Artwork information

In 1889 eight illustrations by J R Weguelin, although not this image, were published in The Cat of Bubastes: A Tale of Ancient Egypt, by the popular and prolific historical novelist G A Henty. The plot turns on the accidental killing of a sacred cat:

So esteemed were even the most common animals of the cat tribe that, if a cat happened to die in a house, the inhabitants went into mourning and shaved their eyebrows in token of their grief; the embalmers were sent for, the dead cat made into a mummy, and conveyed with much solemnity to the great catacombs set aside for the burial of the sacred animals.