They devoted all their efforts to beautifying the principal towns of Egypt, and caused important works to be carried on in most of them--at Karnak, in the great temple of Amon, at Luxor, at Bubastis, at Tanis, at Tell-Mokhdam, and in the sanctuary of Abydos. At the latter place, Khâsoshûshrî Nofirhotpû restored to Khontamentit considerable possessions which the god had lost; Nozirri sent thither one of his officers to restore the edifice built by Usirtasen I.; Sovkûmsaûf II. dedicated his own statue in this temple, and private individuals, following the example set them by their sovereigns, vied with each other in their gifts of votive stehe. The pyramids of this period were of moderate size, and those princes who abandoned the custom of building them were content like Aûtûabrî I. Horû with a modest tomb, close to the gigantic pyramids of their ancestors. In style the statues of this epoch show a certain inferiority when compared with the beautiful work of the XIIth dynasty: the proportions of the human figure are not so good, the modelling of the limbs is not so vigorous, the rendering of the features lacks individuality; the sculptors exhibit a tendency, which had been growing since the time of the Usirtasens, to represent all their sitters with the same smiling, commonplace type of countenance. There are, however, among the statues of kings and private individuals which have come down to us, a few examples of really fine treatment. The colossal statue of Sovkhotpû IV., which is now in the Louvre side by side with an ordinary-sized figure of the same Pharaoh, must have had a good effect when placed at the entrance to the temple at Tanis: his chest is thrown well forward, his head is erect, and we feel impressed by that noble dignity which the Memphite sculptors knew how to give to the bearing and features of the diorite Khephren enthroned at Gîzeh. The sitting Mirmâshaû of Tanis lacks neither energy nor majesty, and the Sovkûmsaûf of Abydos, in spite of the roughness of its execution, decidedly holds its own among the other Pharaohs. [Illustration: 414.jpg STATUE OF HARSÛF IN THE VIENNA MUSEUM] Drawn by Boudier, from a photograph by Ernest de Bergmann. From Dahshur, now at Gîzeh; it has been published in Morgan’s Dahshur.