It is a shrine entirely different from any we have seen before in Egypt, and more grandly situated than any other. It is approached from the river by a gradually ascending avenue, once, no doubt, lined with the customary sphinxes down to the high-water landingplace. Of this, however, little or nothing remains and as little trace of the great pylon-towers that once formed its outermost gate. Instead there is naught but a succession of three levels, one above another, each reached by an inclined causeway and backed by porticoes sustaining the court above. The central terrace is by far the most extensive. Portions of the colonnades which marked the bounds of the several courts are in admirable preservation, especially the one at the rear of the central terrace which serves to support the raised hall above. These colonnades are the distinguishing feature made familiar by photographs. But it is the painted decoration of the porticoes that is most interesting on a closer inspection, particularly the series of paintings, now somewhat faded, which relate the story of the great queen's famous expedition to Punt—a region on the Somali coast bordering the Red Sea to which the monarchs of Hatasu's day were wont to send parties in quest of incense, eye-paint, gums, and other luxuries. The way to it was long and arduous, extending from the Nile Valley across the Arabian Desert by desolate

wadis, or ravines in the eternal sands; and the keeping open of this track, the provision of convenient watering-stations, and the policing of the highway afforded a considerable task to the monarchs of old. Hatasu's expedition was a great success, and it appears to have been the exploit of which she was most proud.

Consequently in the depth of one portico in her new temple she caused to be depicted many a sight which her envoys saw in that distant land- beehive huts perched over the water, cattle grazing under wonderful and exotic trees, gold and myrrh being shoveled into great balances for weighing, and a multitude of trees set in tubs for importation into Egypt-indeed, for this very temple. Hatasu had conceived the idea of creating at her mountain shrine "another Punt," and to that end she caused to be hollowed out scores of depressions in the rocky floor of her extensive terraces wherein to place mud from the Nile for the support of many an incense-bearing tree. It must have been a thing of rare beauty in its prime, this artificial oasis in the arid and rocky plateau that underlies the precipices of the desert, well above the alluvial plain of Thebes and giving a splendid view across it. Nothing of that magnificence remains save the bare terraces, the pillared walls, and the depressions carved out for the transplanted garden.

In the third level, smallest of the three, there was once a hypostyle hall which has entirely perished. There remain only the recesses in the living rock behind, sanctuaries sacred to the gods and to the memory of Hatasu and her consort-brother, Thutmosis. The latter, as we know, survived his sister-wife and reigned long and wisely in his own right; and it is a pity to discover that when he came to his belated but stupendous power as king, he mutilated sadly the shrines erected by Hatasu both at Karnak and at "Dehr-el-Bahri," as the terraced temple has come to be called. Her image in many of the decorated rooms has been deliberately chiseled out, along with her cartouches and sundry references to her greatness. Few portrait-reliefs of her remain, even in her own temple.

What does survive, though battered and faded by ages of exposure, still affords a very good idea of the art employed. Pictorially, the skill of the painters was remarkably great, especially in the rendering of grazing animals. My chief regret is that the light in the porticoes proved insufficient to enable photographing the paintings of the expedition to Punt. In the sunlit courts without, the low walls of which are still standing, it was possible to obtain some very good views of painted soldiery, and in one of these I found an aged altar dedicated to Re-Harakhte