We can now approach the interpretation of the famous symbol called the Tetractys or Tetrad, which is a compendium of Pythagorean mysticism. The tetractys is itself a system of numbers. It symbolizes the ‘elements of number,’ which are the elements of all things. It contains the concordant ratios of the musical harmony. It might well be described in the Pythagorean oath as ‘containing the root and fountain of everflowing Nature.’ In one of the acousmata preserved in Iamblichus it is identified with the cosmic harmony. It was also called κσμος, οὐρανς, πν. Theon says it was held in honour because it contained the nature of the universe.

There is a division of opinion on this subject which is perplexing to the ordinary student of Homer. The extremists on one side hold that hiatus was all but absolutely barred, while the more thoroughgoing among their opponents believe it was freely tolerated. A notable paper by the eminent philologist, Karl Brugmann, Zur Geschichte der hiatischen (zweisilbigen) Vokalverbindungen in den indogermanischen Sprachen, in Berichte üb. d. Verhandlgn. d. königl. sachs. Gesells. d. Wissensch. zu Leipzig, philol.-histor. Klasse, 1913, 139 sqq., might well, it seems, be taken as a starting-point for further investigation.

I desire to invite the attention of students of Plato and of Greek mathematics to a solution of a passage which has long been a field of controversy for critics. For brevity's sake I shall take for granted an acquaintance with the two solutions which at present dispute the field, and further adopt certain positions which previous enquirers have established beyond reasonable doubt.

Plato nowhere deals systematically with the problem of the origin of evil. And yet no system of philosophy which proposes to explain the mysteries of existence can leave untouched the undeniable and perplexing fact of warps and imperfections in the fabric of our life, seemingly inherent in the very tissue of which it is woven. It is difficult to believe that Plato could shape his scheme without taking this into account—somewhere, one feels, he must offer an explanation. He does, indeed, in various dialogues drop scattered hints which apply to the matter in hand, without throwing light on the problem as a whole. The following are typical instances. In the Republic he says that evil may be a punishment for sin in a former life, or, if not that, may be good which we cannot recognize: Оȕτως äρα ύποληπτέον περι τοΰ δικαον νδρός ὲάν τ' ν πενϭ γγνηϒαι ν τ' ν νόσοιας ἥ τινι δδλѱ τών δοκούντων κακŵν, ώς τούτψ ταûτα ες γαθόν τι τελεντήσει ξѾντι ἥ καί ποθανόντι. ‘Then this must be our notion of the just man, that even when he is in poverty or sickness, or any other seeming misfortune, all things will in the end work together for good to him in life and death’ (Jowett's translation).

The sumptuous edition of Herodas by Headlam-Knox, while it throws welcome light on many dark places, is perhaps hardly adequate in a few points where ancient religious ideas are involved. I venture, therefore, to offer the following suggestions:

I. II and 66, μà τàς Моίρας. IV.30, πρòς Моιρέων.

I. 32,μà τήν Αϊδεω (?) Κούρην.

I. 69, μà … τήν Φίλην δήμητρα.

The tale current in antiquity that a certain section of the people known as Αίθίοπες was peculiar for its longevity is one of whose origin a satisfactory account is still to seek. To say that the legend was attached by the Greeks to the Aithiopians through their remoteness from the Mediterranean world is no explanation; nor is it a very cogent conjecture that the fable may have arisen from misunderstood reports of an African five-month year, for which there is some evidence in modern times. With the utmost diffidence I venture to make a suggestion which, whether it carries conviction or not, is at least so obvious that it can hardly fail to have occurred to many schdiars in the past. My one excuse must be that it does not seem to be mentioned either in the more ordinary books of reference, where it might be expected to appear, or in any other works which have come my way.

Professor V. Wilamowitz-Moellendorf has recently published a paper in which he argues, firstly, that the very remarkable topographical errors in Thucydides' account of the Pylos and Sphacteria campaign, shown so clearly in Grundy's and Burrows' articles in the Hellenic Journal, can only be accounted for on the supposition that he had none but Athenian sources of information, and secondly, that as later— after 421—; he had access to Peloponnesian sources, his account of this campaign was written before 421; we have, therefore, an early example of Attic prose comparable with the oligarchic Constitution of Athens. Now seeing that the incident of the campaign which interested the contemporary Greeks most was the surrender of the Spartans, and that Thucydides goes out of his way, more Herodoteo rather, to give an anecdote (with explanation) to illustrate this interest, it would be sufficiently remarkable if he had not been to the trouble of getting the Spartan version of the affair; the more especially as Spartan sources were easily available in the prisoners themselves, who seem to have received at Athens the common treatment of that time, compounded of cruelty and freedom, which is so foreign to our own method, and to whom Thucydides could have had ready access. It is therefore worth while seeing if there is any reason for supposing Wilamowitz' view to be true.

When Gamurrini first published the Peregrinatio ad loca sancta (Rome, 1887), the narrative by an abbess of a pilgrimage undertaken to the Holy Land in the last quarter of the fourth century, he identified the authoress with Silvia, the sister of Arcadius' minister Rufinus. Heraeus, however, in his edition (Sammlung vulgärlateinischer Texte, Heidelburg, 1908) lends the weight of his authority to the view that the work was written by a certain Aetheria, and in his preface gives solid reasons for his preference. He also states that a thirteenth-century catalogue of the Limoges Cathedral Library mentions the book under the title Itinevarium Egenae abbatissae, but he regards the form Egeria as a mere corruption.

Ep. 2, § 3 ‘non Conualescit planta, quae saepe transfertur.’ ‘coalescit’ (‘manuscrit de Mons’) commendat P. Thomas. Conferatur tamen Ep. 121, § 15 ‘herba conualuit,’ Ep. 38, § 2 ‘conualescunt et exurgunt.’

Ep. 13, § 14 ‘pudet me i bi sic tecum loqui.’ ‘diu,’ cf. § 15 ‘nimium diu te cohortor.’

When M. Félix Sartiaux says1 of the domain of Troy that ‘sa principale industrie est l'!èlevage de chevaux,’ he touches a point that has not been sufficiently considered in its bearing on the religion of Troy and its connexions with the tribes of Thrace, the Danube, and North Greece. In his study of the Thracian proper names Tomaschek notes2 the large number compounded with ‘Aulo-,’ which he regards as equivalent to ἴππο and remarks on the fact that it is natural to have such names in Thrace, as the chief business of the ruling Thracians was the breeding of horses, their food was flesh of horses, and horse-blood and horse-milk their drink. The same tendency is seen in the Iliad in the names with ἴππος as first or second member. They are for the most part names of Trojans or Trojan allies, the greater number belonging to Trojans. Only four Greeks have these names, and in two of these cases there seems to be an oversight on the part of the poet. Hipponoos occurs in a puzzling list of Greeks slain by Hector in II. XI. 301–304, in which the names that occur elsewhere in the poem are names of Trojans. Hippasides also constitutes a puzzle when used in the thirteenth book as a patronymic for Hypsenor, who is a Trojan in the fifth book, and has himself a characteristically Trojan3 or Dardanian name in ηνωρ Hippasos is a Trojan, father of Charops and Sokos, and, according to Hyginus, a son of Priam.

In the last instalment of the catalogus codicum astrologorum Graecorum, vol. VIII part iv (1922), Mr Cumont publishes from cod. Paris. Gr. 2425 two fragments of hexameter verse, one of three lines and the other of seven or eight, which he attributes1, perhaps rightly, to Dorotheus of Sidon, on whose remains I have written in C.Q. 1908 pp. 47–61 and 1911 pp. 249 sq. The scribe, who makes a practice of suppressing names, assigns the shorter piece to no author, and the longer he introduces with the circumlocution Фησί τις τν σοФν.