These 'Instructions' were held in high esteem as text-books and writing exercises in schools--a circumstance to which we owe the preservation of many of them. For a considerable number of important and interesting poems, letters, and narratives are only known to us from school exercise-books. The pupil at the 'Chamber of Instruction' wrote out about three pages of these each day, as a means of improving his writing, as a model of style in composition, and for purposes of edification. These exercises {22} abound in errors of spelling and grammar, having sometimes the master's corrections elegantly written above in red. As may be imagined, a schoolboy's scrawl over three thousand years old is no easy thing to translate; but _faute de mieux_ the Egyptologist welcomes any version, even the most barbarous. Fortunately, the MS. from which these translations come is not of this kind; a detailed description of it may interest some of my readers. The Prisse Papyrus, which is well known by name and a few extracts to all persons conversant with Egyptian matters, was acquired in Egypt by M. Prisse d'Avennes, a French archaeologist of distinction, and published by him in 1847.[5] The exact place of its discovery is unknown. M. Prisse is said to have bought it of one of the _fellahin_ whom he employed to make excavations at the burial-ground of Thebes. This man pretended that he had no knowledge of its finding, as he was trying to sell it for a friend. It is believed that it was actually taken by the Arab from the tomb of one of the Kings 'Entef;[6] but this is not certain. If it were, it would perhaps enable us to fix a _terminus ad que,_ for the writing of this copy, although tombs often contain objects of later date. The papyrus was presented in about 1847, by M. Prisse, to the {23} Bibliotheque Nationale (in those days the Bibliotheque Royale) at Paris, where it still is, divided and glazed in the usual manner. Spread out flat, it measures about 23 ft. 7 in., with an average height of 5 7/8 in., which is about the usual height of papyri of the Eleventh and Twelfth Dynasties. It contains at present eighteen pages of heavy and bold black and red writing, in the so-called hieratic character. At first sight it appears to be in perfect preservation, being entirely free from the cracks and decay which mar many fine manuscripts of far later date; but an examination of the contents shows that an unknown quantity has been torn off from the commencement. Originally the roll contained at least two books, of which we have the latter part of one and the whole of the other. Between these there is a blank space of some 53 in. The characters are clearly and carefully made, but are not always correct, as though the copyist had a badly written or very cursive copy before him, and was not always sure of his spelling.