Choisy imagines the procedure after the obelisk had attained a vertical position to have been to fill in the space between the obelisk and the pedestal with filled sand-bags, a long sausage-shaped bag having been placed in the slot in the pedestal. The bags were then to be perforated {51} one by one until the obelisk rested on its edge and the long bag only. The empty bags were to be withdrawn from under the obelisk and finally the long bag opened and the material removed through the slot. This may possibly have been the method used with medium-sized blocks, such as sarcophagus-lids, but I very much doubt whether any bag would stand half the weight of the Aswân obelisk without bursting, besides, the crushing of the inner edge of the slots in the pedestals of all the obelisks at Karnak, except that of the standing obelisk of Ḥatshepsôwet (cf. section 40), is not explainable by Choisy’s ‘long-bag’ theory. The book would have been infinitely improved if it has contained a few references. J. COUYAT et P. MONTET, _Les inscriptions hiéroglyphiques et hiératiques du Ouâdi Hammâmât_, in _Mémoires publiés par les membres de l’Institut français du Caire_, vol. XXXIV, p. 54 (Imprimerie de l’Institut français).—References to iron-workers from inscriptions on the rocks at Wady Hammâmât (section 25). (51) DECOURDEMANCHE (J. A.), in _Annales du Service_, vol. XII, p. 215, gives details of various systems of lineal measures which he suggests are derived from an original talent, taken from measures on the Abydos monuments excavated by Amélineau in 1899 (see section 18). DECOURDEMANCHE, _Poids et Mesures_, published at Paris by Gautier-Villars, 1909.—This gives a large number of systems of the divisions of the cubit and foot and shews clearly how cautious one must be in deducing anything from a single unit of measurement unless it is subdivided as in the case, for example, of a cubit rod. It is possible, in this book, to find an ancient example of almost any unit of length which could be imagined.