When his work is criticised, as it has often, and not unjustly, been, as hasty and wanting in thoroughness, let it be remembered that, with all its faults, it was done under conditions which would have driven most men mad, and that thoroughness and minute care are not precisely the qualities which are encouraged by the knowledge that the exchequer is empty, and that there is no prospect of being able to pay the workmen unless one can catch a wayward prince in a favourable mood. All things considered, the wonder is, not that so much was overlooked and left undone, but that so much was actually accomplished under such maddening conditions. His main object was to form such a Museum in Egypt that it would no longer be possible for the representatives of the European powers to excuse their spoliation by the suggestion that Egypt was unable to safeguard her own treasures of antiquity. With this end in view he was indefatigable in the work of excavation, doing his utmost to gather from Memphis, Thebes, Abydos, Tanis, and other famous sites, such a collection of historical monuments as should render the creation of a permanent home for them a crying necessity. Erelong he had so far succeeded that his collection included fine statues of Ramses II, the well-known Amenartas, the so-called Hyksos Sphinxes, the Triumphal Stele of Thothmes III, and a great mass of amulets from the cemeteries of Memphis, Abydos, and Thebes. To house these treasures he was provided with a set of miserable buildings which were of no use for any other purpose--a deserted mosque which was falling into ruin, some filthy sheds, and a dwelling-house alive with vermin, in which he lived himself. Making the most of this heap of ruins, he improvised pedestals for the statues and cases for the amulets, and turned his early training as a drawing-master to account in the painting of the decorations of his crazy walls. The incident which finally determined Said to yield to the importunity of his energetic Director of Antiquities was highly characteristic, both of the daring and persistence of Mariette, and the waywardness of the ruler with whom he had to deal. One of the chief hindrances to the erection of the Museum was the fact that the excavations, though highly productive of objects of historic interest, had as yet yielded nothing in the way of gold or jewellery, and Said, a thorough Oriental, cared but little for researches which only produced inscribed or sculptured stones. Early in 1859, Mariette’s workmen at Drah-Abou’l-Neggah, near Thebes, discovered the splendid gilded sarcophagus of the Queen Aah-hotep. Mariette sent orders for it to be sent to Cairo at once; but meanwhile the Mudir of Keneh had laid hands on it, opened it in his harem, and, throwing aside the mummy, took possession of the fine set of jewellery which the coffin contained, and hurried off by boat to present it to the Khedive as an offering from himself.