pyramids are lacking.  Twenty centuries work many changes in the usages of daily life, even in conservative Egypt.  We look almost in vain for herds of gazelles upon the walls of the Theban tombs, for the reason that these animals, in Ramesside times, had ceased to be bred in a state of domestication.  The horse, on the other hand, had been imported into the valley of the Nile, and is depicted pawing the ground where formerly the gazelle was seen cropping the pasturage.  The trades are also more numerous and complicated; the workmen’s tools are more elaborate; the actions of the deceased are more varied and personal.  In former times, when first the rules of tomb decoration were formulated, the notion of future retribution either did not exist, or was but dimly conceived.  The deeds which he had done here on earth in no wise influenced the fate which awaited the man after death.  Whether good or bad, from the moment when the funeral rites were performed and the necessary prayers recited, he was rich and happy.  In order to establish his identity, it was enough to record his name, his title, and his parentage; his past was taken for granted.  But when once a belief in rewards and punishments to come had taken possession of men’s minds, they bethought them of the advisability of giving to each dead man the benefit of his individual merits.  To the official register of his social status, they now therefore added a brief biographical notice.  At first, this consisted of only a few words; but towards the time of the Sixth Dynasty (as where Una recounts his public services under four kings), these few words developed into pages of contemporary history.  With the beginning of the New Empire, tableaux and inscriptions combine to immortalise the deeds of the owner of the tomb.  Khnumhotep of Beni Hasan records in full the origin and greatness of his ancestors.  Kheti displays upon his walls all the incidents of a military life—­parades, war-dances, sieges, and sanguinary battle scenes.  In this respect, as in all others, the Eighteenth Dynasty perpetuated the tradition of preceding ages.  Ai, in his fine tomb at Tell el Amarna, recounts the episode of his marriage with the daughter of Khuenaten.  Neferhotep of Thebes, having received from Horemheb the decoration of the Golden Collar, complacently reproduces every little incident of his investiture, the words spoken by the king, as also the year and the day when this crowning reward was conferred upon him.  Another, having conducted a survey, is seen attended by his subordinates with their measuring chains; elsewhere he superintends a census of the population, just as Ti formerly superintended the numbering of his cattle.  The stela partakes of these new characteristics in wall-decoration.  In addition to the usual prayers, it now proclaims the praises of the deceased, and gives a summary of his life.  This is too seldom followed by a list of his honours with their dates.