432 
YEEH A 
Characters raised above the surface. 
LJ LJLJI_lLJL_l L_ILJLJU 
oo 
Cut in the stone. 
These characters were very boldly carved, and they appeared to 
be as fresh and perfect as on the day they were executed, two of 
them being cut into the stone, and the other raised above the 
surface. At the first view I considered them as bearing a great 
resemblance to hieroglyfics, and thought that they might be in- 
tended merely as ornamental ; but upon subsequent considera^ 
tion, I became convinced that they formed a part of an ancient 
Ethiopic alphabet, some of them being precisely the same with 
the letters used at the present day, and others exactly resembling 
those met with in the inscription at Axum. The construction of 
these letters might indeed almost lead to the conclusion that they 
constituted a portion of a primitive alphabet, the whole being 
easily deducible from the simplest forms, varied without any 
great ingenuity to express the different sounds, as may be ob- 
served in the following arrangement of them ; 
