the circumstances, the Government did the right thing. It fell to the duty of Sir Francis Grenfell, K.C.B., to make arrangements for the prevention of fire, and with the precautions taken by him, and the rules which he enforced in person, the collection became comparatively safe.

The removal of the antiquities from Bûlâk to Gizah was carried out in 1889. In 1895 the Public Debt Commissioners voted the sum of £E. 110,000 for the building of a new fireproof museum, and the design of M. Dourgnon, a Parisian architect, was selected by the jury, which consisted of an Englishman, a Frenchman, and an Italian. The building was offered for tender in 1896, the foundations were laid in 1897, and the museum was finished towards the close of 1901; up to the end of 1900 the total cost had been LE.169,000. The total cost of the Museum has been

E.251,000, and already E. 14,000 has been spent on the Catalogue. The transfer of the antiquities from Gizah to the new Museum began on December 3rd, 1901, and was completed on July 13th, 1902. The inauguration ceremonies were performed in the presence of Lord Cromer, Lord Kitchener, and about 100 of the nobles and notables of Cairo on November 15th following.

As already said, the first Keeper of the Egyptian Museum in Cairo was F. A. F. Mariette, who was born at Boulogne-sur-Mer on February 11th, 1821, and who died. at Cairo in 1881. He was appointed on the staff of the Louvre in 1848; he set out on a mission to Egypt in search of Coptic and Syriac MSS. in 1850; he discovered and excavated the Serapeum in 1852, with a grant of 50,000 francs which had been voted by the French National Assembly; he carried on excavations for the Duc de Luynes at Gizah in 1853; and in 1854 he was appointed Assistant Curator at the Louvre. year he was appointed Keeper of the Bûlak the Khedive Sa'id Påshâ made him a Bey.

In the same Museum, and

From 1855 to

1871 he worked indefatigably, and the excavations which he carried out comprise some of the greatest works of the kind ever done in Egypt. Tanis, Abydos, Edfû, Karnak, Denderah, Madinat Habû, Dêr al-Bahari, and many other sites were more or less thoroughly explored by him; he explored hundreds of maṣṭăbas in the cemeteries of Gizah, Sakkâra, and Mêdûm, and he opened the "Maṣṭabat al-Fir'âûn." Whilst engaged in such works he found time to write a Guide to the Museum, entitled "Notice des principaux monuments exposés dans les galéries provisoires du Musée d'Antiquités de S. A. le Khedive à Boulaq," which went through several editions ; he edited facsimiles of papyri, and published several volumes of valuable Egyptian texts. The zeal and enthusiasm of Mariette contributed largely to the advance of Egyptological science, and, as a worker on broad, general lines of study, his equal will not quickly be found. His body was entombed in a marble sarcophagus which first stood in the courtyard at Bûlâk, then was removed to Gizah in 1889, and to the new Museum in Cairo in 1902.

In 1894 Chélu Bey proposed that a statue of Mariette should be erected on a suitable pedestal, and in 1901 the Egyptian Government voted LE.300 for a pedestal, and E.1,200 for a statue. The sculptor selected was Denys Puech. The work was finished in November 1903, and the unveiling of the statue took place on March 17th, 1904.

Mariette was succeeded by Professor Gaston Maspero, who was born at Paris on June 23rd, 1846. He took the degree of Docteur en Lettres in 1873 at l'École Normale, was made Professor of the College de France, in the room of de Rougé, and Member of L'Académie des Inscriptions in 1883, and Oxford conferred upon him the degree of D.C.L. in 1886. As soon

as he was appointed he began to arrange and catalogue the antiquities at Bûlâk, and for the first time it became possible to obtain an idea of the value and sequence of the objects exhibited. The "Guide du Visiteur au Musée de Boulaq" was a most useful work, for in it Professor Maspero not only described his objects, but explained their use and signification, and his "Guide" was in reality a manual of archæology. In addition to his work in connection with the Museum at Bûlâk, Professor Maspero carried out the excavation of Luxor temple in 1884, 1885, and 1886, at the expense of a fund which was raised by the Journal des Débats; it has been customary to ascribe this work to M. Grébaut, but this savant only removed from Luxor to Cairo the antiquities which Professor Maspero had found. In 1884 Professor Maspero discovered the necropolis of Akhmîm, from which such excellent results were obtained; he repaired Karnak, and the eastern part of the Hypostyle Hall; he cleared the Ramesseum at Thebes, and repaired the temples at Abydos; he rebuilt the west part of the girdle wall at Edfû, covered over the sanctuary, and repaired the little temple; and he carried on works of repair and excavation and clearing at Kom Ombo, Al-Kâb, Aswân, Shekh 'Abd al-Kûrna, Asyût, Barsha, Beni Hasan, Tell al-'Amarna, Şakkara, etc. Professor Maspero is the author of a large number of Egyptological works, many of them containing editions of most valuable texts, and his Histoire Ancienne in three volumes is a monumental work. One of his greatest works undoubtedly is the edition of the texts that were found in the pyramid tombs of Unas, Tetà, and other early kings, which he published with translations in French. These documents are of priceless value for the study of the religion of ancient Egypt, and their decipherment and publication are the greatest triumph of Egyptology. They reveal a phase of civilization in

Egypt of which there are no other records than these in writing, and certain portions of them must be coeval with the historic culture of Egypt. In 1886, for private reasons, Professor Maspero resigned his appointment as Keeper of the Bûlâk Museum, and was succeeded by M. Grébaut, the author of an excellent edition of a famous Hymn to Amen-Ra; he increased the collection under his charge considerably, and brought many valuable monuments from all parts of Egypt to the Museum at Gizah; early in February 1901 he discovered a large number of the mummies of priests of Amen, with their coffins, etc., at Dêr al-Baharî. The "find" consisted of 153 coffins, 101 double, and 52 single, 110 general boxes, 77 wooden figures, 8 stele, etc. See Journal Officiel, Février 7 et 23, 1891; and G. Daressy, Rev. Arch., 1896. Under his rule the Egyptian collection was removed from Bûlâk to the Palace of Gîzah.

M. Grébaut was, in turn, succeeded in 1892 by M. J. Marie de Morgan, who was born on June 3rd, 1857, at the Château de Bion, Loir-et-Cher; though he studied archæology for more than 20 years, he is a trained mathematician, engineer, and geologist, and he has turned his training to good account, for he has conducted excavations according to scientific methods, with unusually successful results. Since 1897, when he resigned his appointment, he has been engaged in carrying out excavations at Susa and other places in the country which was called Elam by ancient nations; fortune has favoured his labours, and made him the discoverer of the basalt stele which is inscribed in Babylonian characters with the text of the "Code of Laws" of Khammurabi, king of Babylon, about B.C. 2200. M. de Morgan has travelled over all Persia, Luristan, Kurdistan, Armenia, and Mesopotamia, and is the author of numerous learned works. In connection with Egyptology it may be mentioned that he

was the discoverer of the predynastic and early archaic tombs at Nakâda in Upper Egypt, and it was he who first showed the correct position in the history of Egypt of the people who were erroneously called the New Race..

M. de Morgan was succeeded in 1897 by M. Victor Loret, who is the author of Manuel de la Langue Egyptienne, Paris, 1891; of La Flore pharaonique, Paris, 1892; and of several articles in various publications. In 1898 he discovered in the tomb of Amen-hetep II. at Thebes the mummies of several kings of the XVIIIth and later dynasties, and among them was the mummy of Menephthah, the "Pharaoh of the Oppression," who many believed to have been drowned in the "Red Sea," when the Egyptians were overwhelmed in the days of Moses.

In 1899 M. Loret resigned, and M. Maspero returned to his former position of Keeper of the Egyptian Museum, and during the second period of his rule he has renewed the wise and liberal policy with which all are familiar. Under his guidance the Egyptian collection has been removed from the Palace of Gizah to the new Museum in the European quarter of Cairo, and the interests of Egyptology, both archæological and philological, are well guarded. The various Keepers of the Egyptian Museum have for 30 years or more been ably seconded in all their endeavours by Emil Brugsch Pâshâ, the Conservator of the Museum, to whom the arrangement and classification of the antiquities therein were chiefly due. He holds the traditions of the great Mariette, having been his fellowworker, and possesses an unrivalled knowledge of sites and of all matters relating to excavations; his learning and courtesy are too well known to need further mention. The Assistant-Conservators are M. G. Daressy and Aḥmad Kamal Bey.

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