the ka. And it is interesting to note that by this time the notion that the service of the dead must be near the resting-place of the body had so far disappeared that the mortuary temple could be several miles from the tomb without impairing its efficiency. One will look in vain for shrines aboveground in the Valley of the Kings' Tombs. The temples for this purpose all lay in the smiling plain directly opposite the city, separated from the rough valley by a spur of mountain and as distinct physically from the actual tombs as if they had been on the other side of the river. None of them ever was placed across the Nile, however, possibly because of the fear that running water might be troublesome to a disembodied spirit. But mountains seem to have afforded no insuperable barrier, and in the height of Egypt's glory thus tombs were made.

Many, of course, sought burial in the sacred precints of Abydos, where it was thought the bodyor main portion, at least — of Osiris was laid. Even those who could not be buried there permanently were carried to the shrine of the God for "justification," and by this pious postmortem pilgrimage took sufficient merit away with them to their final abode to insure them eternal repose and a blissful resurrection.

Of the process of mummification a word must be said before turning to other features of the ancient

religion. It was a process as long and as careful as it was efficacious. Herodotus, doubtless following a trustworthy account in the main, says of it:

First they draw out the brains through the nostrils with an iron hook, taking part of it out in this manner, the rest by an infusion of drugs. Then with a sharp Ethiopian stone they make an incision in the side and take out all the bowels; and having cleansed the abdomen and rinsed it with palm-wine, they next sprinkle it with pounded perfumes. Then, having filled the belly with pure myrrh pounded, and cassia, and other perfumes, frankincense excepted, they sew it up again; and when they have done this they steep it in natrum, leaving it under for seventy days; for a longer time than this it is not lawful to steep it. At the expiration of the seventy days they wash the corpse and wrap the whole body in bandages of flaxen cloth, smearing it with gum which the Egyptians commonly use instead of glue. After this the relations, having taken the body back again [from the professional embalmers], make a wooden case in the shape of a man, and having made it they inclose the body; and having fastened it up, they store it in a sepulchral chamber, setting it upright against the wall. In this manner they prepare bodies that are embalmed in the most expensive way.

Those who, avoiding great expense, desire the middle. way, they prepare in the following manner: When they have charged their syringes with oil made from cedar, they fill the abdomen of the corpse, without making any incision or drawing out the bowels, by injection. And having secured the injection against escaping, they steep the body in natrum for the seventy days prescribed; and on the last day they let out from the abdomen the oil of

cedar which they had before injected, and it hath such power that it brings out the vitals in a state of dissolution; the natrum also dissolves the flesh and nothing of the body remains but the skin and bones. When they have done this they return the body to the relations without farther operation.

The third method of embalming is this, which is used only for the poorer sort: Having thoroughly rinsed the abdomen in syrmæa, they steep the body in natrum for the seventy days and deliver it to be carried away.1

From this it appears that the essential thing was the natrum bath, although the removal of the more perishable organs was an important part of the process. Still earlier methods revealed by the exploration of primitive sites appear to have involved the simple steeping of the body in a saline solution.

It should be added also that the process of mummifying was applied to certain animals held sacred, such as crocodiles and the temple beasts and birds, held in reverence as allied to the several gods—the bulls, for example, that were held sacred to Ptah and buried in such imposing sarcophagi in the Serapeum at Sakkâra.

The heart of the deceased was always carefully removed, and its place was taken, as a rule, by a large scarab, or imitation beetle, carved of stone and inscribed with efficacious formulæ and prayers des

1 Herodotus, II, 86, 87, 88.

tined to help the shade to a happy hereafter. And numerous small scarabs, also of stone or of some other durable material, were placed in the grave with the body, sometimes in vast numbers. It is stated that as many as three thousand have been found in a single tomb. The scarabæus was regarded as the symbol of resurrection, it would seem, because of a belief in its spontaneous generation from the earth under the benign influence of Ra.

Numerous as the genuine scarabs must have been, they have proved insufficient to supply the army of modern collectors, and one of the great industries of Egypt has come to be the vending of fraudulent imitations. The safest rule is doubtless to assume that all such offered for sale are spurious and thus avoid all doubt. Genuine scarabs, and indeed genuine antiquities of every sort, are to be known only by the expert- and not always by him. Small objects of value ranging from a few cents to many dollars may be had of the museum authorities, and from one or two reputable dealers in Cairo. But the vast majority of objects offered for sale throughout Egypt are unblushing frauds produced in bulk by ingenious fellaheen.

Some of the genuine scarabs, by the way, are not mortuary offerings at all, but are remnants of souvenir issues gotten out by ancient monarchs to com

memorate notable events, much as a modern government would issue a special series of postage stamps. Not many of the kings resorted to this device, but Amenhotep III authorized several such issues in recognition of his marriage with Queen Tii and of various victories achieved by him. All of which, of course, is quite beside the purpose of our present consideration of ancient religious beliefs and burial customs bearing upon them.

It remains to speak of the most chaotic of all the incidents of the Egyptian religion - its system of gods and goddesses. Nothing can be more bewildering at first sight than the array of names applied to different conceptions of deity. The mythology of Egypt is as crowded as that of Greece and Rome, and the efforts occasionally made both in ancient and in modern times to identify Egyptian concepts with the Greek have tended to produce a situation only to be described as confusion worse confounded.

It appears, however, that the question may be simplified by reducing the whole matter to a consideration of two sets of gods—those of the living and those of the dead.

To speak of either set of gods as at all savoring of monotheism seems absurd, and yet it cannot be denied that the deities of the living, although varying from time to time in numbers and often in names, did tend