Nor is it only to the _elementary_ part of literature, but to the very highest and noblest department of literary research that we find the ancients had arrived. In the history of Job, an acquaintance with astronomy is quite apparent. The names of Arcturus, Orion, and the Pleiades,[469] are distinctly notified in that elaborate composition.[470] Could this have been without the aid of written characters? Could the abstruse calculations involved in that pursuit be possibly carried on without an intimate knowledge of notation and of numbers? Or, if superior memory may effect it in a few cases, without such characters or legible marks, how could the _results_ arrived at, and the steps by which they had been attained, be for any length of time preserved, and their value handed down to successive experimentalists, unless by the instrumentality of expressive signs? We find, accordingly, in the same treatise,[471] the art of writing expressly named: Thus, “Oh that my words were now written! oh that they were printed in a book! that they were graven with an iron pen and lead in the rock for ever!” And that it was of long-continued usage is evident from a preceding chapter,[472] where it is said, “_Enquire_, I pray thee, of the _former age_, and prepare thyself for the _search_ of their fathers!” The alphabet which we had here, before the Roman abjectorium, is still preserved, and called _Beth-luis-nion_,[473] from the names of its first three letters, just as the English is denominated _A B C_, from a similar cause, and the Greek _Alpha-bet_ from a like consideration. Irish. Latin. English. 1 B [Letter] Beithe, Betulla, Birch. 2 L [Letter] Luis, Ornus, Wild ash. 3 N [Letter] Nion, Fraxinus, Ash. 4 S [Letter] Suil, Salix, Willow. 5 F [Letter] Fearn, Alnus, Alder. 6 H [Letter] Huath, Oxiacanthus, White thorn. 7 D [Letter] Duir, Ilex, Oak 8 T [Letter] Timne, Genist. Spin. Furze. 9 C [Letter] Coll, Corylus, Hazel. 10 M [Letter] Muin, Vitis, Vine. 11 G [Letter] Gort, Hedera, Ivy. 12 P [Letter] Peth-bhog Beite, or B mollified, 13 R [Letter] Ruis, Sambucus, Elder. 14 A [Letter] Ailm, Abies, Fir tree. 15 O [Letter] Onn, Genista, Broom. 16 U [Letter] Ur, Erix, or Erica, Heath. 17 E [Letter] Eghadh, Tremula, Aspen. 18 I [Letter] Iodha, Taxus, Yew.