l probability, would have
been oftner quoted by our learned Pedants, than the _Odyssey_ of
_Homer_. What a perpetual Fund would it have been of obsolete Words and
Phrases, unusual Barbarisms and Rusticities, absurd Spellings and
complicated Dialects? I make no question but it would have been looked
upon as one of the most valuable Treasuries of the _Greek_ Tongue.

I find likewise among the Ancients that ingenious kind of Conceit, which
the Moderns distinguish by the Name of a _Rebus_, [2] that does not sink
a Letter but a whole Word, by substituting a Picture in its Place. When
_Caesar_ was one of the Masters of the _Roman_ Mint, he placed the
Figure of an Elephant upon the Reverse of the Publick Mony; the Word
_Caesar_ signifying an Elephant in the _Punick_ Language. This was
artificially contrived by _Caesar_, because it was not lawful for a
private Man to stamp his own Figure upon the Coin of the Commonwealth.
_Cicero_, who was so called from the Founder of his Family, that was
marked on the Nose with a little Wen like a Vetch (which is _Cicer_ in
_Latin_) instead of _Marcus Tullius Cicero_, order'd the Words _Marcus
Tullius_ with the Figure of a Vetch at the End of them to be inscribed
on a publick Monument. [3] This was done probably to shew that he was
neither ashamed of his Name or Family, notwithstanding the Envy of his
Competitors had often reproached him with both. In the same manner we
read of a famous Building that was marked in several Parts of it with
the Figures of a Frog and a Lizard: Those Words in _Greek_ having been
the Names of the Architects, who by the Laws of their Country were never
permitted to inscribe their own Names upon their Works. For the same
Reason it is thought, that the Forelock of the Horse in the Antique
Equestrian Statue of _Marcus Aurelius_, represents at a Distance the
Shape of an Owl, to intimate the Country of the Statuary, who, in all
probability, was an _Athenian_. This kind of Wit was very much in Vogue
among our own Countrymen about an Age or two ago, who did not practise
it for any oblique Reason, as the Ancients abovementioned, but purely
for the sake of being Witty. Among innumerable Instances that may be
given of this Nature, I shall produce the Device of one Mr _Newberry_,
as I find it mentioned by our learned _Cambden_ in his Remains. Mr
_Newberry_, to represent his Name by a Picture, hung up at his Door the
Sign of a Yew-Tree, that had several Berries upon it, and in