d her
perfumed ablutions. Three vases of wavy alabaster fastened to the bier,
as was also the mummy, by a layer of natron, contained, the first two,
essences, the scent of which could still be noticed, and the third,
antimony powder and a small spatula for the purpose of colouring the
edge of the eyelids and extending the outer angle according to the
antique Egyptian usage, still practised at the present time by Eastern
women.

"What a touching custom!" said Dr. Rumphius, excited by the sight of
these treasures; "what a touching custom it was to bury with a young
woman all her pretty toilet articles! For it is a young woman
unquestionably that these linen bands, yellow with time and with
essences, envelop. Compared with the Egyptians, we are downright
barbarians; hurried on by our brutal way of living, we have lost the
delicate sense of death. How much tenderness, how much regard, how much
love do not these minute cares reveal, these infinite precautions,
these useless caresses bestowed upon a senseless body,--that struggle to
snatch from destruction an adored form and to restore it intact to the
soul on the day of the supreme reunion!"

"Perhaps," replied Lord Evandale, very thoughtful, "our civilisation,
which we think so highly developed, is, after all, but a great decadence
which has lost even the historical remembrance of the gigantic societies
which have disappeared. We are stupidly proud of a few ingenious pieces
of mechanism which we have recently invented, and we forget the colossal
splendours and the vast works impossible to any other nation, which are
found in the ancient land of the Pharaohs. We have steam, but steam is
less powerful than the force which built the Pyramids, dug out hypogea,
carved mountains into the shapes of sphinxes and obelisks, sealed halls
with one great stone which all our engines could not move, cut out
monolithic chapels, and saved frail human remains from annihilation,--so
deep a sense of eternity did it already possess."

"Oh, the Egyptians," said Dr. Rumphius, smiling, "were wonderful
architects, amazing artists, and great scholars. A priest of Memphis
and of Thebes could have taught even our German scholars; and as regards
symbolism, they were greater than any symbolists of our day. But we
shall succeed eventually in deciphering their hieroglyphs and
penetrating their mysteries. The great Champollion has made out their
alphabet; we shall easily read their granite books. Meanwh