89 
period to which the reign of Menes can be assigned is 5895 B.C., 3555 * before 
Kectanebo (Birch, Rede Lecture, 1876, p. 16). But there is an immense 
length of time between them and the conterminous races of the Semite 
nations, the people of Assyria, and the people of Palestine. There was, prior to 
all authentic history, a general influx of Caucasians over the countries of Europe, 
Asia, and Africa. These intruders came into Africa as to a land of plenty, 
bringing with them a high civilization, which they engrafted on to a civiliza- 
tion, already existing, of an order nearly as high as their own, and at that period 
those monuments existed. They found them in existence. As to the transla- 
tion of the Egyptian and Assyrian texts ; ever since Sir George Cornwall Lewis 
made some amusing remarks about them, there has been more or less scepticism 
in reference to them and the theories of their translators. If we had only one 
particular text, and only one lost language to discover, it might be hazardous 
to place entire reliance on the work of any one student. But, fortunately, we 
have Egyptian bi-lingual texts containing both Egyptian and Assyrian phrases, 
very brief in form, but long enough to show that the phonetic names in the one 
language were the same as the meaning in the other. We discover the value 
of Egyptian sounds by comparing them with the Greek translations of the 
stele of Rosetta and Canopus ; and in like manner we ascertain the accuracy 
of an Assyrian translation by comparing it with Phoenician names and Phoeni- 
cian inscriptions on the dockets upon the tablets and seals themselves. We 
have plenty of tablets relating to the sale of slaves and the transfer of property 
in Assyrian, which give the same particulars in Phoenician on the edge, and 
we can see when they correspond. In the same way we compare Assyrian 
and Egyptian inscriptions on monuments, such as the vase of Xerxes, and the 
cuneiform inscriptions of Darius at the Cossier Road and on the site of the old 
Suez Canal ( Records of the Fast, ix. 81), and on the Greco-Egyptian papyri. 
The proofs we get are quite sufficient to establish what we want to know 
beyond the possibility of doubt. There may be points of divergence sometimes, 
but there is a general consent of agreement; and this being so, we must accept 
the explanations given by scholars who have given their time to the elucidation 
of those monuments. As to the legends of 'EpaicX?;?, they are, beside an archaic 
myth, exceedingly late in Grecian history. When you talk of Greek or Roman 
history, and compare its records with the Assyrian or Egyptian annals, the 
lapse of time is so great that it reminds one of the words of Horace Smith 
in his well-known address to a mummy in Belzoni’s exhibition — 
“ Antiquity appears to have begun 
Long after thy primeval race was run.” 
* “ Sycellus reports Manetho as claiming for the Monarchy no longer actual 
duration than 3555 years before the conquest of Alexander. Even this view, 
however, seems to be extravagant ” (Rawlinson’s Herodotus, vol. ii. p. 2, 
last edition). Dr. Birch, in his address on the progress of Biblical archaeo- 
logy (1871), says: “Turning to Assyria and other rivals of Egypt in the most 
remote times, Babylonia, the cradle of Semetic civilization, stands prominent, as 
highly civilized and densely populated when Egypt was still in its youthful 
prime.” — Ed. 
