om Punt, wondering at the natives, the incense, the
ivory, and, above all, at a giraffe which had been brought home. How the
poor creature was stowed away on the little Egyptian ship it is hard to
see; but there he was, with his spots and his long neck, the most
wonderful creature that the good folks of Thebes had ever seen. The
precious incense gum was stored in the temple, and the Queen herself
gave a bushel measure, made of a mixture of gold and silver, to measure
it out with.

So the voyage of discovery had ended in a great success. But Queen
Hatshepsut's purpose was only half fulfilled as yet. In a nook of the
limestone cliffs, not far from Thebes, her father before her had begun
to build a very wonderful temple, close beside the ruins of an older
sanctuary which had stood there for hundreds of years. Hatshepsut had
been gradually completing his work, and the temple was now growing into
a most beautiful building, very different from ordinary Egyptian
temples. From the desert sands in front it rose terrace above terrace,
each platform bordered with rows of beautiful limestone pillars, until
at last it reached the cliffs, and the most sacred chamber of it, the
Holy of Holies, was hewn into the solid wall of rock behind.

This temple the Queen resolved to make into what she called a Paradise
for Amen, the god who had told her to send out the ships. So she planted
on the terraces the sacred incense-trees which had been brought from
Punt; and, thanks to careful tending and watering, they flourished well
in their new home. And then, all along the walls of the temple, she
caused her artists to carve and paint the whole story of the voyage. We
do not know the names of the artists who did the work, though we know
that of the architect, Sen-mut, who planned the building. But, whoever
they were, they must have been very skilful sculptors; for the story of
the voyage is told in pictures on the walls of this wonderful temple, so
that everything can be seen just as it actually happened more than three
thousand years ago.

You can see the ships toiling along with oar and sail towards their
destination, the meeting with the natives, the palaver and the trading,
the loading of the galleys, and the long procession of Theban soldiers
going out to meet the returning explorers. Not a single detail is
missed, and, thanks to the Queen and her artists, we can go back over
all these years, and see how sailors worked, and how people lived