One evening, when some friends were staying with me, one of them was speaking of something he had seen in Egypt; and he said that he thought Brugsch’s system was the best, as a rough and ready way of getting at dates. You reckon three generations to a century; and, though this may not be true for a century or two, it comes pretty near the truth on an average of several centuries. Another man looked dubious; so I asked him what was wrong, and he explained. He was descended from William the Conqueror both on his father’s side and on his mother’s, but on one side it was twenty-seven generations, and on the other it was twenty-four; and he was just wondering whether he was a century older or younger than himself. I wrote a book on Egyptian chronology and its application to the early history of Greece. The evidence required more careful sifting than it had received; and my point of view was that of Ovid, _Amores_, ii. 2. 57, 58--“viderit ipse licet, credet tamen ipse neganti, | damnabitque oculos, et sibi verba dabit.” I thought of quoting this upon the title-page, but found it rather long, and only gave a part. And then the _Guardian_ reviewed the book, 9 September 1896, and said:--“The motto on the title-page, _damnabitque oculos_, is, perhaps, the oddest motto that ever graced a scientific treatise issued by a University Press.” Which made it plain that the _Guardian_ had a reviewer who was less familiar with the Latin language than with modern swear-words. * * * * * In reviewing books myself, I have often been amazed at their inaccuracy. Youthful writers have to make mistakes for want of knowledge and experience, but I have found older writers making just as bad mistakes from indolence or carelessness. There is a brilliant volume by Mahaffy on _The Greek World under Roman Sway_. It came out in 1890, and I reviewed it then. At page 391 I came on something quite incredible about the Proconsul of Asia reserving an exceptional privilege for the Christians. The author cited an inscription in support; so I looked this up, and found it was about the citizens of Chios. Of course, the Greek _X_ is _Ch_; and I presume he made his note of this inscription in that form, and then took his Xians for Christians on the analogy of Xmas for Christmas. One day Maspero was speaking to me rather strongly of a blunder that a friend of mine had made. I turned to a great work of his own, that was lying on the table, _Les momies royales de Deir el-Bahari_, and pointed to the hieroglyphic _ka_ in one of the hieratic texts he had transcribed there. He looked at it for a minute, and then wrote down the hieroglyphic _cha_. He said that he pronounced _cha_ as _ka_, and this must have led him into writing the wrong sign.