“ The historian of future ages grubbing among the iron boilers, shafts, and wheels which are characteristic of the period in which we live, will be puzzled to account for the presence of these immense blocks traced with the records of a civilization four thousand years older, and will either come to the conclusion that the ancient Egyptians used steam-engines, or that hieroglyphics were the ornaments with which we covered our sugar-factories. ”

“ The Egyptian official, however, desirous of proving his zeal in the cause of Western civilization and his incorruptibility, was inexorable, and the statue was dashed to pieces then and there, and pounded into the foundations of the sugar-factory, as an evidence of his comprehension of the utilitarian spirit of the age and his sympathies with the advanced ideas of the late khedive. ”

“ At the same time, a stone inscribed with three languages, which might have proved of immense historical value, was broken up by this enlightened official, who also found sarcophagi very useful for building purposes—the workmen engaged in making the excavations ruthlessly blasting the tombs covered with hieroglyphics, and flinging the mummies into the Nile after appropriating whatever they found of value in the coffins. ”