Page:The Pharaohs and their people; scenes of old Egyptian life and history (IA pharaohstheirpeo00berkiala).pdf/204

 have been ruthlessly searched and the mummies torn to pieces in hopes of plunder, and when all of value had been taken, the dishonoured remains of the queens and princesses appear to have been replaced, without care or ceremony, in their rock-hewn tombs, and burned in heaps. The fire thus kindled has calcined the walls of the tombs and sorely damaged the paintings and inscriptions. A few only have escaped; amongst them is a very perfectly preserved portrait of Tai-ti, the beautiful wife of Amenhotep

The care taken in inspecting, and from time to time removing, the bodies of the kings prevented such wholesale destruction; but little could Thothmes or Rameses have dreamt of the destiny that should befall them. Discovered at last in their final hiding-place, their mummies, together with others of earlier and later date, were conveyed down the sacred stream, and, by a strange irony of fate, are now exhibited amongst other curiosities in a museum.