attacks which might be made upon him by beings in the heights above, or fiends in the depths below, and would ensure his succession to the Throne of the Two Lands, i.e., Egypt. Thoth also promised Isis that Ra himself should act as the advocate of Horus, even as he had done for his father Osiris. He was also careful to allude to the share which Isis had taken in the restoration of Horus to life, saying, "It is the words of power of his mother which have lifted up his face, and they shall enable him to journey wheresoever he pleaseth, and to put fear into the powers above. I myself hasten [to obey them]." Thus everything turned on the power of the spells of Isis, who made the sun to stand still, and caused the dead to be raised. Such are the contents of the texts on the famous Metternich Stele. There appears to be some confusion in their arrangement, and some of them clearly are misplaced, and, in places, the text is manifestly corrupt. It is impossible to explain several passages, for we do not understand all the details of the system of magic which they represent. Still, the general meaning of the texts on the Stele is quite clear, and they record a legend of Isis and Horus which is not found so fully described on any other monument. IX. THE HISTORY OF ISIS AND OSIRIS. The history of Isis and Osiris given on pp. 248 is taken from the famous treatise of Plutarch entitled De Iside et Osiride, and forms a fitting conclusion to this volume of Legends of the Gods. It contains all the essential facts given in Plutarch's work, and the only things omitted are his derivations and mythological speculations, which are really unimportant for the Egyptologist. Egyptian literature is full of allusions to events which took place in the life of Osiris, and to his persecution, murder, and resurrection, and numerous texts of all periods describe the love and devotion of his sister and wife Isis, and the filial piety of Horus. Nowhere, however, have we in Egyptian a connected account of the causes which led to the murder by Set of Osiris, or of the subsequent events which resulted in his becoming the king of heaven and judge of the dead. However carefully we piece together the fragments of information which we can extract from native Egyptian literature, there still remains a series of gaps which can only be filled by guesswork. Plutarch, as a learned man and a student of comparative religion and mythology was most anxious to understand the history of Isis and Osiris, which Greek and Roman scholars talked about freely, and which none of them comprehended, and he made enquiries of priests and others, and examined critically such information as he could obtain, believing and hoping that he would penetrate the mystery in which these gods were wrapped. As a result of his labours he collected a number of facts about the form of the Legend of Isis and Osiris as it was known to the learned men of his day, but