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 circumstances 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 passages 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 recumbent 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