Page:Travels & discoveries in the Levant (1865) Vol. 1.djvu/273

Rh I was much disappointed with the MSS. at Patmos. M. Gruerin, the author of the memoir on Rhodes already cited, has recently visited the monastery, and made a catalogue of the library. I read through this list and called for all the classical MSS., and was shown only four, of no great antiquity and in bad condition. I found a Greek lexicon by some unknown Byzantine scholar.96 In the fly-leaf was a curious note, stating that the people of Cyrene dedicated a statue of their king, Battus, holding in his hand the silphium, a plant which supplied the staple of their commerce, and which is represented on the coins of Cyrene.

This note being evidently an extract from some ancient author, I was at first in hopes that it was unedited; but find that it is given in the Scholiast to the Plutus of Aristophanes, 1. 925. I also noticed a MS. of Sophocles, on thin parchment, containing only the Ajax and Electra, with occasional interlinear glosses in red ink; a Diodorus Siculus, on parchment, of the 15th century, wanting beginning and end; and a Libanius, on paper, of the 15th century, wanting beginning, and in bad condition.

The library is rich in Biblical and Patristic MSS., many of which have fine illuminations. Among these may be specially mentioned the Book of Job, probably of the 7th or 8th century, written in uncial characters; some splendidly-illuminated copies of the Gospels from the 10th to the 12th century; and a copy of Origen on the Pentateuch and Prophets, of the 9th century. There is here also a fine collection of