the heavy materials was unknown to the Egyptians, and remained unknown, as we see from the monuments, a still greater force of men and beasts of draught were necessary to move such huge squares and blocks by means of a simple lever and rollers. Finally, the combination and continued employment of such forces presupposes that society has been subordinated to a superior direction and power, which could apply those forces as it chose; in a word, it presupposes an economical, political, and technical civilisation, removed by at least 500 years from pastoral life and patriarchal rule. If therefore we may assume that the great pyramids were erected about the year 2500 B.C., the beginning of higher civilisation in the valley of the Nile must not be placed later than the year 3000 B.C. This assumption is confirmed by the fact that the oldest monuments of Egypt--and they are also the oldest in the world--exhibit the Egyptians in possession of the art of writing. All writing proceeds from pictures. The writing of the Egyptians and Babylonians, like that of the Chinese, Mexicans, and the tribes of North America, was in the first instance no more than speaking pictures. The Egyptians engraved on the stone of their rocks pictures of the objects and events of which they wished to preserve the remembrance. As this use of pictures to assist the memory became more common and more regular, from external no less than internal reasons, it quickly acquired certain abbreviations and combinations. The frequent repetition of a picture led to its abbreviation. The picture of a house dwindled into a square; water is not so much sketched as indicated by waved lines; instead of a forest we have the outline of a tree--in Egypt we find the sycamore, the most common tree in the country. Thus from actual imitative pictures we arrive at indicatory pictures. But how could the various kinds of fluid, for instance, be represented in these indicatory pictures? The three waved lines indicating water were retained, but beside them was sketched a wine-jar or water-pot, and thus the desired end was attained. By adding the picture of a god to the square, a temple was distinguished from a house. By such means the objects of the visible world could be reproduced in pictures more or less abbreviated. Even the actions and conditions of men which do not come immediately under the eye could be represented in this abbreviated metaphorical manner. Giving could be represented by an outstretched arm with a loaf; opening, by a door; going, by a road planted with trees; travelling, by a walking bird; battle, by an arm equipped with shield and lance; binding and fastening, by a coiled rope; destruction, by a prostrate man. It was more difficult to represent conditions which do not show themselves to the eye, as, for instance, hunger and thirst. To express thirst the Egyptians chose the symbol of water and a calf running to it; hunger they represented by a hand