Proctor, Richard A.: The Great Pyramid: observatory, tomb, and temple (New York, 1883)

THE PROBLEM OF THE PYRAMIDS. 121

surface of that water would reflect the rays of
Alpha Draconis up the ascending passage Β c. The
direction for the south line thus indicated could be
marked, and then the plug left to slide down to the
subterranean chamber. Once a year (supposing
one layer of stones added each year, as Lepsius
surmises) would have sufficed for this operation.

Not only do we thus find a natural and perfect
explanation of the circumstance (hitherto unex-
plained) that the ascending passage is inclined at
the same angle to the horizon as the descending
passage, but precisely as we might expect from a
true theory, we find that other points of difficulty
have here their explanation.1 It is obvious that at
β the casing-stones of the descending passage would
have to be very closely set and carefully cemented,
so that the water used, year after year, in obtaining

1 Most pyramidalists content themselves by assuming, as Sir E.
Beckett puts it, ' that the same angle would probably be used for
both sets of passages, as there tuas no reason for varying it? which
is not exactly an explanation of the relation. Mr, Wackerbarth
has suggested that the passages were so adjusted for the purpose of
managing a system of balance cars united by ropes from one passage
to another ; but this explanation is open, as Beckett points out, to
the fatal objection that the passages meet at their lowest point, not
at their highest, so that it would be rather a puzzle ' to work out
the mechanical idea.' The reflection explanation is not only open
to no such objections, but involves precisely such an application of
optical laws as we should expect from men as ingenious as the
pyramid builders certainly were.