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I must not omit to tell you that, to the practised eye of an archaeologist, every object of Egyptian art bears upon it as well defined a date as a mediaeval church window or porch. The astonishing identity which is visible through all the periods of Egyptian art is consistent with an immense amount of change which must exist wherever there is life. There are periods of splendour, progress and deterioration, and every age has its peculiar character. Birch, Lepsius or Mariette, would at once tell you the age of a statue, inscription or manuscript, without looking at the text which actually mentions the exact date.

Painting, as understood in these later centuries, was entirely unknown to the Egyptians, though they had coloured pictures; but the harmony of colours was thoroughly understood by them, and their employment of colour in architecture or generally in decoration puts our modern efforts to shame. "They were aware" (as Sir Gardner Wilkinson says) "that for decorative purposes the primary colours should predominate, and that secondary hues should be secondary in quantity and in position; their most usual combinations were therefore blue, red and green; and a fillet of white or yellow was introduced between them to obviate that false effect which is apt to convert red and blue into purple when placed together in immediate contact. When yellow was introduced, a due proportion of black was added to balance it, and for each colour was sought its

suitable companion; or if certain colours occasionally predominated in a part of the wall, the balance was restored by a greater quantity of others elsewhere, so that the due proportions of all were kept up, and the general effect was a perfect concord.”

The earliest monuments show the use of a great variety of musical instruments-flutes, pipes, harps, guitars, lyres and tamburines-and they give representations of concerts in which human voices are combined with the sounds of several instruments.1 My learned friend Dr. Dümichen, himself an admirable musician, in noticing the presence not only of a monkey, but of hounds, at a concert in the tomb of Ptahhotep, is very much tempted to doubt the musical taste of that great dignitary of the fifth dynasty, and to suppose that he preferred the accompaniments of his canine friends. There is, however, I believe, reason to suppose that the picture is intended to represent dogs from the spirit-land, whose cars are no doubt attuned to the harmony of sweet sounds.

The Egyptians were not, as used on very insufficient evidence to be supposed, a sad or morose people. Their religion at least does not appear to have been "designed to make their pleasures less." The description of their

1 See Wilkinson, "Ancient Egyptians," Vol. I. p. 431; Carl Engel, Music of the Most Ancient Nations," p. 180; and Lauth, "Ueber altägyptische Musik," in the Sitzungsberichte of the Munich Academy, 3rd July, 1869.

festivals given by classical writers is fully corroborated by authentic testimony, and the national tendency, at least in the prosperous times of the monarchy, was towards excess in the exercise of conviviality. Great quantities of wine, both native and foreign, were consumed; and beer-houses, if we may judge of the frequency with which they are inveighed against in the papyri, must have been as serious a pest in the time of the great Rameses as they are in the England of the nineteenth century. The point of the story which Herodotos tells about the representation of a dead body in a coffin being carried round and shown to the guests at entertainments, lies in the final words uttered by the bearer: "Cast your eyes on this figure; after death, you yourself will resemble it; drink then, and be happy." I think it would be easy to quote English, French or German drinking-songs containing the same moral. The element of mournfulness is introduced merely for the purpose of bringing out the convivial sentiment into stronger relief. It is possible that Herodotos makes allusion to a song of which several copies or fragments of copies have reached us. It is called the Song of King Antuf-a monarch of the eleventh dynasty, whom I have already mentioned-and it says:

"Fulfil thy desire while thou livest. Put oils upon

1 "Records of the Past," Vol. IV. P. 117.

thy head, clothe thyself with fine linen adorned with precious metals . . . . .. yield to thy desire-fulfil thy desire with thy good things whilst thou art upon earth, according to the dictation of thy heart. The day will come to thee when one hears not the voice,—when the one who is at rest hears not their voices. Feast in tranquillity; seeing that there is no one who carries his goods with him."

Another poem which has been preserved, "The Lay of the Harper," is very similar in its tone: "Let odours and oils stand before thy nostril. Let song and music be before thy face, and leave behind thee all evil cares. Mind thee of joy till cometh the day of pilgrimage, when we draw near the land which loveth silence."1

It is impossible to read these scraps of poetry without being reminded of a passage in the book of Ecclesiastes, written, in the person of Solomon, by some one living in the last century of the Persian domination in Palestine. It begins: "Go thy way; eat thy bread with joy, and drink thy wine with a merry heart, for God accepteth thy works. Let thy garments be always white; and let thy hand lack no ointment." And it ends "for there is no work, no device, nor knowledge, nor wisdom in the grave, whither thou goest."2

1 "Records of the Past," Vol. VI. p. 129. 2 Eccles. ix. 7, 8, 9.

And if it be true that the Preacher in another portion of his work reminds the young man to whom he is addressing himself that for all these things God will bring him into judgment, not less true is it that the Egyptian harper also sang:

"Mind thee of the day when thou too shalt start for the land to which one goeth to return not thence. Good for thee will have been a good life; therefore be just and hate iniquity; for he who loveth what is Right shall triumph."

Moral Code.

beyond the grave. Although funereal

The triumph of Right over Wrong, of Right in speech and in action (for the same word signifies both Truth and Justice) is the burden of nine-tenths of the Egyptian texts which have come down to us. Right1 is represented as a goddess ruling as mistress over heaven and earth and the world The gods are said to live by it. inscriptions are less to be depended upon when they describe the virtues of the deceased than when they give the dates of his birth and death, they may at least be quoted in evidence of the rule of conduct by which actions were estimated. We are not obliged to believe that this or that man possessed all the virtues

1 The primitive notion implied by the word maat seems to be the geometrical one "right," as in "right line," as opposed to xab, "bent," ""canon." "perverse." Maat as a noun is the "straight rule,"

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