The whole structure lacks unity, and there is nothing corresponding to it in this respect anywhere else in Egypt.  The northern half does not join on to the southern, but seems to belong to quite a distinct structure, or the two parts might be regarded as having once formed a single edifice which had become divided by an accident, which the architect had endeavoured to unite together again by a line of columns running between two walls.  The masonry of the hypostyle hall at Karnak was squared and dressed, but the walls had been left undecorated, as was also the case with the majority of the shafts of the columns and the surface of the architraves.  Ramses covered the whole with a series of sculptured and painted scenes which had a rich ornamental effect; he then decorated the pylon, and inscribed on the outer wall to the south the list of cities which he had captured.  The temple of Amon then assumed the aspect which it preserved henceforward for centuries.  The Ramessides and their successors occupied themselves in filling it with furniture, and in taking steps for the repair of any damage that might accrue to the hall or pillars; they had their cartouches or inscriptions placed in vacant spaces, but they did not dare to modify its arrangement.  It was reserved for the Ethiopian and Greek Pharaohs, in presence of the hypostyle and pylon of the XIXth dynasty, to conceive of others on a still vaster scale.

[Illustration:  236.jpg PAINTINGS OF CHAIRS]

Ramses, having completed the funerary chapel of Seti at Qurneh upon the left bank of the river, then began to think of preparing the edifice destined for the cult of his “double”—­that Eamesseum whose majestic ruins still stand at a short distance to the north of the giants of Amenothes.  Did these colossal statues stimulate his spirit of emulation to do something yet more marvellous?  He erected here, at any rate, a still more colossal figure.  The earthquake which shattered Memnon brought it to the ground, and fragments of it still strew the soil where they fell some nineteen centuries ago.  There are so many of them that the spectator would think himself in the middle of a granite quarry.*

     * The ear measures 3 feet 4 inches (feet ?) in length; the
          statue is 58 feet high from the top of the head to the
          sole of the foot, and the weight of the whole has been
          estimated at over a thousand tons.

[Illustration:  237.jpg THE REMAINS OF THE COLOSSAL STATUE OF RAMSES II.  AT THE RAMESSEUM]

     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a photograph by Beato

The portions forming the breast, arms, and thighs are in detached pieces, but they are still recognisable where they lie close to each other.  The head has lost nothing of its characteristic expression, and its proportions are so enormous, that a man could sleep crouched up in the hollow of one of its ears as if on a sofa.  Behind the court overlooked by this colossal statue lay a second court, surrounded by a row of square pillars, each having a figure of Osiris attached to it.  The god is represented as a mummy, the swathings throwing the body and limbs into relief.