"That is all," sighed the Dean. "It seems merely a laudatory sentiment."
"Who was Ra?" asked Kit, curiously, running her hand around the top of the urn.
"The Sun god. His symbol was the circle. You see it here."
Kit repeated again, slowly:
"'He shall lie in peace, encompassed by Ra,' That means surrounded by Ra, doesn't it, Uncle Cassius?" She picked up the um in both hands and shook it close to her ear.
"My dear child, do be careful," cried the Dean; "it is priceless."
But Kit put it under one arm as though it had been a milk pail and tapped around the inside with her knuckles, listening.
"That's a perfectly good hollow jug," she said, solemnly. "Just you tap it, and listen, uncle. I'll bet a cookie they've hidden something inside the outside and that Ra has guarded it all these years."
"Just a moment, just a moment, my dear," exclaimed the Dean, smiling like a happy boy. "You've given me an idea. This may be a cryptogram, or an ideographic cypher. Just a moment, now; don't speak to me."
He sat down at the desk and figured laboriously for nearly twenty minutes, working out the inscription in cypher, while Kit stared at him delightedly. After all, it was rather gratifying, she thought, to have somebody in the family who could take a little remark made thousands of years ago in old Egypt and make sense out of it to-day. She waited patiently until he had finished. His hands were trembling as he reached for the urn.