Professor Maspero’s recently issued new catalogue of the Boulak Museum, Cairo, deals with antiquities compared with which those referred to the Roman period in Britain seem but things of yesterday. Many of these archæological treasures, but more particularly the funerary tablets or _stelæ_, cover the enormous period of thirty-eight centuries, a period, too, which ends two thousand years before the Christian era. As to the object of these tablets, which are almost invariably found attached to ancient Egyptian tombs, Professor Maspero gives a new theory. There is no doubt that the ancient Egyptians believed in the immortality of the soul, but coupled with this was a belief in the existence of a something outside the soul and body—a kind of shade or double, called the Ka. The preservation of this Ka was essential to the preservation of the soul; and images of the defunct in which this spirit could dwell were entombed with the mummy. The various scenes of domestic labour and pastoral pursuits were not—as was until recently supposed—inscribed upon the Egyptian tombs merely as records of manners and customs, but were associated with the belief in the Ka. The pursuits carried on in life could by these representations enable the spiritual double to carry on the same line of conduct. Representations of various kinds of food in baked clay, limestone, or other material, formed the food of the Ka, and such things have been found in abundance. According to Professor Maspero’s new theory, the _stela_ or tablet enumerated the funereal offerings of the deceased, and contained a prayer for their continuance. This prayer, repeated by a priest—or passer-by, even—would insure the well-being of the Ka. The name and status of the deceased were also inscribed upon the tablet; for, according to Egyptian ideas, a nameless grave meant no hereafter for its inmate. The catalogue referred to is intended to be a popular guide for the use of visitors, but it contains very much which will be of value to the student.