The One Primeval Language traced experimentally through Ancient Inscriptions in Alphabetic Characters, of Lost Powers, from the four Continents. By the Rev. Charles Forster, B. D. London: 1851. Part I. The Voice of Israel from the Rocks of Sinai, or the Sinaitic Inscriptions Contemporary Records of the Miracles and Wanderings of the Exode. 8vo, pp. 182. Sinai Photographed, or Contemporary Records of Israel in the Wilderness. By the Rev. Charles Forster, B. D. London: 1862. 4to, pp. 552. [pp. 533-565]

iS T().] ~i~i~~~ic In~~r4~4~on~. ~ (33
by Aaron and lIur. and their supporting him with a stone, illustrated by a drawl~I _ apparently of the stone containing within it the inscription and tiec figure of
~ioses over it with uplifted hands; aiid lastly the plague of fiery serpents, with
the representation of a serpent in the act of coming down, as it were, from
heaven. upon a prostrate Israelite.
"These references to recorded events of the Exode compose, however, but a
small part of the Sinaitic inscriptions as yet in our pOSseSsion; the great mass of
which consist of descriptions of rebellious Israel under the figures of kicking
asses. restive camels, rampant goats, sluggish tortoises, and lizards of the
desert.~'
~1r. F~~rster finds a significant mystery in each of tlle rude
pictorial representations that accoi~pany these inscriptions
and even in the caricatured fori~s iiito whieb later travellers,
sportively inclined, have distorted the shapes of the letters
(of which " Pl~araoi~'s horse`~ is an instance), as well as in
zigzag or irregular lines, which modern copyists have introdueed into their drawings (to which tlte fiery serpent and the
stone at Rephidirn apparently belong); all these he devoutly
re~ards as coeval witl~, and illustrative of, the inscriptions
tl~emsel ves.
T}ie following specimens of tite renderings given will abtindantlv suffice; the first is supposed to relate to the miraculous
supply of ~uai1s or "feathered fowls;" the second, to the destruction of Pl~araoh's host in the T~cd Sea.
Sinai Photographed," p. 159:-" Congregating on all sides to ensnare them,
the people voraciously devour the red cranes, bending against them the bow
bringing rhem down. Eating eagerly and enormously the half-raw flesh, plague.
stricken become the pilgrims. In the desert, waters flow gusiting down the
smooth rock. The people thirsting, gives them water to drink Moses."
I&iV p 1 C4:-" The waters permitted nud dismissed to flow upon tile
astenied men burst rushing unawares, congregated from all quarters banded
together to slay treacherously lifted up with pride."
Tlic second example, we may add, purports to be the translation of five words which he finds in tile original.
It l~as been seen that ~Ir. Forster first arbitrarily dccij~l~crs,
then as arbitrarily translates, tltc inscriptions which be undertakes to rcad; tl~at, apart from the extravagance of his methods, t ii crc is tuticli in liis results that is incredible, and that
~evcr coi~ld be accepted by any competent linguist; that his
conclusions are not only entirely ulisupported, but directly
VOL. XLll.-~O. iv. 3T