senses, or the seven planets. Dion Cassius corroborates him, while Dionysos of Halicarnassus says, "Melody embraced an interval of five—it never rose more than three and one-half tones toward high, and fell less toward bass." This probably was a result of the use of the three-stringed lyre.
To find a probable origin for the legend of Osiris and Isis, it may seem strange to have to turn to the shores of Mexico and Central America; yet there, among the ruined cities of the ancient Mayan civilization, according to Le Plongeon, are two temples bearing historical inscriptions which in many details correspond with the Egyptian legend. The king, ruling well and wisely, is slain and dismembered by his brother, and the sister-wife, after finding the body, erected over it a pyramid and sphinx, the latter with a human head on a leopard's body; after which she travelled eastward, to the colonies of her race that had settled there centuries before; where she lived until her death. Her son ultimately killed his usurping uncle, and ruled the Mayans in his stead. The points of resemblance between the two legends are too numerous to name here; but as the period when the Mayan events took place is about ten thousand years before Christ, if the legends arose from one common source it would give ample time for history to become merged into myth.
