METEOROLOGICAL REPORT. Obfervations on the State of the Weather, from the 25th of March to the 24th of April, inclu five, 1804, two Miles N. W. of St. Paul's. The quantity of rain fallen this month is equal to 2.768 inches in depth. The most remarkable circumstance relating to meteorology during the month that is now clofed, is the fevere cold that has for very many days been experienced. The feveral boisterous and ftormy days and nights which have occurred, we naturally look for foon after the equinoxes: in the prefent feason they have happened rather later than ufual. Vegetation, as might be expected, confidering the state of the atmosphere, is remarkably backward; more than we have witneffed for fome years past. The wind has been many days in the N. E.; and both snow and hail have fallen three or four times during the month. 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Obfervations on the State of the Weather, from the 25th of March to the 24th of April, inclu five, 1804, two Miles N. W. of St. Paul's. ΜΕΝΟΥ ΚΑΙ ΤΑ ΠΡΟΣ ΤΟΥΣ It was found by a lieutenant of engineers, while fuperintending the repairs of of Fort Elleve, near the Bogar of Rofetta, about two leagues from the town; was brought to Cairo foon after Bonaparte's efcape, and at length depofited with the Inftitute. The copies of this ftone first taken were made at Cairo, by Citizens Marcel and Conté: one, the director of the national printing office in Egypt; the other, chief of the brigade of Aeroftats; and two of them were prefented by General Dugua to the National Inftitute at Paris, in the fitting of August 23, 1800. The tone itfelt was afterward removed with other rarities of ancient art to Alex. andria, and when the city furrendered to the English, was claimed by General Menou, as his own private property. The artifice, however, was too fhallow to attain its purpofe; and "The Gem of An. tiquity," as the French termed it, was at laft fhipped for Engla d, where it arrived on board his Majesty's thip L'Egyptienne, under the care of Colonel Turner, in the month of February, 1802. On the 9th of March, Loid Hobart, one of his Majefty's principal fecretaries of ftate, ordered it to be fent to the Society of Antiquaries, under whofe direction a fac-fimile of the three infcriptions, fimilar to the fpecimens reprefented in the annexed plate, has been engraved; and, finally, in the MONTHLY MAG. No. 115. month of June, 1803, it was depofited in the library of the British Muftum. the learned nearly three years; and it It has now engaged the attention of may be prefumed, that a compendious view of the different illuftrations of this curious monument, accompanied by a faithful copy of the Greek part in the curlive character, and a tranflation into English, will excite a confiderable intereft in the generality of our readers. To enlarge upon every epithet or particular expreffion, would be to write a treatife on the priests, the worship, and the hiftory, of Egypt. We fhall therefore chiefly confine our remarks to fuch matters as tend to place the purport of the infcription in a clearer point of view, fcrupulously adhering in the copy to all the faults of the original; and referving the errors and deficiencies to be corrected or filled up in the commentary at the close. Ptolemy Epiphanes, in remembrance of whofe fervices both to religion and the ftate in general, the infcription was fet up, was only five years old at his acceffion to the throne, in the first year of the 144th Olympiad, 204 years before the Chriftian æra. Ariftomenes, the experienced minifter of his father, Ptolomy Philopator, governed his minority, and raised the kingdom to a profperous condition. In the third year of his reign, the Romans fent an embassy to Egypt to notify their victory over Hannibal, and the treaty of peace that had been made with Carthage: and fucceeded fo far in fecuring the at tachment of the Egyptian lords, that they placed their young king under the protection of the Roman fenate and, though M. Lepidus was at first appointed the royal guardian, the charge was foon conferred upon Ariftomenes, who not only cultivated the connection with the Romans, but took care to renew the ancient alliance between the crown of Egypt and the republic of Achaia. Cato, as quoted by Prifcian the grammarian, commends Prolomy, both as excellent and bountiful, a character which appears to have been only applicable during his minority, while he followed the couniels of Ariftomenes; and to which it is probable, the praises 3 H in in the Decree made by the Egyptian priefs, are to be more immediately referred. The ambition, however, of Antiochus the Great, of Syria, and the treachery of Scopas, who commanded the Egyptian forces, gave the beginning of his reign fome difturbance; but the mea. fures of Ariftomenes overcame them both. After the arreft and execution of the latter, however, (in the 4th year of the 145th Olympiad, and 197 A. C.) it was judged advileable to celebrate the folemnities called Anacleteria, though the king was not of the age that was ufually required. The Anacleteria was the procla mation of the Egyptian kings, and was celebrated by conducting them to Memphis, when they were inthroned, and initiated into the facred myfteries, vefted in facred habits, instructed by fymbolical ceremonies not to tyrannize over their fubjects, and conducted by the priest of Ifis into the fanctuary. The Egyptians, however, rated the taJents of Ptolomy too high; for he no fooner became mafter of the affairs of government, than he abandoned himself to tyranny and excefs. The adminiftration of affairs, in the hands of a new minifter, became too arbitrary for the people to endure; Ariftomenes was put to death for being too free with his advice; and, at last, a general revolt excited. After Ptolomy had laid fiege to Lycopolis, the different chiefs of Egypt, who had joined the confpiracy, made a conditional furrender; but the king, breaking his word, first treated them in the most cruel manner, and afterward put them all to death. A conduct which only led to new diffi culties; but from which he was extricated by his minifter Polycrates. The hatred which the conduct of Anticchus excited in Ptolomy, was fomented by a treachery but rarely paralleled in the records of history. He gave Ptolomy his daughter Cleopatra in marriage, only to get rid of him the eafier, and obtain Egypt in addition to his territories. But the young queen preferred conjugal affection to the ties of blood, and joined Ptolomy against her father, who was also viewed with jealoufy by the Romans. Ptolomy, having exhaufted his treasures in fucceffive warfare, and hardly fuppreffed the rebellion of Lycopolis, prepared to make war upɔn Seleucus, king of Syria; but being asked by one of his chief offi cers how he would raife money to carry on the war, indifcreetly anfwered, that his friends were his treasure: and the inference, that he would purfue the war with the fortunes of his fubje&s, occafioned him to be taken off by poifon. He died, at the age of twenty-nine, about 153 years before the birth of Christ. DECREE of the EGYPTIAN PRIESTS in Honour of PTOLOMY V. THE ORIGINAL GREEK. Βασιλεύοντος του νέου, και παραλαβοντος την Baσtrelay Taga TOU margos nugiou Bachev, μεγαλοδόξου, του την Αίγυπτον καταςησαμένου, και τα προς τους (3) θεός ευσεβούς, αντιπαλων υπερτέξει, του τον βίον των ανθρώπων επανορθωσαντος, κύριο τριακονταετηρίδων καθαπερ ο Ήφαισος ο μέγας βασιλεως, καθάπερ ο Ηλιος (3) μεγας βασιλευς των τε άνω και των κατω χώρων, εκγόνου Θεών φιλοπατόρων, ον ο Ηφαιςος εδοκιμασεν, ω ο Ηλιος εδωκεν την νίκην, είκονος ζώσης το Δέος, υιού του Ηλιου, Πτολεμαίου του (4) αιωνοβίου, ηγαπημένου υπο του Φθω, ετους εναλά εφ ιερέως Αετό του αετού Αλεξανδρα, και Θεων Σωτήρων, και Θεων Αδέλφων, και Θεων Ευεργετων, και Θεων Φιλοπατόρων, και (5) Θεου Επιφανους ευχαρίζου, αθλοφος Βερενίκης Ευεργετίδος Πύρρας της Φιλίνα, κανηφόρου Αρσινόης Φιλαδέλφου, Agelas ng Aloyεvous, Lepelas Agsivors Dioratogos, Είρηνης (6) της Πτολεμαίου μηνός Ξανδικου Telpadi, Alyuπliwy de Mexele onlwxardexan, Ψήφισμα οι αρχιερείς, και προφήται, και οι εις το adulov ELTOPEDOMEVOL TEOS TOY COMIOμoy swy (7) θεων, και πλεροφοραι, και ιερογραμματεις, και οι άλλοι ιερείς τσάντες οι απαντησωνίες εκ των καλα την χώραν ιερών εις Μέμφιν τω βασιλεί, προς την πανήγυριν της παραλήψεως της (3) βασιλείας της Πτολεμαίου αιωνόβιου, ηγαπημένου υπο το φθαι, Θεον Επιφανους ευχαρίστου, ην παρέλαβεν παρα του πατρός αύλου, συναχθέντες εν τω εν Μέμα AN ENGLISH TRANSLATION. The young king now reigning, who received the kingdom from his father, the lord of kings, greatly glorious, who fettled the affairs of Egypt, and refpectful of the gods, pious, fuccefsful over his enemies, the reftorer of the life of men, lord of thirty years, like Vulcan the great king, like the Sun the great king both of the upper and lower diftrids, offspring of the Gods Philopateres, whom Vulcan approved, to whom the Sun gave vidtory, the living image of Jupiter, the fon of the Sun, Ptolomy, the immortal, beloved of Phtha, in the ninth year of the priedhood of Aêtes prief of Alexander, and of the Gods Soteres, and the Gods brothers, and the Gods Euergetes, and the Gods Phi lopateres, and of the God Epiphanes, moft gracious; Pyrrha, the daughter of Philinus, being the athlephora of Berenice the wife of Euergetes; Areia, daughter of Diogenes, being the canephora of Arfinoe, the wife of Philadelphus; Irene, daughter of Ptolomy, being prieftefs of Arfinoe, wife of Philopator; on the fourth day of the month Xandichus, but the eighteenth of the Egyptian Mechir, A DECREE of the high priests, and prophets, and those who enter the fanctuary to cloath the Gods, and the Pterophore, and the Hierogrammatilts, and all the other pricks col lected |