dedicated to Hathor, and served by volunteer priests. One of these
chapels, presumably the oldest, consists of a single rock-cut chamber,
upheld by one large square pillar, walls and pillar having been covered
with finely sculptured scenes and inscriptions which are now almost
effaced. The second chapel included a beautifully proportioned
rectangular court, once entered by a portico supported on pillars with
Hathor-head capitals, and beyond the court a narrow building divided
into many small irregular chambers. The edifice was altered and rebuilt,
and half destroyed; it is now nothing by a confused heap of ruins, of
which the original plan cannot be traced. Votive stehe of all shapes and
sizes, in granite, sandstone, or limestone, were erected here and there
at random in the two chambers and in the courts between the columns, and
flush with the walls. Some are still _in situ_, others lie scattered in
the midst of the ruins. Towards the middle of the reign of Amenemhait
III., the industrial demand for turquoise and for copper ore became so
great that the mines of Sarbut-el-Khadim could no longer meet it, and
those in the Wady Maghara were re-opened. The workings of both sets of
mines were carried on with unabated vigour under Amenemhaifc IV., and
were still in full activity when the XIIIth dynasty succeeded the XIIth
on the Egyptian throne. Tranquillity prevailed in the recesses of the
mountains of Sinai as well as in the valley of the Nile, and a small
garrison sufficed to keep watch over the Bedouin of the neighbourhood.
Sometimes the latter ventured to attack the miners, and then fled in
haste, carrying off their meagre booty; but they were vigorously pursued
under the command of one of the officers on the spot, and generally
caught and compelled to disgorge their plunder before they had reached
the shelter of their "douars." The old Memphite kings prided themselves
on these armed pursuits as though they were real victories, and had them
recorded in triumphal bas-reliefs; but under the XIIth dynasty they were
treated as unimportant frontier incidents, almost beneath the notice
of the Pharaoh, and the glory of them--such as it was--he left to his
captains then in command of those districts.

Egypt had always kept up extensive commercial relations with certain
northern countries lying beyond the Mediterranean. The reputation for
wealth enjoyed by the Delta sometimes attracted bands of the Haiu-nibu
to come prowling in pi