Atkinson — On Prof . Rossi's South-Coptic Texts. 59 



V. 2 wn nftow, " one -fourth. " ; Zech. xiii. 8 p-wne somnt , 

 (2 Reg. xviii. 2), but pwn nsomnt, Zech. xiii. 9.] Then the trans- 

 lation would be as follows : 



" give the one-third of the apicrrov of thy birthday 

 to those who are in need, so that ( j e ) there shall be 

 an honour to thee." 



Even the logic one fancies would have forced on his notice the 

 translation that was to be sought for in the words ! Yet he stops 

 short just at the point where the passage becomes interesting : — 



"The King said to her: 'ask me what thou wilt, and I shall 

 give it to thee, even to the half of my kingdom'. Oh foolish Herod, 

 wilt thou covenant to give the half of thy kingdom to a dancing girl ? 

 Give it to the treasury of the poor, and mercy and remembrance shall 

 attend thee ever from God ; [why, even] give the third of thy birthday 

 banquet to the needy, and it shall be to thee an honour!" 



Everywhere the rhetorical contrasts suggesting the meaning, every- 

 where the words of the writer as plain as a language of pellucid 

 structure can make them ; but Prof. Eossi has neither understood the 

 words, nor felt the contrasts, but has let fall over the passage the 

 asterisk-dotted Veil of Isis. 



The fourth Fasciculus (1886) contains two Texts, the life of 

 St. Hilarion, and the martyrdom of St. Ignatius ; the former a Coptic 

 version of St. Jerome's "Vita S. Hilarionis ", but, as Peyron says, 

 " a graeca versione Sophronii". The Coptic text has an excellent 

 clue to its reconstruction in the Latin Vita, so that there was not 

 needed much ingenuity in ascertaining the meaning. But the editor's 

 knowledge of the vocabulary of Coptic is here too exhibited in an un- 

 favourable light. I have not thought it worth while to go minutely 

 through the text, but there cannot be any doubt that much is wrong, 

 even with all helps, and that the Latin is really the source of portions 

 of the translation which the Coptic text does not warrant. 



What makes the matter worse is that Prof. Rossi announces in his 

 Preface his intention to exhibit to the reader of his translation the 

 differences of the Coptic and the Latin original, by printing in italics the 

 parts he has supplied from the Latin Life. But in reality that is not 

 properly done, nor anything like it; for the version, p. 83 foot, has a 

 long passage in italics, which is largely found in the Coptic text 



