ADDRESS TO AN EGYPTIAN MUMMY IN BELZONI’S EXHIBITION.
The success of the ancient Egyptians in preserving their dead by the operation of embalming was surprisingly great. For a proof of this we have only to turn to the fact of our viewing at this day the bodies of persons who lived three thousand years since. This ingenious people applied the powers of art to the purposes of their religion, and did all they could to keep the human frame entire after death, fondly thinking that if it proved a fit dwelling, its former inhabitant, the soul, would return at some distant period, and animate it afresh, even upon earth.
And thou hast walked about, (how strange a story!)
In Thebes’s street three thousand years ago;
When the Memnonium was in all its glory,
And time had not begun to overthrow
Those temples, palaces, and piles stupendous,
Of which the very ruins are tremendous.
Speak! for thou long enough hast acted dummy,—
Thou hast a tongue, come, let us hear its tune;