mmunicating with each
other usually by arched doorways.

[Illustration: 107.jpg A HALL WITH COLUMNS IN ONE OF THE XIIth DYNASTY
HOUSES AT GUROB]

Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a sketch by Professor Petrie,
_Elahun, Kahun and Gurob_, pl. xvi. 3.

A few houses boasted of two or three stories; all possessed a terrace,
on which the Egyptians of old, like those of to-day, passed most
of their time, attending to household cares or gossiping with their
neighbours over the party wall or across the street. The hearth was
hollowed out in the ground, usually against a wall, and the smoke
escaped through a hole in the ceiling: they made their fires of sticks,
wood charcoal, and the dung of oxen and asses. In the houses of the
rich we meet with state apartments, lighted in the centre by a square
opening, and supported by rows of wooden columns; the shafts, which were
octagonal, measured ten inches in diameter, and were fixed into flat
circular stone bases.

[Illustration: 108a.jpg WOODEN HEAD-REST]

Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a head-rest in my possession
obtained at Gebelen (XIth dynasty): the foot of the head-
rest is usually solid, and cut out of a single piece of
wood.

[Illustration: 108b.jpg PIGEON ON WHEELS]

Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a sketch by Petrie, _Hawara,
Biahmu, and Arsinoe_, pl. xiii. 21. The original, of rough
wood, is now in the Ashmolean Museum at Oxford.

The family crowded themselves together into two or three rooms in
winter, and slept on the roof in the open air in summer, in spite of
risk from affections of the stomach and eyes; the remainder of the
dwelling was used for stables or warehouses. The store-chambers
were often built in pairs; they were of brick, carefully limewashed
internally, and usually assumed the form of an elongated cone, in
imitation of the Government storehouses. For the valuables which
constituted the wealth of each household--wedges of gold or silver,
precious stones, ornaments for men or women--there were places of
concealment, in which the possessors attempted to hide them from robbers
or from the tax-collectors. But the latter, accustomed to the craft of
the citizens, evinced a peculiar aptitude for ferreting out the hoard:
they tapped the walls, lifted and pierced the roofs, dug down into the
soil below the foundations, and often brought to light, not only the
treasure of the owner, but all the surroundings of the grave and