A pilgrimage to the temples and tombs of Egypt, Nubia, and ...

294 BIBAN EL MOLUK.
across the beams like stop-gaps ! Could
the
proud Thebans have foreseen the strange uses to
which their dead bodies would one day be applied,
think you that they would have put into practice
the arts they used to cheat corruption of its prey ?
—and would they not have preferred the natural
process of becoming quietly resolved into dust
to occupying the Arab's fragment basket, or even
the more distinguished position of the best glass-
case in a Royal Museum ?
December 29th.
But it is at the tombs of the Kings, called by
the Arabs Biban el Moluk, that the art of sepul-
ture has been carried to its highest degree of
perfection by the ancient people of this land.
Even the site chosen for the last abodes of their
native Kings shows how deeply the Egyptians
were imbued with a sense of suitableness—if I
may so express myself—in all that concerned
the solemn occupation of their lives (which truly
may be said to have been passed in a preparation
for death), and there is something even poetical
in the analogy between the locality selected, and
the purpose for which it was devoted.
The way to the Royal tombs lies through a
long and winding valley, or narrow gorge, closed
in on either side hy the calcareous Lybian rocks,