of the Letters of the Hieroglyphic Alphabet. 211 
words, and probably coert of another. Now, in these three words, an 8S occurs 
in the vicinity of the changed letter. May not this account for the change? If 
the long serpent was a compound letter, containing a T combined with a sibilant, 
either S, or SH, may not the vicinity of another sibilant have led to the loss of 
this, and to the consequent substitution of the simple T for the compound ? It 
certainly appears to me that these questions should be answered in the affirma- 
tive. Even where no second sibilant was present, we know that ¥ was converted 
into 0, not only in Chaldee words, but in the Hebrew itself; and our own “tea,” 
derived as it is from the Chinese ché, should teach us the possibility of such a 
change as I have supposed. 
(4). I need say little of the affinities of the words containing this letter with 
those of other languages. The Coptic is the only one available for our present 
purpose ; unless, indeed, the relation of m™, the olive, with the word for “oil,” 
to be presently noticed, can be relied on; + is the soft letter corresponding to the 
hard x, and hard and soft letters which corresponded were confounded at Thebes. 
We have seen that the basin passes sometimes into K, and sometimes into © or x. 
The /ong serpent, except in the words just mentioned, where it had previously 
passed into a T, is, I believe, invariably represented by the two latter characters. 
Thus we have xoT, a form of the verb “to speak;” xa T Re or CATCH, a “serpent;” 
xaT ene, “a heap; xoert, “oil;” all of which have hieroglyphic representa- 
tions beginning with the long serpent; as has 02x, or ogg, “ strength,” with its 
undoubted homophone, the cucupha sceptre, the name of which begins with the 
long serpent itself. I am not aware of any word containing this letter, in 
which it represents a hieroglyphic T. I once thought that TI signified “a ship,” 
corresponding to the Coptic xot, and Hebrew x; but I now regard this as a 
mistake. The cases in which x and © represent the basin and its known homo- 
phones are very numerous indeed. 
I have now given a fair statement of the evidence relating to the power of 
this letter, so that each person may form his own opinion respecting it. Mine is, 
that the evidence in favour of each of the values formerly assigned to it, K and 
T, is so strong as to render it impossible that it should be the other of these ; 
that we are, therefore, limited to what may be called the neutral values, TS and 
CH, or TSH; and that the latter of these is the most probable of the two. If 
the values of x and 6 be indeed j and ch, as I entertain no doubt, the fact of 
2D2 
