Chapter 68

. This is the case not only in the papyri, but in tombs like that of Bakenrenef.

1. The later texts say “the eldest of the five gods.”

2. _Who presenteth the tablets and guardeth the door of Osiris._ See picture of Thoth in the Psychostasia.

3. Where Osiris renews his birth.

4. _The Thigh._ The iron instrument so called used in the ceremony of ‘Opening the mouth’ of the deceased.

5. _Sound of heart_ implies that the conscience of the deceased has been recognized as blameless.

6. _Oxen and birds of various kinds._ These kinds are named in the text, but we have no corresponding European names.

7. _I have come to an end._ The first two words of this chapter are evidently copied from the end of the last, but instead of _menḥu_, ‘sacrificial slaughter,’ the notion of _menȧ_ or _meni_ ‘coming to an end,’ has been substituted. Later texts read “I do _not_ come to an end.”

8. _Its hair._ All this paragraph sounds very strangely, and translators are tempted to understand that the _hair_, _side-lock_, and _skin_ of the deceased are acted upon by the winds.[82] But the feminine suffix shows that the converse is the case. The speaker catches the air and distributes it, as we are afterwards told, to the faithful departed.

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Footnote 82:

But we “catch Time by the forelock,” and so did the Greeks.

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