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The tombs of Egypt are among the grandest and most striking of its monuments. The pyramids were tombs, and they are still wonders of the world. The rock-hewn sepulchres, however, which surround the pyramids, and which dot the mountain gorges of Thebes and Bene-Hassan, are now probably the most instructive. Their chambers are so many museums, containing not merely the embalmed remains, but, on the inscribed and sculptured walls, the whole history of the mighty dead. Nothing is overlooked or forgotten that would throw light on their lives and labours. In this way we have a most vivid picture of ancient Egypt; the victories of kings; processes in law courts; the building of cities; the hewing and transport of colossal statues and obelisks; the embalming of the dead; funeral rites and processions; marriage ceremonies; every department of household work and family life, such as cooking, washing, dressing, shaving the head and beard, eating; trades of all kinds — goldsmiths, painters, potters, glass-blowers, bakers, weavers; games and amusements — jugglers, music, dancing; tilling the soil; irrigating the fields; feeding and milking cows; watering flax, reaping, threshing, grinding — all these and many other things are delineated with singular, and not unfrequently amusing, minuteness of detail. In examining those unique tombs one can study the manners and customs, the private life and public acts, the religious rites and ceremonies, the features and dress of those who lived in cottage and palace in that country from three to four thousand years ago, with almost as much advantage as if he had lived among them. The perfect preservation of the paintings and papyri is astonishing. In this Western land of rain and frost half a century of neglect would destroy them; hut in Upper Egypt rain and frost are unknown. The dry and equable climate is the grand curator; and this has been materially assisted by the desert sand, which has partially covered some of the monuments, and for long ages hermetically sealed many of the finest tombs. The figures and brilliant colouring on the walls, and written characters upon the papyrus have been thus preserved as fresh as if only finished yesterday. Looking at them one can scarcely believe that their age has to be reckoned by thousands of years.

(Cassell's Family Magazine.)

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KJV: Woe unto you! for ye build the sepulchres of the prophets, and your fathers killed them.

WEB: Woe to you! For you build the tombs of the prophets, and your fathers killed them.