er Egypt had become a
Roman province, when the beautiful temples of Esne, Dendera, and other
cities, were dedicated in the names of the Roman emperors, they seldom
copied the example of Philometor, and put Greek, much less Roman,
writing on the portico, but continued to let the walls be covered with
hieroglyphical inscriptions.

The Egyptians, when rich enough to pay for it, still had the bodies of
their friends embalmed at their death, and made into mummies; though
the priests, to save part of the cost, often put the mummy of a man just
dead into a mummy-case which had been made and used in the reign of a
Thutmosis or an Amenhothes. They thought that every man at his death
took upon himself the character of Osiris, that the nurses who laid out
the dead body represented the goddesses Isis and Nepthys, while the man
who made the mummy was supposed to be the god Anubis. When the embalming
was finished, it was part of the funeral to bring the dead man to trial
for what he had done when living, and thus to determine whether he was
entitled to an honourable burial. The mummy was ferried across the lake
belonging to the temple, and taken before the judge Osiris. A pair of
scales was brought forth by the dog-headed Anubis and the hawk-headed
Horus; and with this they weighed the past life of the deceased. The
judge, with the advice of a jury of forty-two, then pronounced the
solemn verdict, which was written down by the ibis-headed Thot. But
human nature is the same in all ages and in all countries, and, whatever
might have been the past life of the dead, the judge, not to hurt the
feelings of the friends, always declared that he was "a righteous and
a good man:" and, notwithstanding the show of truth in the trial, it
passed into a proverb to say of a wicked man, that he was too bad to be
praised even at his funeral. This custom of embalming was thought right
by all; but from examining the mummies that have come down to us, it
would seem to have been very much confined to the priestly families, and
seldom used in the case of children. The mummies, however, were highly
valued by the survivors of the family, and when from poverty any man was
driven to borrow money, the mummies were thought good security by the
lender, and taken as such for the loan.

[Illustration: 293.jpg MUMMY, MUMMY-CASES, AND CASKET]

The mummy-cases indeed could be sold for a large sum, as when made of
wood they were covered with painting, and sometimes i