The tomb furniture is excellent of its kind and the cartonnage case of the mummy is well made and rather finely decorated." "Yes, I thought it quite handsome.

But can you explain to me why, after taking all that trouble to decorate it, they should have disfigured it with those great smears of bitumen ?" "Ah!" said Mr.Jellicoe, "that is quite an interesting question.

It is not unusual to find mummy-cases smeared with bitumen; there is a mummy of a priestess in the next gallery which is completely coated with bitumen excepting the gilded face.

Now, this bitumen was put on for a purpose--for the purpose of obliterating the inscriptions and thus concealing the identity of the deceased from the robbers and desecrators of tombs.

And there is the oddity of this mummy of Sebek-hotep.
Evidently there was an intention of obliterating the inscriptions.