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"AN AMUSING STORY."-FROM THE PAINTING BY FRITZ WERNER.

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RITING is the art of expressing ideas by visible signs or characters inscribed on some material. It is either ideographic or phonetic. Ideographic writing may be either pictorial, representing objects by imitating their forms, or symbolic, by imitating their nature or proportions. Phonetic writing may be syllabic or alphabetic; in the former each character represents

a syllable; in the latter, a single letter. Of the origin of this art nothing is positively known. The Egyptians ascribed it to Thoth; the Greeks, to Mercury or Cadmus; and the Scandinavians, to Odin.

The first step towards writing was probably the rude pictorial representation of objects, without any indication of the accessories of time or place; the next, the application of a symbolic signification to some of the figures, so that the picture of two legs, for example, represented not only two legs, but also the act of walking. Pictures, abbreviated for convenience, gradually became conventional signs, and in time these characters were made to stand for the sound of spoken language.

The various systems of writing of the ancient world had probably at least three different sourcesthe Egyptian, the Assyrian and the Chinese systems,

all of which were originally hieroglyphic. The Egyptians practiced four distinct styles of writing-the Hieroglyphic, hieratic, demotic or enchorial, and Coptic. Hieroglyphic writing, which was in use much earlier than 3,000 B.C., was probably at first ideographic; its symbols became gradually used to represent abstract ideas, and in time acquired a phonetic value. The phonetic characters are both syllabic and alphabetic. In the latter, pictoral figures are used to express the initial letters of the words which they represent; for example, the figure of an eagle, akhom, stands for a, of an owl, mulag, for m, etc.

The hieratic writing, which probably came into use 2,000 B.C., was a simplified form of the hieroglyphic style, in which the pictorial symbols developed through a stage of linear hieroglyph into a kind of curious hand. The demotic or enchorial writing was of a still simpler form of the hieroglyphic, and a nearer approach to the alphabetic system. It was in use from about the 7th century B. C. till the 2d century A.D., when it was gradually superseded by the Coptic, which grew out of the hieratic and demotic under Greek influences.

The Ethiopians also used hieroglyphs similar to those of the Egyptians, and their current written language resembled the Egyptian demotic, but its alphabet had fewer symbols. At a later period a third graphic system, somewhat analogous to the Coptic, came into use, which may be called Ethiopic Greek. With what people the Assyrian Cuneiform or Sphenographic styles of writing originated is not known, but it was originally without doubt a hieroglyphic system, and became gradually modified by the different

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nations which occupied the Assyrian empire, until it assumed the form of the present known inscriptions. There are three classes of Cuneiform charactersthe Assyrian or Babylonian, the Scythian or Median, and the Persian. The first is the most complicated,

containing from 600 to 700 symbols; the second is less complicated, but contains about 100 symbols, or three times as many as the third, which is almost purely alphabetic. Of these three original systems, the Egyptian is by far the most important, for from

its hieratic symbols was probably derived the Phonician alphabet, the parent of almost all the principal graphic systems of the world.

The Roman letters were used in Italy until the latter part of the 6th century, when the Lombardic style was introduced. This is also sometimes called Roman, because used by the Popes in their bulls; it continued in use until the 13th century.

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The Visigothic style, carried into Spain by the Visigoths, was legally abolished in 1091, and Latin letters were adopted for all public instruments. In France the Merovingian style prevailed from the close of the 6th century to the end of the 8th. Charlemagne introduced the Caroline, which, having degenerated before the close of the 10th century, was restored by Hugh Capet, and was subsequently called the Capetian. It was in use in England, France, and Germany till the middle

of the 12th century, when the modern Gothic spread all over Europe. The present German alphabet is a modification of this.

There are no traces of writing in Britain before the Roman conquest, when Latin letters were introduced. What is called the Roman-Saxon, resembling the Roman, prevailed until the middle of the 8th century; the set Saxon succeeded it, lasting until the middle of the 9th; this was followed by the runninghand Saxon of the time of Alfred; the mixed

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Saxon, combining the Roman, Lombardic, and Saxon letters; and the elegant Saxon, which was introduced in the 10th century, and did not become obsolete until the middle of the 12th. The Norman style, quaint, illegible, affected, and composed of letters nearly Lombardic, came in with William the Conqueror.

The modern Gothic dates in England from the 12th century; the old English, from the middle of the 14th. The English court had a barbarous corruption of the Norman, which was contrived by the lawyers of the 16th century, and lasted till the reign of George II., when it was abolished by law.

The utmost diversity exists among different nations in the manner or direction of writing; but in general the Semitic races wrote from right to left, and the Aryan from left to right.

In form ancient manuscripts were either rolls, volumnia, or flat pages like our printed books, codices. The Egyptian papyri are usually in rolls of an indefinite length, according to the subject matter, but some of the smaller ones are flat.

The transcripts of manuscripts were committed by the Greeks and Romans principally to slaves, who were esteemed of great value when they excelled in the art. There were also at Rome professional copyists, some of whom were women. About the 5th century, associations of scribes, who worked under stringent rules, were formed. In the middle ages copying was almost exclusively in the hands of ecclesiastics, who were called clerks, clerici. In the Imperial library at Vienna is a Roman calendar executed in the first half of the 4th century. In the Vatican there is a fragment of a Virgil of the 4th century. The most ancient manuscripts extant are the papyrus rolls from the tombs of Egypt, where the dryness of the climate and of the sand beneath which they were buried preserved them in an almost perfect condition for thousands of years.

EGIN with good paper, good pens, good ink.
In a good copy the letters should be of elegant
form, and constructed on natural principles.
Every letter should be as perfect as it is possi-
ble for human skill to execute, that wherever it

occurs it may present an unvarying model to the pupil. The turns and slopes should be alike, the loops of the same length and width, the proper distances between the letters carefully observed, and shade duly distributed.

Curlicues, flourishes, and ornamental capitals, may delight an amateur in a show-case; a thorough business man detests them in his correspondence. In a lady's writing they are simply vulgar.

The course of instruction given in the copies should constitute a system, arranged in that order of progression which is indicated by a careful analysis of the forms of the letters and of the powers of the human hand, so that each advance may pre pare the way for the next, and the steps not be farther apart than the necessities of the case compel. To this end, the simpler forms should precede the more complex; the short, the long. Those that have similar curves and turns and iden tical parts should be together. Words should precede sentences. The columns should be first narrow, then broader, to accustom the hand by degrees to move easily on the given rests across the longest word. These columnar sections, intended to be written down, are the gradual preparation for the sentences, which occupy the width of the page. The se lection of the words for the columns should be in accordance with the same principle of progressiveness,-first the easier, then the more difficult combinations. In them the loops should so occur that when the copy is written they may be handsomely distributed, and the general appearance of the page be harmonious.

A good paper costs more, but it is indispensable. It should be tolerably thick, well laid, with a smooth surface, moderately glazed; so that the ink will not show through when dry, and that there may be no roughness or little hairs for the pen to pick up, and that the pen may glide along without jar on the muscles or nerves of the fingers and hand,—a very impor. tant consideration now that steel pens are used, as paralysis has in several instances resulted from their use, and their injurious effect must needs be greater on a rough surface. A white paper is generally to be preferred to a blue, indeed is almost invariably used.

The pen should be fine-pointed, so that a good hair-line can be made, and have a good springy nib, that the shades may be cleanly cut, and that the writing may not be rendered stiff, a result inevitably following the use of a "hard" pen. They should be of a uniform character as much as possible,-not one

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