44 JOURNAL AND PROCEEDINGS 



were the same in all, and every Egyptian, according, to the national 

 beliefs, was theoretically entitled to such an eternal dwelling. But 

 theory and practice, like faith and works, often differ, and the typi- 

 cal Egyptian tomb was virtually for only the wealthier dead. Mas- 

 pero gives a pathetic picture of the lot of the poor. The funeral 

 rites once over they were disposed of in ransacked tombs, or hud- 

 dled en masse in shallow pits in the sand, and covered only with 

 their bandages or a few palm branches. A pair of sandals of paint- 

 ed card-board or plaited reeds, a staff and a simple ring, the toy 

 image of some favorite god, a mystic eye or scarab, and a cord 

 twisted round one of the limbs to protect from necromancy- — such 

 were the funerary trappings of tht pauper dead. 



The greatest of the Egyptian tombs, the pyramids, have called 

 into existence a literature of their own. More than thirty volumes 

 aim to shew the purpose for which these massive structures were 

 built ; and in addition to books, there are magazine articles and 

 pamphlets without number, written to accomplish the same end. 

 The conjectures of these writers are numerous and some of them 

 fanciful. It is contended that the pyramid of Cheops, Khufu, the 

 great pyramid, 454 ft. high and 750 ft. wide, divinely reveals a sys- 

 tem of weights and measures for the human race, and for all time. 

 Another thinks that they were granaries to provide against famine, 

 and another that they were astronomical observatories. The best 

 Egyptologists, however, stand aloof from such theories. They agree 

 that the 66 pyramids found in Egypt were tombs and were built for 

 no other purpose. The nature of Kings, their souls, bodies, and 

 whole constituent parts, were not supposed to differ from those of 

 other men, and their royal tombs, the pyramids, like other tombs, 

 contain a chapel, passage, and sacred vault. They differ greatly in 

 size, as the smallest is only 30 ft. high, and it is difficult to conceive 

 why the Pharaohs, during the thirteen centuries in which these 

 tombs were built, should have chosen sepulchres of such different 

 proportions, 



In constructing their tombs, when space permitted, the chapel 

 was built over the vault, and a shaft connecting the two was sunk, 

 sometimes in front of the tomb door, and sometimes into a corner of 

 of one of its chambers. In instances the chapel was built apart 

 from the tomb, and occasionally at a considerable distance from it. 

 It was into the chapel that on feast days relatives, friends and priests 



