never have been accomplished. The "Egypt Exploration Fund," thus founded
and maintained, was fortunate in securing the co-operation of M.
Naville, the distinguished Swiss Egyptologist, who set out for Egypt
in January of this year with the object of conducting the explorations
contemplated by the society. After a consultation with M. Maspero, the
Director of Archaeology in Egypt, who has throughout acted a friendly
part toward the society's enterprise, M. Naville decided to begin his
campaign by attacking the mounds at Tell-el-Maskhutah, on the Freshwater
Canal, a few miles from Ismailia. The mounds of earth here were known to
cover some ancient city, for some sphinxes and statues had already
been found; but what city it could be, archaeologists were at a loss to
determine; though some, with Professor Lepsius at their head, believed
it to be none other than the Rameses or "Raamses," which the Children of
Israel built for Pharaoh, and whence they started on their final Exodus.
Any identification, however, of the sites of the Biblical cities in
Egypt was so far merely speculative. Practically nothing definite was
known as to the geography of the Israelite sojourn, except that the Land
of Goshen was undoubtedly in the eastern part of the Delta, and that
Zoan was Tanis, whose immense mounds are to form the next subject of
the society's operations. The route of the Exodus was as uncertain as
everything else connected with Israel's sojourn in Egypt. What sea they
crossed, and where, and by what direction they journeyed to it, remained
vexed questions, although Dr. Brugsch had set up a plausible theory, in
which the "Serbonian Bog" played an important part.

[Illustration: THE EXCAVATIONS PITHOM-SUCCOTH]

Six weeks of steady digging at Tell-el-Maskhutah, under M. Naville's
skillful direction, placed all these speculations in quite a new light.
The city under the mounds proved to be none other than Pithom, the