d in the back by some one who had
probably been lurking close to the door awaiting his coming out.

The general opinion there and in the temple was that he must have
fallen a victim to a feeling of revenge on the part of some attendant
in the building who on his report had undergone disgrace and
punishment for some fault of carelessness or inattention in the
services or in the care of the sacred animals. As a score of
attendants had at one time or other been so reported by Neco, for
he was constantly on the lookout for small irregularities, it was
impossible to fix the crime on one more than another.

The magistrates, who arrived soon after Ameres to investigate the
matter, called the whole of those who could be suspected of harboring
ill-will against Neco to be brought before them and questioned as to
their doings during the night. All stoutly asserted that they had been
in bed at the time of the murder, and nothing occurred to throw a
suspicion upon one more than another. As soon as the investigation was
concluded Ameres ordered the corpse to be brought to his own house.

[Illustration: C. of B.
AMENSE AND MYSA BEWAIL THE DEATH OF NECO.--Page 175.]

Covered by white cloths it was placed on a sort of sledge. This was
drawn by six of the attendants of the temple; Ameres and Chebron
followed behind, and after them came a procession of priests. When it
arrived at the house, Amense and Mysa, with their hair unbound and
falling around them, received the body--uttering loud cries of
lamentation, in which they were joined by all the women of the house.
It was carried into an inner apartment, and there until evening a loud
wailing was kept up, many female relatives and friends coming in and
joining in the outcry. Late in the evening the body was taken out,
placed upon another sledge, and, followed by the male relatives and
friends and by all the attendants and slaves of the house, was carried
to the establishment of Chigron the embalmer. During the forty days
occupied by the process the strictest mourning was observed in the
house. No meat or wheaten bread was eaten, nor wine served at the
table--even the luxury of the bath was abandoned. All the males shaved
their eyebrows, and sounds of loud lamentation on the part of the
women echoed through the house.

At the end of that time the mummy was brought back in great state, and
placed in the room which was in all large Egyptian houses set apart
for the rec