FACE TO FACE WITH THE PHARAOHS with Moses. The king who built Thebes, Karnak, and other great cities, was the man who oppressed the Israelites, although not the one whom the Lord afflicted with plagues thereby causing the Exodus. He was the Alexander of Egypt, the Napoleon of the Nile valley three thousand odd years ago. He conquered the coun¬ tries about him and was rolling in wealth/' . . . now lies he there, And none so poor to do him reverence. ” Rameses is remarkably well preserved. His iron jaw is as firm as when he uttered commands in his capital, the hundred-gated city of Thebes. His enormous nose is still prominent. The face, though black, is wonderfully life-like and the teeth shine out as white as when he brushed them after his morning tub, something like four thousand years ago. I noted the silky, fuzzy hair over his black ears and longed for a lock of it for my collection of relics.

Then I looked up and saw a great curled wig of black hair which the records state was made for King Rameses, and wondered why the spiced old gentleman below did not match his wig to his natural flaxen hair.

Near this casket is one containing Seti I, the Pharaoh who preceded Rameses, another great warrior and con¬ queror, who is said to have made a canal from the Nile to the Red Sea. Not so far away is the mummy of Meneptah, the tyrant who hardened his heart against the Israelites and would not let them go. Seti lies in his coffin with his black arms crossed and his black head cushioned on yellow grave clothes. His features are as peaceful as perhaps they seldom were in life and he appears to sleep well.

The dead past became marvellously real when I looked at another box in which lay a mummied princess with the 97