Several drawings found on old monuments show us the Egyptians engaged in this work. The papyrus barks formed a sort of rafts of reeds, judging by these drawings which represent the oarsmen standing upright on the boats. These latter were small; attempts made later to build them of larger size appear to have failed. As a general rule, the wood intended for the construction of the larger vessels had to be imported. The many pictures on monuments and the large number of models found, enable a very fair idea of the shape of the ancient Egyptian ship to be formed, and it can be seen at the same time that these shapes were little changed. Before describing these models, it will be rather interesting to note that, as a general rule, the oldest ones are not reproduced in accordance with the proportions adopted in practice; they are too high and too broad for the length. Taken by themselves, the stem and the sternpost are well shown, but the intermediate body is too short. The cause of this must be sought in the fact that these models are made from nature and not by taking the dimensions of the boats from carefully prepared drawings. Proceeding in this way, it is very difficult to give exactly the relative dimensions of the boats, especially in the relations between length and breadth. This is why the vessels are drawn so often with too little length. So, many old models must be accepted with the necessary reserves. The vessels shown in mural paintings are generally much better proportioned than those represented by models. In the mural paintings, when the boat is shown in profile, there was no reason to consider the beam; all the same, the figures are often too large. According to ~Belger~ (_“Zeitschrift für Aegyptische Sprache und Altertumskunde”_, XXXIII, p. 24), the models which have been found should be placed in two classes: _a_) solid models made from a massive piece of wood, and _b_) hollow models which are, evidently, a more faithful reproduction of the ship. Belger also shows that, in group _a_, the parts painted _white_ must be considered as not existing, while those painted _brown_ really do exist. It appears, generally, from the examination of these models that the Egyptian boats were not of deep draught; they had, necessarily, to draw but little water on account of the small depth and the frequent changes in the navigable portions of the river. The mural paintings, on their side, show that the bottom length was one-third of the total length. (~Ermann~, p. 637; ~Belger~, p. 25, XXXIII-1895, et id. p. 26.) [Sidenote: II 8] The boats were flat-bottomed with very low sides, so that, in order to prevent the water from coming in, movable upper sides were often used. The outside planking was smooth (all the models are worked in this way) and the boats were finished with neither stem nor sternpost. The keel, in like manner, was not shown on the models, but this would not allow us to say, however, that it never really existed.