56 
thus protected is the heart, which is done by the mediatorship 
of the four genii of the dead to whose care the different 
organs of the body had been confided while in a mummied 
condition. * * * * No sooner, however, is this effected, than one of 
the Typhonic crocodiles f comes forth from the waters on the 
infernal Nile to destroy him; but the deceased repels him by 
the name of “ the great god,” and declares that he “ is Homs 
the preferred,” and thus escapes injury. J This attack is again 
repeated, and again unsuccessfully, for, boasts the deceased, 
strong in the defence of Horus, 
“ My face is open, 
My heart is in its place, 
My head is on me daily, 
I am the Sun protecting himself, 
No evil thing injures me.”§ 
Then comes forth also a terrible viper, but the deceased 
triumphantly repels him.|| Then baffled in their attempts at 
open warfare, the evil beings assail tbe deceased from behind, 
intending to devour his spine, but the repetition of a mystical 
formula drives them away. If Then the deceased is surrounded on 
all sides by snakes, and again he repels and passes through them. 
After this a great tortoise obstructs his passage;** * * §§ and then, still 
more deadly than any enemies which have preceded them, a 
number of little highly venomous asps cling around his feet, but 
all unavailingly, for them the potent declaration terrifies : “ I 
am Horus, the son of Isis, I am come to see my father Osiris”;fj' 
and the name of the benevolent deity overcomes all resistance, 
as does the name of our Blessed Lord in the mediteval legends 
of purgatory and limbo. As a last assault, the Evil Being 
himself, under the form of the Serpent Apophis, comes forth to 
stop the way, and to him and his efforts the deceased rejoins, 
“ Back, thy face is turned down by the gods ; 
Thy heart is pierced by the Lynx.§§ 
* These genii were Amset, Hapi, Tautmutf, and Kabhsenuf. They have 
been often figured, especially in Sharpe’s Bible Texts, p. 187, 1st edition. 
t “Back crocodile Hem, back crocodile Shui, come not against me, I have 
knowledge of potent spells, utter not the name of the great god.” Same 
passage as amended by Mr. Le Page Benouf. 
X Cap- xxxi., “ The Chapter of Stopping those who came to take away the 
Mind of a Person from him in Hades.” § Cap. xxxii. 
|| Cap. xxxii., “ The Chapter of Stopping all Snakes.” 
1 Cap. xxxiv. 
'** Cap. xxxvi., “ The Chapter of Stopping the Tortoise.” 
+f Cap. xxxvii., “ The Chapter of Stopping the Asps.” 
Hone, Ancient, Mysteries described, p. 138. 
§§ An epithet applied to an uncertain divinity, Pasht (?). 
