238 CARNEGIE INSTITUTION 



of Wood at Ephesus. These men achieved important results, but 

 in considering their work we must bear in mind that they were not 

 archeologists at the beginning ; they learned their trade by prac- 

 ticing it — by many costly experiments. Now all this method is 

 changed. In the last excavations on the hill of Hissarlik Dorpfeld 

 employed only one seventh as many common workmen as Schlie- 

 mann had set at the big trench, and had with him three or four 

 trained archeologists to observe, direct, and study. 



In Egyptian explorations pains are taken to allow no scarab to be 

 lost. Of slight ' ' museum value ' ' in itself, any such may supply the 

 clue for the solution of some problem. In the excavations of Flin- 

 ders Petrie in Egypt last winter, one object considered worth all the 

 rest was a little image of the old king Khufu (Cheops), no longer 

 than a man's hand, which would have escaped notice in excavations 

 like Wood's. Modern archeological excavations are much more 

 expensive than those conducted on the railway contractor's plan, but 

 they are also much more instructive than those that were intended 

 primarily to fill museums. Reinach, one of the most distinguished 

 of French archeologists, in going a few years ago to dig at Myrina, 

 in Asia Minor, where an indefinite number of terra cotta figurines 

 had been found, said expressly that the expedition had as its first 

 object not the finding of figurines, but to learn what was possible of 

 the burials and the ancient life at Myrina. Now that the temptation 

 to dig simply for objects of antiquity is removed bj^ the law which 

 forbids their exportation, archeologists are free to explore simply 

 for the sake of science. Mrs. Hearst, of California, be it said to her 

 praise, has given this direction to the party under Dr. Reisner which 

 is digging at her expense in the soil of Egypt ; they are to do what 

 is best for the science of Egyptology, without regard to showy dis- 

 coveries. 



In another respect, too, the archeological excavations of the pres- 

 ent differ from those of the past. Fifty years ago no one planned 

 to lay bare the entire site of a sanctuary, and still less that of a 

 town. Even at Pompeii until 1861 the excavators chose what 

 seemed to be a promissing place here, and another there, as if thej^ 

 were picking blackberries in a mountain pasture. There, too, 

 naturally enough, more attention was paid to the objects found than 

 to what might be learned from the position of the objects, and after 

 the antiquities had been removed to the Naples Museum no sufficient 

 care was taken of what had been uncovered, but left, at Pompeii. 

 Naturally, too, Wood's excavations at Ephesus were entirely un- 



