46 THE ANCIENT EGYPTIANS. CHAP. XI. 



felling trees with this implement ; while others are 

 employed in hoeing the field preparatory to its 



N'o. 425. Hoeing and sowing the land, and felling trees." Thebes. 



being sown, — confirming what I before observed, 

 that the ancient, as well as the modern, Egyptians 

 frequently dispensed with the use of the plough. 



There has been some doubt respecting the admis- 

 sion of swine into the fields after the inundation, 

 and considerable criticism has been expended on 

 the statement of Herodotus above quoted.* Some 

 have objected, that their voracious habits were more 

 likely to injure than to benefit the cause of the 

 husbandman, and that many other animals might 

 be chosen for the purpose of treading in the grain, 

 without the fear of their destroying what they were 

 intended to preserve : but the learned Larcher 

 very properly suggests, that muzzling them would 

 effectually ob^date this inconvenience, and that the 

 historian may allude to their admission into the 

 fields previous to the sowing of the grain, for 

 the purpose of clearing tlie land of roots and 

 noxious weeds, whose growth was favoured by 

 the water of the inundation : an opinion which is 

 strengthened by the representation of some pigs 

 given in a previous part of tliis work, from a tomb 



* Supra, p. 39. 



