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Show 356 PAPYRI IN ll'ERCULANEUM. p .. . the more interesting from the sea being number at ompeidl IS ile distant. Linen has been found now as we state ' a m fi d d . at H' ercul aneum, WI' th the texture well de dn e ; al n f nIn af . ' ho in that city were discovcrc vesse s u o frmterer s s P 1 d f it of the " carubierc,11 almonds, chestnuts, wa nuts, an ru . all dt.s tm. ct1 y recogm.z able from their shape. A lo.a fh, Ia l.s o, st1l 1 retam· m· g I· t·s !~O rm, was found in a baker's s.h op., wit" u0s namhe d it thus. " Eleris Q. Cram Riser. n t e stampefu pon th .ry was a box of pills converted into a counter o an apo cca . . 1' d . l fine eart1 lY su b st a$u. ce .' and by the side of .1 t a small chy m. d r iCaf roll, evidently prepared to be c~t. into pills. By t e Sl e .o these was a J. ai. con ta'In inOo' mediCmal herbs. " In .1 89l7, , mmst o1 1. ves were 1~' ound in a square glass case, and • caviaAre , or ro·e f fi h . state of wonderful preservatwn. n exami-o a s ' In a bl' h d b . f these curious condiments has been pu IS e y nCaotvioenll i,o o f Naples, and they are preserve d 1le rme t'I Ca 11 y sea1 e d in the museum there*. . . Th ere I.S a marked difference in the conditiOn a. nd appea.r.a nced f the animal and vegetable substances found m Pompeu an ~erculaneum; those of Pompeii being pene.trated by a grey ulverulent tuff, those in Herculaneu~ seemmg to have been Pfi 1 d by a paste which consolidated round them, and rst enve ope b · d s f the h ll d them to become slowly car omze . orne o . ~o~l~ ~f o:;yrus at Pompeii still retain their for_m ; but ~he wnt. [· ndeed almost all the vegetable matte•' appear to have mg,_ ahn dl d to have been replaced by volcanic tufa somewhat vaml s e leannt At Herculaneum the eart h y rna tt er h as scarcely pu veru t . ted. and the veO'etable substance of the papyrus ever pene ra ' 0 bl' in has become a t b.m f n.a b le black matter ' alm·o st rescm1 mbg a earance the tinder which remains when s~rff paper las ,;~~ bpp t in which the letters may still be someumes traced. 1 d s;:~l bundles, composed of five or six rolls tied .up toge~?e~ti~: sometimes lain horizontally, and we~e press~d Iln th.at~ JreSmali h db 1 d m a vertica posi wn. but sometimes they a een Pace dl h' h the title of the tickets were attached to e~ch bun e, oln wh IC the sheets been work was m· scr1' be d · In one case onh y ave S numerous found with writing on both sid~s of t e pages. us~ have been are the obliterations and correctiOns, that many m "' Mr. Forbes, Edin. J ourn·, of Scl.. l N o. ;w· :., P• 130 Jan. 1829j I I PAPYRI IN HERCULANEUM, 357 original ~anuscripts. ~l'he variety of hand-writings is quite extraordmary : almost all are written in Greek, but there are a few in Latin. They were all found in the library of one private individual; and the titles of four hundred of those least injured, which have been read, are found to be unimportant works, but all entirely new, chiefly relating to music, rhetoric, and cookery. 'I'here are two volumes of Epicurus "On Nature," and the others are mostly by writers of the same school, only one fragment having been discovered, by an opponent of the Epicurean system, Crisippus *. In the opinion of some antiquaries, not one-hundredth part of the city has yet been explored; and the quarters hitherto cleared out, at great expense, are those where there was the least probability of discovering manuscripts. As Italy could already boast splendid Roman amphitheatres and Greek temples, it was a matter of secondary interest to add to their number those in the dark and dripping galleries of Herculaneum ; and having so many of the masterpieces of ancient art, we could have dispensed with the inferior busts and statues which could alone have been expected to reward our researches in the ruins of a provincial town. But from the moment that it was ascertained that rolls of papyrus preserved in this city could still be decyphered, every exertion ought to have been steadily and exclusively directed towards the discovery of other libraries. Private dwellings should have been searched, and no labour and expense should have been consumed in examining public edifices. A small portion of that zeal and enlightened spirit which prompted the late French and Tuscan expedition to Egypt, might, long ere this, in a country nearer home, have snatched from oblivion some of the lost works of the Augustan age, or of the most eminent Greek historians and philosophers. A single roll of papyrus might have disclosed more matter of intense interest than all that was ever written in hieroglyphicst. * In one of the manuscripts which was in the hands of the interpreters when I visited the museum, the author indulges in the speculation that all the Homeric personages were allegorical-that Agamemnon was the ether, Achilles the sun, Helen the earth, Paris the air, Hector the moon, &c. t During my stay at Naples, in 1828, the Neapolitan Government, after having discontinued operations for many years, cleared out a small portion of Hercula• neuml neal' the sea, where the covering was least thick. After this expense |