Take, for instance, Maspero’s _Histoire Ancienne_, or Breasted’s _History of Egypt_, and compare the brilliant pictures of ancient Egyptian life which you will find in their pages with the dry summaries of events which passed for Egyptian history fifty years ago. What has made the difference? Simply the fact that in the interval the archæologist has been learning that his business is not only or even chiefly with the great historical monuments of the land with which he is dealing, but, above all, with the small things which made the background of life, “the pots and pans,” as Dr. Macalister puts it, “which are essential if he is to fill in the picture of the ancient life of the region.” The change of view thus brought about is marked by a corresponding change of judgment as to what shall constitute the chief object of search in the excavations which reveal the past to us. In the dawn of excavation it was the big and imposing monument which was eagerly and almost exclusively sought for--very naturally, for it was only by the discovery of such relics that the explorer could hope, in the existing state of knowledge, to justify his work, and to create the interest on the part of the public which would provide him with the funds which were needed for its prosecution. Colossal statues, granite sarcophaguses, intact burials in Egypt, winged human-headed bulls, alabaster slabs carved in relief, cuneiform tablets inscribed with legends of the Creation and the Flood in Mesopotamia; such were the prizes which rewarded and vindicated the labours of men like Mariette, Botta, and Layard in the middle of last century. It was all very natural and inevitable, as things then were; and it is both unjust and unreasonable to denounce the work of such pioneers because they worked with the knowledge and under the conditions of their own time. The science of excavation and the knowledge of its true objects did not exist when they did their work; it had to be slowly and painfully created by experience, and in the process it was inevitable that many things should suffer and that there should be much loss of material which a better instructed generation would have known how to value. These great men would doubtless do their work very differently now; but it is vain to criticise them for not possessing a knowledge which nobody possessed in their day. We owe them rather our gratitude for that they accomplished so much in such unfavourable circumstances.