The decoration of palaces and houses was not less sumptuous than that of the sepulchres, but it has been so completely destroyed that we should find it difficult to form an idea of the furniture of the living if we did not see it frequently depicted in the abode of the double. The great armchairs, folding seats, footstools, and beds of carved wood, painted and inlaid, the vases of hard stone, metal, or enamelled ware, the necklaces, bracelets, and ornaments on the walls, even the common pottery of which we find the remains in the neighbourhood of the pyramids, are generally distinguished by an elegance and grace reflecting credit on the workmanship and taste of the makers.* The squares of ivory which they applied to their linen-chests and their jewel-cases often contained actual bas-reliefs in miniature of as bold workmanship and as skilful execution as the most beautiful pictures in the tombs: on these, moreover, were scenes of private life--dancing or processions bringing offerings and animals.** * The study of the alabaster and diorite vases found near the pyramids has furnished Petrie with very ingenious views on the methods among the Egyptians of working hard stone. Examples of stone toilet or sacrificial bottles are not unfrequent in our museums: I may mention those in the Louvre which bear the cartouches of Dadkerî Assi (No. 343), of Papi I., and of Papi II., the son of Papi I.; not that they are to be reckoned among the finest, but because the cartouches fix the date of their manufacture. They came from the pyramids of these sovereigns, opened by the Arabs at the beginning of this century: the vase of the VIth dynasty, which is in the Museum at Florence, was brought from Abydos. ** M. Grébaut bought at the Great Pyramids, in 1887, a series of these ivory sculptures of the Ancient Empire. They are now at the Gîzeh Museum. Others belonging to the same find are dispersed among private collections: one of them is reproduced on p. 249 of this History. [Illustration: 252.jpg STELE OF THE DAUGHTER OF KHEOPS] Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a photograph by Bochard. One would like to possess some of those copper and golden statues which the Pharaoh Kheops consecrated to Isis in honour of his daughter: only the representation of them upon a stele has come down to us; and the fragments of sceptres or other objects which too rarely have reached us, have unfortunately no artistic value.