the Syriac alphabet 

 advanced directly across the central platean. In the North, again, 

 the GraBCo-Italian alphabet, after having gone the ronnd of En- 

 rope, in advance of modern travelers, penetrated into the plains 

 of Siberia. All the alphabets in use on the earth are derived from 

 the twenty-two letters of the Phoenician alphabet. It would be 

 hard to find in the history of discovery another example of an in- 

 vention that has had so extraordinary a fortune." This prodi- 

 gious success is easily explained. The Phoenicians found at the 

 first stroke the formula for universal writing. They understood 

 that the real purpose of the art of writing was to express the 

 sounds of speech by visible signs ; and those sounds being nearly 

 the same everywhere, the same letters, slightly modified, have 

 served for writing all languages. 



The love of the human species for the complicated is striking- 

 ly illustrated in the story told by M. Berger. The simple comes 

 after it, and has to wait its time with enduring patience. The 

 history also shows how easily men may dispense with real goods 

 while setting a high store upon imaginary ones. The world had 

 already grown old, and had written for a long time, when the 

 alphabet was invented, about 1500 b. c. Why did it hold during 

 so many centuries to complicated and laborious systems of writ- 

 ing ? Because they were better adapted to its wants. Writing- 

 served in ancient times for three purposes — for engraving in- 

 scriptions on stone, for correspondence with the absent, and for 

 fixing the winged words of the poet. Inscriptions are of much 

 less evident utility than correspondence and books ; yet, epi- 

 graphic writing was the only use of which men then felt the need. 

 The more monumental and decorative it was, the more it pleased 

 them ; and it must be acknowledged that the hieroglyphics of the 

 Egyptians make a better showing on a wall than the twenty-two 

 letters of the Phoenician alphabet. 



The art of expressing ideas by simple traits was long an occult 

 science, the exclusive property of a caste, of a sacerdotal caste, of 

 a corporation of learned men and clerks. It did not matter that 

 inscriptions were not understood by the multitude: those who 

 had the key to them were charged with their explanation, and 

 could give such interpretations of them as suited their interests. 

 There are, in northern Africa, a large number of inscriptions, of 

 various dates, some of them being several centuries old, and others 

 quite recent. This writing, which is still partly in use among the 

 Tuaregs, is intelligible only to the initiated, particularly to certain 

 women, who keep it as a family secret. 



A savage, who was shown his name written in characters that 

 could be read, exclaimed in astonishment : " Where are my legs ? 

 where is my head ? I see nothing there that distinguishes me." 



