The above cut (Fig. 12) shows the two obelisks known as Cleopatra's Needles, as they were seen for a long time at Alexandria. They have both crossed the seas; one was presented to the British nation by Mehemet Ali, and the other, which now stands in Central Park, was a gift to America from the late Khedive of Egypt, Ismail Pasha. The obelisks were usually erected by the kings to express their worship of the gods, and stood before the temple bearing dedications of the house to its particular deity; they were covered with the quaint, curious devices which served as letters to the Egyptians, which we call hieroglyphics, and each sovereign thus recorded his praises, and declared his respect for the special gods whom he wished to honor. They were very striking objects, and must have made a fine effect when the temples and statues and avenues of sphinxes, and all the ancient grandeur of the Egyptians was at its height; and these grave stone watchmen looked down upon triumphal processions and gorgeous ceremonials, and kings and queens with their trains of courtiers passed near them on their way to and from the temple-palaces. It is always interesting to study the houses and homes of a people--domestic architecture, as it is called; but one cannot do that in Egypt. It may almost be said that but one ancient home exists, and as that probably belonged to some royal person, we cannot learn from it how the people lived. There were many very rich Egyptians outside of the royal families, and they dwelt in splendor and luxury; on the other hand, there were multitudes of slaves and very poor people, who had barely enough to eat to keep them alive and enable them to do the work which was set them by their task-masters. The house of which we speak is at Medinet Habou, on the opposite side of the Nile from Karnak (Fig. 13). It has three floors, with three rooms on each floor, and is very irregular in form. But if we have no ancient houses to study in Egypt, we can learn much about them from the paintings which still exist, and we may believe that the cities which surrounded the old temples fully displayed the wealth and taste of the inhabitants. These pictures show the houses in the midst of gardens laid out with arbors, pavilions, artificial lakes, and many beautiful objects, such as we see in the fine gardens of our own day. [Illustration: FIG. 13.--PAVILION AT MEDINET HABOU.] After about 1200 B.C. there was a long period of decline in the architecture of Egypt; occasionally some sovereign tried to do as the older kings had done, but no real revival of the arts occurred until the rule of the Ptolemies was established; this was after 332 B.C., when Alexander the Great conquered the Persians, who had ruled in Egypt about one hundred and ninety-five years.