We see, too, the ships being loaded with the produce of Punt. The Egyptians are bringing the cargo across a gangway from the shore to the ship. There are bags of incense and gold, ebony, tusks of elephants, skins of panthers, frankincense trees piled up in confusion on the ships’ decks. Monkeys, too, have been obtained, which have been truthfully depicted as amusing themselves by walking along the truss. Any one who has ever taken a monkey on board a sailing ship knows that the first thing he does is to run up the rigging. It is a small point this, but it shows that the artist was anxious to be truthful and exact in his details. The hieroglyphic inscription accompanying this illustration is virtually the bill of lading. It gives a detailed and accurate account of all the articles destined for transport. The translation of this according to Dr. Duemichen is: “The loading of the ships of transport with a great quantity of the magnificent products of Arabia, with all kinds of precious woods of the holy land, with heaps of incense-resin, with verdant incense trees, with ebony, with pure ivory, with gold and silver from the land of Amu, with the (odorous) Tepes wood and the Kassiarind, with Aham-incense and Mestemrouge, with Anau-monkeys, Kop-monkeys, and Tesem-animals, with skins of leopards of the South, with women and children. Never has a transport (been made) like this one by any king since the creation of the world.” [Illustration: FIG. 7. EGYPTIAN SHIP (IN THE TEMPLE OF DEIR-EL-BAHARI).] Finally (see Fig. 7) we are shown three vessels of the fleet returning to Thebes richly laden. The accompanying inscription in this case reads: “The excursion was completed satisfactorily; happy arrival at Thebes to the joy of the Egyptian soldiers. The (Arabian and Ethiopian) princes, after they had arrived in this country, bring with them costly things of the land of Arabia, such as had never yet been brought that could be compared with what they brought, by any of the Egyptian kings, for the supreme majesty of this god Amon-Ra, Lord of the terrestrial thrones.” “If the expedition really landed at Thebes,” says Dr. Edouard Naville, “we must suppose that at that time, long before Ramases II., who is said to have made a canal from the Nile to the Red Sea, there was an arm of the Nile forming a communication with the sea, which extended much farther north than it does now.”[8]