strengthen the courage of his adversary. To be strong means going forward to his goal; to be weak means turning backwards ; to be cowardly means letting himself be taken upon his border. Therefore, because the negro people had heard what went forth out of my mouth, they made no reply. He who made an attack upon them put them to flight. They turned their back and fled away. They kept far from him who attacked them. They were therefore not men of manly spirit; and that means to be wanting in strength and courage. I beheld them, not only in imagination. I took their women, I led away their inhabitants, who had gone out to their fountains. Their bulls were slaughtered, their corn was destroyed, and fire was set to it. I swear by my father that I speak the truth. There is no cause for contradicting the utterance of my mouth. 'Every one of my sons, who maintains this boundary which I have fixed, he shall be called my son, who was born of me. My son is like the protector of his father (i.e. Horus), like the preserver of the boundary of his father (i.e. Osiris). But if he abandons it, so that he does not fight upon it, he is not my son, he is not then born of me. 'I have caused my own image to be set up on this boundary which I have fixed, not that ye may (only) worship it (the image) upon it (the boundary), but that ye may fight upon it.' I have printed the above translation word for word, in order to furnish a proof, from this example, to one of my learned French critics, that inscriptions of the older time are indeed no child's play, and that their value for historical research depends wholly and solely on the correct explanation of the text. A fair-minded reader will not be willing to take up the reproach, which my French critic has made against me, that I have not made so much use of certain important inscriptions for the earlier history of Egypt, as they may probably have deserved. The deciphering of inscriptions has no real significance, until the translator is sure of his subject in its fullest compass. When the opposite course is taken, they bring more damage than profit, for they confuse the facts, and they deter the outer circle of students from availing themselves of even the most certain translations for their researches. I shall bear the blame of my French critic with the greatest composure until he himself shall have furnished the proof, that the most ancient texts are capable of being translated with fuller certainty than the examples hitherto given by him lead us to expect with any special confidence in the future.1 1 In translating the last paragraph, we have not thought that the name of the critic referred to, or certain remarks on the translation of the same inscription by another French scholar, would be of interest to the English reader. In fact, Dr. Brugsch, in his pamphlet of 'Additions and Corrections,' while directing the transposition of the above free translation to its place at Vol. I. p. 160, leaves the last paragraph to be omitted. The direction reached us too late for the transposition to be made; indeed we prefer to see the literal and free translation side by side; and the principles involved in the last paragraph, as to our present understanding of the older inscriptions, seemed to us too important to be omitted.--ED. THE EXODUS AND THE EGYPTIAN MONUMENTS A DISCOURSE DELIVERED ON THE OCCASION OF THE INTERNATIONAL CONGRESS OF ORIENTALISTS IN LONDON September 17th, 1874 BY HENRY BRUGSCH-BEY DELEGATE OF HIS HIGHNESS ISMAËL I., KHEDIVE OF EGYPT TRANSLATED FROM THE FRENCH ORIGINAL NOTE.-The Map which accompanies the original Pamphlet, and on which the Route of the Israelites is marked, is the same as the Map of Lower Egypt appended to this volume DEDICATED ΤΟ HIS HIGHNESS ISMAËL THE FIRST KHEDIVE OF EGYPT BY HIS VERY HUMBLE, VERY OBEDIENT, AND VERY GRATEFUL SERVANT HENRY BRUGSCH-BEY 329 ADVERTISEMENT. THE publication of this Memoir, which should have appeared a year ago, has been delayed by the absence of the Author, while in official charge of an expedition into the interior of the Libyan Desert, of Egypt, and of Nubia. On returning from this journey, he was able to take advantage of his stay in the eastern part of Lower Egypt, to examine the sites, and to verify the topographical and geographical views, which form the subject of this Memoir. The Author is happy to be able to state, that his new researches have contributed to prove, even to the smallest details, the conclusions which the papyri and the monuments compelled him to form with regard to the topographical direction of the Exodus, and to the stations where the Hebrews halted, as related in Holy Scripture. In a special Memoir, which will form a complete chapter of my periodical publication, The Bible and the Monuments' (Bibel und Denkmaeler), announced several months since, the reader will find a collection of all the materials drawn from the monuments, which have enabled me to re-establish the route of the Jews after their departure from Egypt, and which prove incon |