■266 Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy. 



midi [210, 5]. Por, if lie could not go openly at mid-day, could he 

 not go a little later, or a little earlier ? And wliere was the poirit of 

 such a mere mid-day limitation ? 

 But further, what is the text ? 



meiesmoose iSmeere hn wparresia. 



And the problem is to get mid-day out of mm e ere! The Coptic 

 expression for at mid-day is mpnau mmeere [cf. Gen. xviii. 1 ; Job 

 V. 14; Isai. xviii. 4; Amos viii. 9 &c.], for 'mid-day' is meere. 

 His text should be mmeene , " daily". 



116. And there is no insight into the language shown in the words, 

 Je n^ ai pa8 requ de pain aujourd''hui, whereas the Copt said [211, 6], 



mn oeik socp nai mpow, " there is not a loaf remaininy -over to 

 me to-day ". 



What did he take socp to be? Did he think it was sop, and 

 for the form s e p ? It was of course just s j p, ' left over '. 



117. And what could be poorer than this version, at [212,9], 

 mais nous nous offrons a, toi en sacrifice, where the original says, alia 

 hrai hn whrow ntobh hi exomolo g esis, tneine ehwn 

 nak ntnthy sia, " but with a voice of supplication and confession we 

 bring to thee our sacrifices", like [= in place of] that of rams. The 

 wliole point is missed, the passage being simply from the Symn of 

 the Three, vv. 15, 16. 



His text is wrong, at [212, z], efsanwos efiot nmmai 

 etbe nentaiaau, \fil~\veut examiner mes actions ; for fiot has no 

 meaning whatever, it is fi-6p nmmai, "to recTcon loith me about 

 my actions ". 



The passive is a perpetual stumbling-block: aucun homme ne pent 

 se dire juste devant toi, is the manner in which he tries to make up 

 for the proper grammatical knowledge, which should have taught 

 him that in the sentence [213,8], mn laau nrome natmaio 

 mpekmto ebol, the verb tmaio is passive. 



And in continuation of this quotation, he adds : fen ai pour 

 temoin Moise. Such a version has no reference to the text, which 

 says, aurmiitre haroi, 'they have given evidence concerning me'. 

 The point is, not that Moses is a witness in his (Victor's) favour, but 

 that he (Victor) also is naturally (as a soldier) accused of homicide, 

 and that Moses after death was charged by the devil with having 

 murdered the Egyptian. 



What justification is there for rendering airatrome hijm 

 pkah [213, 13], /rtj ete lache sur la terre'^ It is simply, " I have 



