and Lycians were Japhetic races, and in communication with Europe.

European. The alphabet of Asia Minor was probably conveyed throughout Southern Europe many centuries before the Christian era, and everywhere preserved the peculiar type which indicates the line of its descent. Not even in the remote colonies of the Mediterranean could the Phenician style supplant or modify it. The traditions of the introduction of letters by Cadmus and other Phenicians take a place among myths, or the insignificant history of petty colonies.

Greek. It is now seen that the Greeks used all the letters of their alphabet much earlier than has been supposed. Inscriptions of century VII. B.C. exist in Egypt. Relics become numerous after century v. both in Greece and the colonies.

Italian. Bronze plates, stones, vases, gems, and other relics preserve to us the letters of the ancient Italians, although the language of most of them is lost. Their letters are those of Asia Minor, reading sometimes to the right, and sometimes to the left. They incorporate a sufficient number of slight changes to give them a peculiar style. The relics are named according to location, Etruscan, Eugubine, Oscan, Samnite, Roman, etc. Of these the Roman are the most recent, and always read towards the right, and contain a few letters not used by the Etruscans.

Spanish. Early writing in the Spanish peninsula closely resembled the Etruscan. A Shemitic colony on the coast used the Punic letters, known as Bastulan, but the Iberians and Celtiberians used the Japhetic forms, one of the later types of which has been preserved by the Basques.

Historical Inferences. From these facts we are led to infer that in the ten centuries before the Christian era, in which Greece and Rome exhibited their history, there was among the Japhetic races of Europe much movement and intercourse, and also much of literary culture. Knowing now how much of Greek and Roman literature has perished, and how the early Europeans were afflicted by the lack of durable and cheap writing materials, and finding evidences of

great progress in arts at an early date, we are no longer justified in considering all Europeans except in Greece and Italy illiterate. Evidences are accumulating of extensive Etruscan commerce with Northern Europe; and, without these, we know from the letters of the north that cultivating influences had come thither from Italy or Asia Minor.

Runic. At a period not yet ascertained, but early, letters of the Etruscan type passed into general use in central and northern Europe, where their relics are called Runic. There has been much needless mystification respecting these letters, even recent learned books expressing ignorance about them. Their remains are abundant and many are readily deciphered. They are evidence that the Goths were far above barbarism. The principal part of the Runic alphabets consists of Etruscan letters unchanged. The remainder are modifications of Etruscan letters. The simplest style is that of the Norsemen, whose letters are almost entirely Etruscan. These were used by the Scandinavians till their conversion to Christianity in the eleventh century. The Anglo-Saxons used the same letters and a few more, continuing their use to some extent after they became christianized. The Teutonic Goths, and perhaps the Sclaves, used the same principal forms and some peculiar variations. The Welsh, by various changes, increased their alphabet to forty-five runes. An inscription in Helsingland, Sweden, is written in dots, dashes, and short lines, which seem to be abridgments of common runes, and have been so deciphered.

Stenography.-The ancient Latins and Greeks did not satisfy themselves with the use of capital, or uncial, letters. The necessities of a vigorous age pressed then, as now. Systems of abbreviated writing, called "Tironian," after a freedman of Cicero, were in use before the Christian era. Specimens on tablets and papyri are preserved which are ascribed to centuries I. and II.

Small letters.-A multitude of inscriptions on the walls of Pompeii attest the use of small, or minuscule, letters in the first Christian century. It is still noticeable that many small

letters bear closest resemblance to the antique forms of the capitals. It is highly probable that minuscule letters were in use for common purposes before the Christian era, although capitals continued to be used in choice manuscripts.

European from Roman. From the later Latin all the mediaeval and modern styles of Western and Central Europe arose. Christianity was the agent of extension and of adornWhile the essential forms were preserved, new and more tasteful styles became frequent. One, which took shape in the fifth century, was adopted by the Anglo-Saxons; another, considerably later, was taken by the Irish, by whom it is still used. Other styles, like Old English, Black letter, German text, and Church texts, are too well known to need more than mention. But, while these were introduced, the old forms continued to be common, and so the Greek and Latin capitals have the honor of being the most ancient letters now used.

European from Greek. Greek influence in Europe was, of course, less in extent and power than Roman. Yet proximity, and the possession of the original text of the New Testament, made Greece the agent for giving letters to the Meso-Goths and Sclaves.

Meso-Gothic. A copy of the Gothic Bible of century IV., and relics of a more recent date, give us the Gothic letters, which are mostly Greek, both large and small, with traces of the Runic and Latin influences.

Sclavic.-Tradition ascribes the invention of the old letters of the Sclaves to Jerome, in century v. The forms that are preserved are among the most curious styles of the world. An analysis of their essential elements induces the conviction that they contain the remains of a more ancient alphabet, either Phrygian or Greek, to which some additions have been made from old Canaanite. But the forms have been rudely modified. In the ninth century they were modelled by Methodius and Cyrilus into more resemblance to the Greek, and this likeness has since been increased, so that modern letters of Russia and the Sclavic provinces much resemble the Greek and Roman.

Coptic Egyptian. After Greek culture became potent in the world's progress, it entered the birthland of the alphabet; and, among the descendants of its originators, buried in oblivion almost all the old Egyptian letters, and planted the alphabet of the more vigorous northen civilization. This was another phase of the great phenomenon of history. The primeval civilization, best preserved in the wealth of the children of Ham, blossomed among them into beauty, but never improved, and slowly withered. The poorer and slower children of Shem caught some fragments of the dying stock, and conserved without cultivating them. The sons of Japhet, after lingering long on the higher land and poorer soil, cultivated, reaped, and enjoyed the harvest.

Georgian. We turn back our eyes to Asia, but only to that border land of the Caucasus which has always been the meeting-ground of Japhetic, Shemitic, and Scythian races. Ancient cuneiform inscriptions attest a former sway of Assyrian monarchs; but history and native monuments fail, and a shadow covers the antiquity of the high-caste people. We look to their alphabets, and rays appear in the darkness. Tradition ascribes to Pharnabazes, about B.C. 300, the invention of an alphabet for the Georgians. The invention must be denied. The tradition may give the date of the introduction of new elements of civilization. The old capital letters of Georgia are the old common letters of Canaan, only changed by a few tasteful modifications and additions. Later ages made little change in these, except as to style. Impressions from Chaldea, Persia, and Syria are evident; but Greek influence only prevailed to turn the reading from right to left, without reversing the letters. Later times have developed out of the old capitals a set of minuscules very different in appearance, which was only completed in the seventeenth century.

Armenian.-Tradition honors Mesrob, A.D. 406, as the inventor of Armenian letters. The letters themselves deny the invention, and show that the basis of the Armenian alphabet is the Georgian, to which Syrian and Greek additions

have been made. There are two sets of capitals, from which have been developed two sets of minuscules of scarcely recognizable parentage.

The conflict of Oriental and Greek civilization appears in the Georgian letters; but this heathen culture was nearly fruitless. Christianity gave to Armenia a literature and a civilization which is now a power in Eastern Europe and Western Asia.

We turn our eyes now to the South, and to a land where deeper shadows rest. The south of Arabia has ever been, by reason of climate and man's barbarism, nearly impenetrable to Europeans. Recent discoveries have given glimpses of an unsuspected antiquity of civilization there.

Himyarite. Inscriptions of the Himyarite Arabs are found, elegantly carved on fine stones, and associated with ruins of splendid works and cities. No alphabet of the world is so puzzling. Six of its letters are identical with ancient Canaanite. A few more may plausibly be derived from the same source. Others can readily be explained as derived from Egyptian Hieratic, or Canaanite. Eminent scholars have claimed for this writing an antiquity of ten or fifteen centuries before Christ. But, although thirty-five plates are given in a single number of the publications of the German Oriental Society, and the most eminent Shemitic scholars have given much study to the inscriptions, the steps of the development of the alphabet and the age of many of the relics are still uncertain. It may, however, be confidently said that the basis of the alphabet is the same as that of the Canaanite, and that a part is taken therefrom. All the peculiarities may be explained on the supposition of an isolated development of the Himyarite letters under Egyptian, rather than Canaanite, influence. The alphabet contains the twenty-two Canaanite letters, and also the six peculiar aspirates for which the northern Arabs used no special signs till several centuries after Christ. The Himyarite alphabet continued in use till after the time of Mohammed, and its relics are scattered over Arabia, and as far north as Central Syria; but most of them are little older than the Christian era.