aching his religion? Mike's dotty on
Akhnaton--his religion's all right, but as a king he was an ass."

"No, no, Mike hasn't told me anything about him and I really would
rather come to him in his proper place in history. I mustn't dip,
though it's a great temptation, but it spoils serious work."

They had stopped and were looking down from the height of the desert to
the level of the excavation which was furthest advanced. Things had
developed greatly since Margaret's first visit. Now she was able to
see that they were at work upon a vast building of some description.
The enormous size and the beautiful cutting of the stones and the
exquisite strength of the mortarless masonry indicated noble
proportions.

"How interesting it's getting!" she said. "I love these blocks of
evenly-hewn stone in the sand--they look so mysterious, and eternal."

"I want to take the men off this, if we're going to Assuan
to-morrow--it's getting too hot."

"Why?"

"Because there were indications yesterday that we had struck a sort of
rubbish-heap of things which had been turned out of the tomb."

"What kind of things?"

"I don't know yet . . . all sorts of things. Probably the relatives of
the dead threw them out when they visited the tomb from time to time;
just as we throw away faded wreaths and flowers, they threw away
accumulations of broken vases and offerings."

"And you don't want the workmen to know?"

"I want to be on hand when they are cleaning it up, and it can't all be
done in one day. They are quite capable of sneaking back here before
the _gaphir's_ about in the morning, to see what they can pick up, to
sell to the visitors in Luxor. It's a great temptation."

"I suppose they consider the tiny things they find far more theirs than
ours?"

"I suppose they do, but, mind you, the Museum in Cairo gets its pick
and the choice of all that's found in Egypt in the various sites of
excavation."

"Oh!" Margaret said. "I didn't know that."

"Certainly it does," he said, "and rightly, too, although nothing would
be saved or be in any museum if it wasn't for the various European
schools. The natives would eventually plunder and steal everything,
and if the excavation had all been in the hands of the Egyptian
Government, heaven knows where the treasures would be to-day! As it
is, Cairo has the finest Egyptian museum of antiquities in the world."

"Akhnaton was buried in this valley?"

"Yes, in later days in his