τέλει· τί φῶ ; τί δ' ἀλλό γ ̓ ἢ πόνοι μίλας Χαρών μονόστολον θεωρίδ ̓ εἰς

In v. 851. τάδε servant MSS. 4. vulgo τὰ. V. 854. vulgὸ ἀλλὰ γόον. At MSS. 2. γόων. V. 859. vulgὸ τὴν ἄστονον μελάγκροκον ναύστολον. At Schol. MS. Seld. legit τὰν ἄστολον. unde erui μονόστολον. Charontis cymba unum eodem tempore defunctum corpus transvectare dicitur ; ναύστολον nascitur ex μονόστολον corrupto. Mox Ald. μελάγκαρον: ubi latet μέλας Χαρών. In Zonæ Epigramm. vi. usurpatur κέλαινε Χαρών. Denique τὴν ἀνάλιον in ἀνάλιον τε γᾶν mutavi. Extat et Epodus in v. 901. et sqq. quod Systema Antispasticum nescio an primus ipse in Antistrophicum carmen disposuerim, legendo

In v. 908. vulgo Διαλλακτῆρι δ ̓ οὐκ ἀμεμφίᾳ φίλοις Οὐδ ̓ ἐπίχαρις "Agns At deest verbum quòd latet in doux scilicet dãx': mox oid ἐπίκουρος redde partibus neutrius opitulatus. Ultimus denique Epodus sic constituendus est.

In v. ἐτεοκλεῖς ludit Æschylus, ut sæpius ludit in Πολυνεικής.

Redde igitur verè celebrati. Mox pro a quod intelligere nemo potest, dedi μνήμα « tumulum.”

που σφε θήσομεν χθόνος ;

Ad finem hujus novæ distributionis speciminis, quod alio tempore ad umbilicum perducetur, obiter moneo Hermannum longè longè, que ceteros rerum metricarum peritos superare in disponendis cantibus Choricis à v. 961. usque ad 994. Ideòque lectori auctor esse volo, ut nusquam illum ducem nisi apertè cæcuticntem deserere audeat.

Imposition of Hands considered as a Mark of Favor in the East, applied to the Illustration of Scripture.

THEN went up Moses, and Aaron, Nadab, and Abihu, and seventy of the elders of Israel: and they saw the God of Israel; and there was under his feet as it were a paved work of a sapphire stone, and as it were the body of Heaven in his clearness And upon the nobles of the children of Israel he laid not his hand; also they saw God, and did eat and drink.” Exodus, c. xxiv. v. 11. Mr. Burder, in his "Oriental Customs," (Vol. 11. p. 45. 3d. edn.) says: “It is usually said, that God laid not his hand in a way of terror, or anger, on these nobles on account of their intrusion: but in the Monthly Magazine for January 1804, is the following description of the appearance at court of the Mogul's officers, who partake of his bounty or rewards: Those officers of the districts, whose time has expired, or who have been recalled from similar stations, repair to the imperial presence, and receive the reward, good or evil, of their administration: when they are admitted into the presence, or retire from thence, if their rank and merit be eminent, they are called near to his Majesty's person, and allowed the honor of placing their heads below his sacred foot; the Emperor lays his hand on the back of a person on whom he means to bestow an extraordinary mark of honor; others from a distance receive tokens of kindness, by the motion of the imperial brow, or eyes' now, if the nobles of Israel were not admitted to the same nearness of approach to the Deity as Moses and Aaron, perhaps this phrase should be taken directly contrary to what it has been: he laid not his hand in a way of special favor; nevertheless they saw God, and did eat and drink in his presence: this sense of laying on the hand is

supported by a passage in Bell's Travels to Persia, (p. 103.) The minister received the credentials, and laid them before the Shah, who touched them with his hand, as a mark of respect : this part of the ceremony had been very difficult to adjust, for the Ambassador insisted on delivering his letters into the Shah's own hand; the Persian Ministers, on the other hand, affirmed, that their King never received letters directly from the Ambassadors of the greatest Emperors on earth.'”—Theological Magazine, Vol. iv. p. 140.

This interpretation of the passage is also confirmed by the following passages, which are taken from Captain Turner's account of the Embassy to Tibet. We are told in a letter from the Minister of the late Teshoo Lama to Warren Hastings, (p. 455.) that when the holy man was proceeding towards the land of China," he laid his hand" [upon the crowd, which flocked to obtain the honor of an audience,] conferring blessings upon their heads, and made them joyful; and this was the established practice all the way." We are told in Poorungheer Gosein's Narrative of the particulars of the journey of Teshoo Lama, (p. 464.): "The ceremony of introduction, and mode of receiving the blessing of the Lama, at the time of being presented to him, may here be best remarked: when any of the Princes, or immediate relations of the Emperor, were presented, they were all received by the Lama, without moving from where he sat, but they were distinguished by his laying his bare hand upon their heads, whilst he repeated a short prayer, or form of blessing: the nobility, or men of the second rank, when introduced, went through the like ceremony, except that the Lama wrapt a piece of clean silk round his hand, and in that manner rested it on their heads, whilst he repeated the blessing; and for those of inferior note, a piece of consecrated wood, of about half a yard long, was substituted, and held by him in his hand, with the end of which he touched their heads, in like manner as he had the others with his hand :" Again, p. 422. "When ordered to receive his dismission, Poorungheer approached the [infant] Lama, and bowing before him, presented his head, uncovered, to receive his blessing, which the Lama gave by stretching out his hand, and laying it upon his head."

Mr. Ives says in his Travels, p. 401.: « In our walk this morning, (at Leghorn,) I could not but take particular notice of a great number of horses, which were led about dressed with ribbons and other ornaments; upon my inquiring into the reason of this piece of pageantry, a French gentleman, who came with us from Cyprus, and now happened to be upon the parade, shook his head, and said, He was ashamed to inform me, but the fact was, that the too credulous people, conformably to an annual custom, were leading those creatures to a certain church, in order to their being blessed, which was done by the prayers and laying on of hands of a priest, who for his good offices received a pecuniary satisfaction; and without this benediction the owners never expect any good services from their cattle for the ensuing year.”

Mr. Burder, in his "Oriental Customs," Vol. 11. p. 25. makes the following observations upon Genesis, c. 48. v. 14. "And Israel stretched out his right hand, and laid it upon Ephraim's head.' Imposition of hands was a Jewish ceremony, introduced, not by any divine authority, but by custom; it being the practice among those people, whenever they prayed to God for any person, to lay their hands on his head: our Saviour observed the same custom, both when he conferred his blessing on children, and when he healed the sick, adding prayers to the ceremony: the Apostles, likewise, laid hands on those, upon whom they bestowed the Holy Ghost: the Priests observed the same custom, when any one was received into their body: and the Apostles themselves underwent the imposition of hands afresh, every time they entered upon any new design: in the ancient church, imposition of hands was even practised on persons when they married, which custom the Abyssinians still observe."

We may perceive from these remarks, whence the idea of the supposed efficacy of a royal touch in cases of the evil arose; it undoubtedly came from the East, where, as we have seen, the people still consider a royal touch as a signal blessing. These remarks will also enable us to perceive the force and beauty of the following passage in the 139th Psalm, “ Thou hast beset me behind, and before; and laid thine hand upon me;" that is, in the way of favor and kindness.

Trin. Coll. Cambridge, May 18, 1811.

E. H. BARKER.

468

REMARKS

ON SIR W. DRUMMOND's DERIVATION OF THE

WORD "PHAROAH."

TO THE EDITOR OF THE CLASSICAL JOUrnal.

SIR,

You have rightly presumed, that I had not read the passage in Sir W. Drummond's Essay on the Punic Inscription, which he has quoted and subjoined to my last letter at your p. 374; but now that I have read it, I do not find that it removes in the least my former complaint of a derivation having been formed by an incongruous medley of two different languages; on the contrary it gives farther strength to my objection against Sir William's derivation of the Hebrew word Pharoah. It does indeed appear by that quotation from the above essay, that Sir W. did not omit to observe, that the Jews formed their word Pharoah from the Egyptian Ph'ouro, their word for the king, which still subsists in the Coptic translation of the Bible; but this did not appear from his former note to c. 45 at your p. 174, where he derived Pharoah immediately from the Egyptian Phi and the Hebrew roh, to which I therefore objected. Now the circuitous course, which he thus proposes to give to his derivation by going through Egypt, adds no advantage to it, and really renders the incongruity still worse, besides another still stronger objection to it from anachronism. He appeared at first to mean, that it was the Jews, who had borrowed the Egyptian article Phi and prefixed it to their own Hebrew word roh; but now it is the Egyptians, who are supposed to have made this incongruous medley, by prefixing their own article Phi to the word roh, Shepherd, borrowed by them from the Israelites, which is still less probable than the former method. For as the Israelites had lived long in Egypt, it was possible that they might have brought along with them into Palestine some Egyptian words, as they did several Chaldean when they returned from Babylon; but it was very unlikely that the Egyptians should be obliged to go to the Israelites, when just arrived in Egypt, for a title for their own king; the consideration of being foreigners and slaves, a despised and oppressed people while in Egypt, would render it