And yet, (let me say it without offence,) a very little attention ought to be enough to convince any one familiar with this subject that the proposed inference is absolutely inadmissible. For, in the first place, a _solitary_ asterisk (not at all a rare phenomenon in ancient MSS.(199)) has of necessity no such signification. And even if it does sometimes indicate that all the verses which follow are suspicious, (of which, however, I have never seen an example,) it clearly _could_ not have that signification here,—for a reason which I should have thought an intelligent boy might discover. Well aware, however, that I should never be listened to, with Birch and Griesbach, Scholz and Tischendorf, and indeed every one else against me,—I got a learned friend at Rome to visit the Vatican Library for me, and inspect the two Codices in question.(200) That he would find Birch right _in his facts_, I had no reason to doubt; but I much more than doubted the correctness of his proposed inference from them. I even felt convinced that the meaning and purpose of the asterisks in question would be demonstrably different from what Birch had imagined. Altogether unprepared was I for the result. It is found that the learned Dane has here made one of those (venial, but) unfortunate blunders to which every one is liable who registers phenomena of this class in haste, and does not methodize his memoranda until he gets home. To be brief,—_there proves to be no asterisk at all,—either in Cod. 756, or in Cod. 757_. On the contrary. After ἐφοβοῦντο γάρ, the former Codex has, in the text of S. Mark xvi. 9 (_fol. 150 b_), a plain cross,—(_not_ an asterisk, thus [symbol: x with dots in corners] or [symbol: broken x with corner dots] or [symbol: inverse or open x], but a cross, thus +),—the intention of which is to refer the reader to an annotation on _fol. 151 b_, (marked, of course, with a cross also,) _to the effect that S. Mark xvi. 9-20 is undoubtedly __ genuine_.(201) The evidence, therefore, not only breaks hopelessly down; but it is discovered that this witness has been by accident put into the wrong box. This is, in fact, a witness _not_ for the plaintiff, but _for the defendant!_—As for the other Codex, it exhibits neither asterisk nor cross; but contains the same note or scholion attesting the genuineness of the last twelve verses of S. Mark. I suppose I may now pass on: but I venture to point out that unless the Witnesses which remain to be examined are able to produce very different testimony from that borne by the last two, the present inquiry cannot be brought to a close too soon. (“I took thee to curse mine enemies, and, behold, thou hast blessed them altogether.”)