"paper-reed," leads us to infer that the prophet had two classes of vegetation in view,-the wild and the cultivated growth. He speaks of the troublesome times about to come upon Egypt, and of the failure of the waters. "The paper-reeds by the brooks, by the mouth of the brooks, and every thing sown by the brooks, shall wither, be driven away, and be no more." Here the prophecy seems to have referred to the general verdure by the brooks, which sustained the life both of man and beast, as well as to that which was of use in the arts. Now, the papyrus was only one of the important articles of growth. among the reed-kind which grew wild, and if cut off there were others that would support the inhabitants and the cattle, as we have shown under the article "Flags." But a word which signified all the green and wild reedy growth upon the brooks would naturally be used when contrasting the uncultivated with all that was cultivated. Hence it appears more likely that the prophet referred to all that wild class of growth known as reeds when he used the word aroth, translated "paperreed." The word, therefore, as occurring in Isaiah, includes all that remained to the flocks and herds, and to the inhabitants, which they were accustomed to use when their crops should fail. The prophet in the above passage, when he adds the assertion, "every thing sown by the brooks," would be understood to mean the total destruction of every hope of sustenance from the soil. For when the brooks failed the drought commenced; and that was a fearful time when the reeds by the mouth of the brooks were unable to grow.