perhaps in actual wording, and certainly in significance, the property of humanity at large. The necessity of curbing the hasty tongue, the dispraise of folly, the value of true friendship, the watchfulness that enmity entails, the influence of womankind, the fabrication of excuses, the vainglory of boasting and pretension, the exposure of hypocrisy, the evil of ingratitude, the golden irradiation of the pathway of life by hope, the buoyant strength and confidence of youth, the sad decrepitude of old age, the retribution that awaits wrongdoers, were as keenly understood three thousand years ago as to-day, and the trite expression of these verities, crystallised into warning, encouragement, or reproof, is as much a part of the equipment of life to the date-seller of Damascus as to the ploughman in an English shire. Proverbs have been handed down from generation to generation from the remotest ages, and were in circulation from mouth to mouth long before any written records, since in the earliest writings extant we find them given as obvious quotations. By means of them, primitive peoples entered upon a heritage of sound wisdom and good working common-sense, and had ready to hand counsels of prudence, hints for the conduct of life, warnings of its pitfalls. Much that is interesting in history, in manners and customs, is also preserved in them, and though times change it is scarcely safe to say that any proverb is obsolete. A local allusion may be understood by some old countryman that to the philosopher and savant is nought. Time after time as we travel onwards through life we find our knowledge somewhat nebulous, our ideas in need of precision and sharpness of definition. We accept so many things, almost unconsciously, on trust, and should find it almost impossible in many cases to give an exact reason for the belief that is in us. The nature and construction of a proverb appears a thing too self-evident for any question to arise, the definition of it one of the simplest of tasks, and we do not at all realise its difficulty until we are fairly brought face to face with the problem, pen in hand, and a sheet of blank paper before us. Waiving a personal definition, we will endeavour by means of the statements of others, men whom we may more or less recognise as authorities and specialists, to arrive at a satisfactory conclusion.