Records Of The Past.

Jesuit Kirscher , for instance—strange that such audacity and ignorance should have dared to impose upon mankind , it' not upon himself—the key to the Egyptian hieroglyphics has been found by Young and Champollion le

Jeune , while the cuneiform characters of famed Babylon ancl Nineveh have yielded to the energy of Grotefend and Eawlinson , and other skilled interpreters .

We will UOAV begin with the Assyrian hieroglyphics . We clo not , indeed , quite agree Avith the statement of the Times revieAver as to Assyrian discovery , though in the main , no doubt , correct , ancl it is

in vain , AVO know , to seek to adjust the rival claims of contemporary decipherers . Probably the Times reviewer is right in making Grotefend ancl Sir W . BaAvlinson the " facile principes" of cuneiform discovery .

Let us hear what he says . In 1803 a German professor , named Grotefend , forged , in the recesses of his study , out of that much reviled inner consciousness , a key to the cuneiform . He had no bilingual inscription to use as a pick-lock , so he invented a logical passe-partout for the mysterious Avedges Avhich ornamented the Avails and

win-CIOAVS of Persepolis . The palace , he reasoned , Avas that of a King of Persia , and the title of this ruler Avas ahvays " Kings of Kings . " Such a phrase , he conjectured , Avould be shoAvn by the repetition of a certain group Avith

another group between them for the grammatical structure . The characters Avhich preceded these he inferred would be the name of the monarch . Such was the natural magic applied by the learned German , ancl presto

" Darius" stepped out of the Avail . Provided with the value of the characters Avhich formed Darius , he invoked the shades of the names of Xerxes and Artaxerxes . With these talismans the Persian cuneiform alphabet Avas evolved and the inscriptions read . Lassen and Burnouf , subsequent decipherers , only travelled round their

studies and opened their books , while Sir H . RaAvlinson climbed the rocks of Behistun and obtained , by paper impressions and other appliances , the scarp-recorded bulletin of Darius . But the Empire of Darius had a leash of

official languages . At Babylon , the oldest capital , prevailed a courtl y Semitic , the most ancient form of that branch of language . It Avas Avritten in a complex cuneiform , a black letter Avedge hand . Susa , on the contrary ,

spoke the Turanian tongue of the Medes , Avhich it wrote in a set of sinir pier alphabetic Avedges ; while Persepolis , the seat of the later victories of Western Asia , discoursed in Iranian or Zend , reduced the puzzling syllabaries

of the Babylonians ancl even the Median into a moderate alphabet . The Persians were more merciful to languages than to men . The haughty records of their Kings announced in all three languages to the conquered East the extent of then- dominions and the grandeur of their actions . The order

of the languages on the public monuments Avas first the Persian , then the Median , finally the Babylonian ; and , as nearly 70 proper names were hi the three languages of the same inscription at Behistun , the requisite elements for

the elimination of an al phabet of Median ancl Babylonian had escaped the wreck of Empire . This obtained a solution in the hands of Sir H . Eawlinson , Hincks , Oppert , ancl Norris . The grammatical form and verbal roots

of the Babylonian were brought to light , Avhile Norris and Oppert interpreted the less important Median . Such were the beginnings of the cuneiform interpretation , ancl which led year by year to still more striking

and certain results . In Assyria the spade aided the inquirers by exhuming the records . of the Assyrian Monarchy . Botta , ancl later Oppert , excavated the Palace of Sargon at Khorsbad in an exhaustive ancl scientific style which leaves nothing for the future investigator . Layard , Loftus , and Bassani dived into the