An initial distinction between these royal statues and the portraits of private individuals is found in the materials employed. For subjects even of high rank, wood or limestone was good enough, but when the august person of the monarch had to be immortalized a substance which was at once harder and more beautiful was employed. The Egyptians had no marble, and when they wished to do particular honour to their models they made use of those volcanic rocks, whose close grain and dusky brilliance of tone make them resemble metal. The slowness and difficulty with which these dense rocks yielded to the tools of the sculptor increased the value of the result, while their hardness added immensely to their chances of duration. It would seem that figures which only took form under the tools of skilful and patient workmen after years of persevering labour might defy the attacks of time or of human enemies. Look at the statue on the next page. It is very different from the figures we have been noticing, although it resembles them in many details. Like many of his subjects the king is seated. His head, instead of being either bare or covered with the heavy wig, is enframed in that royal head-dress which has been known, ever since the days of Champollion, as the _klaft_.[206] It consists of an ample band of linen covering the upper part of the forehead, the cranium, and the nape of the neck. It stands out boldly on each side of the face, and hangs down in two pleated lappets upon the chest. The king's chin is not shaved like those of his subjects. It is adorned like that of a god with the long and narrow tuft of hair which we call _the Osiride beard_. At the back of Chephren's head, which is invisible in our illustration, there is a hawk, the symbol of protection. His trunk and legs are bare; his only garment is, in fact, the _schenti_ about his middle. His left hand lies upon his knee, his right hand holds a rod of some kind. The details of the chair are interesting. The arms end in lions' heads, and the feet are paws of the same animal. Upon the sides are figured in high relief the two plants which symbolize the upper and lower country respectively; they are arranged around the hieroglyph _sam_, signifying _union_. [206] This is a Coptic word meaning _hood_. [Illustration: FIG. 205.--Statue of Chephren. Height five feet seven inches. Boulak. Drawn by G. Bénédite.] The other statue, which now consists of little more than the head and trunk, differs from the first only in a few details. The chair is without a back, and, curiously enough, the head is that of a much older man than the Chephren of the diorite statue. This difference makes it pretty certain that both heads were modelled directly from nature.