above to find it. For there, sculptured all round the apartment, and
looking nearly as fresh as the day it was done, was the pictorial
representation of the death, embalming, and burial of an old man with a
long beard, probably an ancient king or grandee of this country.

The first picture represented his death. He was lying upon a couch which
had four short curved posts at the corners coming to a knob at the end,
in appearance something like written notes of music, and was evidently
in the very act of expiring. Gathered round the couch were women and
children weeping, the former with their hair hanging down their backs.
The next scene represented the embalmment of the body, which lay stark
upon a table with depressions in it, similar to the one before us;
probably, indeed, it was a picture of the same table. Three men were
employed at the work--one superintending, one holding a funnel shaped
exactly like a port wine strainer, of which the narrow end was fixed in
an incision in the breast, no doubt in the great pectoral artery; while
the third, who was depicted as standing straddle-legged over the corpse,
held a kind of large jug high in his hand, and poured from it some
steaming fluid which fell accurately into the funnel. The most curious
part of this sculpture is that both the man with the funnel and the
man who pours the fluid are drawn holding their noses, either I suppose
because of the stench arising from the body, or more probably to keep
out the aromatic fumes of the hot fluid which was being forced into the
dead man's veins. Another curious thing which I am unable to explain is
that all three men were represented as having a band of linen tied round
the face with holes in it for the eyes.

The third sculpture was a picture of the burial of the deceased. There
he was, stiff and cold, clothed in a linen robe, and laid out on a stone
slab such as I had slept upon at our first sojourning-place. At his