ir beauty. Besides this offering, the head of the tribe,
who is entitled _khak_, or "prince," and named Abusha, presents to
Khnum-hotep a magnificent wild-goat, of the kind which at the present
day frequents the rocky mountain tract of Sinai. He wears a richer dress
than his companions, one which is ornamented with a fringe, and has a
wavy border round the neck. The scene has been generally recognized as
strikingly illustrating the coming of Jacob's family into Egypt (Gen.
xlvi. 28-34), and was at one time thought by some to represent that
occurrence; but the date of Abusha's coming is long anterior to the
arrival in Egypt of Jacob's family, the number is little more than half
that of the Hebrew immigrants, the names do not accord; and it is now
agreed on all hands, that the interest of the representation is
confined to its illustrative force.

Usurtasen II. reigned for nineteen years. He does not seem to have
associated a son, but was succeeded by another Usurtasen, most probably
a nephew. The third Usurtasen was a conquering monarch, and advanced the
power and glory of Egypt far more than any other ruler belonging to the
Old Empire. He began his military operations in his eighth year, and
starting from Elephantine in the month Epiphi, or May, moved southward,
like another Lord Wolseley, with a fixed intention, which he expressed
in writing upon the rocks of the Elephantine island, of permanently
reducing to subjection "the miserable land of Cush." His expedition was
so far successful that in the same year he established two forts, one on
either side of the Nile, and set up two pillars with inscriptions
warning the black races that they were not to proceed further northward,
except with the object of importing into Egypt cattle, oxen, goats, or
asses. The forts are still visible on either bank of the river a little
above the Second Cataract, and bear the names of Koommeh and Semneh.
They are massive constructions, built of numerous squared blocks of
granite and sandstone, and perched upon two steep rocks which rise up
perpendicularly from the river. Usurtasen, having made this beginning,
proceeded, from his eighth to his sixteenth year, to carry on the war
with perseverance and ferocity in the district between the Nile and the
Red Sea--to kill the men, fire the crops, and carry off the women and
children, much as recently did the Arab traders whom Baker and Gordon
strove to crush. The memory of his razzias was perpetuat