Note 170 — Chapter III
Walter Armstrong translation
In a Theban tomb described by M. Maspero (Étude sur quelques Peintures funéraires) the tenant, Harmhabi, is made to speak thus: "I have come, I have received my bread; joining the embalmed offerings to my members, I have breathed the scent of the perfumes and incense." It is also possible that this conduit may have been intended to permit of the free circulation of the double, to allow it to pass from its supporting statues to the chapel in which it is honoured. This curious idea, that the spirit of the dead can pass through a very small hole, but that it cannot dispense with an opening altogether, is found among many nations. The Iroquois contrived an opening of very small diameter in their tombs, through which the soul of the dead could pass and repass. See Herbert Spencer, Principles of Sociology, vol. i. p. 192.