266 Papers on a Latin Acrostic Inscription engraved 
Aveustus to conciliate the Egyptians, and concealed for security, and had 
again been sought for and restored in the time of Aprran. 
©) Ut spirent cautes. The word cautes here is, as I conceive, applied (and 
not improperly), to the immense blocks of stone which formed the Egyptian 
statues. The statue of Mremnon was seid by many authors to have uttered a 
sound like the human voice, which would justify the word spirent. JuvENAL, 
it is true, (sat. xv. 1.5), speaks of the magice chorde, implying that the 
sound was produced by the vibration of strings; yet, according to an old 
scholiast on that line, it was vox humana. Tactrus terms it vocalem sonum. 
Dionysius Prertec. uses the word yeywvws ; EustatHius, Qwvwy and meorroAwy. 
The Greek and Latin inscriptions on the legs of the statue speak of the 
sound as vocal. An interesting collection of these, seventy-two in number, 
copied by Mr. Sar, and restored and explained by M. Lerronng, a 
member of the French Institute, is inserted in vol. II. of the Transactions 
of the Royal Society of Literature.. Many of these attest, that the sound 
was heard in the time of Aprtan, and state by whom. One informs us, 
that this Emperor himself heard the statue, before the rising of the sun, 
saying to him, * yeip:,” hail! This is decisive as to the pretended nature of 
the sound. ‘The above view of the meaning is confirmed by the line 
following. 
(6) Signa must be the word here. ‘The third letter is almost perfect, and 
nearly the whole of either a C ora G. 
) Fides supertim appears here to signify the favour and protection of 
the gods. It seems to me to be personified ; although this is rather a strong 
figure. 
(®) In civitate. I cannot imagine any other way of completing the line, 
which is broken off at INCIVI, these letters being quite distinct. It is not 
a conclusive objection that the first syllable of civi‘ate is made short ; because 
it is certain that the ancient poets, and more so, no doubt, in the later times, 
used frequently the license of altering the usual length of syllables, not only 
(though principally) in proper names,* but also in other words.t In the 
fragment before us we have Hadridni with the penultima short ; unless the 
two vowels are to be pronounced as one long syllable, if that can well be done 
afterdr. We have instances of this name measured in the same manner in 
* De Bosch. ad Anthol. 4to. Ultraj. 1810. Vol. IV. p. 298. 
+ Ibid. p. 437. 
