This is very wonderful art, and proves that the Egyptians excelled all who came after them in the use of the chisel and brush; since they could not only represent in a drawing on the wall of a tomb the gaiety of an evening party and the subject of its conversation, but could make the picture convey as well the talk of the guests to their friends after they returned home!
We had read a good deal about the harem of Rameses III., and it was naturally the first object of our search at Medeenet Haboo. At the first visit we could not find it, and all our expectation of his sweet domestic life was unrealized. It was in vain that we read over the description:—“Here the king is attended by his harem, some of whom present him with flowers, or wave before him fans and flabella; and a favorite is caressed, or invited to divert his leisure hours with a game of draughts.” We climbed everywhere, and looked into every room, but the king and his harem were not visible. And yet the pictures, upon which has been built all this fair fabric of the domestic life of Rameses, must exist somewhere in these two pyramidal towers. And what a gallery of delights it must be, we thought. The king attended by his harem!
Upon a subsequent visit, we insisted that the guide should take us into this harem. That was not possible, but he would show it to us. We climbed a broken wall, from the top of which we could look up, through a window, into a small apartment in the tower. The room might be ten feet by twelve in size, probably smaller. There was no way of getting to it by any interior stairway or by any exterior one, that we could see, and I have no doubt that if Pharaoh lived there he climbed up by a ladder and pulled his harem up after him.
But the pictures on the walls, which we made out by the help of an opera-glass, prove this to have been one of the private apartments, they say. There are only two pictures, only one, in fact, not defaced; but as these are the only examples of the interior decoration of an ancient royal palace in all Egypt, it is well to make the most of them. They are both drawn in spirited outlines and are very graceful, the profile faces having a Greek beauty. In one Rameses III., of colossal size, is represented seated on an elegant fauteuil, with his feet on a stool. He wears the royal crown, a necklace, and sandals. Before him stands a lady of his harem, clad in a high crown of lotus-stems, a slight necklace, and sandals turned up like skates. It must be remembered that the weather was usually very warm in Thebes, especially on this side the river. The lady is holding up a lotus-flower, but it is very far from the royal nose, and indeed she stands so far off, that the king has to stretch out his arm to chuck her under the chin. The Pharaoh's beautiful face preserves its immortal calm, and the “favorite is caressed” in accordance with the chastest requirements of high art.