The valley, which contains the tombs of which I have been speaking, was devoted to the sepulture of the kings of the nineteenth and twentieth dynasties. The greater part of them were found open, and had, in the times of the Ptolemies, been already rifled. Their desecration, and the injuries they received, ought probably to be attributed to the Persians. I have already said something about the extent and the sculptures of the catacomb of Sethos. The chamber, containing the sarcophagus of this great Pharaoh, had been so carefully concealed, that it fortunately escaped discovery down to our own time. Belzoni, in his investigation of this tomb, finding that a spot which a happy inspiration led him to strike, returned a hollow sound, had the trunk of a palm-tree brought into the gallery, and using it as a ram, battered down the disguised wall. This, at once revealed the chamber which, for more than four thousand years, had escaped Persian, Greek, Roman, and Arab intrusion. In the midst of this chamber stood the royal sarcophagus. This sarcophagus, one of the most splendid monuments of Egypt in its best days, was of the finest alabaster, covered with the most beautiful and instructive sculptures. Who can adequately imagine the emotions of Belzoni at that moment? It had been reserved for him to be the first to behold, to be the discoverer, of what had escaped the keen search of so many races of spoilers and destroyers, the finest monument of the greatest period of Egyptian history. That monument is now in Sir John Soane’s Museum, in Lincoln’s Inn Fields. In the valley to the west of this are some of the tombs of the preceding, the eighteenth, dynasty, that which drove the Hyksos out of Egypt. They have, however, been so dilapidated that not much is to be learnt from them. Behind the great temple-palace of Medinet Haboo are the tombs of the queens and princesses. These, too, have been much injured; and have, at some period, subsequent to that of their original appropriation, been used for the sepulture of private persons. Along the foot of the hills, from the tombs of the queens to the entrance of the Valley of the Kings, is one vast Necropolis for the priests, the official class, and wealthy private individuals. All these fall within the New Empire. Among them, however, are found some instances of royal interments, but they belong to the Old Empire. When we talk of the New Empire we must not forget its date: its palmiest days belong to the time of the Exodus and of Abraham’s visit to Egypt.