ANIMALS 



193 



CHAPTER XXXV. 



OF MUMMIES, WAX-WORKS, &c. 



" MAN 8 is not content with the usual term 

 of life, but he is willing to lengthen out his ex- 

 istence by art ; and although he cannot pre- 

 vent death, he tries to obviate his dissolution. 

 It is natural to attempt to preserve even the 

 most trifling relics of what has long given us 

 pleasure ; nor does the mind separate from 

 the body, without a wish, that even the wretch- 

 ed heap of dust it leaves behind may yet be 

 remembered. The embalming, practised in 

 various nations, probably had its rise in this 

 fond desire : an urn filled with ashes, among 

 the Romans, served as a pledge of continu- 

 ing affection; and even the grassy graves in 

 our own church-yards, are raised above the 

 surface, with the desire that the body below 

 should not be wholly forgotten. The soul, 

 ardent after eternity for itself, is willing to 

 procure, even for the body, a prolonged du- 

 ration." 



But of all nations, the Egyptians carried 

 this art to the highest perfection : as it Avas 

 a principle of their religion, to suppose the 

 soul continued only coeval to the duration of 

 the body, they tried every art to extend the 

 life of the one by preventing the dissolution 

 of the other. In this practice they were ex- 

 ercised from the earliest ages ; and the mum- 

 mies they have embalmed in this manner, con- 

 tinue in great numbers to the present day. 

 We are told, in Genesis, that Joseph seeing 

 his father expire, gave orders to his physici- 

 ans to embalm the body, which they execu- 

 ted in the compass of forty days, the usual 

 time of embalming. Herodotus also, the most 

 ancient of the profane historians, gives us a 

 copious detail of this art, as it was practised, 

 in his time, among the Egyptians. There are 

 certain men among them, says he, who prac- 

 tise embalming as a trade ; which they per- 

 form with all expedition possible. In the first 

 place, they draw out the brain through* the 



* This chapter I have, in a great measure, translated 

 from Mr. Daubenton. Whatever is atlded from others, 

 is marked with inverted commas. 



nostrils, with irons adapted to this purpose; 

 and in proportion as they evacuate it in 

 this manner, they fill up the cavity with aro- 

 matics : they next cut open the belly, near 

 the sides, with a sharpened stone, and take 

 out the entrails, which they cleanse, and wash 

 in palm oil ; having performed this operation, 

 they roll them in aromatic powder, fill them 

 with myrrh, cassia, and other perfumes, ex- 

 cept incense ; and replace them, sewing up 

 the body again. After these precautions, they 

 salt the body with nitre, and keep it in the 

 salting-place for seventy days, it not being per- 

 mitted to preserve it so any longer. When 

 the seventy days are accomplished, and the 

 body washed once more, they swathe it in 

 bands made of linen, which have been dipt in 

 a gum the Egyptians use instead of salt. When 

 the friends have taken back the body, they 

 make a hollow trough, something like the shape 

 of a man, in which they place the body ; and 

 this they enclose in a box, preserving the 

 whole as a most precious relic, placed against 

 the wall. Such are the ceremonies used with 

 regard to the rich. As for those who are con- 

 tented with a humbler preparation, they treat 

 them as follows : they fill a syringe with an 

 odoriferous liquor extracted from the cedar- 

 tree, and, without making any incision, inject 

 it up the body of the deceased, and then keep 

 it in nitre, as long as in the former case. 

 When the time is expired, they evacuate the 

 body of the cedar liquor which had been in- 

 jected ; and such is theefTect of this operation, 

 that the liquor dissolves the intestines, and 

 brings them away : the nitre also serves to eat 

 away the flesh, and leaves only the skin and 

 the bones remaining. This done, the body 

 is returned to the friends, and the embalmer 

 takes no farther trouble about it. The third 

 method of embalming those of the meanest 

 condition, is merely by purging and cleansing 

 the intestines by frequent injections, and pre- 

 serving the body for a similar term in nitre, 

 at the end of which it is restored to the re- 

 lations. 



