ut take care not to chip the
edges of the cover as you put in your crow-bars, for I propose to carry
off the tomb and present it to the British Museum."

The whole company bent their efforts to displacing the monolith. Wooden
wedges were carefully driven in, and presently the huge stone was moved
and slid down the props prepared to receive it. The sarcophagus having
been opened, showed the first bier hermetically sealed. It was a coffer
adorned with paintings and gilding, representing a sort of shrine with
symmetrical designs, lozenges, quadrilles, palm leaves, and lines of
hieroglyphs. The cover was opened, and Rumphius, who was bending over
the sarcophagus, uttered a cry of surprise when he discovered the
contents of the coffin, having recognised the sex of the mummy by the
absence of the Osiris beard and the shape of the cartonnage. The Greek
himself appeared amazed. His long experience in excavations enabled him
to understand the strangeness of such a find. The valley of Biban el
Moluk contains the tombs of kings only: the necropolis of the queens is
situated farther away, in another mountain gorge. The tombs of the
queens are very simple, and usually consist of two or three passage-ways
and one or two rooms. Women in the East have always been considered as
inferior to men, even in death. Most of these tombs, which were broken
into at a very distant period, were used as receptacles for shapeless
mummies carelessly embalmed, which still exhibit traces of leprosy and
elephantiasis. How did this woman's coffin come to occupy this royal
sarcophagus, in the centre of this cryptic palace worthy of the most
illustrious and most powerful of the Pharaohs?

"This," said the doctor to Lord Evandale, "upsets all my notions and all
my theories. It overthrows the system most carefully built upon the
Egyptian funeral rites, which nevertheless have been so carefully
followed out during thousands of years. No doubt we have come upon some
obscure point, some forgotten mystery of history. A woman did ascend the
throne of the Pharaohs and did govern Egypt. She was called Tahoser, as
we learn from the cartouches engraved upon older inscriptions hammered
away. She usurped the tomb as she usurped the throne. Or perhaps some
other ambitious woman, of whom history has preserved no trace, renewed
her attempt."

"No one is better able to solve this difficult problem than you," said
Lord Evandale. "We will carry this box full of secrets to o