We certainly had a feeling of guilty pleasure when we sat in front of Shepheard's Hotel and smoked the wicked little things, and knew that the policeman standing a few feet away did not dare to raise his hand against us.
A very clever young American owns a shop near the hotel. He is a student of Egyptology and a dealer in genuine antiquities, including mummies. While I was nosing through his collection of scarabs, idols, coins, and other time-worn trinkets, he suggested that I purchase a mummy.
"I can get you a gross, if you want them," he replied.
"What would a man do with a gross of mummies?"
"You can give them away. They are very ornamental. Formerly my only customers were colleges and museums. Now I am selling to people who put them in private residences. Nothing sets off an Oriental apartment to better effect, or gives it more colour and atmosphere, as you might say, than a decorated mummy case."
I told him I would not object to the "colour," but would draw the line at "atmosphere." He assured me that after a few thousand years the mortuary remains become as dry as a London newspaper and as odourless as a Congressional investigation.
I followed him into a large back room and saw two beautifully preserved specimens in their rigid overcoats being packed away for shipment to America, while others leaned against the wall in careless attitudes.
What a grisly reflection! Here was a local potentate, let us say Ipekak II. of Hewgag--ruler of a province, boss of his party, proud owner of broad fields and grazing herds. When he died, 1400 B.C., and was escorted to his rock tomb by all the local secret societies, the military company, and a band of music, his friends lowered his embalmed remains into a deep pit and then put in a rock filling and cut hieroglyphics all over the place, telling of his wealth and social importance, and begging all future generations to regard the premises as sacred.
Some two thousand years later along comes a vandal in a cheap store suit and a cork helmet, engages Ipekak's own descendants to pry open the tomb and heave out the rock at fifteen cents per day, hauls the mummy into the daylight, and ships it by luggage van to Cairo, where it is sold to a St. Paul man for $125!