FERLINI'S NARRATIVE Ferlini refers the reader to No. 153 of his Catalogue for a description of the bars of the bier, but if we compare that given by him in Italian with the French translation made by B. B.

already referred to, we shall see that it is in many particulars quite different. The translator also adds that the bars were fourteen in number. This interesting piece of information he must have obtained from Ferlini, and it is important as suggesting that the additional details which are given in the French translation were derived from that source.

We have next to note that Ferlini tells us that after fifteen days' work in pulling down the pyramid, when the upper half of it had been removed, he found a niche formed by three slabs of stone, wherein were two metal vessels of most beautiful workmanship. The narrative is quite explicit, and he says that he saw the vessels himself in the niche, but as the statement stands it is to me incredible. The vessels could serve no useful purpose when buried in an inaccessible niche in the interior of the pyramid, about twenty-four feet from the ground, and neither the piety nor the superstition of its builder would be served by hiding vases in this manner. Vessels in bronze, earthenware, &c., ornaments and jewellery, arms and weapons, &c., when buried with the dead, were intended to be used by the dead in the Other World, and were always placed near the bodies in their last resting-places, or at any rate somewhere in the sepulchral chamber, or in neighbouring chambers, which were connected with it by a corridor.

Ferlini's narrative of the " find " in the pyramid closely resembles the stories which natives all over Egypt tell travellers to whom they wish to sell some article of unusual interest or importance, and they have been in the habit of telling marvellous stories for some generations, hoping thereby to make sure of selling their antiquities. It is most probable that most of the objects which Ferlini describes in his Catalogue were found somewhere in or near the pyramid, but not in any chamber or niche in the building itself. Their number and variety suggest to me that they represent the loot collected by some thief from several tomb chambers, and not the ornaments and jewellery of one queen only. Or it is quite possible that they 297