The Ely miner. [volume] (Ely, Minn.) 1895-1986, 1911-08-11

| f. lOTc the Ol
Great Pyramid of Cheops, or Khu-
flu. 1t still stands there, eight
miles from Cairo, defying time,
the elements and the vandals, all
working together, barely able to
stretch its skin. Psychologists worked
at it; Napoleon fought one of his
splendid battles in it's shadow. And
an American, Dow Covington, mas
brought out the latest word from It's
mysterious depths; he has almost
solved its secret.
Mr.. Covington has cleared every
passage that can be found. He has
made it possible for visitors to reach
the mysterious subterranean chamber
within its shaft, which goes as far
down as the level of the Nile in 2170
B. C.
Best of all, he has cleared the sim
gle remaining course just above the
sands of the desert and revealed to
the world that its outer sheath
was of pure white limestone,
which nobody knew before, be-
cause the great mass of stone had
been used as common quarry for
thousands of years. The limestone
sheathing makes a mosque In Egypt
today. When the tomb of Cheops was
first reared it was as white as mar
BILE mansion of our times. But 1t is not
so now.
Few of us can realize what thirty
seven centuries before Christ really
means. That is 5,611 years ago. The
technical work of those days was mar
velous. The masonry is absolutely
unrivaled-there is nothing better in
all the world today. Monuments and
palaces have come and have gone
hundred times since the great pyra-
mid was built. They have persisted;
1t remains.
For twenty years 100000 men toiled
at the stones. They built their great
pile facing exactly north. and south.
They chose a base of nearly sew
enth of a mile, 761 feet, to be exact.
This was a plot covering nearly Ii
acres. There were 21O perfect courses
of stone almost invisibly Joined. of
Mokattem limestone blocks. At an
angle Of little more than fifty-one de-
grees it's four sides swept up, tapering
to the pointed apex, 431 feet above the
ground.
In it were $4,000, 900 cubic feet of
stone, put up by people who had no
modern machinery. There are about
100000 individual blocks. Treated
for centuries as public quarry, all it's
outer stones and facings have been
taken to Cairo and elsewhere, chiefly
for mosque construction. The anti
quaries never knew about this outside
sheath until Mr. Covington of America
came there with permission from the
British governments to make his ex-
plorations.
Mt. Covington began his work nine
years ago, making his camp in the
shadow of the great pyramid. He
started where the Caliph Mamoun left
| off In S18 A. D., nearly LOO years ago.
It was Mamoun who forced the first
passage into tho stern depths of the
monster of stone, but after he found
1t nothing more was done for CEN
turtles Whole generations came and
went before anything was learned OF
the mystery.
First Of all the American searcher
cleared away all the debris. Then he
started at the descending or entrance
passage, just below it's granite plugs,
and found the mysterious chamber be-
low the ground-burrowed out of the
living rock beneath the mighty pile
above-"The stones of darkness and
the shadow of death" What this
chamber was for is not yet known.
The passage leading to it may now be
used by cautious visitors. 1t is $50
feet long and through the natural rock
slopes down not half an inch out of
plumb. You must go on your hands
and knees because it is but four feet
high and little more than three feet
wide.
When he got to the bottom of this
chamber Mr.. Covington realized that
there was more to do. He found a
well shaft, 1872 feet long, piled up with
cleared away there started a current
of strong, fresh air. 1t swept down
the entrance passage, up the well
shaft, thence down the descending
passage out by the forced passage
made by Mr.. Mamoun. Immediately
the temperature dropped 2 degrees.
When Mr.. Covinsvcn cleared the de-
bris from the lower end of the kings
chamber south air channel, 174 feet
long, he reduced the temperature
again.
The ordinary man may but visit the
great pyramid-or any Of the others,
for THAI matter. Unless he have au-
thority from the British government.
which has Sir CASTOR Maspero as its
director general of antiques, no man
Is allowed to touch a single pebble,
much less explore. But Mr.. Covington
did such good work at the beginning
that he has been authorized to clear
away the sixty-nine feet of debris
which 0bstructs the upper and outer
end of the channel which leads to the
.. great chamber of the king-the great
Cheops, or Khufu, himself Then for
the first time In history the interior
Of this wonder Of the world will be
free from all distractions
Beneath the great Kings chamber,