696 KANSAS CITY REVIEW OF SCIENCE, 



To France it is important for the diffusion of her manufactures over the isles 

 and coasts of the Pacific, while the whole continent of Europe and most of South 

 America are deeply interested in this enterprise. — Harper's Magazine for March. 



ANCIENT EGYPT. 



BY FRANCIS E. UNDERWOOD. 



The history of Egypt can never be fully known, although its memorials are 

 more numerous and more profoundly interesting than the remains of any other 

 ancient civilization. No other people ever took such pains to perpetuate their 

 annals. Every one of their temples and colossal sculptures, as well as their eter- 

 nal pyramids, seems to have been designed to preserve the name of a Pharaoh 

 and the events of his reign. Mounds of stone along the Nile, and by its old and 

 deserted channels in the Delta, designate the sites of dead and forgotten cities ; 

 and every column and pedestal and fragment of wall still bears the indestructible 

 characters which tell of the pride and power of some successor of Amon-ra. 



The ruins of Egypt, beyond all others on the planet, show grandeur of de- 

 sign with adequate skill and boundless energy in execution. To an Egyptian 

 architect nothing was impossible. We are not losing sight of the works of the 

 Greeks ; but the art and architecture of that lively and accomplished people have 

 been so long domesticated in modern life and blended with modern thought that 

 they give us an impression of elegance and proportion, of refined and tranquil 

 beauty, but never the sense of sublimity. The central idea in Egypt was an all- 

 compelling power, finding expression in original and tremendous forms. The 

 Hall of Columns at Karnak, and the gigantic twin statues of Amen-hotep III, are 

 instances of the purely sublime. — March Atlantic. 



WONDERS OF THE VATICAN. 



BY EMILY F. WHEELER. 



The Vatican, then, is an immense and irregular pile of buildings, erected at 

 different times, and with little attempt at architectural unity. It consists of count- 

 less halls and rooms, and these surround courts with colonnades and fountains. 

 Many of them are lighted from above ; but others, especially in the library, look 

 out on sunny garden spaces where are close-clipped hedges, trim flower-beds, and 

 orange and lemon trees laden with golden fruit. The halls, given up to statues 

 and pictures — and there is half a mile of them, according to Murray — are cold 

 and stately in their effect ; and, despite a scaldino here and there, they chill one to 

 the morrow of his bones in half an hour. The Etruscan and Egyptian museums 

 beneath are gloomy, but the library halls are warm and bright. Their walls are 

 adorned with frescoes, their doorways and columns are of marble in all varying 



