A Strange Manuscript Found in a Copper Cylinder - James De Mille (best english books to read TXT) 📗

apply; and I am inclined to think that if they were spelled with perfect accuracy they would show the same relation between the Kosekin language and the Hebrew that there is between the Saxon English and the Latin.”

The doctor gave a heavy sigh.

“You’re out of my depth, Oxenden,” said he. “I’m nothing of a philologist.”

“By Jove!” said Featherstone, “I like this. This is equal to your list of the plants of the Coal Period, doctor. But I say, Oxenden, while you are about it, why don’t you give us a little dose of Anglo-Saxon and Sanskrit? By Jove! the fellow has Bopp by heart, and yet he expects us to argue with him.”

“I have it!” cried Melick. “The Kosekin are the lost Ten Tribes. Oxenden is feeling his way to that. He is going to make them out to be all Hebrew; and then, of course, the only conclusion will be that they are the Ten Tribes, who after a life of strange vicissitudes have pulled up at the South Pole. It’s a wonder More didn’t think of that⁠—or the writer of this yarn, whoever he may be. Well, for my part, I always took a deep interest in the lost Ten Tribes, and thought them a fine body of men.”

“Don’t think they’ve got much of the Jew about them,” said Featherstone, languidly. “They hate riches and all that, you know. Break a Jew’s heart to hear of all that property wasted, and money going a-begging. Not a bad idea, though, that of theirs about money. Too much money’s a howwid baw, by Jove!”

“Well,” continued Oxenden, calmly resuming, and taking no notice of these interruptions, “I can give you word after word that More has mentioned which corresponds to a kindred Hebrew word in accordance with ‘Grimm’s Law.’ For instance, Kosekin ‘Op,’ Hebrew ‘Oph;’ Kosekin ‘Athon,’ Hebrew ‘Adon;’ Kosekin ‘Salon,’ Hebrew ‘Shalom.’ They are more like Hebrew than Arabic, just as Anglo-Saxon words are more like Latin or Greek than Sanskrit.”

“Hurrah!” cried Melick, “we’ve got him to Sanskrit at last! Now, Oxenden, my boy, trot out the Hitopadesa, the Megha Dhuta, the Rig Veda. Quote Beowulf and Caedmon. Gives us a little Zeno, and wind up with Lalla Rookh in modern Persian.”

“So I conclude,” said Oxenden, calmly, ignoring Melick, “that the Kosekin are a Semitic people. Their complexion and their beards show them to be akin to the Caucasian race, and their language proves beyond the shadow of a doubt that they belong to the Semitic branch of that race. It is impossible for an autochthonous people to have such a language.”

“But how,” cried the doctor⁠—“how in the name of wonder did they get to the South Pole?”

“Easily enough,” interrupted Melick⁠—“Shem landed there from Noah’s ark, and left some of his children to colonize the country. That’s as plain as a pikestaff. I think, on the whole, that this idea is better than the other one about the Ten Tribes. At any rate they are both mine, and I warn all present to keep their hands off them, for on my return I intend to take out a copyright.”

“There’s another thing,” continued Oxenden, “which is of immense importance, and that is their habit of cave-dwelling. I am inclined to think that they resorted to cave-dwelling at first from some hereditary instinct or other, and that their eyes and their whole morals have become affected by this mode of life. Now, as to ornamented caverns, we have many examples⁠—caverns adorned with a splendor fully equal to anything among the Kosekin. There are in India the great Behar caves, the splendid Karli temple with its magnificent sculptures and imposing architecture, and the cavern-temples of Elephanta; there are the subterranean works in Egypt, the temple of Dendera in particular; in Petra we have the case of an entire city excavated from the rocky mountains; yet, after all, these do not bear upon the point in question, for they are isolated cases; and even Petra, though it contained a city, did not contain a nation. But there is a case, and one which is well known, that bears directly upon this question, and gives us the connecting link between the Kosekin and their Semitic brethren in the northern hemisphere.”

“What is that?” asked the doctor.

“The Troglodytes,” said Oxenden, with impressive solemnity.

“Well, and what do you make out of the Troglodytes?”

“I will explain,” said Oxenden. “The name Troglodytes is given to various tribes of men, but those best known and celebrated under this name once inhabited the shores of the Red Sea, both on the Arabian and the Egyptian side. They belonged to the Arabian race, and were consequently a Semitic people. Mark that, for it is a point of the utmost importance. Now, these Troglodytes all lived in caverns, which were formed partly by art and partly by nature, although art must have had most to do with the construction of such vast subterranean works. They lived in great communities in caverns, and they had long tunnels passing from one community to another. Here also they kept their cattle. Some of these people have survived even to our own age; for Bruce, the Abyssinian traveller, saw them in Nubia.

“The earliest writer who mentions the Troglodytes was Agatharcides, of Cnidos. According to him they were chiefly herdsmen. Their food was the flesh of cattle, and their drink a mixture of milk and blood. They dressed in the skins of cattle; they tattooed their bodies. They were very swift of foot, and were able to run down wild beasts in the hunt. They were also greatly given to robbery, and caravans passing to and fro had to guard against them.

“One feature in their character has to my mind a strange significance, and that is their feelings with regard to death. It was not the Kosekin love of death, yet it was something which must certainly be considered as