with the Shihak of scripture, which is asserted by Josephus, he considers to be an untenable opinion; and the period assigned by Larcher, as that at which Sesostris mounted the throne (namely, 1356 A. C.), Sir William proves to be erroneous, although he is unable to determine the point himself. It is no proof, however, that the monarch did not once exist, because we are incapable of ascertaining at what epoch: "when the face of the day is obscured by clouds and mists, we doubt not that the sun is shining above, though we can neither discern its orb through the gloom, nor point out its place in the heavens."

With this illustration Sir Wm. Drummond terminates, for the present, his learned labours; intimating that the succeeding volume will contain remarks on the origin of the Phœnicians, Arabians, and some of the nations of Asia Minor.

Those who possess the learning, the curiosity, and the leisure, necessary in order to accompany Sir William throughout the laborious investigations contained in this work, will very probably complain that many of his theories are fanciful and destitute of foundation. His eagerness after etymological evidence, the common failing of great linguists, tempts him occasionally beyond reasonable limits. For example:

In his disquisition (c. xii. pp. 434-437) on the twelfth king of Eratosthenes' table, Chnoubos Gneuros, after citing the various definitions of the name given by Scaliger, Salmasius, and Jablonski, Sir William adopts the reading of the former, Xvoußis, Xvɛūpos; and these words he considers to be corruptions for Ken nouphi, Ken nouro, which he interprets, filius bonus, filius regis. His reason for translating Ken by filius is this: when the Egyptians wished to denote a son in hieroglyphic writing, says Horapollo, they painted a vulpanser. This bird in Egyptian (Coptic) is Kenesoos; and, as our author observes, was often, as we may easily believe, abbreviated to ken in common discourse. Neither is it, he adds, unlikely that the Greeks borrowed their xv, anser, from the Egyptians. Ken, therefore, may have been, and probably was, often used in ancient Egyptian to denote a son.

The reader cannot fail to remark here that all the evidence is mere assumption. The reading of Scaliger is not the text of Eratosthenes; the conversion of the Greek Xvoußis, Xveupos into Ken nouphi, Ken nouro, is by no means apparent; the rendering Ken by filius, which in every other instance in the work (e. g. pp. 440, 456, 501) is expressed by the Coptic se, is very suspicious. Admitting that a son was denoted in hieroglyphics by a vulpanser, and that the name of the bird in ancient Egyptian was Kenesoos (neither of which is certain), why should a son be expressed in common discourse by the name of the object which denoted a son in hieroglyphics? Suppose this difficulty obviated, what authority is there for supposing that the Egyptians, in common discourse, retrenched two syllables out of three in a word, just if we should, in common discourse, say pat for paternal? Even the collateral evidence borrowed from the Greek name of a goose is altogether nugatory. The Greeks certainly did not borrow their x from the Egyptian (Coptic) Kenesoos. No etymology can be more satisfactory than that which deduces xv from xáw, or xaívw, hisco, whereby the sound emitted by the animal, and the action which accompanies it, are at once expressed.

Imperfections like these, however, are incidental to an undertaking in the prosecution of which the most slender aid must not be despised or rejected. We mean not to qualify the opinion already given by us of this work; we think it a production highly creditable to the talents and industry of Sir Wm. Drummond, and deserving of a place in other libraries besides those of antiquaries.

Papers

Papers relating to the Deccan Prize Case, containing the Correspondence with the Trustees, the Duke of Wellington and Mr. Arbuthnot; and also the Applications to the Lords Commissioners of the Treasury. 1823-1825. Pp. 86. Observations on the Services and Claims of the Army of the Deccan. London, 1825. Pp. 112.

THIS is a painful subject. We approach it with more anxiety since we have discovered, from the perusal of these publications, that causes of dispute and irritation altogether extrinsic have intermingled themselves with the intricacies natural to the case, and, to borrow the expressions of the Lords of the Treasury, are "calculated to throw great difficulties in the way of amicable and confidential communications between the trustees and those acting for the army of the Deccan."

We shall not err, probably, in attributing the first of these publications (which consists solely of official papers) to Mr. Atcheson, the law-agent of the late Deccan army; and the latter to Major Wood,* the general prizeagent of that army in England. This remark implies no censure of either Individual: the first is impelled by an anxiety to protect his character; the last by a motive equally legitimate-the desire of vindicating his rights. It is but just, however, to the other parties concerned, that the public should be aware of the sources from whence these publications emanate.

We shall endeavour to make the reader acquainted with the subject by laying before him the allegations and points at issue in a perspicuous form.

After the long-protracted discussions respecting certain claims to the booty captured in the Mahratta and Pindarry war had been brought to a close in the year 1823, his Majesty, to whom the prize property of right belonged, was pleased to grant, by warrant under his royal sign manual, dated 22d March 1823, the whole of the booty to the Duke of Wellington and the Right. Hon. C. Arbuthnot, in trust, to be distributed to the various individuals composing the Deccan army, in the manner and upon the principles recommended by the Lords of the Treasury, who had declared their opinion as follows:

"My Lords, having heard Counsel in support of the claims of the Marquis of Hastings and the Grand Army, and of those of Sir Thomas Hislop and the Army of the Deccan, and having maturely and deliberately weighed and considered all the documentary evidence laid before them in behalf of the several parties, and the arguments of the Counsel, are of opinion that the most just and equitable principle of distribution will be to adhere, as nearly as the circumstances of the case may admit, to that of actual capture; and although they are aware that the principle of constructive capture must, under certain circumstances, in a degree be admitted, the disposition should be to limit rather than to extend that principle.

"They are therefore of opinion that the mode of distribution originally intended by the Marquis of Hastings would be most equitable and just, with respect to the booty taken at Poonah, Mahidpoor, and Nagpore; and that the booty taken on each of those occasions respectively should belong to the divisions of the Deccan army engaged in the respective operations in which the same was captured. But that, as the division of the Bengal army, under Brigadier-General Hardyman, appears to have been put in motion for the purpose of co-operating directly in the reduction of Nagpore, and to have been actually engaged with a corps of the enemy antecedent to the surrender of that place, this division appears to my Lords to be justly entitled to share in the booty captured at Nagpore; and that such other booty arising from the operations against the Mahrattas, in the years 1817 and 1818, as may now be subject to his Majesty's royal disposition,

should The advertisement states, indeed, that "the observations suggested themselves upon reading the papers containing the correspondence." But the artifice is perfectly innocent.

should be granted to such divisions of the grand army under the command of the Marquis of Hastings, and of the Decean army under the command of Sir Thomas Hislop, as may respectively have captured the same,”

Mr. Atcheson, the law agent of Sir Thos. Hislop and the Deccan army, and who, with Major Wood (appointed joint general prize agent with Major Cadell, who acts in India) seems to have been recognized on the part of the army as their organ, applied without delay to the trustees, announcing that a full statement of the circumstances relative to the booty and to the claims of the different divisions of the army was in preparation by Major Wood, from voluminous documents and other information collected by the prize committee in India, and which would be submitted to the trustees, who, in reply, requested to be furnished with every information in his power to request which they made also to Sir Thos. Hislop.

30

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The object of the two agents was to obtain "a free communication with the distinguished persons appointed to act as trustees, or with such persons as they might depute."

In consequence of the request expressed by the trustees, Mr. Atcheson transmitted to them, on the 5th April 1823, two documents; the first shewing the estimated amount of booty captured and claimed by the army of the Deccan; namely, from the Peishwa, 148 lacs of rupees; from the Rajah of Berar, 70 lacs; from Mulhar Rao Holkar, 200 lacs:* the second shewing the prize proceeds paid into the East-India Company's treasury in India, amounting to 17,38,252 rupees. The letter accompanying these documents contains some severe reflections upon the East-India Company, whom the writer charges with appropriating to their own purposes the greater part of the public property captured; and adverts to the conduct of the Company's civil servants in India, who took from the troops jewels and plate, which were replaced by credits of sums arbitrarily and inadequately presumed equivalent. In one instance, it is stated, “the loss of a large treasure was actually risked, rather than that it should become undoubted prize to the forces engaged in the war; and generally the representations of the Commander-in-chief of the army of the Deccan, on behalf of the forces he commanded in the field, were rejected and repelled."

In this stage of the proceedings, Gen. Hislop and Major Wood applied to the trustees for an issue of money on account of the pecuniary responsibility they had incurred, and the advances made by them, for the general benefit of the captors. This application is thus answered in a passage of a letter from the trustees, dated Apsley House, 3d May 1823 :

We have till now deferred giving an answer to your letter of the 26th of April, in hopes that the information which you or your agents would have afforded us, might have enabled us to address to the Court of Directors of the East India Company a demand of payment founded upon some well-authenticated documents, showing that the Crown had some claim upon the Court for money paid into the Company's treasury in India, or disposed of by the Company's government in that country. But the statements hitherto produced are either of a nature to show that the money, if there be any, is not in the Company's treasury; or they are altogether so vague and loose, that they afford no ground on which to found any demand on the Company. For these reasons we find ourselves under the necessity of declining to make any demand upon the EastIndia Company, until we shall have been furnished with statements and documents to enable us to make and to enforce our demand with at least some probability of success.

The * In this account, the word lacs is printed instead of rupees in the original, which would create great misapprehension in a person quainted with the notation of Indian money.

The explanation given in a succeeding letter of Gen. Hislop and Major Wood, alleges that various sums of money, not disputed as to their nature or amount, were specified in receipts signed in quadruplicate, one copy being lodged with the e East-India Company themselves. The trustees request copies of these receipts, or, at all events, a copy of the order of the GovernorGeneral under which the money was lodged in the Company's treasury; but no return to this request is found among the papers.

On the 31st May, Gen. Hislop transmitted his first statement of the claims of the army to the booty captured from the Peishwa, accompanied by a request that the counsel for the army might wait upon the trustees to give any explanations which should be considered necessary. No notice appears to have been taken of this request, until repeated in Gen. Hislop's note of June 16, when it was acceded to; and at that interview, according to Mr. Atcheson, onThe counsel represented the difficulties which they experienced in attempting to subemit to the trustees written statements of the cases applicable to the several portions of booty, from their ignorance of the conduct of the East-India Company, in relation to the decisions of the Supreme Government in India as to the booty, and their unwillingness to anticipate any objection on the part of the Company to the just claims of the army. They observed, therefore, that they could only, in the first instance, give to e trustees the statements of facts and general arguments, and must, to avoid any apparent indelicacy towards the East-India Company, reserve their further observations until they should be rendered necessary by the opposition of the East-India Company to the claims of which those statements contained an outline. *CISIPO

the

13 On the 5th September, Sir Thos. Hislop transmitted his second statement of claims of the army to the booty captured from the Bhooslah Rajah of Nagpore. It was accompanied by a request that a copy of the opinion of the law-officers of the crown on the Poonah case might be given to Mr. Atcheson; and that, before any application was made to the East-India Company on the subject of these or the other claims, a copy might be sent to the law-agent for the previous inspection of the counsel for the army.

On the 22d September, the trustees addressed some queries, upon the subject of the last statement, to Gen. Hislop, which were answered in a letter from Mr. Atcheson, who subsequently transmitted the third statement of claims to the property captured from Holkar, accompanied by a letter from Gen. Hislop, enclosing an opinion of Mr. Harrison, one of the counsel for the army, who urged a repetition of the request for the opinion of the law-officers on the Poonah case.

The letter from the trustees, dated Oct. 14, 1823, which followed this communication, was addressed to Gen. Hislop, and contained the following pas

sage:

Being the trustees of the Crown for the collection of the booty, the property of his Majesty, resulting from the operations of his Majesty's troops in concert with those of the East-India Company, in the late campaign in the Deccan, we called upon you, Sir, to afford us the information we required, as the person most capable of affording it; and although we are not unwilling to receive information from any persons who have it in their power to afford it, and that in your absence from England we have no "objection to receive such information from any person you will think proper to appoint to convey to us your answers, we conceive that, when you are present in England, wit would be much more convenient, more decorous, and less expensive that those answers should proceed from yourself.

The trustees further observe, that the opinion of Mr. Harrison was brought before

before them in an irregular manner; that “it relates not to any point of law in the case, but to the expediency of their communicating to the said W. Harrison and Dr. Jenner the opinion which the law-officers of the Crown have given to them, as the trustees for the Crown in this business ;" and that, “it was desirable, for the interests of those concerned in the capture of the booty, that the sort of proceeding which had been carried on hitherto should

Sir Thos. Hislop justified himself from the suspicion of intending offence towards the trustees, by stating that he had no lawful control over the general interests of the army, and could not arrogate the province of deciding on the representations proper to be made to the trustees; and he divested himself of responsibility, by referring the Duke and Mr. Arbuthnot, on all points affecting the army of the Deccan at large, to Major Wood and Mr. Atcheson, the only persons legally entrusted by the army with the charge of their interests. This misunderstanding occasioned a temporary suspension of intercourse between the trustees and the representatives of the army: the real causes seem to lay below the surface.

The letter of the trustees refers to the expense attending an intermediate channel of intercourse between them and Gen. Hislop; and in a subsequent letter (14th January 1825) they state, more explicitly, that they "have observed, throughout the consideration of these questions, a strong desire on the part of some to go to law,-a proceeding which they think quite unnecessary, and which must lead to expense and delay."

As it must be assumed, not merely from the high rank of the trustees, but from the nature of their office, that they can have no bias or partiality, their anxiety to prevent unnecessary expense and litigation, is highly commendable; and it is by no means apparent that they really stand in need of that aid concerning the realization of the booty, which the agents believe to be exclusively in their power to contribute. The only party whose interests are alleged to be in conflict with those of the army, is the East-India Company; and it is evident from the tenor of the correspondence, that the Company are not likely to get more than strict justice at the hands of the trustees.

On the other side, it is clear, that the mass of evidence relative to their claims must be obtained from the army; and as its Commander-in-chief, contrary to custom, was not appointed trustee, he was invested with no legal power to act as its representative, and would, as a matter of prudence, be guided, in his communications with the trustees, by legal advice. The agents appear to be regularly accredited, so that no objection lies against them on the ground of want of authority.

We might conjecture that a natural and laudable zeal on behalf of their clients' interests may have tempted them to manifest an apparently litigious spirit; and sundry passages in Mr. Atcheson's letters, which can be justified only by evidence not before the public, nor perhaps before the trustees, would support such conjecture; but there is another subject of dispute which is disclosed in the Observations, &c., and which, according to the writer, "may possibly explain the conduct of the trustees, and supply a motive for the change in their language and proceedings."

By the Prize Act (to which the warrant of his Majesty refers) the prizeagents duly appointed for captured booty are entitled to five per cent. on the total sum realized, taking upon themselves the expense attending its distribution. In the present case, the value of the booty is estimated by the captors at five millions sterling; the commission on which would therefore amount to £250,000.