another, for it would have been the greatest folly to destroy their friends and fellow-sufferers: and if so, why should the Egyptians have manifested on their monuments towards the Israelites, the same hatred which they bore towards the Shepherds? and, therefore, why should we find the Israelites exhibited in the same abject and humiliating posture as the Shepherds, and why should their images have been drawn upon the soles of the shoes of the Egyptians?

This objection is more specious than just. You remember that, according to Manetho, the Israelites called to their assistance the expelled Shepherds; and though afterwards they might have become the victims and the slaves of their allies, still the Egyptians could never forget that their own sufferings were the consequence of this first step of the Israelites. This consideration alone was sufficient to stifle in their hearts every feeling of compassion for their fellow-sufferers, and even persuade the Egyptians to extend to them the indignation they felt towards their oppressors; for in point of fact, the Israelities had been the first and only cause that had brought on the land of Egypt and its wretched inhabitants, the devastation and misery produced by the second incursion of the Shepherds.

To this powerful reason another might have been added, arising from the vanity of the Pharaohs, or the flattery of the courtiers, who, perhaps, joined the Israelites to the conquered enemies of

their country for the sake of giving a greater degree of splendour to the victories, the memory of which their monuments were intended to preserve.

But, it may be replied, admitting that the national indignation towards the Shepherds might have been extended to the Israelites for having invited them to come to their assistance; and admitting that the Exodus of these latter took place under the reign of Mandou-ei II. there is no possible reason to account for the hatred which the Egyptians exhibited against this prince, who, after all, had nothing to do with the Shepherds; because, if these had been the oppressors of the Egyptians, as well as of the Israelites, so as to excite the wrath of the Almighty, who overpowered them at last in the Red Sea, no cause can be assigned for the indignation of the people against the Pharaoh Mandou-ei; for he either had no share whatever in the transaction, or must have directed his exertions in favour of his subjects, and against the common enemies of his country. We must, therefore, conclude, that either the Exodus of the Israelites did not take place during the reign of this prince, or that the cause which prompted the Egyptians to erase the name of this Pharaoh from the monuments, had no connexion whatever with the Israelites.

I am obliged to acknowledge the force of this difficulty; the only one, in fact, which appears to overturn the supposition of the Shepherd kings being the oppressors of the Israelites, and their

monarch the Pharaoh who was drowned in the Red Sea; for, admitting that the hatred of the Egyptians against the name of Mandou had been directed, not against the god, but against the Pharaoh, we are at a loss to account for so much national indignation, but by the simple supposition that he was the monarch who had brought upon his people the evils recorded in Scripture, and had been the leader of the army that perished in the Red Sea.

Notwithstanding, however, so great an objection, we ought to consider that we know so little of the Egyptian history of this period, and that little from the fragments of Manetho; these have not reached us entire, but much mutilated and altered by his antagonists, who quoted him for the sake of proving, contrary to his own assertions, that the Hyk-shos were no other than the Jews. We must, therefore, pause before we lay aside the mass of evidence and facts which I have detailed to you merely because we cannot account for the expression of national indignation which the Egyptians had manifested against Mandou-ei II. But whether we deny or admit the supposition in regard to the mutilation of characters which I have just mentioned; that is, whether we deny or admit that the king of the Hyk-shos, and not the monarch of Egypt, was the Pharaoh who was drowned in the Red Sea; the validity of the computation which fixes on the reign of the Pharaoh Mandou-ei II. as the era in which the Exodus took

place, remains equally unaffected and established; for the account we have from Manetho, mutilated as it is, has been acknowledged to be true by the most accredited historians; and we must, as far as

it

goes, consider it as a true and faithful representation of the events that happened at the time. The Egyptian monuments also command our belief; their authority and genuineness are undeniable; they, as well as their historian, explain events, and account for facts which are either shortly related by, or merely hinted at, in the sacred books of Genesis and Exodus. How, then, is it possible to reject such a mass of direct as well as collateral evidence which presses upon our minds?

The question, after all, is a simple question of chronology, resting upon data which are generally admitted. We have but to count 430 years from Abraham first visiting Egypt to the Exodus, and compare the result with the statement of Manetho, from the first irruption of the Shepherds, to their final expulsion. And whether we follow the reckoning of the Hebrew text, or of the Septuagint, I do not see how we can deny that the Pharaoh Amenophis was the prince who admitted Israel and his family into Egypt. This being the case, we have but to reckon 215 years from this period downwards, through the whole series of the princes who succeeded Amenophis, and the consequence is undeniable; for these 215 years terminate at the time of the Pharaoh Mandou-ei. Perhaps the monuments will, ere long, supply

the deficiency of history; and this inquiry, which is at present surrounded with so much difficulty, will then appear simple and clear, even to the most inattentive reader. For one thing, however, I may be permitted to express my regret, and that is, that the luckless fate which has attended many of my pursuits, has still, on this occasion, exercised its malignant influence. I had ventured to write on this subject to Champollion; and that amiable scholar, with the readiness that always accompanies high talent and real knowledge, had been kind enough to collect for me some important materials in answer to the questions that I had put to him. But my evil genius was still on the watch; the friend I had commissioned; to obtain Champollion's answer, not happening to call at the moment, Champollion, in the hurry and confusion of his departure for Egypt, forgot both my questions and his answers, and the valuable information never reached me. Notwithstanding, however, such a loss, wishing to gratify the repeated instances of my friends, I have endeavoured, to the best of my power, to collect and to state as shortly as I could, what has been written, and what my thoughts are on this most interesting point of ancient history; a point which hitherto has baffled the efforts of men much my superiors in regard to natural talent, and solid and extensive knowledge.

With this inquiry we close, for the present, our Lectures on hieroglyphics. On this curious subject more still remains to be said; and I am sorry