28 Paper Reed* 



common material for writing upon, and the use of which quite 

 superseded that of Papyrus, was owing to the fact that an 

 Egyptian sovereign prohibited the exportation of reed papei 

 from his kingdom. As frequently happens in such cases, a 

 substance was soon discovered to take its place, and to Attalus, 

 king of Pergamus, is ascribed the credit of having first prepared 

 the skins of animals for this purpose. In this connexion, it 

 may be remarked that a curious treatise might be written on 

 the various ancient substitutes for paper, and the methods of 

 writing on them. Books are yet in existence written on palm 

 leaves, and the most ancient inhabitants of Italy, as well as 

 some of the East Indian nations, used a kind of linen cloth, so 

 prepared as to retain the marks of the pen. Tablets of various 

 kinds of wood, and the bark of trees, have also been employed. 

 The latter substance, called by the Latins liber, has given the 

 name for book to the languages of Southern Europe. Our word 

 book is itself. derived from the Gothic, signifying beech-tree, since 

 the bark of that tree was used for writing upon, as also the 

 wood, which for that purpose was cut into thin plates or staves ; 

 whence verses in poetry are often called staves, each- being 

 separately written on one of these tablets." 



The Papyrus also supplied the Egyptians with a fibre which 

 they twisted into a fine cord, and used in the lacing of their 

 mummy cases. It appears that, in those cases, which were 

 ornamented and prepared before the corpse was placed iii 

 them, an aperture was left open in the back for its introduc- 

 tion, which was afterwards drawn together with these cords in 

 a very ingenious manner, and the seam then covered with a 

 piece of cloth glued or cemented, so as to make it perfectly 

 secure. 



The Papyrus, when growing together in groups, as repre- 

 sented in the engraving, is an extremely elegant plant, the 

 upper part resembling a graceful plume of green feathers. In 

 favorable situations, it sometimes attains the height of fourteen 

 feet, but its ordinary height is less. The tender shoots and 

 roots were sometimes used as food. 



