* We still possess school exercises of the XIXth and XXth dynasties, e.g. the Papyrus Anastasi n IV., and the Anastasi Papyrus n V., in which we find a whole string of pieces of every possible style and description—­business letters, requests for leave of absence, complimentary verses addressed to a superior, all probably a collection of exercises compiled by some professor, and copied by his pupils in order to complete their education as scribes; the master’s corrections are made at the top and bottom of the pages in a bold and skilful hand, very different from that of the pupil, though the writing of the latter is generally more legible to our modern eyes (Select Papyri, vol. i. pls. lxxxiii.-cxxi.).

** Evidence of this state of things seems to be furnished by all the biographies of scribes with which we are acquainted, e.g. that of Amten; it is, moreover, what took place regularly throughout the whole of Egypt, down to the latest times, and what probably still occurs in those parts of the country where European ideas have not yet made any deep impression.

[Illustration:  065.jpg THE STAFF OF A GOVERNMENT OFFICER IN THE TIME OF THE MEMPHITE DYNASTIES]

Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a wall-painting on the tomb of Khunas.  Two scribes are writing on tablets.  Before the scribe in the upper part of the picture we see a palette, with two saucers, on a vessel which serves as an ink-bottle, and a packet of tablets tied together, the whole supported by a bundle of archives.  The scribe in the lower part rests his tablet against an ink-bottle, a box for archives being placed before him.  Behind them a nakht-khrou announces the delivery of a tablet covered with figures which the third scribe is presenting to the master.

[Illustration:  THE CRIER ANNOUNCES THE ARRIVAL OF FIVE REGISTRARS OF THE TEMPLE OF KING USIRNIRI, OF THE Vth DYNASTY]

Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a picture in the tomb of Shopsisuri.  Four registrars of the funerary temple of Usirniri advance in a crawling posture towards the master, the fifth has just risen and holds himself in a stooping attitude, while an usher introduces him and transmits to him an order to send in his accounts.

Thus equipped, the young man ended usually by succeeding his father or his patron:  in most of the government administrations, we find whole dynasties of scribes on a small scale, whose members inherited the same post for several centuries.  The position was an insignificant one, and the salary poor, but the means of existence were assured, the occupant was exempted from forced labour and from military service, and he exercised a certain authority in the narrow world in which he lived; it sufficed to make him think himself happy, and in fact to be so.  “One has only to be a scribe,” said the wise man, “for the scribe takes the lead of all.”  Sometimes,