of art presents anything to be compared with the realism of the ancient Egyptian sculptor. Unfortunately for the completeness of his art, the absolute dominance of the need for recognisable likeness in the head limited his work in other respects. So long as the head was a success, the rest of the body did not matter so much; and consequently we have, even in such fine examples as the Ti and the Ranefer, a noble head joined to a body which is much less thoroughly studied, while in examples of poorer quality the contrast between the care with which the head is worked out and the rude blocking out of the torso and the extremities is almost ludicrous. Still, Egyptian art, like all art, is entitled to be judged by its best, and not, as has so often been done, by its worst; and even when we admit all its limitations the fact remains that to charge it with incapacity to interpret individuality is, to anyone who is familiar with its best work, merely ridiculous. The case is the same when we turn to the criticisms which have been directed against the other great branch of Egyptian sculpture--its relief-work. The great reliefs of the temples, with their battle pictures and scenes of offerings, are what at once commands the attention and invites the criticism. We are told, and very justly so far, that “Kings, gods, prisoners, the smiting champion, and the transfixed victim are all equally expressionless. Clearly the idea that art can be charged with, and visibly body forth, the emotions and ideas of the human mind was never grasped by Egyptian sculptors”; but who in the world ever dreamed of taking the vast advertisements of the glory and valour of Pharaoh, for that is what the battle reliefs of Karnak and Medinet Habu are--contract work, at so much the square yard--as fair representatives of the delicate and most decorative work which has given us the tomb-reliefs of the Old Kingdom? In some respects Egyptian relief-work is decidedly inferior to the remarkable animal sculpture with which the Assyrian kings decorated their palaces. The Egyptian sculptor rarely attempts anything like the difficulty of the problems of motion which the Assyrian tackled with such dash and light-heartedness, and when he does make the attempt his work is apt to seem stiff beside that of his rival, whose hunting scenes have rarely been equalled; but in his portrayal of quiet scenes of home, field, and farmyard the Egyptian comes to his own again, and it is difficult to imagine anything more effective as wall decoration than his quiet and unstrained work, which, unlike that of the bitter Assyrian, almost invariably leaves a pleasant impression on the mind.