1872.] Notices of Books. 87 
infiltration. In the same breath is another mystification, thus— 
“‘the chambers are all destitute of hieroglyphs.” With somewhat 
of astonishment would the years’-stricken author of ‘* The Monu- 
mental History of Egypt” hear this! And what would the 
shades of Howard Vyse declare could they address us? And 
Richard Lepsius.too, with the very first plate in his world-famous 
‘* Denkmaeler,” exhibiting some of the very hieroglyphs them- 
selves as they were found by Vyse, painted in red minium, in 
some of the ‘‘chambers of construction?” Strangely significant 
is it that in the sectional drawing of the Pyramid forming part 
of this Swedish work, the essential five ‘‘chambers of con- 
struction” above the ‘‘ King’s Chamber” are omitted. Among 
the most important testimonies which the entire building con- 
tains are these particular hieroglyphs, and notably among them 
the cartouche of Shufu; they not only confirm the date of the 
building and name of the king by whom, Herodotus tells us, 
the Great Pyramid was built, but more than that, they show 
that the date made out on astronomical grounds is true also. 
The hieroglyphic, historic, and astronomical dates all closely 
agree to something near about the year B.c. 2170. 
Proceeding onwards we are assured that ‘this singular theory 
(7.e., the modern metrological and esoteric theory), was first 
broached by a Medical (sic) Professor of Oxford, Dr. Greaves.” 
In his ‘“ Pyramidographia,” however, published in 1647, the 
same John Greaves announces himself as “ Savilian Professor of 
Astronomy at Oxford,” and this is confirmed, too, by the learned 
Dr. Hooker: whilst as if to destroy altogether at one blow the 
labour of modern researchers, it is asserted that ‘this” (Pro- 
fessor Greaves’s) ‘‘ view has been lately revived by the Astro- 
nomer-Royal for Scotland, Professor Piazzi Smyth,” which, 
however, as being so excessively wide of the fact, any candid 
reader may be satisfied of by a careful examination of the last- 
named Professor’s ‘‘ Life and Work at the Great Pyramid,” 
wherein doctrines exactly opposite to those of Greaves’s are 
advanced. 
As concerning the size of the monument, at page 5 of the dis- 
sertation, is to be found a host of erroneous statements, far 
too numerous to receive attention individually within the limits 
of a mere review, as to what the Scottish Astronomer-Royal has 
propounded. We may instance the following :—“ He is obliged 
to make a number of arbitrary assumptions, among which we 
signalise his assumption ‘that the ancient Hebrew standard of 
length or sacred cubit was exactly 25°025 English inches, equal 
to our 1o-millionth part of the earth’s polar semi-axis.’” M. 
Wackerbarth seems lamentably ignorant, if in strict sincerity he 
so writes. Has he acquainted himself with the directions left to 
his successors by no less a philosopher than Newton, who some 
I50 years ago wrote how the true measures of the ancient 
cubits, both sacred and profane, would eventually be found 
