How to See the British Museum in Four Visits Part 5

CHINESE CURIOSITIES.

These are distributed with particular regard to the economy of s.p.a.ce, and accordingly the visitor may see at a glance objects huddled together, the uses of which are of the most opposite nature. On the first shelf of cases 1, 2, are distributed the tally of a Chinese soldier describing his age and place of residence; ladies' gloves; military boots; bows and arrows; and the mock spears shown above the walls of Woosang in 1842 to intimidate the British forces. The second shelf exhibits the grotesque varieties of Chinese deities and leaders of sects; and in other parts of the cases are endless Chinese curiosities, including Chinese scales and weights; padlocks; mirrors; a pair of Chinese spectacles in a leather case; shoe brushes from Shanghai; chopsticks; a bra.s.s pipe; Chinese mariners' compa.s.ses; a Chinese bank-note, value one dollar; Chinese needles; agricultural implements; joss sticks; the sea-weed eaten by the Chinese; ancient bronze bell; vase in shape of a lotus leaf; and an advertis.e.m.e.nt for quack pills. The visitor should remark the great royal wicker s.h.i.+eld that is on the top of the case, ornamented with the head of a tiger; and the model of a junk. The third case contains Chinese divinities, of which the G.o.ddess of Mercy, Kwan-yin, on the first shelf, is the most noticeable figure. The two last cases 4 and 5 given up to Chinese, are filled chiefly with Chinese musical instruments, including the pair of sticks used by Chinese beggars as castanets to attract attention to their pet.i.tions; Chinese shuttlec.o.c.ks, made of feathers and lead, the Chinese battledores being the soles of their feet, suggestive of vigorous exercise; fly-flaps; surgical instruments; paints; boxes; and j.a.panese shoes. Over these cases is a circular stand, in twenty-two parts, representing, in relief, the chief deities of the Hindoo mythology. The four next cases (6-9) are given up to

INDIAN CURIOSITIES.

Among the miscellaneous collection of objects crowded into these four cases are many figures of Buddha in earthenware, wood, alabaster and ivory; bronze divinities of the Hindoo Pantheon; Hindoo playing cards; copper-plates containing grants of land; a Hindoo mathematical instrument; a powder-horn from Burtpoor; Affghan cloak and pistol; bows and arrows; baggage and accommodation boats; and early Arabian bronze water ewers inlaid with silver. Over the Indian cases are figures of Hindoo deities, including a bronze figure of Siva with four arms, and Lakshmi, the wife of Vishnu. The four following cases (10-13) are chiefly filled with

AFRICAN CURIOSITIES

of a miscellaneous description, and from various parts of the continent. These include, in cases 10, 11, Nubian and Abyssinian baskets; Arabic quadrants; Egyptian water-bottles; sandals, and a variety of other manufactures from Ashantee, including a shuttle, and specimens of native cotton cloth; an iron bar used as a medium of exchange, and worth about one s.h.i.+lling on the African coast; gourd boxes and calabashes; cloths and other curiosities collected on the Niger Expedition; specimens of native silk from Egga; a skin bottle for holding galena to colour the eyelids; opaque gla.s.s beads from Abyssinia; all kinds of arms from French Guiana, Fernando Po, Abyssinia, and Nubia, including a Nubian spear, enveloped with a snake's skin from Thebes. Over the cases an Ashantee loom for weaving narrow cloth, and Abyssinian baskets, and at the side an Indian inlaid cabinet. Pa.s.sing from these cases, the visitor at once reaches those devoted to

AMERICAN CURIOSITIES.

The cases numbered from 14-21 are filled with articles ill.u.s.trative of the life and climate of the Esquimaux, and the extreme northern regions of America, including the native fis.h.i.+ng-hooks and lines; models of canoes; skin dresses, men's boots from Kotzebue's Sound; Lapland trousers; utensils made of the horn of the musk ox; Esquimaux woman's hair ornaments; over the cases hereabouts the sledge which Sir E. Parry brought from Baffin's Bay, and a canoe from Behring's Straits; waterproof fis.h.i.+ng jackets, made from the intestines of the whale; harpoons of bone tipped with meteoric iron; specimens of rude sculpture from these northern regions; clubs; hatchets; the magic dome of an Iceland witch; baskets and mats; calumets of peace; scalps; a model of a cradle, showing the method adopted by the Indians of the Columbia River to flatten their children's heads. The cases 23, 24, are filled with curiosities from more southernly parts of the North American continent; and chiefly with various objects from the most interesting of the old inhabitants of America--the Mexicans. The collection from Mexico, including their divinities, specimens of their arts, &c., are arranged in seven cases (24-30). The objects from Guiana occupy the greater part of cases 31-34; and the remarkable objects in the 35th case are the dried body of a female, from New Granada; a mummy from New Granada wrapped in cotton cloths; a curious Peruvian mummy of a child, the legs curiously bound up; and silver and gold Peruvian sepulchral ornaments. The cases marked 36, 37, are devoted to objects from South America, including black earthern vessels from cemeteries in Peru; bows and poisoned arrows; and a sacrificial bason, ornamented with serpents, supposed to be one from the temple of the Sun at Cuzco. The rest of the cases contain miscellaneous objects from groups of islands. The contributions from the Marquesas and Sandwich Islands are in cases 53-56; the war dresses, of feathers, &c., from Tahiti, in case 57; and the nets and baskets, clubs and tatooing instruments from the Friendly Islands will be found arranged in cases 65, 66. On the second shelf of cases 66, 67, is deposited a tortoise-sh.e.l.l bonnet, made in imitation of an European bonnet from Navigator's Island. Cases 68, 69, are devoted to objects from New Zealand; and those marked 70, 71, were collected during an exploring expedition into Central Australia. The last cases are devoted to miscellaneous objects from the Fiji Islands, Borneo, and other localities; and with these the visitor should close his second visit to the Museum; regaining the ante-room to the Southern Zoological gallery, by pa.s.sing out of the Ethnographical room through its eastern opening. He has now completed the examination of the galleries of the Museum with the exception of the print and medal rooms, which are not open to the public generally, but are reserved for the use of artists and antiquarians. He has dipped into many sciences on his two journeys; made some acquaintance with the history of the animals that frequent the different parts of the world; dwelt amid the fossil fragments of long ages past; examined the elementary substances of which the earth's crust is composed; been with the dust of men that lived before Jerusalem was made for ever memorable; surveyed the spoils of Etruscan tombs; and lingered amid the varieties of household things from the barbarous nations of the present hour; and not wholly profitless have the journeys been, even if the scientific mysticism be not mastered, so that there remains in the mind a general impression of the time that has gone by, the great laws that govern the universe, and the humility that becomes man, when he sees his individuality, in relation with the mighty past, and the great progresses of Nature.

END OF THE SECOND VISIT.

VISIT THE THIRD.

The visitor, on entering the British Museum for the third time, will commence his examination of the ma.s.sive Antiquities, which are scattered throughout the n.o.ble galleries that stretch along the western bas.e.m.e.nt of the building. His spirit must again wander to the remote past. Again must he recur to the ancient civilisation of southern Europe, and the busy people that covered the valley of the Nile before Alexander breathed. He has already examined the household utensils, the bodies, the ornaments, and the food of the ancient Egyptians, and has had more than a glimpse of the artistic excellence to which they attained long before our Christian era. Of the sepulchral caves of Thebes, of the ma.s.sive pyramids sacred to the ancient Pharaohs, of the strange images of beasts and men, of the sacred beetles, and the universal Ibis, he has already examined minute specimens arranged in the cases of the Egyptian Room; but he has yet to witness those evidences of power, and scorn of difficulties, exhibited in the colossal works of the Egyptian people.

On entering the Museum for the third time, the visitor should turn to the left, and pa.s.sing under the staircase, enter the galleries devoted to Ancient Sculpture. He will at once be struck with the strange allegorical figures cl.u.s.tered on all sides, the broken bodies, the fragments of arms and legs, the corners of slabs, and other dilapidations. Here a fine figure is without a nose, there Theseus holds aloft two handless arms, and legs without feet. The visitor who has not the least insight into the heart of all these collections of fragments from tombs, and temples, and neglected ruins, is perhaps inclined to laugh at the enthusiasm with which they are generally examined, and the rapturous strains in which the greatest critics have written of them. Not to all people is the enthusiasm of Lord Elgin comprehensible. Why not allow the fragments of the Parthenon to be ground into fine white mortar, and the busts of ancient heroes to be targets for the weapons of Turkish youths? are questions which a few utilitarians may be inclined to ask; and it would certainly be difficult to show, for instance in figures, the gain the country has made by expending 35,000. on the Elgin marbles: in the same way that it is difficult to appraise the beneficial influence of beauty, or to test the developments of the universe by double entry.

But let the visitor pace these n.o.ble galleries of his national museum with a reverent heart, let him learn from these beautiful labours of long ago, that not only to him and his fellows of the proud nineteenth century, when fiery words are flas.h.i.+ng through the seas, and steam fights like a demon with time, were the living years pregnant with the glories of art; but that the Egyptian, with his rude bronze chisel, cut his native rocks with no unskilful hand, before the Son of G.o.d lay cradled in a manger.

Past the bewildering fragments of art in the south-western gallery to the south-western corner of the building, then south like an arrow to the northern end of the sculpture rooms, should the visitor at once proceed. He will pa.s.s by fragments of a.s.syrian, Greek, and Roman art, but to these he should now pay little heed, as his immediate business is with the fine gallery of

EGYPTIAN SCULPTURE,

which is the most northernly apartment or gallery of the western wing.

Here he will at once notice the rows of Sarcophagi, which are ranged on either side of the central pa.s.sage of the gallery. These colossal outer-coffins contained the mummies of distinguished Egyptians. Along the walls of the room are ranged the sepulchral tablets, or tombstones of ancient Egyptians, and the inscriptions generally record the name and age of a deceased person; and in some cases, points of domestic history and pious sentences. Their dates range over a s.p.a.ce of time amounting to more than twenty centuries. Interspersed with these are other sculptures, chiefly of Egyptian deities; but the attention of the visitor will be probably attracted first to the

EGYPTIAN OUTER COFFINS.

The visitor, having reached the northern end of the Egyptian Saloon, should turn to the south, and begin a minute examination of its contents. The sarcophagi, or outer coffins of stone, in which the rich ancient Egyptians deposited the embalmed bodies of their relations, occupy the greater part of the ground s.p.a.ce of the saloon. They are ma.s.sive sh.e.l.ls, hewn from the solid rock, polished and engraved skilfully with hieroglyphics, which, so far as the learned have been able to decipher, record the exploits of the great men they contained.

Some of them are in the shape of common boxes with raised lids; while in others, attempts to represent the features of the deceased, and a rough outline of a mummy are apparent. These ma.s.sive coffins, which are upwards of three thousand years old, and are eloquent with the mystic written language of that remote antiquity, deserve more than a transient notice even from the unscientific visitor. Mummies were found in most of these, proving their use. Some were discovered placed in an erect, and others in a rec.u.mbent posture, in the tombs of Thebes, or on the sites of ancient cities.

Of the sarcophagi or coffins, fas.h.i.+oned in the shape of a mummy, the visitor should notice that in calcareous stone, numbered 47, which was discovered at Tana; another, with the paintings restored, marked 39; another in green basalt, marked 33, known to be that of a female called Auch, decorated with the embalming deities, and inscribed with a prayer on behalf of the deceased woman; and one of later date which has held the remains of a member of the priestly cla.s.s, numbered 17.

To arrive at a fair estimate of the average art displayed in these ancient sepulchral remains, it is worth the trouble of the visitor to wander a little about the saloon from one specimen to the next immediately connected with, or proximately resembling it. Having examined the coffins shaped like mummies, the visitor should next direct his attention to the ma.s.sive oblong cases which lie upon the ground on either side of him.

The first of these which he may examine is that marked 32. This sarcophagus was excavated from the back of the palace of Sesostris, near Thebes. Athor appears in bas-relief upon the lid; the sun is represented in the interior, together with Heaven represented as a female, and a repet.i.tion of the G.o.ddess Athor.

The names of several royal ladies have been deciphered from the inscriptions, which are the addresses of deities. The black granite chest of a sarcophagus, numbered 23, is that of a royal scribe named Hapimen. Here the well-known figures of the Amenti, the embalmer Anubis, and other deities and symbols, will remind the visitor of the Egyptian room up stairs, with its strange green little images of figures half human and half b.e.s.t.i.a.l. Round the interior are the deities to whom the various parts of the human body were severally dedicated. Since this ma.s.sive granite was the coffin of Hapimen, it has been known to the Turks as the "Lover's Fountain," and used by them as a cistern. The Syenite sarcophagus of a standard-bearer, is marked 18. The chest of a royal sarcophagus that was taken from the mosque of St. Athanasius at Alexandria, and which contained the mummy of a king of the twenty-eighth dynasty, is marked number 10. On the exterior, the Sun is represented, attended by appropriate deities travelling through the hours of the day; and on the interior the visitor will recognise the quaint symbolic forms of the usual sepulchral G.o.ds and G.o.ddesses. The two remaining sarcophagi are those of a scribe and priest of the acropolis of Memphis, and a bard. That of the former, marked 3, is covered with the figures of Egyptian divinities and inscriptions to the deceased; that of the latter, in arragonite, is in the form of a mummy, like those first examined by the visitor. This coffin has five distinct lines of hieroglyphics engraved down the front, expressing a chapter of the funeral ritual: and the face bears evidence of having been gilt.

Having sufficiently examined these ma.s.sive coffins, upon which the proudest undertaker of modern times must look humbly, and deplore the decline of his business as an art, the visitor should at once turn to other specimens of the sepulchral art of the ancient Egyptians. Of these, the most interesting are the sepulchral tablets, which are literally

ANCIENT EGYPTIAN TOMBSTONES.

Our modern tombstones record only the virtues of the dead. If future generations have to rely upon the revelations of our churchyards for facts connected with the people of modern times, they will write that we were all of us faultless as fathers, irreproachable as husbands, and devoted and self-sacrificial as children. Every tombstone is engraved with a catalogue of human virtues; and idlers wandering round about our country churches, find themselves surrounded by the ashes of fond husbands, innocent angels, and adored wives. These prattlings of sorrow have their happy significance, since they show the universal forgiveness that follows even the worst and basest of mankind to the grave. But viewed as historical records, tombstones are sadly erring guides. They tell histories of men, written by their mistresses or their children. The sculpture which adorns the graves of modern races in this country, generally represents urns, or weeping cherubims, broken flowers, or fractured columns, or grieving angels. These symbols of death and grief contrast often oddly with the hopeful scriptural sentences which they surmount. In some instances the occupation or calling of the deceased is typified on his tomb--the unstrung lyre telling the whereabouts of a dead musician; and a palette indicating the resting-place of a defunct painter. Little that is great in sculpture has of late marked burial-places.

The Egyptians, on the contrary, employed their choicest workmen to decorate their tombs. The visitor may, gathering together the scattered fragments from this saloon, picture to himself one of the ma.s.sive solemn vaults of the old Egyptians--the walls decorated with sepulchral tablets, and beneath each tablet a ma.s.sive sarcophagus, containing the mummy of the deceased whose actions the tablet records.

Not altogether unlike the vaults of the present day, save that perishable materials suffice for modern notions; whereas the Egyptian provided comforts for the long, long rest, that, according to his creed, would elapse, before the mummy would shake off its bandages, and walk forth bodily once more. The Egyptian tablets, of which there are a great number scattered about the saloon, are, as the visitor will perceive, of small dimensions, but crowded with mystic hieroglyphics, and ornamental groups of the funereal deities and other subjects. The writing records the actions and the name of the deceased, together with various religious sentiments; and is therefore, in form and spirit, not unlike the modern epitaph. This resemblance is not so wonderful as it at first appears, seeing that the same circ.u.mstances acted upon the dictator of the old Egyptian epitaph, as those which make the modern widow eloquent. The most modern of the tablets in the present collection are those executed while Egypt was a Roman state, many are of the time of the Ptolemies, and one is believed to be of a date before the time of Abraham. This tablet is to the memory of a state officer: it is marked 212. The examination of the sarcophagi, will have led the visitor to the southern end of the saloon; and from this point he should once more turn to the north, and examine the sepulchral tablets on the eastern and western walls. He will notice that numbers of them exactly resemble one another in certain forms; that certain sepulchral scenes are frequently repeated, and that therefore the tablets cannot be said in many cases with certainty, to represent either pa.s.sages in the life of the deceased, or symbolic images of his career.

First let the visitor remark, numbered 90, a basalt slab, presented to the museum by the Lords of the Admiralty. It is supposed to have been originally the cover of a stone coffin, in the time of the Ptolemies.

It is remarkable for a Graeco-Egyptian rec.u.mbent figure, executed in bas-relief. The sepulchral tablets marked 128-9-31-32, are in calcareous stone. The first is that of a scribe, who is receiving a funeral offering from his son; the second is that of Akar-se, who is receiving the offerings of his bereaved family; the third, from Abydos, has similar representations of family offerings, and the fourth is that of the chief keeper of the cattle of Rameses II., named Hara, who prays to Horus, Isis, Nephthys, and Osiris. The first three tablets are dedicated to Isis. The visitor may also remark in this neighbourhood a fragment in bas-relief from the tomb near Gizeh, of Afa. Afa was a palace officer, who is supposed to have flourished about the period of the fourth dynasty. He is here represented, in company with various members of his family.

The next tablet to which the visitor should direct his attention is from Thebes, and is marked 139. It is that of a priest named Rames, who flourished during the reign of King Menephtah. Here the priest is represented in the act of adoring various deities, and accepting funeral honours from his family. The tablet marked 142 is of the time of the nineteenth dynasty. It bears an inscription referring to a governor of the Ramesseium, named Amen-mes. The next tablet that deserves particular remark is one in calcareous stone, from Abydos. It is in honour of a military chief of the twelfth dynasty, named Nechta.

The pictorial embellishments represent the chief before a table of offerings, with his wife, mother, and nurse, seated before him. On the next tablet (144) a judge named Kaha, is adoring funeral deities, and receiving the usual honours from his family. Pa.s.sing the tablet of the commander of the troops of the palace of Sethos I. (146) the visitor should pause before the interesting tablet marked 147. This tablet records the date of the birth and marriage of a female named Tai-em-hept, of the advent of her son Tmouth, and of her death which took place in the tenth year of the reign of Cleopatra. As the visitor progresses with his inspection of these tablets, he will be more and more struck with the minute revelations they afford of the subdivision of labour among the ancient Egyptians. For instance, one tablet (148) is that of a superintendent of the builders of the palaces of Thothmes IV. in Abydos; another (149) is that of a scribe of the royal quarries; a third (150) is that of a Theban judge, on the lower part of which are representations in yellow, in the style of the nineteenth dynasty, of the transport of the corpse, and other funeral ceremonies; a fourth (154) is that of a royal usher; a fifth is that of Pai, a queen's officer, among the ill.u.s.trations of which a tame cynocephalus may be noticed. The tablet marked 159 is a very ancient specimen. It is that of Rutkar a priest, who is represented, in company with his wife, surveying the domestic occupations of his dependents. The tablet from Thebes, of Baknaa, a master of the horse in the reign of Sesostris is marked 164. Here the deceased is represented adoring a group of deities. The other tablets in this vicinity are chiefly of the time of Rameses II. or III, and are in honour of scribes and other functionaries immediately connected with the court. Two sepulchral tablets from Sakkara are interesting. That marked 184 is in honour of a priestess of Phtha named Tanefer-ho. The pictorial embellishments represent the priestess about to be introduced to Osiris and other deities by Anubis and other presiding spirits of the tomb. This specimen bears the date of the nineteenth year of the reign of Ptolemy Auletes. The second tablet from Sakkara (188) is that of an ancient pluralist named I-em-hept, who is represented introduced to Osiris and other deities by Anubis and his brother spirits or genii. The inscription below, in the vulgar character of the ancient Egyptians, is supposed to begin with the sixth year of Cleopatra. Near these tablets is one in dark granite, of a date before the twelfth dynasty (187) in honour of Mentu-hept, a superintendent of granaries and wardrobes. The next tablet to which the visitor's attention should be directed, is one crowded with symbolic animals and deities (191). It is that of a functionary named Kaha, who is adoring Chiun, standing on a lion, and grasping snakes, with Horus and other deities. Asi, a military chief and priest of a very remote period, is represented on the next tablet (192), with food before him, and the next (193) is that found before the great sphinx at Gizeh. On it the sun is represented, and a Greek inscription tells that it was erected in the time of Nero, by the inhabitants of Busiris to the Roman governor of Egypt, Tiberius Claudius Balbillus. The next tablet (194) is that discovered by Belzoni, near the temple of Karnak, on which a line of adoring deities are represented. The tablets marked 548, 9, 51 have no particular points of interest; the visitor may therefore at once pa.s.s to the group, most of which are coloured yellow, and are elaborately embellished, marked from 555 to 598. The first of these worth especial notice is that (555) of a Theban judge of the eighteenth dynasty. It is coloured yellow and the deceased is represented with the boat and the sun's disc above, and in company with his sister adoring the cow of Athor; the second (566) is in the form of a doorway, is of the nineteenth dynasty, is coloured, and is in honour of a conductor of the festival of Amen-ra; the third and fourth (557-8) are of earlier date, or the twelfth dynasty, and represent the deceased before tables of viands; the fifth tablet (560) is in honour of Her-chen, who is represented with his relations, and Phtah-kan, a scribe, also represented and similarly attended, all well finished and coloured; the three following tablets represent the deceased before tables of viands, coloured; the next (564) is that of the keeper of the treasury, or "silver abode," in the twelfth dynasty--he too is before a table of food in company with his relations; the next remarkable specimen is that marked 569, which is in honour of Athor-si, a functionary supposed to have been the superintendent of mines in the twelfth dynasty, who is here represented in one part before a table loaded with food, and in another part seated, with his hands humbly crossed upon his breast; the next tablets presenting particular points for remark are those of Eun-necht, (575) a superintendent of corn and clothing, of the twelfth dynasty. Senatef, chief of the palace to Amen-emha II., who is represented receiving a goose, a haunch, and other food from his relations. Eunentef, a chief and his son standing face to face, bearing wands and sceptres--a sculptor named User-ur, who is represented with his wives and parents, and upon which the square red lines used by the precise Egyptian artists are still visible on the unfinished parts. After several other tablets of the twelfth dynasty, is placed (584) a small square one of an earlier date in honour of Chen-bak, an architect, who is seated with his wife, receiving the duty of his children. Near this is a good specimen of old Egyptian bas-relief on calcareous stone, in honour of a palace officer named Amen-ha (586); and next to it (587) is a tablet in honour of a superintendent of all the G.o.ds, named Seraunut. Hereabouts also is the tablet from Thebes in honour of Hera, a royal scribe (588). On this tablet the deceased is represented bearing an appropriate feather sceptre before Nameses the ninth of the twentieth dynasty, who is seated on his throne, under the particular guardians.h.i.+p of the G.o.d of truth.

The tablet from Thebes marked 593 is that of a judge and his wife, and is dedicated to Osiris and Anup. Hereon, the lotus flower is represented, with corn and bread. The next tablet (594) is one in the shape of an altar of libations, and is dedicated to Amenophis I. and the queen Aahmes-Nefer-Ari. It is ornamented with representations of various foods, including vases of figs. In this neighbourhood are a few more tablets, including one on which are jars, water-fowl, and bread cakes, (596) and a fragment upon which the head of a king is traceable, marked 595. The visitor should also notice now the two early Saracenic tombstones presented by Dr. Bowring. Having examined these, the more remarkable of the sepulchral tablets, or tombstones of the ancient Egyptians, the visitor, still lingering amid the funereal relics of long ages ago, should turn to the

EGYPTIAN SEPULCHRAL VASES.

As we explained when the visitor was in the Egyptian room, better known as the Mummy room, up stairs, in the course of his second visit, the ancient Egyptians, when they embalmed their dead, extracted the viscera, and deposited them, apart from the body, in four vases, over which the genii of the dead severally presided. Thus every mummy had, properly, four sepulchral vases; and the collection arranged in the saloon amply ill.u.s.trates the varieties of ornament expended upon them.

As the visitor has probably forgotten the particular parts a.s.signed separately to the genii, it may be well to repeat here that Amset (who is human-headed,) had the stomach and large intestines under his especial protection Tuautmutf with his jackal-head presided over the heart and lungs; Kebhsnuf, with the fierce head of the widely wors.h.i.+pped hawk, took the gall, bladder, and liver, in charge; while the baboon-headed Hapi reserved to himself the care of the small intestines. There does not appear to have been any supernatural protector of the brains, which, as we have noticed, were drawn through the nose by the embalmer. These vases are of the most ancient times, chiefly before the advent of Alexander, after which event the people began to enclose the entrails of their dead in wax cloths, and fastening to the various parts the appropriate genius, to have been content to deposit them in the same case with the body. The vases which the visitor is about to examine are carved in different materials, the more costly and highly finished being of arragonite, and the less important, in wood, stone, or clay. They are all ornamented with appropriate inscriptions, consisting of exhortations of the deities to the dead, or comforting syllables from the genii of the intestines to the departed. The visitor will not care to examine all these vases in detail, nor would any purpose be served were the unscientific spectator to hover in this corner for a whole day; it is sufficient for him to understand the pa.s.sage these vases occupy in the ancient history of Egypt, and to notice cursorily the degree of excellence displayed in the manufacture of them. He will find the hawk-head of Kebhsnuf in one direction, and the baboon-head of Hapi in another, and from these pictorial revelations he will know what part of a deceased Egyptian was deposited in each vase.

With these preliminary words we may leave him to examine the collection, reserving to ourselves the task of pointing his attention to one or two of the more remarkable specimens. First let the visitor notice the complete set of four, in arragonite, marked 614-17. These were for the internal parts of prince Amen-em-api, the eldest son of Rameses II., and as the visitor will notice, have severally their presiding genius, with sacred inscriptions. Another remarkable vase is that in arragonite marked 609, with its cover fas.h.i.+oned in the form of a human head, and the remains of an inscription which had been laid on with a thick kind of colour. That marked 629 with the jackal-head of Tuantmutf, bears an inscription in which the standard-bearer of Plato named Hara, part of whose body was inclosed, is reminded that the genius attends him. One (635) of arragonite has a green waxy paint, and belonged to a royal bow-bearer of the nineteenth dynasty, named Renfu. There is another complete set, which do not appear to have been opened, marked 636-39. The arragonite vases are the most expensive, and, as we have remarked the most highly finished; but the visitor may notice also those in coa.r.s.er material.

Having sufficiently examined these vases, the visitor may take a general glance at the contents of the saloon, and prepare to examine the Sphinxes, and colossal figures that are crowded into it. In these he will recognise only colossal copies of many of the little figures he saw in the Mummy room up stairs. He will see huge granite representations of the strange G.o.ds and G.o.ddesses to which the ancients devoutly knelt; and in many of these forms he will trace a placid beauty that reveals often the soul of the sculptor fettered by the strange formulas of his religion. The visitor having examined the high reliefs on the tablets and sepulchral monuments of the ancient Egyptians, has now to examine the specimens that remain of their statuary. But first of

EGYPTIAN HUMAN STATUES.

In viewing cursorily the statuary of the ancient Egyptians, the investigator is first struck with the colossal proportions adopted by their sculptors. In those days, when iron was unknown, and when bronze was the manufactured metal, men contrived without the use of gunpowder, to remove vast ma.s.ses of granite from their quarries, and to shape these ma.s.ses into the form they chose. Had they a hero to whom they would pay honour? Forthwith his figure was immortalised in colossal granite. How these vast ma.s.ses, when separated from the rock, and chiselled into statues, were removed to their destination in the court, or at the entrance of a temple, is a point not satisfactorily determined. That thousands of lives were spent, year after year, in the production of the vast monuments which now lie scattered in confusion about the valley of the Nile is certain; and some men contemplate this large expenditure of human muscle upon these rude ma.s.ses, with a gentle melancholy that is not altogether called for.

There was a spirit in the work that made it n.o.ble. And here it is well that the visitor shall see the opinion of a man whose conclusions were based upon profound erudition in his art, on the subject of ancient Egyptian art, artistically viewed. In his lectures on sculpture, Flaxman says, "Their (the Egyptian) statues are divided into seven heads and a half, the whole weight of the figure is divided into two equal parts at the _ospubis_, the rest of the proportions are natural and not disagreeable. The princ.i.p.al forms of the body and limbs, as the b.r.e.a.s.t.s, belly, shoulders, biceps of the arm, knees, s.h.i.+n-bones, and feet, are expressed with a fleshy roundness, although without anatomical knowledge of detail; and in the female figures these parts often possess considerable elegance and beauty. The forms of the female face have much the same outline and progression towards beauty in the features as we see in some of the early Greek statues, and, like them, without variety of character; for little difference can be traced in the faces of Isis, in her representations of Diana, Venus, or Terra, or indeed in Osiris, although sometimes understood to be Jupiter himself, excepting that in some instances he has a very small beard, in form resembling a peg. The hands and feet, like the rest of the figure, have general forms only, without particular detail; the fingers and toes are flat, of equal thickness, little separated, and without distinction of the knuckles; yet, altogether, their simplicity of idea, breadths of parts, and occasional beauty of form, strike the skilful beholder, and have been highly praised by the best judges, ancient and modern. In their ba.s.so-relievos and paintings, which require variety of action and situation, are demonstrated their want of anatomical, mechanical, and geometrical science, relating to the arts of painting and sculpture. The king, or hero, is three times larger than the other figures; whatever is the action, whether a siege, a battle, or taking a town by storm, there is not the smallest idea of perspective in the place, or magnitude of figures or buildings. Figures intended to be in violent action are equally dest.i.tute of joints, and other anatomical form, as they are of the balance and spring of motion, the force of a blow, or the just variety of line in the turning figure. In a word, their historical art was informing the beholder in the best manner they could, according to the rude characters they were able to make. From such a description it is easy to understand how much their attempts at historical representation were inferior to their single statues. What has been hitherto said of Egyptian sculpture, describes the ancient native sculpture of that people. After the Ptolemies, successors of Alexander the Great, were kings of Egypt, their sculpture was enlivened by Grecian animation, and refined by the standard of Grecian beauty in proportions, att.i.tude, character, and dress. Osiris, Isis, and Orus, their three great divinities, put on the Macedonian costume; and new divinities appeared amongst them in Grecian forms, whose characteristics were compounded from materials of Egyptian, Eastern, and Grecian theology and philosophy."

First, to give the visitor an idea of the magnitude of the colossi of the ancient Egyptians, let him notice from the southern extremity of the saloon the gigantic cast of the face of Sesostris, placed against the southern wall of the central saloon. This face is a cast from a colossal statue of that great king of the Egyptians, which was one of four discovered by the energetic Belzoni, in front of the great temple of Ibsamboul in Nubia. It is a sitting figure, fifty feet high. These colossal figures of the great Egyptian monarch were plentiful throughout Egypt. As the visitor stands before this fragment of a stupendous piece of sculpture, he may recall to mind the points in the career of Giovanni Battista Belzoni. First, the boy helping his father to shave the beards of the Paduans; then the young adventurer flushed with hope, jogging on his way to Rome; then the grave young man, with his vast physical development shrouded in the monkish habit; then, in 1800, when Napoleon was busy in Italy, the monkish garments thrown aside, he wanders about the continent, stared at everywhere for his size and strength of limb; then as lecturer on hydraulic machinery, and exhibitor of feats of strength at Astley's Theatre; then, under the patronage of the Pasha, constructing a machine to water some gardens on the banks of the Nile; then engaged by the English Consul in Egypt, Mr. Salt, to prosecute some of the investigations into the monuments of antiquity, upon which that gentleman was expending much time and money; and here he is for the first time recognised in his true position. Of his labours as explorer of the tombs and temples of ancient Egypt few people are ignorant. How, dressed as a Turk, he transported the colossal granite bust of Memnon to Alexandria, and saw it safely on its way to England; how he penetrated into the Temple of Ibsamboul; how he patiently explored the rocks of the valley of Beban-el-Malouk, beyond Thebes to discover the entrances to tombs, and took exact copies of the thousands of figures he discovered upon sepulchral walls; how he penetrated into the bowels of the pyramid of Cephrenes, and found in the inmost chamber only the bones of a sacred bull; how he was honoured on his return to his native city; and how a desolate grave on an African sh.o.r.e was the end of his chapter--are matters of exciting adventure that are read by thousands of young people in the present day.

The visitor will see a strong family likeness in the colossal heads that are in the saloon. Proceeding northward from the southern end of the saloon, the visitor may rapidly notice the colossal fragments of the statues of kings and high officers, which are all distinctly marked. First, let the visitor examine two colossal heads (4-6), wearing the kingly head-covering, and said to resemble the features of Amenophis III., which were excavated under the superintendence of Mr.

Salt, at Gournah; and then the visitor may turn to a fragment marked 9, which is a colossal fist, found among the ruins of Memphis by the French, and which fell, together with other valuable relics, into the possession of the English on the capitulation of Alexandria in 1801.

This fist may well excite the admiration and respect of the most determined pugilist of the present day. Hereabouts also are a remarkable monument (12) found in the ruins of Karnak under the superintendence of Mr. Salt, placed upon a white stone pedestal in an angle of the wall of the great temple, and showing on each of its sides representations of Thothmes III. of the 18th dynasty, holding the hands of deities, said by some to be the moat curious specimen of Egyptian bas-relief in the Museum; a fractured colossus (14) in black granite, from Thebes, supposed to be part of a statue of Amenophis III.; the colossal head (15) discovered at Karnak by Belzoni in 1818, supposed to represent the features of Thothmes III.; the head and upper part of a statue of Sesostris, known as the Young Memnon. Before this, the most celebrated of the Egyptian specimens in the saloon, the visitor should pause to learn something of it, and notice its peculiarities for himself. Its name, 'Memnon,' is that given by the Greeks to many of the colossi which they saw scattered about the country when they made their way into Egypt. Memnon was the name given by the ancient Greek writers to an Egyptian hero who had a great reputation for his conquests, and was said to have done his share of work in the famous Trojan war. This name having been given indiscriminately to various statues, conveys no proof of their ident.i.ty, since it represents only a mythical hero, whose fame reached Greece many centuries before our hero. Generally, this young Memnon is held to be a portrait of the great Sesostris, who was either the first or second Rameses; but some authorities declare that the weight of evidence goes in favour of Amenophis III., who was a pharaoh, or monarch, flouris.h.i.+ng more than fourteen centuries before Christ. It is certain, however, that we have here a carefully-elaborated portrait of an Egyptian hero who flourished many centuries before our era. The features have all the prominent parts noticed by writers on Egyptian sculpture as characteristic of the Egyptian style. Here are the wonderfully high and prominent ears (which must have been invaluable peculiarities to Egyptian wits), the thick Ethiopian lips, the coa.r.s.e nose, and the full eyes, all carefully and skilfully chiselled.

Certainly, when we recall the time, realise fully the antiquity and the social state in which this great work was performed, we may see the sculptor's dawning soul in the majestic repose of this head. The lines are hard and stiff--have not the flow of the Parthenon decorations; but here is nothing mean or poor,--all large, solid, and carved with the force of a giant. The picturesque accounts of its transmission from the Memnonium at Thebes to Alexandria are familiar to the majority of readers, with the great Belzoni, with his marvellous strength and energy, urging on the workmen. "I cannot help observing," he tells us, "that it was no easy undertaking to put a piece of granite of such bulk and weight on board a boat that, if it received the weight on one side, would immediately upset; and, what is more, this was to be done without the smallest help of any mechanical contrivance, even a single tackle, and only with four poles and ropes, as the water was about eighteen feet below the bank where the head was to descend. The causeway I had made gradually sloped to the edge of the water, close to the boat, and with the four poles I formed a bridge from the bank into the centre of the boat, so that when the weight bore on the bridge it pressed only on the centre of the boat.

The bridge rested partly on the causeway, partly on the side of the boat, and partly on the centre of it. On the opposite side of the boat I put some mats well filled with straw. I necessarily stationed a few Arabs in the boat, and some at each side, with a lever of palm-wood, as I had nothing else. At the middle of the bridge I put a sack filled with sand, that, if the Colossus should run too fast into the boat, it might be stopped. In the ground behind the Colossus I had a piece of a palm-tree planted, round which a rope was twisted, and then fastened to its ear, to let it descend gradually. I set a lever at work on each side; at the same time that the men in the boat were pulling, others were slackening the ropes, and others s.h.i.+fting the rollers as the Colossus advanced.

"Thus it descended gradually from the mainland to the causeway, when it sunk a good deal, as the causeway was made of fresh earth. This, however, I did not regret, as it was better that it should be so, than that it should run too fast towards the water; for I had to consider that if this piece of antiquity should fall into the Nile, my return to Europe would not be very welcome, particularly to the antiquaries; though I have reason to believe that some among the great body of its scientific men would rather have seen it sunk in the Nile than where it is now deposited. However, it went smoothly on board. The Arabs, who were unanimously of opinion that it would go to the bottom of the river, or crush the boat, were all attention, as if anxious to know the result, as well as to know how the operation was to be performed: and when the owner of the boat, who considered it as consigned to perdition, witnessed my success, and saw the huge piece of stone, as he called it, safely on board, he came and squeezed me heartily by the hand."

On the back of the statue are hieroglyphics describing the t.i.tles of Rameses. Marked 21, is a colossal black granite statue of the third Amenophis, also called Memnon, found also at Thebes in the year 1818.

The next remarkable object to which the visitor's attention may be drawn is the sandstone statue of a monarch of the 19th dynasty, known as Leti Menephta II. (26), found at Karnak by Mrs. Belzoni. Here the characteristics of ancient Egyptian sculpture are strictly preserved, the figure having the arms close to the body, the hands resting upon the knees, and in the hands an altar, upon which is a ram's head.

Hereabouts, also, is the lower part of a kneeling statue of Sesostris, supporting an altar, with the scarabaeus, or sacred beetle. Of the age of the 18th dynasty (of which Amenophis III. was the most notable monarch) is the restored group marked 29, which represents a guardian of the temple of Amenra and his wife, seated upon a throne ornamented with dedications to various deities. Having glanced at the limestone bust (30), from Gournah, of a statue to a king, the visitor may turn to a group (31) which represents an ecclesiastic, with his sister (who is a priestess), and his little son, a priest to Amenophis II.--the sister holding a bunch of lotus flowers. This group was found in a tomb near Thebes. A headless statue, marked 35, with red colouring matter upon it, extracted from a sepulchre in the neighbourhood of the pyramids of Gizeh, is the next remarkable object deserving the general visitor's notice; and hereabouts, also, is another group, in the old Egyptian style (36), of an officer seated beside a female relation.

Pa.s.sing some remarkable objects which remain for notice under a separate head, and the lower part of a statue of Sesostris from Abydos (42), the visitor should next pause before a figure marked 43. This black granite statue is that of a queen of the 18th dynasty, and mother of the great Amenophis III. She is represented, as the visitor will perceive, seated upon a throne. A vulture, in an Athor-headed boat, hovers over her; and upon the boat the learned may read her name and dignities. Pa.s.sing the upper part of a grey granite statue, representing a king, probably of the 12th dynasty (44), which was found in the neighbourhood of Gizeh, the visitor should halt before the statue of an Egyptian scribe, marked 46. This sitting figure is loaded with symbols. The pectoral plate suspended from his neck describes the dignities of the great Sesostris; in his right hand is a symbol of life, and in his left he holds a blade of corn. Near the scribe the visitor will notice a heavily-draped figure of black basalt, with the arms solemnly crossed, which was excavated from behind the Memnon at Thebes. This statue represents a military chief of the early part of the 18th dynasty, named Banofre. The figure numbered 51 is that of a prince named Anebta, who lived in the 18th dynasty: it is of calcareous stone, and was found at Thebes. The two next statues are those of a royal scribe of the 19th dynasty, and an officer connected with the libations to the G.o.d Amen-ra, both from Thebes. Two fragments, marked respectively 54 and 55, are the feet of a statue, and a colossal arm in red granite belonging to the colossal head, conjectured to be that of Thothmes III., found in the sand in the Karnak part of Thebes. Having examined these ponderous fragments, the visitor should next notice the colossal red granite statue of Sesostris found at Karnak (61), the kingly rank of the monarch being marked by the hat and the royal ap.r.o.n; and the upper part of a statue of the same monarch wearing the Pschent or crown of the Pharaohs, and holding a crook and whip. The small statue of Bet-mes, a state officer of the sixth dynasty, found in a tomb at Gizeh, is remarkable for its extraordinary antiquity; and in this neighbourhood, also, is a statue of an Ethiopian prince of the time of the great Rameses, named Pah-ur, which was found by Belzoni in Nubia. The figure is kneeling, and holding an altar. Pa.s.sing the fragment, in grey granite, of a monarch of the 18th dynasty (75), the visitor may pause before another object taken from the French (81). It is the statue, from Karnak, of a high priest of Amen-ra, seated, holding an ear of corn, and, like his companions in stone, resting his arms upon his knees. Another fragment, of green basalt, may be pa.s.sed (83), which is from a comparatively modern statue--that of a chamberlain in the reign of Apries, of the 26th dynasty; and then the visitor should pause before a white stone statue of the Ptolemaic period (92), which represents a priest of the G.o.d Chons, or Hercules, holding an altar upon which is a figure of the G.o.d; and hereabouts, also, he may remark another specimen of white stone sculpture, being the colossal bust of a queen of the 18th or 19th dynasty (93). Pa.s.sing another fragment of a statue of the great Rameses, the visitor should next direct his attention to a dark granite statue, mutilated, of a high military officer, supposed to have flourished about the 12th dynasty. Among other fragments hereabouts, the visitor should not fail to examine the fragment (104) found in Alexandria, at the base of Pompey's Pillar, upon which are clearly traceable the figure of the great Rameses, being crowned by divinities, and a list of his dignities; the red granite colossal fist (106), presented to the Museum by Earl Spencer; and a curious fragment, which represents parts of a royal scribe, with his writing slab attached to his leg (103). Pa.s.sing the curious double statue (110), of a State officer of the time of the eleventh Rameses, the visitor should once more halt before a basalt statue of a functionary (111), of the 26th dynasty, found in 1785, in the Natron Lakes, near Rosetta, and a granite group (113), representing, side by side, a chief, and a royal nurse, with the chief's daughter. Amid another group of fragments, the visitor should remark particularly an arragonite torso (121); the upper part of an officer, holding a standard (122); and a red granite bust of a monarch wearing the neumis (125). A small black basalt statue, of the period of the 26th dynasty (134) should be noticed. The figure, that of a palace officer, is kneeling, and has dedications to the deities. Further on is a statue of the third Thothmes, of the 18th dynasty (168), the head of which has been restored. Here the visitor should remark the nine bows which symbolise the enemies of the Egyptians. Having thus far noticed the collection of statuary which represent human beings, the visitor will gladly turn to those strange revelations of the ancient Egyptian mind developed in the

EGYPTIAN SPHINXES.

In these strange conglomerations of various races of animals--the lions with human heads and hawks' heads--there is generally preserved that majestic repose, and that mighty force of execution, which rescue the most incomprehensible of the ancient Egyptian monuments from contempt. Not at all farcical or barbarous could the effect have been, when the Egyptian approached his place of wors.h.i.+p through an avenue formed by rows of these colossal sphinxes--all grandly fas.h.i.+oned and full of majesty. Mr. Long says: "Most speculations on the origin of the compound figure, called a sphinx, appear unsatisfactory; nor, indeed, is it an easy matter for the modern inhabitants of Western Europe to conceive what is meant by the symbolical forms which enter so largely into the ancient religious systems of the Eastern world. It seems to us altogether an a.s.sumption without proof, that either the andro-sphinx, or the sphinx with the female head, ought to be considered as the original type of this compound figure. The sphinx differs from other compound figures, which occur very often in the Egyptian pictorial representations, in always having the body of a lion, or, it may be, a panther, or some such animal as might be considered a symbol of strength and courage. The whole history of our species bears testimony to that tendency of the human mind, when not restrained and guided by better knowledge, to pourtray in some visible form its conceptions of Deity. However far many superior minds of the heathen world might advance, in deducing from the contemplation of all around them more correct views of the goodness and wisdom of an all-ruling power, these were ideas far too refined for the ma.s.s, who felt the want of something more apparent to the senses--something on which the mind could repose from vain imaginings and real fears. Hence the Deity was invested with various forms of familiar objects, under which he was venerated as a protector and friend, or feared as an avenging and angry power. Under the form of a ram, and the name of Ammon, we find a deity wors.h.i.+pped along the banks of the Nile, from the temple of the ancient Meroe to the sand-girt oasis of Siwah. The mild and benignant expression of the sacred ram would indicate the diffusion of tranquillity and peace, nor would the essential value of the symbol be changed by finding the head of the ram placed on human shoulders, or attached to the body of a lion. In the first case it would, in accordance with the Egyptian tradition of G.o.ds having a.s.sumed the forms of animals, commemorate, as in the Hindoo mythology, an incarnation of the superior power; and in the second, the union of strength and courage with mildness and the arts of peace. The crio-sphinx, then, belongs to the Ammonian mythology, and is a distinct symbol from the andro-sphinx and female sphinx, which, probably, are connected with the wors.h.i.+p of Osiris and Isis."