I have taken notice, up and down throughout my history, that the Abyssinians never fight in the night. This too was a rule among the Persians[74]. Notwithstanding the Abyssinians were so anciently and nearly connected with Egypt, they never seem to have made use of paper, or papyrus, but imitated the practice of the Persians, who wrote upon skins, and they do so this day. This arises from their having early been Jews. In Parthia, likewise, Pliny[75] informs us, the use of papyrus was absolutely unknown; and though it was discovered that papyrus grew in the Euphrates, near Babylon, of which they could make paper, they obstinately rather chose to adhere to their ancient custom of weaving their letters on cloth of which they made their garments. The Persians, moreover, made use of parchment for their records[76], to which all their remarkable transactions were trusted; and to this it is probably owing we have so many of their customs preserved to this day. Diodorus Siculus[77], speaking of Ctesias, says, he verified every thing from the royal parchments themselves, which, in obedience to a certain law, are all placed in order, and afterwards were communicated to the Greeks. From this great resemblance in customs between the Persians and Abyssinians following the fashionable way of judging about the origin of nations, I should boldly conclude that the Abyssinians were a colony of Persians, but this is very well known to be without foundation. The customs, mentioned as only peculiar to Persia, were common to all the east; and they were lost when those countries were over-run and conquered by those who introduced barbarous customs of their own. The reason why we have so much left of the Persian customs is, that they were written, and so not liable to alteration; and, being on parchment, did also contribute to their preservation. The history which treats of those ancient and polished nations has preserved few fragments of their manners entire from the ruins of time; while Abyssinia, at war with nobody, or at war with itself only, has preserved the ancient customs which it enjoyed in common with all the east, and which were only lost in other kingdoms by the invasion of strangers, a misfortune Abyssinia has never suffered since the introduction of letters. Before I finish what I have to say upon the manners of this nation, having shewn that they are the same people with the ancient Egyptians, I would inquire, whether there is the same conformity of rules in the dietetique regimen, between them and Egypt, that we should expect to find from such relation? This is a much surer way of judging than by resemblance of external customs.