side walls of the vaults slope outwards as they ascend;
and the arch is formed, like those in Egyptian buildings and Scythian
tombs, by each successive layer of bricks, from the point where the arch
begins, a little overlapping the last, till the two sides of the roof are
brought so near together that the aperture may be closed by a single
brick. The floor of the vaults was paved with brick similar to that used
for the roof and sides; on this floor was commonly spread a matting of
reeds, and the body was laid upon the matting. It was commonly turned on
its left side, the right arm falling towards the left, and the fingers
resting on the edge of a copper bowl, usually placed on the palm of the
left hand. The head was pillowed on a single sun-dried brick. Various
articles of ornament and use were interred with each body, which will be
more particularly described hereafter. Food seems often to have been
placed in the tombs, and jars or other drinking vessels are universal.
The brick vaults appear to have been family sepulchres; they have often
received three or four bodies, and in one case a single vault contained
eleven skeletons.

[Illustration: PLATE 12]

The clay coffins, shaped like a dish-cover, are among the most curious of
the sepulchral remains of antiquity. [PLATE XI., Fig. 2; PLATE XII.,
Fig. 1.] On a platform of sun-dried brick is laid a mat exactly similar
to those in common use among the Arabs of the country at the present day;
and hereon lies the skeleton disposed as in the brick vaults, and
surrounded by utensils and ornaments. Mat, skeleton, and utensils are
then concealed by a huge cover in burnt clay, formed of a single piece,
which is commonly seven feet long, two or three feet high, and two feet
and a half broad at the bottom. It is rarely that modern potters produce
articles of half the size. Externally the covers have commonly some
slight ornament, such as rims and shallow indentations, as represented in
the sketch (No. 1). Internally they are plain. Not more than two
skeletons have ever been found under a single cover; and in these cases
they were the skeletons of a male and a female. Children were interred
separately, under covers about half the size of those for adults. Tombs
of this kind commonly occur at some considerable depth. None were
discovered at Mugheir nearer the surface than seven or eight feet.

The third kind of tomb, common both at Mugheir and at Telel-Lahm, is
almo