_Pharaoh's Ring_ (Vol. viii., p. 416.).--The mention of the ring conferred
on, or confided to, Joseph by the Pharaoh of Egypt, as stated in Genesis
xli. 42., reminds me of a ring being shown to me some years ago, which was
believed by its then possessor to be the identical ring, or at all events a
signet ring of the very Pharaoh who promoted Joseph to the chief office in
his kingdom.
It was a ring of pure gold, running through a hole in a massive wedge of
gold, about the size, as far as I recollect, of a moderate-sized walnut. On
one of its faces was cut the hieroglyphic (inclosed as usual with the names
of Egyptian kings in an oval), as I was assured, of the king, the friend of
Joseph, as was generally supposed by the readers of hieroglyphics: I
pretend to no knowledge of them myself.
The possessor of the ring, who showed it to me, was Mr. Sams, one of the
Society of Friends, a bookseller at Darlington. Since railroads have {522}
whirled me past that town, I have lost my means of periodical communication
with him. He had, not long before I saw him last, returned from the Holy
Land, where he assured me he had visited every spot that could be
identified mentioned in the New Testament. He had also been some time in
Egypt, and had brought home a great quantity of Egyptian antiquities. The
lesser ones he had in the first floor of a carver and gilder's in Great
Queen Street, between the Freemason's Tavern and Lincoln's Inn Fields. He
was then anxious that these should be bought for the British Museum, and I
think that at his request I wrote to the Earl of Aberdeen to mention this,
and that the answer was that there was already so large a collection in the
Museum, that more, as they must most of them be duplicates, would be of no
use.
What has become of them I know not. I was told that a number of his larger
antiquities, stone and marble, were for some time placed on Waterloo
Bridge, that being a very quiet place, where people might view them without
interruption. I did not happen to be in London that season, and therefore
did not see them.