fourteenth century a careless style came into fashion, of which Cod. Leicestrensis (No. 40) is an exaggerated instance, and during this century and the next our manuscripts, though not devoid of a certain beauty of appearance, are too full of arbitrary and elaborate contractions to be conveniently read. The formidable list of abbreviations and ligatures represented in Donaldson’s Greek Grammar (p. 20, third edition)(42) originated at this period in the perverse ingenuity of the Greek emigrants in the West of Europe, who subsisted by their skill as copyists; and these pretty puzzles (for such they now are to many a fair classical scholar), by being introduced into early printed books(43), have largely helped to withdraw them from use in modern times. 12. We have now to describe the practice of Biblical manuscripts as regards the insertion of ι forming a diphthong with the long vowels _eta_ and _omega_, also with _alpha_ long, whether by being _ascript_, i.e. written by their side, or _subscript_, i.e. written under them. In the earliest inscriptions and in the papyri of Thebes ι _ascript_ (the iota not smaller than other letters) is invariably found. In the petition to Ptolemy Philometor (_above_, p. 41) it occurs four times in the first line, three times in the third: in the fragments of Hyperides it is perpetually though not always read, even where (especially with verbs) it has no rightful place, e.g. ετωι και αντιβολωι (facsimile No. 9, ll. 3, 4) for αἰτῶ καὶ ἀντιβολῶ. A little before the Christian era it began to grow obsolete, probably from its being lost in pronunciation. In the Herculanean Philodemus (the possible limits of whose date are from B.C. 50 to A.D. 79) as in Evann. 556, 604 (Matt. ii. 12, 13), it is often dropped, though more usually written. In Codd. Vaticanus and Sinaiticus it is probably not found, and from this period it almost disappears from Biblical uncials(44); in Cureton’s Homer, of the fifth or perhaps of the sixth century, ι _ascript_ is sometimes neglected, but usually inserted; sometimes also ι is placed _above_ Η or Ω, an arrangement neither neat nor convenient. With the cursive character ι _ascript_ came in again, as may be seen from the subscriptions in the Bodleian Euclid and Plato (p. 42, note 1). The _semicursive_ fragment of St. Paul’s Epistles in red letters (M of St. Paul, Plate xii No. 34), used for the binding of Harleian 5613, contains ι _ascript_ twice, but I have tried in vain to verify Griesbach’s statement (Symbol. Crit. ii. p. 166) that it has ι _subscript_ “bis tantum aut ter.” I can find no such instance in these leaves. The cursive manuscripts, speaking generally, either entirely omit both forms, or, if they give either, far more often neglect than insert them. Cod. 1 of the Gospels exhibits the _ascript_ ι. Of forty-three codices now in England which have been examined with a view to this matter, twelve have no vestige of either fashion, fifteen represent the _ascript_ use, nine the