The chapel itself is of the ordinary type, with its gigantic pylons, its courts surrounded by columns—­each supporting a colossal Osirian statue—­its hypostyle hall, and its mysterious cells for the deposit of spoils taken from the peoples of the sea and the cities of Asia.  His tomb was concealed at a distant spot in the Biban-el-Moluk, and we see depicted on its walls the same scenes that we find in the last resting-place of Seti I. or Ramses II., and in addition to them, in a series of supplementary chambers, the arms of the sovereign, his standards, his treasure, his kitchen, and the preparation of offerings which were to be made to him.  His sarcophagus, cut out of an enormous block of granite, was brought for sale to Europe at the beginning of this century, and Cambridge obtained possession of its cover, while the Louvre secured the receptacle itself.

These were years of profound tranquillity.  The Pharaoh intended that absolute order should reign throughout his realm, and that justice should be dispensed impartially within it.

[Illustration:  322.jpg THE FIRST PYLON OF THE TEMPLE]

There were to be no more exactions, no more crying iniquities:  whoever was discovered oppressing the people, no matter whether he were court official or feudal lord—­was instantly deprived of his functions, and replaced by an administrator of tried integrity.  Ramses boasts, moreover, in an idyllic manner, of having planted trees everywhere, and of having built arbours wherein the people might sit in the shade in the open air; while women might go to and fro where they would in security, no one daring to insult them on the way.  The Shardanian and Libyan mercenaries were restricted to the castles which they garrisoned, and were subjected to such a severe discipline that no one had any cause of complaint against these armed barbarians settled in the heart of Egypt.  “I have,” continues the king, “lifted up every miserable one out of his misfortune, I have granted life to him, I have saved him from the mighty who were oppressing him, and have secured rest for every one in his own town.”  The details of the description are exaggerated, but the general import of it is true.  Egypt had recovered the peace and prosperity of which it had been deprived for at least half a century, that is, since the death of Minephtah.  The king, however, was not in such a happy condition as his people, and court intrigues embittered the later years of his life.  One of his sons, whose name is unknown to us, but who is designated in the official records by the nickname of Pentauirit, formed a conspiracy against him.  His mother, Tii, who was a woman of secondary rank, took it into her head to secure the crown for him, to the detriment of the children of Queen Isit.  An extensive plot was hatched in which scribes, officers of the guard, priests, and officials in high place, both natives and foreigners, were involved.  A resort to the supernatural was at first attempted,