But although the Egyptian painter made no attempt to imitate the hues of nature in their infinite variety, we find a curious effort in certain Theban paintings to reproduce one of those modifications of local tone which were to attract so many artists of later times. The flesh tints are brown where they are uncovered, and light yellow where they are veiled; the painter thus attempting to show the warm skin shining through the semi-transparence of fine linen.[348] [348] LEPSIUS, _Denkmæler_, part iii. pl. 216. This is, however, but an isolated attempt, and it does not affect the truth of our description of Egyptian painting, and of its conventional methods of using colour. The observations we have made apply equally justly to coloured bas-reliefs and to paintings properly speaking. The latter are only found in the tombs. In the temples the figures which compose the decoration are always engraved upon the walls in some fashion before they are touched with colour, and the office of the painter was restricted to filling in the prepared outlines with colour. It is the same, as a rule, with the steles; but a few exist upon which the painter has had the field to himself. The papyri, too, were illustrated by the artist in colour. Those elaborate examples of the _Ritual of the Dead_, which come from the tombs of princes and of rich subjects, are full of carefully executed vignettes (Figs. 97 and 184, Vol. I.). It is easy to understand why the painter reserved himself for the tomb. The pictures upon the external walls of the temples and upon the pylons were seen in the full glare of a southern sun; so too, at least for a part of the day, were those upon the walls of the courtyards, and upon the shafts of their surrounding columns. Even in the interior many of the decorations would receive direct sunlight from the claustra of the attic, others would be subject to friction from the hands and garments of visitors. Painting by itself would be unfitted for such situations. It would either have its effect destroyed by the direct light, or its colours dulled and damaged by constant touches. Figures carved in the substance of the walls would have a very different duration. When their colours paled with time, a few strokes of the brush would be sufficient to renew their youth, and the combination of colour with relief would give a much more telling result than could be obtained by the use of the latter alone. [Illustration: FIG. 264.--Portrait of Queen Taia. From Prisse.] With the tomb it was very different. In its case neither violent changes of temperature, nor friction, nor the rays of a dazzling sun were to be feared. Its doors were to be ever closed, and the scenes which were entrusted to its walls were to have no spectator but the dead man and his protecting Osiris. To carry out the whole work with the brush was quicker than to associate that instrument with the chisel, and we need therefore feel no surprise that many tombs were so decorated.