The Press. — London, England, 1858-09-04 00:00:00

THE PRE S S, SEPTEMSER 4, lB5B. " survey of the field or of the sequence and har " mony of its various parts." He knows probably what to tell now he is informed, because he recollects what he wanted to know when he was ignorant. His arrangement is clear and com prehensive, and his style, though not first-rate, is fresh and pleasant to read. The contents of his work will be best set forth in his own words : On opening the book, the reader will find a chapter enti- tled The Historian's Materials, which enumerates the various sources from which early ancient history is com piled, that he may not passively receive what is said, but may reflect and compare for himself. Then it will be seen that my subject is simply the aute•Greek era, beginning from the earliest period, and continued down to the point where Persian history ceases to flow on as a distinct stream, but commingles with that of Greece. And there seems tome a peculiar propriety in selecting this period, because it is, of all others, the one where the chasm is at this moment the widest between the compendium and the larger scientific works. The progress of discovery has been of late very rapid in Egypt and Assyria, and a com pendium written only a few years ago has, with regard to many important particulars, been left behind. Egypt, for instance, is no longer a single mass as it then was. It is broken up into three very distinct periods, of which the first is widely different from the last—that is to say, the Old empire from the New empire. Then I have a chapter on Egyptian chronology; and another to show the accord ance between Egyptian history and Bible history. In speaking of social life and of the state of the arts among the Egyptians and Assyrians, I become, so far, a supple mentary handbook to the British Museum. Much, for want of space, cannot be said ; but what is said will, I hope, Rive a fresh zest to many in the study of these antiquities. Next follows a chapter on Palestine, too often regarded as a part of sacred history alone ; after which we survey the wonders of Babylon—the fall of that city--and of the As syrian power; and lastly, the rise and progress of the Persians. This is the most amusing period, because, as time rolls on, the narrative becomes more distinct, the events are more graphic, and Herodotns is everywhere my guide. The chapter on the materials of history includes the Bible, Herodotus, Diodorus, Xenophon, Plutarch, Strabo, Manetho, and Berosus, and gives some account of the modern Egyptian and Assyrian discoveries. These authorities are well enough described, though it may perhaps convey a wrong impression to say of Herodotus that "no author was ever more worthy of our confidence." No author, certainly,—because the Father of history evidently meant to tell the truth ;—but many books are more worthy," because he did not always succeed in telling it. In alluding to the blunders of Herodotus which have afterwards turned out to be proofs of his accuracy, Mr. Menzies might well have mentioned his view of the source of the Nile. For some time after Bruce's supposed discovery it was considered to be erroneous, but it has since turned out that the Black Nile, which Bruce explored, is not the principal one, and that the Bahr-el-Abiad, or " White River," which is really the main stream, flows, as Herodotus said it did, from the south west. Mr. 'Menzies would also, probably, have found the " intelligent mechanic," to whom he has an eye, not by any means averse to some lucid explanation of the means by which the first steps were respectively taken in decyphering the Egyptian and Assyrian inscriptions. Few things, we should think, are more adapted to awaken the curiosity of the people who "at the British Museum besiege the civil officials with questions," than an account of the manner in which the key to the interpretation of the Rosetta atone was dis covered, and the curious inductive process—some thing like that by which prying persons unravel the cryptographs in the second column of the Times —that was employed by Rawlinson, llincks, and Grotefend for compelling the Babylonian cylinders to surrender their treasures of information. Of the two parties into which Egyptologers are divided,—those who make Egyptian events harmonize with popular systems of chronology, and those who throw back their commencement to a point quite incompatible with the period of six thousand years ago at present assigned to the limits of historv,—Mr. Menzies sides with the former. Most Englishmen will be disposed to agree with him ; there being always a certain balance among us in favour of any 'orthodox ' view, and a slight balance against it in Germany and France. He quotes with approval Mr. Poole's " Hone Egyptiacie," which has been pub lished some years, but he does not appear to have seen that gentleman's articles (' Egypt and Hiero glyphics') in the new edition of the Encyclopedia Britannica, where the most recent authorities are cited, and the arguments for the shorter period are set forth in a wore mature and much more popular way than in the previous work.—The following passage has struck us as the best in the Egyptian chapte rs. . After describing the high state of civilization and power evidenced by the monuments, Mr. Menzies draws our attention to the parallel " which may be traced between " sacred and profane history with regard t o t h e " state of society in Egypt" • :-- It is a parallel which evidences that the sacred histo liens must have been eye-witnesses of what they describe or they could not possibly have described it so faithfully: Fully to appreciate it, we must bear in mind that Egypt under the Pharaohs—in the time of Joseph —no more resembled the court of a prince in Palestine than Queen Victorio's court now resembles that of some great African chief. It is a contrast between civilization and semi -civilization, exactly ou the points wherein the two differ. In Pharaoh's court much attention was bestowed upon dress and ceremony. There was a refined taste and simplicity in the dress of the higher ranks, unlike the many-colonred and grotesque fashions of a semi-civilized people. What, indeed, more elegant or suitable for a hot and clearclimate than just a vesture of fine linen, with the single ornament of a gold chain thrown around the neck, and a ring on the finger. In Pharaoh himself we see a nisjesty and dignity of demeanour befitting a great sovereign descended from an ancient line of princes. No violence of passion or summary judgment on offenders, but everything orderly and systematic. Even a slave, and on an occasion re• quiring haste, must not appear in the royal presence until he had shaved and dressed himself. In the arrangements of the court the same order is apparent. There is a gre. dation of offices, with principal officers of rank over etch department, a standing corps of guards, and a regular pri• son built in wards. The nobles kept their pnyste car riages, distinct from the war-chariots. They had stewards of their houses, and used silver plate at table. . . The picture which the Bible gives us of Egypt at the time of the Exodus is equally graphic, and it actor to very exactly with the representations on the monuments. T. lose at a blow a fifth part of the population—one in every house—and yet immediately afterwards to pursue the Israelites with six hundred chosen chsriats, with horse. men and a vast army, is an effort beyond what could be anticipated from the most flourishing monarchy of modern Europe. It shows a •igour in the Government, and la organization of its resources during a great crisis, which places Egypt infinitely in advance of the rest of the world at that time ; and if the sacred writers had not been per. sonally and intimately acquainted with Egypt, they could not have so accurately described these things. The accord. ante between the monuments and the Scripture narrative in such particulars may confirm our faith in those earlier historical facts also, in which there is no such accordance. The remainder of the account of Egypt appears to be abridged from Sir J. G. Wilkinson's large work, and though well enough done, there is nothing in it to call for further special notice. The chapter on Palestine is rather less satis factory. Considering that Mr. Menzies is of an extremely orthodox turn, and loses no opportu nity of impressing on the " intelligent mechanic" that the Bible is not an obsolete work of fiction. it is curious that his remarks upon it should be so scanty. He passes over the social condition of the Jews because, he says, " we are familiar with " them [it ?] from our childhood." Familiar we may be with the leading events in their history. but few people, we imagine, realize to themselves how a Hebrew, of the time of Solomon , for in stance, spent his day—what sort of house he lived in, and how he amused himself, if he did amuse himself—with anything like the vividness with which they can follow a Greek or a Roman through his various scenes and occupations. of Menzies's notices of the physical geography 0 Palestine might have been enriched by some re ference to Mr. Stanley's able and attractive work. His remark also on the Dead Sea is p e rils? a little misleading : It is by far the deepest known fissure in the earth, far in addition to its own great depth of tw o thousand leel. the surface of it is considerably below that of the Medi terranean. Johnston, to whom reference is made in a note. says "on the earth's surface." The text 101 111 seem to imply that a person at the bottom of the Dead Sea would be nearer to the centre of the earth than at any other point. But this would be erroneous, for the surface of th e Dead Ses 1,312 feet lower than that of the 31editerranesn. and this, added to its own depth, make only 3,412 feet, which is far less than t h e profound abysses, "deeper than ever plwume t sounded," which exist in the Atlantic and other oceans. The following passage will put our residers in • ' of Mr. possession of one of the character is t ic s 'lenzies's work. He is speaking o f H ero dotuss 350 fathornhs. sto of the visit of Solon to the court of Crees ul er and the well-known advice of the ft:r ut ' " to esteem no man happy till htihad 01111) L " his life" ; animadversion, and the more so because we fear that they are not strictly shortcomings, but rather deliberate misdeeds. Early Ancient History ; or, the Ante-Greek Period, as it appears to us since the most Ancient Discoveries in Egypt and Assyria ; with References to Wilkinson, Layard, and other Authorities. By henry Menzies. Lon don : Chapman and Hall. BooKs on history, says Mr. Menzies in his preface, are all either voluminous works like Grote and Gibbon, or dry compendiums like those which vex the souls of unhappy schoolboys with their multitudinous array of closely-packed names, dates, and events. This is not altogether untrue ; but it is a statement which demands more qualification than Mr. Menzies has given to it. To mention, for instance, the first books that occur to our recollection, we have, for a great part at least of ancient history, Dean Liddell's Rome," which in the compass of two volumes combines scholarship and research with an agreeable and vigorous style ; while for the whole of modern history there is Mr. White's "Eighteen Christian Centuries," which we have already had occasion to commend to our readers for its entertaining character and happy selection of topics. Then Mr. Menzies's ground has to some extent been preoccupied by Mr. Van; whose "Nineveh and Babylon," though not free from inaccuracies, was a neat and popular state ment of some of the early discoveries of Layard and Rawlinson. Still it is true that the peculiar class of works which Mr. Menzies desiderates,which, instead of including every fact that can possibly be squeezed into the limit of their pages, select the leading ones and tell the story of these in a read able and interesting way, is a small one, and capable of judicious enlargement. This is a task, however, which must not be undertaken by the ordinary hack compiler. Short cuts of any kind are proverbially treacherous, and the man who offers to be our guide by a path which is to be brief but not obscure, and popular without being inaccurate, ought to enjoy rather special powers of mind. lie ought to have—in a minor degree— s, giant's strength, but without the will to use it as a giant. lie ought to have somewhat of the grasp and power of the regular voluminous historian, the sense of historic perspective iden tical in kind with that possessed by a Hume or a Macaulay, a telling style, and something of original research, to lend freshness and piquancy to his pages. With all this he must have the moderate ambition which contents itself with the production of one volume instead of a dozen, and abandons the composition of the "monumental" work to which he might perchance have aspired, for that of a book which all who have time to read monumental works will consider only the first round of their ladder, and, perhaps, unkindly sneer at as superficial directly they have got a step or two beyond it. The qualifications we have demanded may seem rather inordinate, but it is certain that they are rarely found united, and this probably is the reason of the scarcity of the kind of books in question ; for there can be no doubt that they are always popular enough even if only moderately well executed. Mr. Menzies does not quite conic up to the standard we should adopt for such writers, but he is in many respects not at all ill-fitted for the work. lie has common sense, and a habit of independent thought. His reading, though perhaps not very wide or deep, seems to have been sufficiently miscellaneous to make him sensitive to the different kinds of historic evidence, and he shows a certain skill in making little stray bits of knowledge bear upon the subject in hand. Though perhaps not a very young man, we should infer that the pre-cunei form period of his intellect was not so distant, but that he can remember what it felt like to be hazy about Semiramis or Sesostris, or his first thrill of intellectual pleasure at learning that the verse about " every shepherd" being " an abomi nation to the Egyptians," contains an allusion to the hated rule of the Ilyksos. Hence he is qualified to sympathize with the " masses" at whose instruction he aims, and who, he tells us in his preface, include " everybody who knows " just a little of history—who has dipped into "Wilkinson and Layard, and heard perhaps that " Bunsen is an opponent of the received chro " nology ; but, at. the Dome. time, ha 4 no clear giim!!! Ct tor hare obje Ntw thur he( in s ire 1 hilt ratli the inyt All Sob will WI lesi tru wh bei en( na or for "d tht mi tin tat to ha, en( to the nn ➢ ol th or P a de ah Pt sp of in th tl. al is tl P it e Ir .1, P. le 12 1 G. It et in r. er