340 Analysis of Scientific Books. 



dimensions, and among them part of the ccecum, with its vermi- 

 form appendix, and portions of the ilium. Several large pieces of 

 the peritoneal membrane were likewise observed. 



There were also several lumps of a particular species of brittle 

 resin, two or three small pieces of myrrh in their simplest and 

 natural state, and a few larger lumps, of an irregular shape, of 

 some compound of a bituminous and resinous nature, mixed up 

 with an argillaceous earth. No traces of the right kidney could 

 be found, nor of the liver or minor glands of the abdomen ; al- 

 though, among the many fragments of membranes and other soft 

 parts which lay in confusion, and were removed for better inspec- 

 tion, the late Dr. Baillie, who was present at one of the demon- 

 strations, detected the gall-bladder slightly lacerated, but in 

 other respects perfect, retaining a small portion of the peritoneal 

 covering of the liver attached to it, as well as considerable remains 

 of its own ducts. 



The cavity of the thorax was next examined ; it was found 

 that the pericardium, which adhered partially to the diaphragm, 

 came away with it, and that a laceration had taken place at the 

 same time in that sac. 



The heart was found suspended, in situ, by its large blood- 

 vessels, in a very contracted state, attached to the lungs by its 

 natural connexions with them. 



The last cavity examined was that of the cranium; for this 

 purpose it was sawed in two, horizontally, and when thus opened, 

 it was ascertained that the brain had been removed through the 

 nostrils ; the plates of the inner nasal bones having been destroyed 

 in the operation by the instrument employed, as evidenced by the 

 state of those parts. 



" The eyes appeared not to have been disturbed. The tongue 

 was preserved, and neither above nor below it was there found any 

 coin or piece of metal, as recorded of some of the mummies, but a 

 lump of rags dipped in pitch. The teeth were perfectly white 

 and intact." 



Dr. Granville next offers some remarks on the age of this 

 female, and on the disease of which she died, deduced from the 

 examination of the parts. " When we reflect for a moment," he 

 says, " that the individual in question, according to the more 

 generally received opinion respecting the antiquity of mummies 

 found in the hypogei of Thebes, had probably lived upwards of 

 three thousand years ago ; it will bespeak a very extraordinary 

 power of preservation in the mode of embalming then practised, 

 in some cases at least, to be able to say, that the female of which 

 we are speaking, died at an age between fifty and fifty-five years ; 

 that she had borne children ; and that the disease which appears 

 to have destroyed her was ovarian dropsy, attended with structural 



