Mr. Akerblad was far from having completed his examination of the whole enchorial inscription, apparently from the want of some collateral encouragement or cooperation, to induce him to continue so laborious an inquiry; and he had made little or no effort to understand the first inscription of the pillar, which is professedly engraved in the sacred character, except the detached observation, respecting the numerals at the end: he was even disposed to acquiesce in the correctness of Mr. Palin’s interpretation, which proceeds on the supposition, that parts of the first lines of the hieroglyphics are still remaining on the stone. It was natural to expect, that, after the possibility of a partial success, in this part of the undertaking, had been almost demonstrated by what Mr. Akerblad had cursorily observed, the critics and chronologists of all civilised countries would have united, heart and hand, in a common effort to obtain a legitimate solution of all the doubts and difficulties, in which the early antiquities of Egypt had long remained involved. But, excepting Mr. Champollion and myself, they have all chosen to amuse themselves with their own speculations and conjectures: the mathematicians of France have continued to calculate, and the metaphysicians of England have continued to argue, upon elements which it was impossible either to prove or disprove; while the fortuitous coincidences of some accidental results, with the collateral testimony of history or of astronomy, have been forced into the service of the delusion, as evidences of the truth of the hypotheses from which they had been deduced. Nor are these amusements even at this moment discontinued, by some persons, who have shown themselves capable of doing better things.