loss of his son, and even by Adam when he grieved for Abel.

Aben Ezra, the famous Rabbi, interpreter, and expounder of
scripture, and who is said to have excelled in every branch of
knowledge, attributed the invention of chess to Moses. His
celebrated poem on chess, written about 1130 A.D., has been
translated into nearly all languages of the civilized globe,
into English by Dr. Thomas Hyde, Oxford, 1694.

The unknown Persian, author of the imperfect M.S. presented
by Major Price the eminent Orientalist, to the Asiatic Society,
and upon which N. Bland, Esq., mainly bases his admirable
treatise on Persian Chess, 1850, says--"Hermes, a Grecian
sage, invented chess, and that it was abridged and sent to
Persia in the sixth century of our era."

The famous Shahnama, by Firdausi, called the Homer of
Persia, and other Eastern manuscripts as well as the M.S. of the
Asiatic Society, give less ancient traditions of the adaption of
chess relating to the time of Alexander the Great and Indian
Kings, Fur, Poris, and Kaid; in one of these the reward of a grain
of corn doubled sixty-four times was stipulated for by the
philosopher, and the seeming insignificance of the demand
astonished and displeased the King, who wished to make a
substantial recognition worthy of his own greatness and power,
and it occasioned sneers and ridicule on the part of the King's
treasurer and accountant at Sassa's supposed lack of wisdom and
judgment. However, astonishment and chagrin succeeded before
they were half way through their computation, for when the total
was arrived at, it was found to exceed all the wealth of the