[Illustration:  027.jpg CAMP OF THE EXPEDITION OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA AT NAG’ ED-DER, 1901.]

The cemetery of Nag’ed-Der is of the usual prehistoric type, with its multitudes of small oval graves, excavated just a little way below the surface.  Graves of this kind are the most primitive of all.  Those at el-’Amra are usually more developed, often, as has been noted, rising to the height of regular brick tombs.  They are evidently later, nearer to the time of the Ist Dynasty.  The position of the Nag’ed-Der cemetery is also characteristic.  It lies on the usual low ridge at the entrance to a desert wadi, which is itself one of the most picturesque in this part of Egypt, with its chaos of great boulders and fallen rocks.  An illustration of the camp of Mr. Reisner’s expedition at Nag’ed-Der is given above.  The excavations of the University of California are carried out with the greatest possible care and are financed with the greatest possible liberality.  Mr. Reisner has therefore been able to keep an absolutely complete photographic record of everything, even down to the successive stages in the opening of a tomb, which will be of the greatest use to science when published.

For a detailed study of the antiquities of the prehistoric period the publications of Prof.  Petrie, Mr. Quibell, and Mr. Randall-Maclver are more useful than that of M. de Morgan, who does not give enough details.  Every atom of evidence is given in the publications of the British explorers, whereas it is a characteristic of French work to give brilliant conclusions, beautifully illustrated, without much of the evidence on which the conclusions are based.  This kind of work does not appeal to the Anglo-Saxon mind, which takes nothing on trust, even from the most renowned experts, and always wants to know the why and wherefore.  The complete publication of evidence which marks the British work will no doubt be met with, if possible in even more complete detail, in the American work of Messrs. Reisner, Lythgoe, and Mace (the last-named is an Englishman) for the University of California, when published.  The question of speedy versus delayed publication is a very vexing one.  Prof.  Petrie prefers to publish as speedily as possible; six months after the season’s work in Egypt is done, the full publication with photographs of everything appears.  Mr. Reisner and the French explorers prefer to publish nothing until they have exhaustively studied the whole of the evidence, and can extract nothing more from it.  This would be admirable if the French published their discoveries fully, but they do not.  Even M. de Morgan has not approached the fulness of detail which characterizes British work and which will characterize Mr. Reisner’s publication when it appears.  The only drawback to this method is that general interest in the particular excavations described tends to pass away before the full description appears.