s to the heavenly storehouses. Yet this
was but the least part of the burdens laid upon him by the laws of the
country, which did not suffer him to become enervated by idleness, but
obliged him to labour as in the days when he still dwelt in Egypt.

[Illustration: 275.jpg THE MANES TILLING THE GROUND AND REAPING IN THE
FIELDS OF IALU. 1]

1 Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a vignette in the funerary
papyrus of Nebhopit in Turin.

He looked after the maintenance of canals and dykes, he tilled the
ground, he sowed, he reaped, he garnered the grain for his lord and for
himself. Yet to those upon whom they were incumbent, these posthumous
obligations, the sequel and continuation of feudal service, at length
seemed too heavy, and theologians exercised their ingenuity to find
means of lightening the burden. They authorized the manes to look to
their servants for the discharge of all manual labour which they ought
to have performed themselves. Barely did a dead man, no matter how
poor, arrive unaccompanied at the eternal cities; he brought with him a
following proportionate to his rank and fortune upon earth.

[Illustration: 276.jpg UASHBITI. 1]

1 Drawn by Faucher-Gudin from a painted limestone statuette
from the tomb of _Sonnozmu_ at Thebes, dating from the end
of the XXth dynasty.

At first they were real doubles, those of slaves or vassals killed at
the tomb, and who had departed along with the double of the master to
serve him beyond the grave as they had served him here. A number of
statues and images, magically endued with activity and intelligence,
was afterwards substituted for this retinue of victims. Originally of
so large a size that only the rich or noble could afford them, they were
reduced little by little to the height of a few inches. Some were carved
out of alabaster, granite, diorite, fine limestone, or moulded out
of fine clay and delicately modelled; others had scarcely any human
resemblance. They were endowed with life by means of a formula recited
over them at the time of their manufacture, and afterwards traced upon
their legs. All were possessed of the same faculties. When the god who
called the Osirians to the corvee pronounced the name of the dead man to
whom the figures belonged, they arose and answered for him; hence their
designation of "Respondents "--_Uashbiti_. Equipped for agricultural
labour, each grasping a hoe and carrying a seed-bag on his shoulder,
they set out