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JOURNAL 
 
 OF A 
 
 VOYAGE UP THE NILE, 
 
 MADE BETWEEN THE MONTHS OF 
 
 NOVEMBEH, 1848, AND APEIL, 1849. 
 
 BY AN AMERICAN. 
 
 BUFFALO: 
 
 PUBLISHED BY PHINNEY & CO. 
 
 1851. 
 
Entered, accorcling to Act of Congress, in the year 1849, by 
 G. P. PUTNAM, 
 
 in the Clerk’s Office of the District Court for the Southern District 
 of New- York. 
 
PTIBLISHEES’ ADVEETISMENT. 
 
 This graphic account of incidents and researches, on a voyage in 
 1848 and ’49 was furnished for publication at the request of Eev. 
 Francis L. Hawks, L. L. D., as an appropriate companion to his 
 “ Egypt and its Monuments,” and was introduced by him as the con- 
 tribution of an intelligent and educated American, to the researches 
 in Egyptian antiquities. The following are brief extracts from the 
 Notices of several Editors who have examined it. 
 
 “ A work of extreme interest, freshly and ably written.” — Albion, JV. Y. 
 
 “It will be heartily enjoyed by many readers .” — Washington In- 
 telligencer. 
 
 “Racy and picturesque — full of graphic and historic incident.” — 
 St. Louis Intelligencer. 
 
His wandering step, 
 
 Obedient to high thoughts, has visited 
 The awful ruins of the days of old: 
 
 Athens, and Tyre, and Balbec, and the waste 
 Where stood Jerusalem, the fallen towers 
 Of Babylon, the eternal pp’amids, 
 
 Memphis and Thebes, and whatsoe’er of strange 
 Sculptured on alabaster obelisk. 
 
 Or jasper tomb, or mutilated sphinx. 
 
 Dark Ethiopia on her desert hills 
 Conceals. Among the ruined temples there, 
 
 Stupendous columns, and wild images 
 
 Of more than man, where marble demons watch 
 
 The Zodiac’s brazen mystery, and dead men 
 
 Hang their mute thoughts on the mute walls around. 
 
 He lingered, poring on memorials 
 
 Of the world’s youth, through the long burning day 
 
 Gazed on those speechless shapes, nor, when the moon 
 
 Filled the mysterious halls with floating shades 
 
 Suspended he that task, but ever gazed 
 
 And gazed, till meaning on his vacant mind 
 
 Flashed like strong inspiration, and he saw 
 
 The thrilling secrets of the birth of time. 
 
 Shelley — Alasior^ or the Spirit of Solitude. 
 
STEAMER TO EGYPT FROM CONSTANTINOPLE. 
 
 Never was morning more beautiful than that in which we 
 prepared to leave the harbor of the Golden Horn, at Constan- 
 tinople. The thousand varied and beautiful views on all 
 sides, from the “valley of sweet waters,” and the mosque- 
 crowned heights of Eyaub, to Galata’s tower and the gardens 
 of the Seraglio, left a series of pictures impressed on the 
 memory which will long be a source of pleasure. 
 
 The Turkish passengers crowd on board, and the cabins 
 are filled with the wives of the Grand Pacha, Fuchtar Effendi, 
 of two tails, whom the Sultan has recently appointed Governor 
 of Mecca. Finally, his Pacha friends crowd around in their 
 boats to wish him adieu. With them are some European 
 envoys, among whom is a Russian. What a group on this 
 steamer’s deck ! The Pacha and his two attendants ; gentle- 
 men, with about forty servants ; cawasses, eunuchs, <fec. ; 
 Kurds, Tartars, with their shawled caps, Persians, Copts, 
 Greeks, Armenians, Jews — in fact, all the specimens of Mo- 
 hammedanism to be found in the Turkish Empire ; and, save 
 the engineer (an Englishman) I am the only Anglo-Saxon. 
 
 The Pacha’s young and favorite wife, I have once seen 
 distinctly. She is very beautiful. He is a man of noble 
 presence, with the brow and features of a statesman and a 
 
6 
 
 STEAMER TO EGYPT FROM CONSTANTINOPLE. 
 
 great man. Nobler never could have belonged to the Prophet 
 himself. Some of the Pachas who rushed to bid him farewell 
 bent to kiss his feet. Hark ! the gun. The Sultan is in that 
 steamboat, returning from the launch of a vessel of war. All 
 along np the Bosphorus the ships of war are manned to their 
 topmast yards, and the flags flying. I had recently witnessed 
 a still more magnificent scene, where the Sultan embarked at 
 his palace on the Bosphorus to go to mosque. 
 
 Hark ! there is another gun. It is sunset, and the Moslems 
 have all washed, and are kneeling in prayer, with their faces, 
 as ever, turned toward Mecca. What religionists in the 
 world observe the duties of their faith more praiseworthily 
 than these ? The old Pacha, too, so devout ! Pie prays as 
 if it were praying that had given that noble dignity to his 
 face. 
 
 It is over, and now we are under way. Farewell to 
 Pera, and all its varied and picturesque population, roman- 
 tic environs and its Armenian girls. Farewell to Galata, and 
 its miserable streets of Greek fishermen, where I have so often 
 lost my way amidst the throng of traders from every clime ; 
 where the cannie Scotchman from Greenock strikes bargains 
 with the Persian of the Caucasus. P^arewell to the beautiful 
 Bosphorus and the distant Symplegades, whose blue forms 
 it must suffice to see afar off, without running Jason’s risk. 
 P^arewell to the gorgeous Sultan’s palace ; Bebek and its lovely 
 bay, the castle of Venetian splendor ; Tiierapia, and its Greek 
 maidens ; Buyukdere, and its beauties ; and the Asiatic shore ! 
 the ‘Csweet waters,” the beautiful valley, and the Sultan’s 
 lovely, dark-eyed Circassians ! Farewell to Scutari, and the 
 old cypresses of the cemeteries, and Stamboul, that strange 
 compound, so grand at a distance, so filthy within. In its old 
 
7 
 
 STEAMER TO EGYPT FROM CONSTAI^TiKOPLE. 
 
 ! 
 
 ! 
 
 Seraglio, I W^^duld fain yet linger amid the crumbling capitals 
 i built by the Greek Emperors, and the chambers filled with the 
 Caliph’s works ; the libraries of rare books, the portraits of the 
 Sultans — every one of whom rose by the murder of some 
 father or brother ; the beds glittering Avith gems in the dark 
 old Saracenic chambers, Avhere many a Sultan has. been 
 strangled ; the halls, where the tyrant would only show him- 
 self through a steel grating. Farewell to all these : we are 
 now for the land of Egypt to study its lore, as did the Grecian 
 scholars of old, when they left the cool shades of the Academy 
 for the priestly colleges of Sais and Heliopolis. Will it make 
 us Christian, like Alciphron, or unbelieving, like the infidels 
 of France ? 
 
VOYAGE TIP THE NILE. 
 
 The Nile has become nearly as much travelled by Americans 
 as the Rhine ; it requires but a moderate income to jump to 
 Athens, Cairo, Jerusalem ; many an American flag meets the 
 traveller beneath Luxor’s old temple ; hundreds of New-York 
 and Boston names, and those of every city in our States, greet 
 his eye in the tombs of the Remeses, and throughout the mighty 
 wrecks of Thebes. Several go to the Nile as they go up the 
 Clyde or Hudson, to see a change of manner, primitive enjoy- 
 ments, and to enjoy a dry, pure air, and the sweetest of water. 
 And yet, notwithstanding burlesque travels, and “ Punch on 
 the Pyramids,” there are those to be found, who still regard 
 Egypt with the mysterious awe of their earlier days, and in 
 her monuments And the most material evidence in existence 
 of the truth of divine revelation ; — who turn from the unsatis- 
 factory juggleries and traditions of the Holy Land, to the chisel- 
 led and painted memorials of the Pharaohs’ artists, which give 
 us now the authentic records of early Egyptian dynasties, in 
 almost the same condition as when Diodorus saw them two 
 thousand years ago. 
 
 By one of those extraordinary artifices which creates ex- 
 citement by manufacturing opinion, it has been fashionable 
 with a certain class to slight the continued, palpable evidence 
 deduced from the monuments and deciphered language of 
 
10 
 
 VOYAGE UP THE NILE. 
 
 Egypt in favor of Scripture, until the great science of “ Egyp- 
 tology” has been made — in the hands of ingenious philologists, 
 accomplished German infidels, crafty French sophists, decay- 
 ed Italian scholars, and popular appealers to the spirit of infi- 
 delity, which always is alive — to attack the received opinions 
 of the Christian church upon Scripture history and chrono- 
 logy. 
 
 I have been to Egypt, partly to gratify the confirmation 
 of a faith instilled in childhood, and inculcated by teachings of 
 accomplished scholars. ‘ Accident threw in my way, in a tour 
 in Italy three years since, works upon the records of Egypt and 
 theology, which, by the skilful management of the hierogly- 
 phical records, had the effect to darken for a time my Chris- 
 tian faith, and to suggest doubts and conjectures rather than 
 confidence in the Scripture records. 
 
 Perhaps a future volume 'may give me the opportunity of 
 showing more fully than can be done here, what is the true 
 character of those works ; and, I may also relate my own convic- 
 tions after a pretty thorough examination of the whole subject. 
 
 Before undertaking this visit to Egypt, I had enjoyed the 
 advantage of consulting the most important works relating to 
 that country, in the principal public libraries of Europe — in- 
 cluding the British Museum, and the Royal libraries at Paris, 
 Vienna, and Berlin ; and I had studied the Egyptian remains 
 in the chief Museums. The privilege of some acquaintance 
 with several of the learned archaeologists and oriental scho- 
 lars of Europe, had been of essential service in enabling me 
 to prepare for this voyage. Unambitious of fame, I had nothing 
 to lose ; nothing to gain but truth. 
 
 In the works, the names of which the lectures of Gliddon 
 have brought to notice in America, there was much to ques- 
 
VOYAGE UP THE NILE. 
 
 11 
 
 tion. The “ monumenti ” of Rosellini and Champollion are fill- 
 ed with evidences of Scripture fulfilment and Scriptural illus- 
 tration. The philologists of Germany and Paris have found 
 their own refutation in the pages of the Berlin theologists. 
 Some are too absurd, too malicious against Scripture, to be 
 noticed, and are disavowed by moderate archaeologists like 
 Bunsen, who are by no means to he praised for their ortho- 
 doxy : and their sophistry, like that of Fourier and the French 
 infidels on the Zodiacs of Dendera and Esne, so fully exposed 
 in the work of Champollion — “ Fourier and Napoleon” — soon 
 satisfied me that their objections were null, and their study 
 loss of time ; philological ingenuities, ethnological resem- 
 blances were all their objections were founded on. 
 
 The volumes of Osborn, Hengstenberg, and Wilkinson 
 furnish much that is conclusive in confirmation of the Bible ; 
 and after a careful study of these introductory works, perhaps 
 no candid man would need further evidence, that the Egyp- 
 tian monuments do really illustrate and verify the Scriptures. 
 These books, with the great French and Italian works on the 
 hieroglyphics, and the Egyptian grammar and dictionary, will 
 enable me to commence the profitable study of the monuments 
 themselves. 
 
 The eminent scholar Letronne, of Paris, although too 
 Jesuitical and conservative, in an age when looseness and 
 license of opinion was prevailing around him, has grouped 
 much that is valuable of the evidence, from the Egyptian 
 monuments, in favor of Scripture truth. His death, lamented 
 by all the archaeologists of Europe, free-thinking as well as 
 orthodox, has deprived the world of much that is rare as well 
 as definite upon the subject. Part of this, and a summary of 
 the materials that I have collected, will be given to the world 
 
12 
 
 VOYAGE UP THE NILE. 
 
 in a future and more elaborate work. When, upon a subject 
 so vast, a scholar like Letronne hesitates to group his evidence 
 until he can put upon it the stamp of incontrovertibility and 
 completeness, it may seem presumptuous in a novice not to 
 hesitate also. The object of the present pages, however, is 
 more introductory than full ; a mere journal of objects as they 
 presented themselves. 
 
 The purpose of the author in going to the Nile being fully 
 understood, he will describe his voyage and visit to those 
 interesting places, in which difficulty, of necessity, made his 
 voyage adventurous, threw him upon all his fancy for interest, 
 and made him catch enthusiasm from the high religious satis- 
 faction, poetry from the genius of the place, and constant 
 excitement from the noble antiquities of the “ times when the 
 world was young.” 
 
 The Rhine, Switzerland, the Italian lakes, the Tyrol, 
 French, German, Hungarian revolutions, added interest to his 
 journey to the ancient land. He paused in Greece, gazed on 
 Parnassus and the Parthenon, and galloped over Attica. He 
 looked upon the Areopagus, for it was the Mars Hill from 
 which Paul preached of the temples in which dwelt the Living 
 God ; upon Mount Ida and the Troad ; upon the citadel at 
 Smyrna — that one ruin of the seven churches of God, and 
 where Polycarp poured out his blood for Christ ; upon ancient 
 Byzantium’s wall, and modern Constantinople’s beauties ; fol- 
 lowed the Bosphorus to the Symplegades ; roamed with a 
 solitary Greek boatman through the isles of the ^Egean ; gazed 
 upon the isle where St. John wrote the awful Revelation ; 
 breathed the mild air of Rhodes, and followed art and nature 
 with a dreamer’s eye. But what was Lake Leman to the 
 Lake Mareotis ? what were all the rivers in the world when 
 me sees the glorious Nile ? 
 
ATFEH. 
 
 13 
 
 Arriving at Alexandria by the Turkish steamer, I was 
 impatient to rush over the canal, and without waiting for a 
 steamboat, I jumped into one of the most ordinary of the 
 carrying boats, and arrived in two days at Atfeh ; an Arab 
 boy, who knew a little Italian, was my companion. What a 
 delight to behold that broad glorious river ; its rushing waters, 
 its noble palm groves ; the Libyan and Arabian mountains ; 
 the strange life in the Arab towns, and all the varied novelties 
 of oriental life and scenery ! 
 
 It was in the latter part of November, 1848, that, at Atfeh, 
 I procured a traveller’s boat of the agent of the Oriental 
 Company, and began my voyage up the Nile. The rich loam 
 of its banks told stories of its deposits, as the soundings in 
 Alexandria’s harbor did to Herodotus ; and proofs of the ex- 
 haustions of Nubia’s soil gave increased certainty to the cor- 
 rectness of Scriptural chronology. Geologists have ascertained 
 for us some facts, but the claim of ten thousand years for the 
 world’s history of man finds, apparently, but doubtful support 
 from the Delta of the Nile. Deltas have yet to tell their tale, 
 and Biblical Geology is yet to be written. 
 
 I had some knowledge of the vulgar Arabic, which I had 
 studied with the oriental advantages of Paris and Vienna, and 
 in Marcel’s Dictionnaire of the vulgar Arabic. The Arabic 
 rudiments which I had acquired from Causin de Percival and 
 De Sacy enabled me to trafiic for my provisions, and order 
 my dinner with ease ; which, as I had no dragoman, was a 
 matter of convenience. At the end of a short time I had 
 
14 
 
 VOYAGE UP THE NILE. 
 
 learned something of Nile boatmen and Egyptian life, had 
 been satiated with the songs, “La Allah, V Allah y’ lilla,” 
 could understand some of their stories of Antar and Hybla, 
 learned to admire their deep earnestness ; and, on the whole, 
 to think favorably of the Egyptian Arabs. The song for 
 “Hawaga” [the traveller] when he sits down to table, the 
 sleeping song, the watchfire on the bank when the boat pulls 
 to the shore, the wild dance and the sakia, or rude drum, 
 the perfect time of their tunes and chorus — all these were 
 novelties. 
 
 It was the liveliest of Cairo donkeys, and the ugliest and 
 smartest of donkey boys, that took me into Cairo. These 
 donkey boys,' like the Gamins of Paris and the newspaper 
 boys, will tell you every thing. They enliven your rides to the 
 site of Heliopolis, to the fountain and tree of the Holy Family 
 at Mataryeh, to the Citadel of Saracenic and Mohammedan 
 Egypt, telling on its ruined walls tales of Pharaoh Hophra,* 
 Saladin, and Mohammed Ali. One must not pass over the 
 new mosque at Cairo. Its interior architecture is of the finest 
 Saracenic, and when completed, its exterior will be quite as 
 imposing as that of our Capitol at Washington. 
 
 It was pleasant to amble through the groves of palm and 
 acacia that abound in the rich, wild country north of Cairo, 
 to that rare palace of orientalism at Shoubra of Mohammed 
 Ali, whose gardens and kiosks and mosaics, are only rivalled 
 by those of Granada. In these rides, I frequently met Mo- 
 hammed Ali in his carriage, like a plain English gentleman, 
 and he always saluted me with the uniform politeness that he 
 has ever displayed towards Anglo-Saxons. He had recently 
 lost his eldest son, the celebrated Ibrahim Pacha. We heard 
 
 * riis‘ cartouche is in the wall. 
 
CAIRO. 
 
 15 
 
 of his death at Rhodes and all the Arabs to whom I had 
 spoken of it, only replied with the flashing glance of pleasure, 
 “ Allah Akbar,” God is great. The Turks uniformly seemed 
 pleased at the accession of a pious, bigoted Mussulman like 
 Abbas, as the Arabs were glad to be rid of the tyranny of 
 Ibrahim. Abbas was on his way to Mecca. Mohammed Ali 
 merely replied, on hearing of the death of Ibrahim, that it 
 was sad a father should live to see the day that he could not 
 1 egret the death of his own son. Nearly four months after 
 this, Abbas Pacha returned from Constantinople, where he 
 had been to visit the Sultan, on receiving the hatti scheriff 
 investing him with the Pachalik ; which was read soon after 
 his accession, in the citadel. 
 
 On his visit to the Sultan, his Mussulman character 
 gained him the title of Vizier (or Mushir, the highest, next 
 the Sultan) and Pacha of Nubia ; and his return, in February, 
 was celebrated by illuminations throughout Cairo for three 
 days. The English policy was much gratified by this, as 
 they wished to reduce Egypt to a mere province, to weaken 
 French influence there ; and thus it has lost the progressive 
 independence of government that Mohammed Ali had given it. 
 The English consul-general, Hon. Charles Augustus Murray, 
 has availed himself of the weakness of Abbas Pacha’s habits 
 and government, to gain free passage for armed English troops 
 to India, and many other important advantages ; while the 
 Egyptian fleet transferred to the Sultan, and the strong mea- 
 sures of Admiral Parker against the aggression of Russia 
 in the prohibited Bosphorus, has aided England’s design of 
 increasing the power of the Porte, and augmented, also, her 
 own influence in Egypt. Whether the establishment of our 
 own lately appointed consul-general there, Mr. Macauley, who, 
 
16 
 
 VOYAGE UP THE NILE. 
 
 from his long residence in Barbary, is fully acquainted with 
 Turkish manners, language, and diplomacy, may lessen the 
 encroachments of English influence, is a matter that belongs 
 alone to diplomatists. Soon after his arrival there, in the 
 United States frigate “ Constitution,” the assault of one of the 
 Arab soldiers on the person of a passed midshipman, who 
 commanded one of the boats’ crews of men ashore, called for 
 Mr. Macauley’s interference, and he was prompt enough to 
 treat the dissimulating procrastination of the government rela- 
 tive to the punishment of the soldier, with the threat that he 
 would haul down his consular flag, if an answer were not 
 given by sunrise. Such decision, and his course with the 
 Bashaw of Tripoli, will doubtless make his representation of 
 our country valuable. 
 
 I rode to Ghizeh, and over the plain to the pyramids. 
 Dragged to the summit, like thousands of others, I stood on 
 Cheops’ pyramid, where Diodorus had once stood. I could 
 not find the name of Herodotus ; but that of my hotel-keeper 
 was boldly chiselled, and so was “ Day and Martin’s black- 
 ing.” An Arab offered to go up the Cephrenes pyramid for a 
 shilling, then for a sixpence. I was awed before the Sphinx ; 
 for, mutilated as it is, there is something in that expression 
 alike Caucasian and great. I read the records of the fourth 
 dynasty in the chambers ; and found Scripture proofs clear in 
 the records of the tombs on the Libyan chain, stretching 
 through the whole Necropolis to the Saccara and Dashoor 
 pyramids, with its cut mummy-pits. All this, is it not written 
 fully in the three huge volumes of Colonel Vyse ? 
 
 And Memphis — that desolate plain ! One can find interest 
 here, although the temple of Vulcan, the site of which is 
 spoken of by antiquarians as the square where, according to 
 
MEMPHIS. 
 
 17 
 
 Herodotus, the bull Apis was kept, is gone. But the great 
 object of interest is the Acherusian lake, which gave to 
 the Grecians and Romans the mythology which the latter 
 cherished in Campania. Over this, in the sacred boats, so 
 they fabled, the souls of the dead heroes were carried. The 
 dark groves upon its banks, the jutting points, and the setting 
 sun over the shades, made it peculiarly picturesque. I had 
 been over the scene of the mythologies of the ^neid from the 
 grotto of the Sibyl to the Lake Avernus and Elysian Fields, 
 and had e:^lored Greece. How pleasant to trace here the 
 source of these superstitions ! 
 
 As for the statue of Remeses the Great, and his son and 
 daughter, I have seen the copy in the British Museum, and 
 it is far more impressive than the original here lying in the 
 mud. 
 
 The site of Memphis has received its best consideration in 
 the pages of Mr. St. John, Dr. Richardson, Conder, and Shaw 
 — and the confusion on the subject is well accounted for 
 by Gibbon, on the supposition that it extended numbers of 
 miles. But how unsatisfactory the exploration from Ghizeh 
 to Mitraheny ! The fallen colossal statue alone, which is so 
 perfectly revived in the cast in the British Museum, is all. 
 And yet how much is here ! Was it not the first founded 
 city by the immediate descendants of Noah ? That it was 
 the oldest, the decay of its monuments attest, while Thebes 
 remains. Allowing even the superiority of the climate of the 
 Said for the preservation of temples and sculptures, how 
 could the granite of Syene have disappeared so entirely were 
 it not a ruined city, after the decay of the latter Pharaonic 
 dynasty ? How full of deep interest is this spot ! The scene 
 of the Mosaico-Egyptian history, the site of a city that, from 
 
 B 
 
18 
 
 VOYAGE UP THE NILE. 
 
 the rule of Menes over this locality to that of Abbas Pacha, 
 has seen a greater number of successions, preserved a greater 
 permanence of locality for civilization, than any spot in the 
 world. Rome and Athens are but of yesterda^^ in comparison 
 with Memphis. When I stood on the tomb of Cecrops in the 
 Acropolis, I was awed by the antiquity of the pioneer of Egyp- 
 tian emigration to Greece ; it was from Memphis that he went 
 forth. Jerusalem was founded earlier still. Babylon, its nearer 
 contemporary, is a howling desert : and Nineveh furnishes few 
 wrecks of Assyrian sway ; but old Memphis is here. Stand- 
 ing on the roof of your sojourning house in the place, 
 Esbekiah, you may turn from glittering Turkish- Arab- Jewish- 
 Coptic-Cairo of to-day, to the Citadel, and bring up the 
 Mameluke-Turcoman-Saracen-Caliph-governing-Cairo of yes- 
 terday ; live over the histories of Masr-el-Atikeh and Masr-el- 
 Kebyr, — new Cairo and old Cairo ; — turn to the tombs of the 
 Caliphs, and the thousand mosques and monuments of that 
 era ; and then to the Coptic churches, and the memorials of 
 Christian patriarchal sway in the distance ; and then a little 
 north your eyes wander upon Rhoda island and the shores, 
 whose musical palaces of Beys are the sites of the palaces of 
 the Pharaohs of Jewish memory ; and then wandering to the 
 pyramids, the sphinxes, the caves, and tombs on the Libyan 
 mountain ridge, with names of kings and records of Egypt to 
 her fourth dynasty ; and a little further rest on the plains and 
 mounds, which need yet the labors of a Belzoni or a Vyse — 
 where Menes and Misraim subjects gained the first wealth of 
 this fertile valley of the generous Nile. 
 
 Many flatter themselves that Egypt is yet to be more fully 
 unveiled, that there are evidences in the mounds and passages 
 under Memphis which will bring to light more truth. There 
 
EGYPTIAN ASSOCIATION. io 
 
 were those too who believed that deep under yon pyramid of 
 Ghizeh lay concealed the table of emerald on which the thrice 
 great Hermes engraved the secret of alchemy, which was 
 lost before the flood ; and that Egypt, through the whole 
 valley of the Nile, was traversed by a subterranean realm, 
 which kings who had that art which gave gold at will, used 
 for their purposes. 
 
 Devoting a little time to investigations of the Pelusiac 
 branch of the Nile, at Heliopolis ; arriving at the conclusions 
 of Hengstenberg ; and glancing at the subject of Pithom, the 
 Patumos of Herodotus, which I did without visiting the in- 
 teresting site of Sais, where Herodotus and Plato found so 
 much, or the modern towns of Mansoura, the rice granaries 
 of Damietta, and rich fertility of the Delta, with its peculiar 
 Levantine characteristics, from Rosetta to Damietta ; and 
 having spent some investigation on the fine papyri of Dr. Ab- 
 bot’s museum and literary association, where I enjoyed the 
 advantage of acquaintance with one of the best Coptic scholars 
 living ; and having gained much aid from the library of the 
 Egyptian Association, (which, by the beneficence of English 
 noblemen, has become a mine of treasure, under the super- 
 intendence of Dr. Lieder, containing all published on the 
 subject, as well as all European facilities,) I engaged my boat, 
 made a contract, employed a dragoman, and prepared for my 
 voyage to the temples of the Nile. My boat was small, its 
 cabin only sufficient for one : but being recommended for 
 speed by an English gentleman, who had just returned from 
 the first cataract in it, I was well satisfied. 
 
 Coming down from a visit to the citadel, I was told a fine 
 lion from Dongola was shown here, belonging to Mohammed 
 Ali, and I stopped to take a look at his majesty. We went 
 
20 
 
 VOYAGE UP THE NILE. 
 
 up a few steps, aixd entered a room, where stood chained, with 
 his bushy mane, an enormous red lion. There was no grate, 
 as at the Surrey or Regent Park gardens, to impede our view, 
 and I did not feel particularly pleasant to be in the same room 
 with a lion just fresh from the deserts of Dongola, with only 
 a few iron links to prevent him from making his breakfast of 
 his visitors ; but imagine my terror when the keeper, after 
 having displayed some feats of animal taming that far excelled 
 VaaAmburgh, left him, and while I was gazing into his eyes, 
 he rose and made a leap, snapping one end of his chain. I 
 was near the door, and in an instant I was out, and the keeper 
 against the door, which his attendants without secured, while 
 he was standing up and pointing to the corner for the lion to 
 go back to his chain. I was fairly frightened, and rushed 
 down the steps leading into the street, glad enough to escape. 
 
 I went from here to see the bastinado. I found there an 
 imperturbable Englishman from our hotel, who was always 
 there, I believe. He had invited me frequently to go up with 
 him and see one, as, he said, it gave him an appetite for his 
 dinner. For my part, it was disgusting to me. The kourbash 
 is very painful for the first two or three blows, but after, 
 it is scarcely felt, in comoarison. The Mohammedan who 
 takes his bath so frequently, and has the soles of his feet 
 made so tender by the rubbing, must be peculiarly sensitive 
 there. 
 
 The Ghourah bazaar and its rare attractions have been 
 well descanted on by travellers ; though not excelling in rich- 
 ness the shaAvl bazaar of Constantinople, and some others 
 there, it is fuller of various life. Every nation in the world, 
 almost, is represented - here : Turks, Syrians, Kurds, Hindoos, 
 Ethiopians, Abyssinians, Circassians ; and Turkish and Ara- 
 
SIGHTS OF CAIRO. 
 
 21 
 
 bian women, less veiled than those in Constantinople. The 
 perfumery bazaar, with its quaint orientalism ; the carpet and 
 mat bazaar, with its Turks bearded like Abraham ; the Ham- 
 zaja bazaar ; the handkerchief and embroidery bazaar ; the 
 bazaar of arms ; the Hanhalil ; the Settizenab, and its Be- 
 douins of the desert caravans ; the Bab-el-Nasr, and ancient 
 gate of the vanquishers of the Crusaders ; the Ghu-a-hinneh ; 
 the palaces of the old Beys, and rare Turkish life in the old 
 quarter : all this is well described in Mr. Lane’s Book of the 
 Modern Egyptians, and you may see it recorded and pictured 
 in his fine edition of the Illustrated Arabian Nights. Mr. 
 Lane is one of the foreign lions of Cairo, but keeps himself 
 very secluded, being industriously engaged on a large Arabic 
 dictionary — a great desideratum to oriental scholars. He lives 
 with his sister, Mrs. Poole, author of The Englishwoman in 
 Egypt whose son has been well praised by Miss Martineau, 
 as, for a young Egyptian hieroglyphical scholar, he is almost 
 unexcelled. 
 
 The days of chivalry, as D’Israeli makes Baron Rothschild 
 say, were not difierent from ours. “ Life then was a circle of 
 great ideas; now ’tis a circle of small ones.” Instead of 
 Richard Coeur de Lion and Saladin, it is a Consul General and 
 a brutal Abbas Pacha. Instead of a noble Arab, as Scott has 
 represented in his Talisman, it is a quarrelsome Reis and his 
 quarrelsome crew ; a swindling dragoman trying to pocket 
 your piastres, and suiting all his plans and purposes to that 
 end. As to what modern Egyptian life is, I cannot improve 
 upon Mr. Lane’s description of the “ Manners and Customs of 
 the Modern Egyptians,” and the notes that are scattered 
 through his edition of the “ Arabian Nights and it is super- 
 fluous to repeat in this brief and rapid sketch what others 
 
22 
 
 VOYAGE UP THE NILE. 
 
 have spent more than a quarter of a century in describing. 
 A half day’s walk through Cairo sufficed to prove the remark- 
 able accuracy of Lane’s work. 
 
 - My first week in Cairo was actively employed in sight 
 seeing, and whirling around its narrow streets, with a donkey 
 boy crying, Riglac oh bente — “ get out of the way, oh lady 
 or Riglac nousrami^ “ get out of the way, Christian — Riglac 
 haudouVj “ get out of the way, you other donkey-bo^^” 
 
 There is no lack of amusement in all these oddities ; and 
 as for the sights, from the Mohammedan betrothal and wed- 
 ding, with all its grotesque masquerading, and symbols, and 
 Alme’s dancing, et id genus^ to the circumcision with its 
 drums, &c., the pure orientalism of the turban — the black 
 turban of the Copt and his huge sensual neck, the bright eyes 
 of an Arab from the shores 
 
 “ Off Mozambic or where the spicy odors blow. 
 
 From Araby the blest,’’ 
 
 how shall I describe them? There too was the Memlook 
 dress, and its owner glittering with arms and proudly ferocious 
 in gait ; the flaming Cairean robes of striped silk adorning the 
 Turk or the Jew ; the Egyptian lady with her mantle of black 
 silk, which is also worn by many Italians and French. 
 
 Camels loaded with stones come along threatening to crush 
 you and your donkey ; water-carriers, beggars, santons ; Turks 
 sitting in their bazaars, crying, Thayeeh Mashallah ; Greeks 
 looking for a chance to turn a penny or to blackguard you : 
 Arabs of every variety, from the Hadji of Mecca, the sheikh 
 of the desert, to the boatman and camel-driver ; ukmah or 
 sellers of sherbet, serpent charmers with their snakes, orange 
 women, and other women with their caps or wares ; beggars, 
 
23 
 
 DR. ABBOTIS MUSEUM. 
 
 barbers, pedlers of robes from Damascus, fortune-tellers, 
 jugglers, mountebanks, fakirs, merchants and mollahs, Mo- 
 hammedan priests, barbers and butchers, saddlers and slipper- 
 makers, in the narrow dingy streets — there are they all. 
 
 Dr. Ahbofs Museum . — This is one of the great curiosities 
 of Cairo. Lepsius has said that the museum is worth £7000. 
 His price is £10,000. 
 
 Among the many objects of interest is the necklace bearing 
 on several of the links the cartouche of Menes of the first 
 dynasty, “ who walks with Amon,” a seal ring of gold, with 
 a broad face, on which in most exquisite engraving is the car- 
 touche of Souphis or Cheops of the fourth dynasty. An iron 
 breastplate and chain, much covered with rust, has the name 
 of Shishak or Sheshonk, who vanquished Jeroboam. Some 
 of his curiosities, a lizard in metal, and some sculptures in 
 limestone, are the most beautiful I have ever seen. His 
 mummied bulls and human mummies, his rings and thou- 
 sand cartouches, are antiquities of several dynasties. His 
 mummied cats, and particularly his papyri, are very perfect. 
 There is one containing a ritual, which is very valuable. 
 Numerous steles or tablets of the times of the shepherd kings, 
 &c., are full of historical interest. 
 
 The Egyptian Literary Association, of which Dr. Abbot is 
 one of the founders, and Clot Bey, Suleiman Pacha, and 
 several learned Europeans, members, is one of the finest insti- 
 tutions in the world for the study of Egyptian subjects. 
 
 The tombs of the Memlook kings to the south of old Cairo 
 and toward the Arabian desert in the east, are an interesting 
 necropolis. Familiar as I was with Mohammedan cemeteims 
 in Constantinople, Scutari and Pera, the Golden Horn and the 
 Bosphorus, I could not but compare the beauty of those upon 
 
24 
 
 VOYAGE UP THE NILE. 
 
 which “ Annstasius ” so poetically dwells, with this forest of 
 turbaned-headed tombstones in the skirts of the lonely desert. 
 Here are the interesting tombs of the Memlook kings in a 
 walled court, covered with flowered ornaments of brilliant 
 colors and Arabic inscriptions. But the finest specimens of 
 arabesque I saw in the tombs of the Pachas : those of Mo- 
 hammed Ali’s family, his wives and sons, particularly that 
 of the lamented and promising Tousson, so spoken of by 
 travellers, were the finest. It is a beautiful thought of 
 orientalism, to place perpetual flowers on the dwellings of the 
 dead. Here was the tomb of Ibrahim covered with a green 
 shroud, for it was not yet completed. Some of the family 
 were here, and many real flowers lay scattered about, and 
 wreaths on the head-stones. What a prolific progenitor 
 Mohammed Ali* has been ! he may well vie with Methusaleh, 
 and the other patriarchs, or with Solomon. A large mosque is 
 filled with the tombs of his family, and I should judge that 
 thirty were tho*se of his sons and daughters, his sons’ wives, 
 and grandsons and granddaughters. 
 
 The Imaum-e-Shufifer is worth visiting. 
 
 I also went to the site of the Roman Babylon, which was 
 not far from old Cairo. 
 
 The mosque of Tayloom is one of the finest erections of 
 Caliph and Mameluke architecture. I rode my donkey into 
 it, which quite shocked the Mohammedan bystanders. 
 
 Spur on my donkey — my Arab boy — to Mataryeh and the 
 sacred tree and fountain of the Holy Family, and then over 
 
 * While correcting the proofs of this work, the intelligence reaches us that 
 this great reformer of Egypt — great alike in his usefulness, his ambition, and his 
 crimes — is dead. Even the shadow of his name will no longer save Egypt from 
 England or the Porte. 
 
HELIOPOLIS. 
 
 25 
 
 the plain to the orange groves, where stand the site and obe- 
 lisk of Heliopolis. The City of the Sun, or of Destruction, as 
 the prophet Isaiah calls it, is one of the five cities in the land 
 of Egypt that “ should speak the language of Canaan, and 
 swear by the Lord of hosts.” It can boast of no ruin, but a 
 solitary obelisk in the midst of a garden marks the spot vdiere 
 stood the famed city, On, and its temple of the Sun. Here 
 Joseph found in the daughter of its high priest, a wife ; and 
 here, perhaps, Moses studied the ancient lore. The prophecy 
 of Isaiah* was fulfilled here- for Onias, the high priest, in the 
 time of the Maccabees, built a temple that was much resorted 
 to by the Jews. The obelisk bears the name of Osirtasen, the 
 king who (as some believe) expelled the shepherd kings from 
 Egypt. Several of the obelisks have been carried away. 
 Those which are at Alexandria are said to have stood here. 
 True, you may see in the British Museum a cast of the obe- 
 lisk, and read its characters ; but do you stand in On, and in 
 the place where Moses was schooled, among the shades where 
 Plato and his companions walked in the orange groves — 
 where Diodorus, and Herodotus, and Anaxagoras, and Solon, 
 (the thrifty olive-merchant of Greece,) came to learn mysteries 
 and the secret of eternal life, which the priests of Phre — the 
 Poti-phres, or Potiphars, were suposed to have taught? A 
 part of the inscription on the obelisk is as follows, when trans- 
 lated into English, beginning to read from the south side : — 
 Verse first. ‘‘The Sun to King Ramestes. I have be- 
 stowed upon you to rule graciously the world. He whom the 
 I Sun loves is Horus the Brave, the lover of truth, the son of 
 Heaven, born of God, restorer of the world. He whom the 
 Sun has chosen is King Ramestes, valiant in battle, to whom 
 
 * Chap. xix. vers. 18, 19. 
 
 2 
 
26 
 
 VOYAGE UP THE NILE. 
 
 all the earth is subject by his might and bravery. Ramestea 
 the king, the immortal offspring of the Sun.” 
 
 Verse second. “ Horns .... the brave, who sheds a splen- 
 dor over Heliopolis, and regenerates the rest of the world, and 
 honors the gods, who live in Heliopolis, him the Sun loves.” 
 Verse third. “ Homs the brave, the offspring of the Sun, 
 all glorious, whom the Sun loves,” &c. 
 
 Another verse. “ He beautified Heliopolis.” 
 
 To the east. Verse first. “The great god from Heliopo- 
 lis. Celestial Homs, the brave .... Him Ammon . loves 
 
 And him the all glittering has chosen for his eternal king.” . . . 
 
 This is sufficient to identify the site, for which purpose 
 they are quoted. 
 
 Rhoda island is one of the charms of Cairo. Its roses 
 make it the resort that its gardens have ever been since the 
 Romans or the Greeks, and probably Pharaohs. The gay 
 Caireans crowd here on Friday ; and its roses are as thick 
 and luxuriant as when the Greeks named it Pcodog. When I 
 came here, Ibrahim Pacha had just died, and his fine palace, 
 to which it is the garden, was being stripped. Its orange 
 groves, fountains and walks ; its kiosk of shells ; its Nilo- 
 meter on the south end, where Moses v/as said to have been 
 found : the view from the walled walk, of the luxuriant valley, 
 and the rank sedgy banks, make you encourage in fancy the 
 thought, that here the Pharaohs chose what must have been 
 the most enchanting spot for their palaces. Here Amense the 
 princess, “daughter of Pharaoh,” walking on banks where 
 you still see bulrushes, found the hero-infant — the future 
 lawgiver of God — who, in youth and early manhood, (as it is 
 said,) repaid the debt by teaching her the true God, and for 
 which, in turn, she obtained for him those exclusive privileges 
 
RIVER PALACES OF OLD CAIRO. 
 
 27 
 
 from the priests, of their instructing him in “ all the wisdom 
 of the Egyptians,” and, had he desired it, would have made 
 him the successor to the throne : virtues which her successor, 
 Moeris, in jealousy of Moses, repaid by blotting her name 
 from, and defacing the monuments. 
 
 In the evening, I rambled among the palaces of the Beys 
 and Pachas, and the colleges and military schools of the young 
 Osmanleys. I listened to the notes from piano, harp, and 
 timbrel, which are to be heard through the closed, latticed 
 windoAvs of the harem, where are Circassian beauties, and all 
 the richness of oriental luxury, safely concealed from the 
 profane eye of the “ unbeliever.” 
 
 The sun was setting over the distant pyramids in the ex- 
 quisite beauty and glow of an Egyptian sky, and the cymbals 
 of the Turkish garrison were ringing in my ears, while I did 
 full justice to the dinner provided by Beckra, my Syrian cook 
 from Damascus ; and in anticipation dwelt with delight upon 
 all that I was to see in the six hundred miles of beauty and 
 antiquity before me. 
 
 I hoisted the American flag, took leave of kind friends who 
 came down to see me off, and established myself comfortably 
 in the cabin, armed Avith pistols, books, and a mosquito-net. 
 The crew began their happy song, beating the sakia or earthen 
 drum^ clapping their hands in accompaniment, and chanting 
 a low song, increasing in energy and motion till they danced. 
 We passed the Halil palace, (from Avhose windows came soft 
 music and singing, Avhich I knew was of a Circassian voice,) — 
 and the Nilometer. The Arabs sang me to a refreshing sleep. 
 The first two days went on finely. After Ave had left the 
 pyramids of Abousir, the false pyramid was the first ruin of 
 interest, and the pyramids of Howara and Illaloon, a journey 
 
28 
 
 VOYAGE UP THE NILE. 
 
 to which St. John has well described. When a head wind 
 kept us to the bank, I went ashore to a heled^ or village, 
 where I usually called on the venerable old sheikh ; with Coptic 
 or Jewish scribes, sitting on a mat. When I told him that I 
 was an American, with an air of superior wisdom he told his 
 attendants that “ Americanos were the ship-builders of the 
 Sultan in Stamboul.” 
 
 Reis Suleiman commanded my boat, and Abder Achmed, 
 his brother-in-law, was helmsman ; a tall Nubian, a Berber 
 'Abudillah, an industrious Arab Ali, an honest Berber Schadi 
 — these six composed the crew. 
 
 My dragoman, Antonio Kalieh, is an Albanian Greek. He 
 was born in Iro Castri in Albania, and has made many trips 
 through the east, to Damascus, and has frequently been from 
 Aleppo to Bagdad by caravan. He was once a dragoman to 
 Hamilton, who gave him a good character ; but has probably 
 since degenerated. 
 
 The grottoes of El Massara, which are near the village 
 Tourah, may well induce one to stop his boat. Here they 
 found the stone for the pyramids and mighty works of 
 Memphis, and here the Hebrews labored for their cruel 
 taskmasters. 
 
 One morning after breakfast I went ashore with my gun, 
 popping at the pigeons, wild ducks, and pelicans, along the 
 bank. Now I would start the beautiful white Ibis, whom the 
 Egyptians might well respect for his carriage, and liken to 
 humanity. I enjoyed with rapture the salubrious clime, the 
 clear and serene heaven, the genial warmth of the sun, — the 
 fragrant breath of nature. Village after village enticed me far 
 in advance of my boat. Here were cool delightful groves, near 
 which old patriarchal Turks were overseeing the labors of the 
 
ADVENTURES ASHORE. 
 
 29 
 
 simple, respectful Arab, cultivating for them the fig and the 
 vine, — lofty palm-trees, scattered in isolated beauty, spread a 
 refreshing shade. Sometimes the old men came up and kissed 
 my hand : one sitting on a mat in front of his house, where 
 his wife was sewing, invited me to sit down. Declining the 
 courteous solicitation, I pursued my course, now walking 
 through open woodland ranges, luxuriant with dense foliage 
 and the richest sward, approaching the majesty and grace 
 of an English park — now passing through a populous village, 
 conspicuous with mosque and minaret and bath — always 
 pursued by the snarling bark of the unchristian dogs, and the 
 “ or “ Nousrami^^ (dog of a Christian,) of the no less 
 
 malignant juveniles. The children and the curs are as anti- 
 Christian as ever. Some of the finest men and women that I 
 had ever seen, were returning from the well cultivated fields 
 that extend to the oasis of the Fayoom ; they always gave 
 the respectful salutation of “ Salaam Aleycoum,” (God be with 
 you,) or “ Sabbahy V kair,” (Good day.) The atmosphere was 
 impregnated with the fragrant blossoms of pea and bean 
 fields, in full bloom, which were tall as one’s head in growth. 
 At sunset, I reached the bank of the river again. I had been 
 in the sun all day, and was heated. I threw my clothes 
 off, and enjoyed the refreshing luxury of a plunge in the river. 
 What a renovation ! This Nile is certainly a valuable gift to 
 Egypt. 
 
 In the next village a woman cooked me some eggs, and 
 I supped on milk and Arab bread. Ten o’clock came, and 
 no boat. I was about to accept the hospitality of a boatman 
 lying by the shore, as the village was filled with scowling 
 men prowling with clubs, but I saw a light in the far dis- 
 tance. I fired my gun, while the boatmen hailed Reis 
 
30 
 
 VOYAGE UP THE NILE. 
 
 Suleiman. How it echoed in the night solitude ! Soon I 
 heard one of iny pistols fired by Antonio, and the clear distinct 
 cry of “ Howaga.” In half an hour my boat came up. My 
 boatmen were no less joyed than myself. Antonio had kept 
 my dinner warm, and I dined at eleven o’clock, and rested 
 from the fatigues of the day. 
 
 Reached Benisooef the next evening. It is a good sized town, 
 has a little bazaar, palace of a Bey, mosque, (fee. Halil, 
 Effendi, a Bey, was starting on a visit to Minieh, and I saw 
 an instance of the oppression of the rulers. They pressed at 
 every village men from their work ; one man, armed with a 
 whip and dagger, ran along, catching whom he could, and, 
 dragging them to the boat, made them pull it to the next 
 village, where the same was repeated ; while the crowds 
 deserted their work as they came up. One of the taxgatherers 
 I saw take a poor man’s sheep, his only property in the world ; 
 and every man has to pay his neighbor’s taxes, if he be poor, 
 so that all comes to the oppressive pacha. 
 
 At Benisooef, one of my crew, Achmed, deserted. He had 
 been my companion in excursions ashore, and always carried 
 my fowling-piece. I had given him several presents, which 
 he repaid by running away. We had a head wind, and the 
 crew behaved badly : but I was spending the interval com- 
 fortably under the roof of a French refugee, Castellan, who 
 had served in Egypt and Algiers, and was physician here ; 
 and next to the Governor, as Hakim Pacha^ had the rule. He 
 gave me letters to all the Hakims, and French gentlemen in 
 the towns ; lectured my crew ; abused my dragoman as a 
 mauvais Grecque^ which I began half to suspect was the 
 case, and insisted on parting most affectionately. In my walks 
 along the shore to Benisooef, I found exceeding interest in the 
 
BENISOOEF. 
 
 31 
 
 neighborhood of the brick pyramid of Hawara and of Illaloon. 
 I found the works of the Israelites, which their taskmasters, 
 Moeris and his contemporaries, made them build. In enter- 
 ing the region of the Fayoom, I made frequent excursions 
 toward Lake Moeris ; but as to the Labyrinth, I had satisfied 
 myself from the authorities of all writers from Herodotus to 
 St. John, that a search for it would be most unsatisfying. In 
 one excursion, in which I must have been very near it, I 
 found brick with straw^ such as the Hebrews used. The 
 obelisk, bearing the name of Osirtasen, is really of interest ; but 
 I preferred resting quietly and reading in Moore’s “ Epicurean,’’ 
 of the poetical labyrinth, to looking for sites of the real one. 
 
 The two cities of Heracleopolis and Oxyrinchus, which are 
 both included in the ancient nome of Arsinoe, 'have scarcely a 
 wreck of their former grandeur. A single Corinthian column 
 stands alone to mark the site of Oxyrinchus. The town of 
 Behnesa is situated in sight of the river, and on an eminence. 
 I took my Berber, and followed the water-carriers crowding 
 to it : it is about a mile off, situated in a flourishing plain. I 
 walked through the bazaar, and one or two well dressed and 
 caparisoned Turks passed me on their horses. The Governor’s 
 palace was here, but I had not time to call on him. In the 
 mosque of Behnesa are some columns once belonging to old 
 Oxyrinchus. Mounds are all around, showing the former site 
 of a great city. 
 
 We had an exquisite sunset and view up the river, as we 
 passed Gebel el Teir, or Mountain of the Birds. The wild- 
 ness of this region has been well described by travellers. 
 There are tombs cut all along in the side of the rock. The 
 convent is inhabited by monks almost of the same character 
 with the people. My Arabs are full of fears. They keep upon 
 
32 
 
 VOYAGE UP THE NILE. 
 
 the other side of the river, and with some reason ; for I find, 
 since the time of Bruce, they have been here a wild robber race. 
 Worse, more hang-dog looking faces, I never have seen. One 
 who devastated the whole country, came to a village where 
 there were two or three soldiers, stripped them all, and told 
 them to go to Ibrahim Pacha and tell him it was he — giving 
 his name — and to catch him if he could. At Tehnah I 
 visited the site of the ancient Achoris : near here is the cele- 
 brated cave of Diana, and the worship of Diana was kept up in 
 this region. Every locality and mountain in Egypt has its 
 legend, and goddess protector. Here it was Diana ; and lying 
 in my boat, as we passed those mountains in the moonlight, I 
 could fancy the old Greco-Egyptian’s worship of his goddess, 
 who he believed chased her prey over the hills ; or of the 
 older Egyptian to whom she was Diana-Lucina, and who 
 believed her the nurse of Horus ; and the legend is, that flee- 
 ing from Typhon, she hid him in these caves. The site of 
 Artemidos Speos is just above, where her abode was ; and 
 the moon lighting up these hills like day, I fancy we hear 
 the fleet horses of the goddess. Yes, like fair Greece, bright 
 Egypt had its beautiful mythology, but 
 
 “ The intelligible forms of ancient poets, 
 
 The fair humanities of old religion, 
 
 The power, the beauty, and the majesty. 
 
 That had their haunt in dale, or piny mountain. 
 
 Or forest, by slow stream, or pebbly spring. 
 
 All these have vanished ; 
 
 They live no longer in the faith of reason.” 
 
 Schiller’s Wallenstein. 
 
 The prodigy of the mountain of the birds is a legend that, 
 at a certain season and hour, large flocks of birds assemble in 
 
ANTINOE. 
 
 33 
 
 the valley, and go through the mysterious ceremony of insert- 
 ing their bills in one of the clefts, and it closes upon one of their 
 number, when he is left here to die, and the others fly away. 
 
 ■ Soon we were beyond the mountains of Sheikh Said, 
 where the Arabs, from an old tradition, throw some bread 
 into the water, and call upon him, “ Oh ho. Sheikh Said 
 these mountains are worn underneath, and into natural 
 grottoes, in which several crocodiles were sunning themselves, 
 who started as we approached. On shore near Schmoun, I 
 saw a young man riding on an ass with his wife behind him, 
 and they looked so young, and such a happy couple, that I 
 thought oWsaac wedding Rebekah. 
 
 From here the winds are very high, particularly in the 
 neighborhood of Gebel Aboulfaydee, and the Reis and Arabs 
 keep a good look-out in holding the sail. The old Grecian 
 city is thus described by Alciphron : “ the light Grecian archi- 
 tecture of the imperial city, the luxuries and honors of its gar- 
 dens — the arches of triumph — the superb portico that encircles 
 the whole city with its marble shade — the Circus of the Sun, 
 by whose rare colored pillars the mysterious movements of the 
 Nile is measured — the proud monuments of glory and art, 
 and the gay multitude that enlivened them.”* 
 
 It is after passing Gebel Hassan, on the east bank, that we 
 come in sight of the ruins of Antinoe, and the city built by 
 Hadrian in memory of his favorite, the young Antinoe. If the 
 same spirit of beauty was upon this city as is upon the head 
 of Antinous, what a spot of loveliness it must have been ! It is 
 an oasis in the wild district, whose thievish people stretch all 
 along here. My Arabs dislike going to that shore, and always 
 cross to the other side before night. Antinoe is called in 
 
 * Epicurean. 
 2 * 
 
34 
 
 VOYAGE UP THE NILE. 
 
 Arabic, Sheikh Ababdie, from a tradition of the Arabs related 
 by Aboulfouda in his description of Egypt. In those times it 
 was the metropolis of Upper Egypt, and a great town under 
 the Saracens. The young Antinous is said to have been 
 drowned in the Nile, but his memory is preserved in one of 
 the finest sculptures of the finest Italian gallery. The traces 
 of Corinthian pillars, triumphal arches, an avenue of granite 
 columns, an aqueduct, and many other Roman remains still 
 mark the site ; but I could with difficulty trace the theatre 
 spoken of by travellers. 
 
 It is among the anchorite caves in this rhountain that 
 Moore lays the scene of his Epicurean, and the. retreat of 
 Melanius, to which the two lovers fly. The picture he draws 
 from the top of the mountain you might draw now, were not 
 Antinoe, opposite, a ruin. 
 
 The view from the top of the rock extending on either 
 side embraced the two extremes of fertility and desolation. . . . 
 When we turned to the river what a picture of animation 
 presented itself ! Near us to the south were the graceful 
 colonnades of Antinoe, its proud populous streets and tri- 
 umphal monuments. On the opposite shore, rich plains, all 
 teeming with cultivation to the water’s edge, seemed to offer 
 up, as from verdant altars, their fruits to the sun, while beneath 
 us the Nile, 
 
 “ The glorious stream, 
 
 That late between the banks was seen to glide, 
 
 With shrines and marble cities on each side. 
 
 Glittering like jewels strung along a chain, 
 
 Had now sent forth its waters, and o’er plain 
 And valley, like a giant from his bed. 
 
 Rising with outstretched limbs, superbly spread.” 
 
AN AGREEABLE ENCOUNTER. 
 
 35 
 
 In the beautiful valley the palm-trees seemed to merge into 
 cool alcoves, and we appeared to sail through a land of roses. 
 On the west shore lies a town, Coloso or Kolokosaneh. Here 
 crowds of market women, sitting on the bank with the deli- 
 cious fruits of the clime, invited us to the shore ; and I was 
 equally willing as my boatmen, as the wind was not fair, and 
 the Arabs had been pulling all day, to rest here for the night. 
 In a cafe were gathered a crowd of Aimes, drinking sherbet ; 
 and one pretty Alme attracted me very much, as I sat sipping 
 some delicious Turkish colfee. 
 
 An hour or two after, strolling through the town, a crowd 
 attracted me to the caf6 again, and there I found several 
 Turks of the better class. There was an Effendi there, a 
 Turk, and very much of a gentleman ; two or three Arabs 
 from the Red Sea, who were in some political station, and of 
 noble presence. A Kurd from Erzeroum, with his tall cap, 
 had wandered there by some means ; and a wild-looking, 
 rascally fellow of a Persian, from Kandahar. They had pro- 
 bably been to Mecca, and were returning upon some Moham- 
 medan affairs. We were very gracious to each other; my 
 cigars made them all friends to me, and we had on the whole 
 a charming chat. We kissed each other’s hands, when we 
 parted ; they having learned from me, as they supposed, all 
 about England and America, and I having learned a great 
 deal of Arabic and of the customs of the better class. 
 
 Just as I was going to bed, I heard the voices of some 
 boatmen coming up ; and looking- out on the bright moon, 
 saw the two English flags of some voyageurs. Our drago- 
 man soon made us acquainted, and I went on board. Mr. 
 
 F y, an English gentleman ; Mr. C 1, from Scotland ; 
 
 and Mr. F., a Dutch gentleman from Batavia, in Java. We 
 
36 
 
 VOYAGE UP THE NILE. 
 
 had a pleasant evening. I dined with them after it ; and as 
 they had all just come from India, they had much to tell of 
 interest. Our Java friend had many stories of Thugs and 
 Phansigars, and the beauty of that island which he had fully 
 explored. I heard with delight his stories of the Malays. 
 
 With a fair wind, we push on through groves and islands, 
 and sedgy banks ; the river all the way to Osiout is dangerous, 
 and since the days of Bruce has abounded in robbers. The 
 boatmen have two guards at night. A story of an English- 
 man is frequently told, that some blacks from Sahara, that 
 abound in the bazaar villages from here to Osiout, came 
 from shore and killed dragoman, Englishmen and all. They 
 generally swim in the water silently, and come up alongside 
 the boat from the water side and cut your throat. My Arabs 
 sing less frequently. Pass Fushna, a pretty village with palm 
 groves. 
 
 We are through the province Fayoom, and now enter the 
 Vostani, or Middle Egypt. We pass Minieh with a fair wind ; 
 and though I visited it on my return, I will describe it here. 
 
 Minieh is the site of the ancient Cynopolis,” or city 
 of the dog ; and it was said that there were here temples in 
 honor of this animal ; but the most interesting associations of 
 Minieh are those of the times of the Caliphs. In the times 
 of Ibn Katib, (after whom it was named Minieh Ihn Katib^) 
 the Caliph, sent hither and took from here a Governor who 
 had been promoted from a menial office to gratify his pique 
 against the town. This man, Ibn Katib, had become the 
 best of governors ; but now deprived of his office was wan- 
 dering poor and a beggar about Bagdad, when a poet came up 
 and sang his praises. He replied by giving him a jewel 
 which he had saved from his wreck ; and the value of this 
 
MINIEH. 
 
 37 
 
 caused him to be brought before the Caliph, who, upon hear- 
 ing the story, restored him to Minieh, where he and his 
 posterity long reigned. 
 
 On my return here, I stopped and visited the beautiful 
 old mosque which hangs over the water’s edge. I wan- 
 dered through the Turkish town (and they are all copies 
 of each other), looking for memorials of the oriental sway in 
 this old city. I entered the bath, so well described by Ste- 
 phens, and I believe I had the same operator. Many people, 
 of high rank, are living here. My old shampooer had so 
 satisfied me at the bath, that I gave him as much as I did the 
 keeper of the bath, for which I could hear them abusing him 
 after I had left. 
 
 The Governor of Minieh is very severe. One woman had 
 just been executed for infidelity, and her headless trunk was 
 lying in the streets. A wind from the north detained us there 
 some hours, strolling about the bazaars. I saw a French 
 
 hakim^ or physician, Mr. M h. I was pleased at the 
 
 handsome appearance and correct carriage of the women, who 
 came to the water’s edge to draw water. 
 
 On ascending the bold Mount Heredy, I found myself 
 looking down into a deep dark valley, which glittered with a 
 sort of crystal that fills the place. Some of these crystals are 
 immense, and it might well be called the diamond valley. A 
 large vulture was on a distant crag, and I at once saw the 
 origin of the story of Sindbad, when my Arabs spoke of the 
 Elif Laila^ or thousand and one nights. A serpent of huge 
 size lived here, and the people were afraid to go down into 
 this abyss to get crystals for fear of him : voila^ the bits of 
 flesh ; the roc,* the serpent of Sindbad. This serpent, or 
 
 * From the Rock ham, Arabic, for “ vulture.’ 
 
38 
 
 VOYAGE UP THE NILE. 
 
 another one, was here till very lately, and the Arabs believed 
 that the body of Sheikh Heredy was changed into a serpent ; 
 the legend probably derived from the Egyptian idea of the 
 serpent Kneph — their good spirit. When they are in difficulty 
 they call on Sheikh Heredy, and my Arabs cried out. “ Ah ! 
 ha ! Sheikh Heredy P to show me the echo of the place. 
 
 Mount Ababdie and Sheikh Ababdie is another legend. 
 
 The colossal figure, spoken of by Yates, is still to be seen 
 at the bottom of Sheikh Heredy. It somewhat resembles the 
 Sphinx, and is in a sitting posture. The mountains here offer 
 fine subjects for the pencil, and I have been trying my poor 
 hand at sketching. I never so much wished to be an artist as 
 here on the Nile, to carry away some of the beautiful features 
 of the scenery, which few think belong to this river. I trust 
 our artists will yet be here, and carry away a panorama of it, 
 and its thousand views, as they have done of the Mississippi 
 and the Rhine. What a picture it would be ! Thebes, 
 Edfou, Phila0, Alexandria, Cairo, Osiout, moving on canvas 
 before you. 
 
 The fun of a fair wind on the Nile is great. • There is 
 sometimes a gust that nearly capsizes our little boat, and 
 nothing can be more picturesque than the efforts of our Arabs. 
 Each one shrieking, jumping first to one side and then to 
 another ; the venerable Reis storming, and the folds of their 
 turbans, and their long flowing robes streaming in the wind ; 
 their alarm, and efforts with their poles ; the white sails, so 
 like the wings of a bird, now shifted by them to this side, and 
 now to that ; and they, with their flashing eyes and ivory 
 teeth showing their anxiety as they tack, while on we speed 
 like a bird by villages, towns, mosques, minarets, in an 
 oriental panorama. And when all danger is passed, the old 
 
GEBEL ABOULFOUDA. 
 
 39 
 
 R4is comes aft with a grin, as he has done a thousand 
 times, “ Haoua thayeeh, HowagdJ^ — “ Wind is fair, Howaga 
 Mouch ketyr minheeny^^ — “ Not too much of it just here 
 hokra (to-morrow) Luxor ^ or hokra Lender as the case may 
 be : and the others, as if I should pay them for the fair wind 
 which Heaven had sent, would cry, “ Backsheesh^ Howaga 
 and if I answered, “ Inshallah,'^ they would say, “ Thayeeh, 
 Howaga — Howaga, thayeebP 
 
 A nay’s sail among the mountains of Aboulfouda, the wild 
 scenery, the picturesque rocks sinking into the river, the tower- 
 like promontories and strata, were indeed among the most in- 
 teresting objects of my journey. 
 
 There are the mountains just before Manfaloot. St. John, 
 Dr. Richardson, and all writers upon Egypt, have dwelt upon 
 the peculiar beauty of this scenery of Gebel Aboulfouda. 
 Though not so grand as that of the mountains of Cheno- 
 buscion, I can scarce imagine any thing more picturesque. 
 You sail under the rocks ; the river has worn caves unap- 
 proachable save by the water. Here the anchoret has cut 
 himself seats, 
 
 “ Vivoque Sedilia saxo 
 
 ind you can look far into them. Then on the edge basks the 
 crocodile, and birds fly around ; pigeons make their nests — 
 tame creatures, sometimes flying on your boat : so sacred is 
 the bird. Birds rest on your sails, and some pick up the 
 crumbs by you and the grain of your fowls. 
 
 We passed after Sheikh Said, or Shek Saadi, the Tel-el- 
 Amaron, and El Hargeh, and soon arrived in sight of Manfaloot, 
 but having a fine wind, did not land till on my return. I was 
 pleased with the town, as its towering minarets and tree-hidden 
 
40 
 
 VOYAGE UP THE NILE. 
 
 mosques made it look so like a New-England village, situated 
 as it is in a green plain, and on the placid river. Evidences of 
 lively Turkish life were about, — numerous soldiers, the capari- 
 soned horses of Turkish officers, and the clashing cymbal sounds 
 of a Turkish band, playing an old English tune, which I have 
 frequently heard in representations of Norman history in the 
 theatre. How familiar it sounded on the remote Nile. Some 
 English refugee had been here, and taught the Arabs ; who 
 have a native musical skill, and under French teachers, as in 
 the military bands of Cairo, make fine musicians. 
 
 On my return down the Nile, early in the morning, before 
 sunrise, we landed at this place, and I strolled into the square, 
 where the market-women were exposing fruits, vegetables, 
 milk, butter, cheese, bread, and all the products. I was there 
 struck with the civilized restraint, which is not so apparent in 
 Upper Egypt. I walked several times through the bazaar, a 
 large, wide street, which would have been an ornament to 
 any city. The superiority of the shops, the fine stores of a 
 peculiar kind of cloth that is manufactured here, the abun- 
 dance of Jew and Greek merchants and Turks, the enter- 
 prising appearance of the place, (owing doubtless to this com- 
 paratively unproductive part of the valley of the Nile,) all had 
 an interest from its contrast. 
 
 Beni Hassan. — Who does not here recall the expression 
 in the book of Job, a “ tomb cut in the rock The name of 
 theOsitarsen is here, who, say some, expelled the shepherd kings 
 from Egypt, and was contemporary with Joseph ; and who, Bun- 
 sen says, with more explicitness than accuracy, lived a thousand 
 years before Moses ^ and that in his reign the shepherd kings 
 invaded Egypt. But, turning from such crude chronological 
 conclusions, how interesting the proof of Scripture truth con- 
 
BENI HASSAN. 
 
 41 
 
 tained here. The interest of Egyptian customs and trades 
 developed here, is all written in Wilkinson. In the tomb of 
 Pahri, I was gratified by the testimonies in favor of Scripture 
 that crowded upon me. But, doubtless, the shepherd kings 
 were expelled by Amosis ; and Nolan’s views on this point 
 seem more reasonable, excepting his dates, for which I prefer 
 to trust to Hales. As to the last fragment of Manetho, which 
 Bunsen accepts and Lepsius rejects, I think it either a forgery, 
 or a lie of Manetho. 
 
 Miss Martineau, in her book, exaggerates somewhat the 
 beauty of the trades and customs represented in the tombs. 
 In all of them, you can trace doorways and pillars, some 
 sculptured, some, like the best tombs in Thebes, unfinished. 
 Few enter all the tombs, as there are thirty-one in all, and 
 but six or eight are interesting. The next to the two last in 
 the face of the mountain has a vaulted portico, and two fluted 
 pillars ; its basement is painted a deep red. 
 
 Ositarsen the First is settled by Dr. Lepsius, of Berlin, to 
 have been the Setorsarsen of the twelfth dynasty. The expul- 
 sion of the shepherd kings, by Amosis, according to Hales, 
 dates 1909 b. c. ; while, as Bunsen says, the shepherd kings 
 invaded Egypt in his time. His chronology (by his accepting 
 every fragment o’f Manetho, which is doubtless in parts a forgery) 
 difiers several hundred years from Hales’s. Josephus, ambi- 
 tious to prove the Hebrews a great people, has falsified history. 
 He wished to identify them with the shepherd kings. With 
 Hales’s chronology I think it can be reconciled ; but with the 
 lesser chronology of Usher, and the greater of Bunsen, it can- 
 not be. This, and the proofs from these tombs and those of 
 Ghizeh, will be fully shown in another work. 
 
 I noticed in one of the tombs, Sechonsosis’ name, of the 
 
42 
 
 VOYAGE UP THE NILE. 
 
 same dynasty as Manetho names. The idea that the captives 
 in this tomb were Joseph’s brethren, which Mrs. Romer, in 
 her Travels, makes such a great noise about, is well exposed 
 by Miss Martineau ; as well as the Elginism of Mrs. Romer, in 
 removing a figure of one of the captives. They cannot be 
 Joseph’s brethren, because they are figures of thirty-seven 
 captives^ instead of Joseph’s ten brethren. 
 
 The Doric style of the columns is very beautiful, showing, 
 in this highly ancient monument of Egypt, the origin of archi- 
 tecture, so improved by the Greeks ; for, except the pyramids, 
 Beni Hassan’s tombs are the oldest monuments in Egypt. 
 
 Miss Martineau says it is safe to visit Beni Hassan ; but I 
 think that she was not ashore, among the scowling vaga- 
 bonds that abound all the way up from Gebel El Teir to the 
 tombs, as often as I was. 
 
 In one little Arab village, I entered just as three or four 
 had reclined around a woman sitting under a tree. She was 
 of the red hue of the Abyssinians, and, as I remarked, it was 
 the acacia which blooms in Abyssinia. I could not but fancy 
 she was apostrophizing, in her song, the tree of her native 
 land, in the manner of the poet : — 
 
 “ Oh, Abyssinian tree ! 
 
 We pray, we pray to thee. 
 
 By the glow of thy golden fruit, 
 
 And the violet hue of thy flower. 
 
 And the greeting mute 
 Of thy boughs’ salute. 
 
 To the stranger who seeks thy bower. 
 
 “ Oh, Abyssinian tree ’ 
 
 How the traveller blesses thee, 
 
OSHMUNEIN. 
 
 43 
 
 When the night no moon allows, 
 
 And the sunset hour is near, 
 
 And thou bendest thy boughs 
 To kiss his brows. 
 
 Saying, ‘ Come, rest thee here.’ 
 
 Oh, Abyssinian tree ! 
 
 Thus bow thy head to me.” 
 
 But the sentiment was only for a moment, for two tall, stout 
 fellows, armed with clubs, came out and checked my admira- 
 tion. Two Turks stood there, who had observed my admi- 
 ration for the singer ; which now controlling, I walked away, 
 throwing her a piastre, and after making our purchases at the 
 'village, we continued on our way. 
 
 As to the convent of the pulley, whose beggarly monks 
 are seen at this, as well as the convent of St. Anthony and St. 
 Paul, and those abounding here, I leave them to the pages of 
 Curzon, who, in his Monasteries of the Levant, has fully 
 described and exposed their claims to the support and atten- 
 tion of the Christian world. 
 
 Oshmunein is the site of Hermopolis Magna of the Greeks 
 and Romans ; but few ruins remain of the great city of Hermes 
 of the Egyptians, the stories of whom make us well conclude, 
 with Nolan, that it was the divinely taught astronomical and 
 provident wisdom of Joseph that furnished the tradition and 
 original of Hermes. That Joseph’s interpretation of dreams 
 gave them Hermes,* and his astrological science, there is no 
 manner of doubt. 
 
 Here they built their city ; and as he was the original of 
 the Mercury of the Greeks and Romans, as the divinity of 
 
 * See what Nolan has since written on the subject. 1849. 
 
44 
 
 VOYAGE UP THE NILE. 
 
 wisdom and learning here at Hermopolis Magna, the Mace- 
 donian and the Emperors Ptolemys and Roman Emperors culti- 
 vated his worship. What a sublime idea, that Scripture Joseph 
 gave Egyptians, Greeks, and Romans their finest originals of 
 mythology ; and, carry the idea through : was not Noah, Osiris ; 
 and Typhon the deluge ? was not Shem, Pthah, and did they 
 not worship Ham as an astrologer ? [see in Scripture the allu- 
 sion to “ the wisdom of Canaan.”] Did they not gain their spir- 
 ituality of belief from the Hebrew divine doctrine of the 
 immortality of the soul ? and were not their Amenti the last 
 judgment, and all their natural religion the remains of primi- 
 tive revelation given to the patriarchs and Hebrews, and partly 
 inculcated among the Egyptians by Moses and Joseph ? 
 
 Few remains mark the site of the great Hermopolis, and 
 only some bricks tell what was the great city of Hermes, but 
 the well of Joseph yet gladdens the Palestine traveller, and 
 the localities of real, defined Scripture antiquity, are settled 
 without doubt. What a host of convictions confirm the 
 truth of the Bible in Egypt ! The mysteries of Egypt were 
 bugbears and charlatanism, and the truth of Scripture is the 
 highest, best truth, possessing, as Sir W. Jones said, “more 
 science, more antiquity, more lofty poetry, more true wisdom 
 than all the writings of all the authors in the world.” 
 
 Passing over, I was near the mountains on the Libyan side, 
 two miles distant from the river. Here I entered a town 
 nearly as large as Benisoof, which was really a curiosity. I 
 doubt whether it has been visited by many travellers. The 
 houses were handsomely built, better than any of the towns 
 down the Nile. Hundreds of Bedouin encampments were 
 around it, and the town was walled. Going into the gates, I 
 walked through numberless streets, where women, engaged in 
 
BEDOUIN TOWN. 
 
 45 
 
 I 
 
 i 
 
 ■ the most industrious occupations, seemed to be as much aston- 
 I ished at my dress, as the Indians at Peru were at the Spaniards. 
 
 I I could buy nothing, though I saw abundance of every thing 
 I I asked for. The men were all lying on the ground in the 
 i streets in rags, and a richer, more independent set of beggars I 
 never saw. Not even a Turk was here — not a trace of civili- 
 zation ; nothing but the Bedouin Arabs. Flocks of camels, 
 sheep, and goats, were around, and all showed the patriarchal 
 independence of that primeval mode of life, in which God 
 created man. I was unarmed, but I received not even an 
 insult — not a word, but politeness. Had I entered a town 
 nearer civilization, where Europeans are protected by Consuls 
 and frigates, I would have been insulted, and, being defence- 
 less, would have been endangered. I shall never forget the 
 bright page of that Bedouin town. Virtue, the wealth of a 
 fine soil, a salubrious atmosphere, and contentment seemed 
 to reign. On my way toward the river, numbers of young 
 men, apparently fourteen or sixteen, passed with their wives, 
 of the same apparent age, all carrying baskets, riding on 
 one donkey. They evinced the best breeding, and modesty 
 that would have adorned a modern city. I never carried 
 arms again among the Bedouins. 
 
 I returned, directing my course to the southeast, and, from 
 a high dike, or mound, saw my boat — a mere speck far below. 
 I distinguished the flags of my two friends’ boats far in the 
 distance. I arrived in two hours at a village on the river 
 side, and waited for my boat. Here I found some people 
 slaughtering an ox, and could easily buy milk, bread, and 
 eggs, which I was refused every where along the plain, away 
 from the river. In the larger Bedouin towns they told me I 
 could only procure food at a Belled^ or small village. They 
 
46 
 
 VOYAGE UP THE NILE. 
 
 are forced to conceal the possession of even milk to save it 
 from the Pacha and his French emissaries, for one of whom 
 they doubtless took me. 
 
 On arriving at my boat, I learned my acquaintances had 
 passed it, and left an invitation for me to dine in the 
 afternoon at Osiout in their boat. The views of the land- 
 scape increase in beauty ; miles in the distance lay Osiout, in 
 the midst of a fertile plain. 
 
 It has a little port where my frienfls’ boats lay, and they 
 having gone to the mountain, I hurried to mount one of the 
 donkeys, which were offered me in good English ; and 
 Antonio and I were soon upon the lovely ride to Osiout. 
 Such a beautiful situation ! The trees have a peculiar flower 
 that perfumed the atmosphere ; and, on each side of an ele- 
 vated road, over which we ambled on our nice little animals, lay 
 gardens of orange trees, and groves : and, as we approached 
 the outskirts, these gardens, attached to palaces of the Beys, 
 and wealthier Osmanleys, increased in beauty. In the bazaar 
 I saw numbers of Bedouin blacks from the desert of Sahara ; 
 the tallest men I ever saw, perfectly black, with the purest of 
 white robes, armed ferociously, and looking like very Lucifers. 
 Here all the marks of an Eastern bazaar are to be seen — 
 Turks, Jews, Greeks, Arnaouts, Gwawazie, Arabs. 
 
 The Governor’s house has been described by Stephens. I 
 peeped into the mosque, and saw some fine columns. I hur- 
 ried away to the tombs and site of ancient Lycopolis. Its 
 ruins are built into the mosques and towns of modern Osiout. 
 
 Here was the capital of the Lycopolite nome, where the 
 worship of the Avolf and mummies was kept up — some say the 
 dog, but doubtless it was the jackal, partaking of the nature of 
 both. The paintings on the tombs abound with representa- 
 
TURKISH BATH. 
 
 47 
 
 tions of them, and the pits are filled with their mummies ; a 
 strange and sickening idolatry, which Egyptian scholars, who 
 conceive idolatry was only symbolical, may well note. It 
 was the worst specimen of animal worship. Wolves and 
 jackals abounded here, and were the curse of the people ; 
 they feared them, and worshipped them. 
 
 The view from the top of this mountain has been well 
 described by Stephens, and I fear my readers may suspect the 
 genuineness of my rhapsodies on Egypt, if I continue them. 
 The plain filled with fields, the vast extent, the clear atmos- 
 phere, the river winding through the noble plain, is there still, 
 and is well worth a voyage up the Nile. 
 
 To the southeast lay the Gebel el Kofferi, in whose sides 
 those tombs are cut, which furnish Stephens with his descrip- 
 tions and adventures with wolves and bats 
 
 The Sababinath, or Chamber of the Seven Virgins, has 
 been fully described. E. Joy Morris, in his travels, relates an 
 adventure, as well as the murder of one boatman, and the 
 Governor’s conduct in whipping his own crew for it. On my 
 return to the town, I saw among the Sahara Africans some 
 who were said to be from Senaar, who came here to trade in 
 gold and ivory. I went to the Turkish bath, and found in 
 the room, reposing on his couch, and enjoying his pipe, my 
 Dutch friend, who seemed in a very disinterested manner, (in 
 that luxurious position,) to ofier to wait for me. That bath I 
 shall never forget. Constantinople’s baths of Suleyman Pacha 
 were nothing to it. At Cairo I was always boiled, but in 
 Osiout I enjoyed such a bath ( Turc) as I never had, or expect 
 to have again, unless I get to the Mussulman’s Paradise. The 
 darkness on entering, the luckily late hour and absence of 
 persons, and the cleanliness, the finished and artistical rubbing 
 
48 
 
 VOYAGE UP THE NILE. 
 
 with the brush, the shampooing, the plunge, and the delight- 
 ful splashing with cold water — and though I cried, “ Not too 
 hot,” my old Arab understood the philosophy of contrast too 
 well to oblige me — the soaping, and the whole operation, seemed 
 to stamp the character of my performer. When he gets to the 
 Prophet, he will be promoted to his grand Hammam^ and have 
 as many Houris as the Sultan. On reaching the couch room, 
 I found my friend still ready to wait ; and, swathed in towels, 
 for an hour I reposed, while the soles of my feet were rubbed : 
 and after a nap, and coffee, pipes, sherbet, lemonade, &c., we 
 were on our donkeys, and riding back to the port and our boats. 
 How the clear, delightful air seemed to rush into every pore as 
 if a thermometer had regulated the atmosphere for us — every 
 breath seemed Paradise ! How beautiful the mountains in 
 the setting sun — the high temperature of an air, one remove 
 only from the tropical. 
 
 Back to Nile and its refreshing waters again. I dined 
 with my friends ; but, as the wind was fair, and they were 
 forced to wait for their men to make bread, (a contingency 
 which I had guarded against by instructing my dragoman to 
 buy a sheep and bread for our men that we might not delay,) 
 I was soon leaving beautiful Osiout. A piastre had given 
 each of my Arabs a bath, and they were in as fine spirits as 
 I was ; and in the evening, as the clear bright moon shone 
 upon the forms of Gebel Osiout, and the Libyan chain, and 
 the wind carried us on, while the stars were reflected on the 
 water as I have seen them in clear Lake Leman, or on the 
 Rhine at Basle, the Arabs told a beautiful story, in which 
 I recognized a likeness to one of the Mollaka stories of Per- 
 cival. They told the story of Joseph and Potiphar’s wife, and 
 their usual exciting tales of An tar, and his beautiful loved 
 
OSIOUT. 
 
 49 
 
 Hybla. They told them with flashing eyes, interspersed them 
 with fables that might have been in Lochman, and stories from 
 the Elif Laila and songs. 
 
 We bade adieu to El Hamra, the port of Osiout, whose 
 donkey boys are so smart, and leaving our English friends, 
 started with a fair wind. I sat through the evening, running 
 over in my mind the history of the town we had left. Miss 
 Martineau, in her work, describes the beautiful plain, and has 
 run over the history. Here, in earlier times, even in such 
 beauty of nature, men worshipped and embalmed the wolf, 
 and the dog, and the jackal, because they feared them as 
 the destroyers of their flocks. Here the Greek Emperors had 
 a home, as Egypt’s rulers have to this day. Here lived the 
 Christian Bishop, John of Lycopolis, whose famous adventure 
 and connection with the Emperor Theodosius of Byzantium 
 has been well storied. 
 
 While going over the beautiful palace and gardens of Ibra- 
 him Pacha, where Mohammed Ali always lived on his way to 
 Upper Egypt, I could not but feel the interest of the changes : 
 that the Christian Bishop should no more govern this charm- 
 ing plain, and that while his creed rules the finest part of the 
 world, his former home is ruled by the Moslem. The fourteen 
 minarets of Osiout ; the steamboat of the Pacha’s daughter, 
 who is old now, but has been celebrated for her lovers ; the 
 many monuments of Moslem sway — what a change ! Miss 
 Martineau compares the immense plain and its fertility to the 
 rolling prairies in Illinois, and with some justice. Osiout is 
 the present capital of Upper Egypt, and is the most interesting 
 city on the Nile, after Cairo. A description of the present 
 Egyptian towns would form an interesting volume by them- 
 selves. o 
 
60 
 
 VOYAGE UP THE NILE. 
 
 Soohajz is the ancient ‘‘ Crocodilopolis,” or city of the 
 crocodiles, where they were worshipped. Here we were sure 
 of seeing large ones, and our guns were ready for a fine 
 aim. We saw two huge ones on a bank, but not in time for 
 a sure shot. From here travellers generally visit the convent 
 of Aboo-Shenood, and an interesting place it is : the half-naked 
 monks, running about, their delight at seeing a Frank and 
 Christian who will give them a few piastres, are a real nov- 
 elty. The site of the convent is the old city of Medeneh A treeh, 
 Mr. Curzon, in his Monasteries of the Levant, has fully de- 
 scribed one of his visits here. Certainly the monks are hospita- 
 ble to all pilgrims who come from Abyssinia, or are going to 
 the church there ; and one was there, who, though black, was 
 said to be a highly learned man. How much that Hamyar 
 priest, (whose black skin could not conceal the delicate mod- 
 esty of the scholar,) how much could he tell me of the Sabe- 
 ans and the kings of the East, those who first acknowledged 
 Christ ; — whose queen.-^as Sheba ; and of the Abyssinian 
 church in the land whence came gifts of gold, frankincense, 
 and myrrh. 
 
 Though it was said we should see crocodiles after we had 
 passed Minieh, we did not see them till we had passed Osiout. 
 They uniformly dived into the river as we approached. 
 
 Our boat took a wrong route, and the reis was perplexed by 
 the numerous islands here. As it went back, I crossed one of 
 the islands and proceeded up. As my boat came up in an hour, 
 I had to cross a fork of water up to my neck, and one of my 
 boatmen, who had been sent to get me, stripped, and I sat on 
 his head. Half way over, I heard his neck crack beneath’ 
 me, and expected a splash ; but he carried me bravely over 
 and dropped me on the bank, so fatigued that he could only 
 
FARSHIOUT- 
 
 51 
 
 grin, and mutter “ Thayeeb Howaga.” Poor Saadi ! I liked 
 him best of them all. He wanted to go with me to America. 
 
 Farshiout lies between Soohajz and the bend which the 
 river makes to Dendera. Like the whole country from Gir- 
 geh, it is highly productive and beautifully cultivated. Im- 
 mense ditches go to the mountains, which irrigate where the 
 river Soohadjz or Soohadjz Moje Water and its streamlets do 
 not flow. The water-wheel or Sakias, or Persian wheels, are 
 frequently seen, and a greater industry seems to prevail in 
 the cultivation here. The river is filled with islands, and 
 navigation is difficult. Sometimes our boats get aground, and 
 our boatmen strip and jump into the water, despite the timse- 
 achs or crocodiles. 
 
 At sunrise of this lovely morning, I Was on my feet 
 and climbing the lofty mountains on the Arabian side, the 
 whole chain of which are called the mountains El Said, and 
 rise in forms of castellated grandeur as we ascend the Nile. 
 The Gebel-el-Teir was a wild chain.^ Gebel Heredy was lofty 
 and noble *, Gebel Osiout was high and picturesque ; and 
 Gebel Girgeh higher still. But if these are grand, the Gebel- 
 el-Said is sublime. I walked along through shady groves of 
 the down palm, which I here saw for the first time, and of 
 which Juvenal speaks. The fruit looks enticing, resembling 
 a pomegranate, but is said to be poisonous. Catching a view 
 of the distant furnaces of How or Havou, the Diospolis Parva 
 of the ancients, and which, from its furnaces, may well be 
 called the Birmingham of Upper Egypt, I hurried back to my 
 boat and breakfast. The mimosa and acacia trees fill this 
 fertile plain. 
 
 Passing How, I landed again, our boat having crossed to 
 the Other side, upon the Libyan or western bank. These 
 
62 
 
 VOYAGE UP THE NILE. 
 
 Libyan mountains, like the Arabian chain, make a circuit of 
 several miles, their gray, brown forms glistening in the sun. 
 Between the Nile and these, stretches a semicircular valley of 
 the most beautiful green, and spotted with a hundred Bedouin 
 encampments and straw huts, with their flocks of camels, 
 sheep, buffaloes, and goats. It was all primitive as the patri- 
 archs. ‘These, my dragoman told me, were the poorer Bedou- 
 ins from Mecca or Hajji, so called. While we were walking 
 along, one of them came up with several scarabaei with 
 cartouches on them, saying that he had brought them from 
 Gournou. I saw they were newly manufactured. Scarcely 
 a genuine antique was offered me at Cairo or Thebes, for in 
 both places the German agents get every thing. He armed 
 himself with an ugly weapon or pickaxe, as if afraid of us. 
 
 Looking down the Nile here from the high mound along 
 the river, as it makes a turn, what a magnificent view ! a 
 combination of the most lovely attributes of Nature, and beau- 
 ties of mountain and valley ; the Arabian chain bounded the 
 vale in the distance, and between it and the Lybian chain 
 flowed, through the most luxuriant of plains, the lovely Nile. 
 
 Thus O Egypt, has the Almighty Power, who avenges 
 nations, yet left upon thee the impress of beauty, as if to say 
 that, though cursed in thy rulers, thou hast yet the marks of 
 external and noble grandeur. Below wound the wide river and 
 its beautiful waters. Far in the distance, grove upon grove, 
 paradise upon paradise like, the view seemed to stretch : the 
 town of How was visible miles down in the clear atmosphere. 
 
 But what lofty castle is this before us, jutting over the 
 river, or rather, assemblage of castles 7 It is one which Isis or 
 Nature threw down as a challenge to all the Gothic piles in 
 the north of Europe ; and in every century the Baron, — the 
 
CHENOBUSCION. 
 
 63 
 
 architect, has tried to equal it, and failed ; a thousand piles of 
 man’s workmanship could hardly equal in grandeur that 
 bold form. Fortress of eternal rock, that over that Egyptian 
 city of Kasr-el-Said, and stones of the ancient city Cheno- 
 buscion, rearest thy lofty form, and haltest here in boldness 
 and grandeur, which the Drachenfels, or Hudson’s cliffs, or 
 Gibraltar, cannot excel ; thy lofty battlements, thy terraces of 
 hundred surmounting strata, thy clusterings of fluted columns, 
 and points and spires, which the glacier can scarce rival ; thy 
 pillars, like vertehrce, of a huge animal, thy broad eternal front 
 reflecting its dark form in the clear glassy mirror below — 
 contrasting in grandeur with the puny forms of the dates and 
 palms, skirting the green at thy base ; like man to a pyramid : 
 what are man’s attempts, St. Peter’s Church, the Pyramids, or 
 St. Paul’s pile, when beside thee ? Slope away again from the 
 river, wild mountains of Araby. It is a noble work, that last of 
 thine, Dame Nature, and you may well retire with such modest 
 grace. 
 
 I passed here a boat of two acquaintances, and English 
 ladies ; one of whom I had met two winters since in Italy, 
 who had made the tour of Syria, as English ladies, without 
 any protector but Lord Palmerston’s letters. One of them I 
 had known to be an afiectionate wife in Naples, and who had 
 given a large sum recently to the new English Church in 
 Jerusalem, for an organ. I fired a salute, and the echo of the 
 report bounded through those mountains, and replied again 
 and again. I 
 
 On an island we passed three or four crocodiles, the largest 
 I ever saw. That motion of theirs — half awful, half dis- j 
 gusting — -their huge size, makes one think of the formless ; 
 larva and the theory of the old Rosecrucians, creeping into 
 
64 
 
 VOYAGE UP THE NILE. 
 
 life, and gazing with its dead, dreamless eyes. They were 
 worthy of being gods of o\di-reposing Egypt, hke the sphinx 
 or god of whom it may be said : 
 
 “ Sedebit eternum que sedebit.” 
 
 Further on, mountains still noble. A boat of two English 
 travellers, brothers ; — Messrs. B. — one a reverend, who had 
 been to Wady Haifa, or second Cataract. In the evening 
 the steamboat, with Dr. Lallemand. passed. He afterwards 
 told me that he went to Philae and back, and I believe was 
 only a fortnight. He said that he thought a sail-boat must be 
 intolerable. I could not go in any other with pleasure. 
 
 The panorama of Nature of this fine day is to close. 
 Never did day close more finely. Such a sunset ! such clouds 
 and colors, before the monarch of day leaves this clear atmos- 
 phere, as if in regret; such ranges of golden hues, such a 
 liquid expanse of splendor, and fretted gold, and gorgeous 
 curtain upon curtain of cloud rolling over ; and scarlet and 
 crimson, and all the colors. I would be a pantheist of old 
 Egypt, and sun worshipper, did I not know that thou, O 
 God, my Father, made it all — 
 
 “ These things of beauty that are a joy forever 
 and for these I thank thee. 
 
 In the afternoon of the next day, I stopped at Ikhmim, on 
 the east bank, to explore the ruins of the celebrated Panopolis^ 
 spoken of by Yates and several travellers as being the city of 
 Nero ; but inquiring at the Christian Convent of the Austrian 
 propaganda^ I found a most polite missionary, with whom I had 
 a conversation in Italian. He assured me it was not the site 
 of Panopolis, which was far distant ; that there was no arch 
 there, of which Conder and Yates speak so positively. I was 
 
IKHMIM, IBOSEIR, TAHTA. 
 
 55 
 
 most politely received, and he pressed on me coffee and pipes, 
 but I pleaded the fair wind, and got away. It is said to have 
 been founded by Ikhmim, great-grandson of Ham, grandson 
 of Cush, and son of Misraim : here of old the magicians had 
 their chief seat. 
 
 The proper Panopolis, the polite ecclesiastic told me, was 
 near Soohajz, and does not agree fully with Wilkinson’s 
 account, who copies several inscriptions from it here. 
 
 The oppressive taxes of this town, I doubt not, are the 
 secret of this wretchedness that seems so irreconcileable with 
 the fertility of the country ; the Pachas, here the cruel task- 
 masters, suck up every thing that is produced. 
 
 At the Arab town of Iboseir, we leave the last town of the 
 ancient division of Middle Egypt, and enter the Thebaid. It was 
 not far from here that two of my acquaintances from England 
 had their boat capsized in a gale, and it sank. All their 
 clothes and stores were lost or spoiled. They were invited by 
 the Grovernor of Osiout to his house, where they remained till 
 they refitted another boat and went up. The danger is great 
 in a heavy wind, and the agitation of the Arabs ludicrous. 
 
 What fertility ! Here the Nile has conquered the desert ; 
 and these little struggles of Osiris and Typhon you see all 
 along up the Nile. How drew the old Egyptians their 
 mythology from nature ! 
 
 Tahta . — The fine wheat of the rich, open plain, is dwelt 
 upon by all travellers. There are large coal-pits here, the coal 
 being burned from the acacia ; and we, being marketing in coal 
 just now, put to the shore to purchase some. I found here an 
 eminently trading people. They wished to sell me sheep, tur- 
 keys, geese, lambs, chickens, &c. ; but we had laid in our 
 mutton at Osiout, and pushed on to the village of Gau-el- 
 
66 
 
 VOYAGE UP THE NILE. 
 
 Kehyr^ or Great Gaw, to visit the ruins of the ancient Antaeo- 
 polis, which I examined more fully on my return. 
 
 Among the beautiful islands that abound in this fertile 
 part of the Nile we wind, enchanted at the increasing purity 
 of the air, rejoicing in the most perfect health, and thankful 
 for the Creator’s gifts that are so boundlessly scattered over 
 these fertile plains. The wheat crops and all kinds of grain, 
 beans, and peas, charm the eye and perfume the air. We 
 had heard of the excellent bread of Millawi, and stopped for 
 some. 
 
 Above Soohajz we passed Menshieh or Moonshieh, which 
 has a Coptic church, convent, walls, and fine groves — 
 the site of “ Ptolernais Hermes,” or the Hermes of the Ptolemies. 
 A quay only remains. Its fine wheat and bread are famous. 
 Here we enter the Said, and are rejoiced at the dryness of the 
 climate, the clearness of the atmosphere, and charming beau- 
 ties of this smiling land. The Romans, in the times of the 
 Emperors, sent their invalids here for health ; and no wonder, 
 for in all the world there is scarce more congeniality of the 
 atmosphere. Here no exciting volcanic air, as in the baths of 
 Baiae in Campania, gives unnatural fire to the blood, but the 
 dry, clear atmosphere gives you that unconsciousness of being 
 aught else, than a creature made to thank God for his gifts. 
 
 In the morning, at sunrise, I left my boat and started for a 
 walk to the mountains. Passing through a plain rich in all 
 kinds of grain, I kept on up the river. I walked through 
 numberless Bedouin encampments, with flocks and herds ; 
 but, strange to say, I could buy neither milk, eggs, nor bread, 
 which was usually my excuse for a chat. 
 
 The incidents with my reis and crew would form a book 
 of themselves. We started well, and for four days it was all 
 
INCIDENTS WITH REIS AND CREW. 
 
 57 
 
 happiness. The first difficulty was, their refusing to drag with 
 a slight head wind. I rose and stormed in English and French, 
 which latter my dragoman alone understood, and made 
 them leap out of the boat and obey me. At Benisooef, my 
 friend the Frenchman Castellan, by his lectures to them when 
 he visited me, and by threatening to inform all the Hakim 
 Pachas up the river by letter that I was on my way, and if I 
 was not there at the proper time, to have them punished — and 
 a few other influences-^arried us swimmingly up to Luxor, 
 although we had a head wind nearly all the time. I never 
 struck one of them a blow ; though twice, to frighten them, I 
 levelled my pistol at the heads of one or two of them, and used 
 to practise putting a ball through an orange, and always pre- 
 tended to have a most violent temper, which really made 
 them afraid that, in a fit of passion, I would shoot one of 
 them. The fear that one has in starting alone from a town 
 in the extreme part of the Nile, entirely at their mercy, soon 
 wore off, and I was soon as much at home with them as in 
 my father’s house. It was ever “backsheesh” at night, when 
 the boat stopped ; whenever my dragoman went ashore ; and 
 I always gave them a little. An occasional glass of wine to 
 the reis and steersman, a little brandy to them all, cigars 
 almost daily, for I had five or six boxes not fit to smoke, al- 
 ways conciliated them. Sometimes I would order coffee to all 
 around ; and sometimes, when they were out of bread, I gave 
 them all my own store rather than have them stop. It re- 
 quired a great deal of management, which was constant occu 
 pation and amusement. After five or six days, they were 
 down on me for a harouf^ or mutton, and the promise of a 
 sheep at Osiout quieted them : now I would give them one or 
 
 Z* 
 
58 
 
 VOYAGE UP THE NILE. 
 
 two turkeys, and nothing would give me more pleasure than 
 “Howaga thayeeb.” 
 
 1 found out my dragoman early and drew the purse strings 
 upon him, giving him only a himdred piastres — one pound at 
 a time. The prospect of getting the joh of being my drago- 
 man through Syria, kept him from violence and too open fraud. 
 He had no influence with the crew, and all the storming ! was 
 forced to do myself ; and he was only fit to set my table, and lie 
 down and tell me stories about Damascus, and Aleppo, and 
 Bagdad. He was harmless generally and sometimes provoking. 
 I once threatened to pitch him into the Nile, and once came 
 very near thrashing him. In my excursions I used to have 
 one of the Arabs for a companion, with whom I could talk by 
 this time very well, or my Syrian Turk Bokra, who was a tall 
 man, and had he been dragoman, and the other the cook, I 
 should have much preferred it. At most of the towns up the 
 river where the boat lay, there was usually a guard, who 
 was paid. At Luxor, while absent one night on an excursion, 
 some of my best clothing was stolen. The next morning I 
 refused to pay the guard, who had done his business so badly. 
 I finally flung him a piastre, and he joined my dragoman in 
 some words in Arabic, which were not very complimentary. 
 These little affairs were but momentary, and only relieved 
 the monotony that I began to feel. 
 
 Girgeh . — How prettily this town looks. Its tall minarets ; 
 its houses with pigeon tops, a species of architectme which 
 strikes you a few villages below. Its thick grove behind, was 
 beautiful ; it was formerly the capital of Upper Egypt, and a 
 very large town. There is a governor here ; thousands of 
 Turks strutting through the town ; and some important-looking 
 dignitaries, Greek Albanians. The stores have the best articles 
 
ST. GEORGE. 
 
 59 
 
 of Upper Egypt exposed for sale. Here we saw the boat of a 
 rich Turk and his gayly-dressed wife. The women here are 
 good-looking, and their heads ornamented with coins ; num- 
 bers of soldiers are to be seen in the streets. 
 
 We left Girgeh for a ride to Abydos. Girgeh was named 
 after St. George, patron saint of the Egyptians, who is also the 
 watchword of England, and the legend was obtained by one 
 of her knights at Bibbeh, below Benisooef, where his memory 
 is transformed into that of a Moslem saint, and honors are paid 
 as such to his memory — dragon and all. 
 

 
 
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PART II. 
 
 PBOVINCE OF THE THEBAID, IN THE ANCIENT 
 DIVISION OF UPPER EGYPT. 
 
 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 ABYDOS. 
 
 Abydos or This, How, Dendera, Cooft or Coptos, Coos, 
 Luxor, Karnac, Gournou, Medinah Tabou, Thebes, Biban el 
 Memlook, A1 Asassif, Hermonthis, Esne, Edfou, Eilythyas, 
 Gebel Luxor, and quarries of Hadjar Silsillis, Koom Ombos, 
 Assouan, Philae. — Among the ancient Egyptians these were the 
 principal sites. But commencing with the earliest days of 
 Egypt’s splendor, we find three great sites of empire, Abydos 
 or the ancient This^ situated sixty miles below Thebes, (built 
 a few centuries from the date of the pyramids and Memphis,) 
 and which we are now approaching. It had sixteen sovereigns 
 reigning while Cheops built the first pyramid. Over this pro- 
 vince of Tanis, which extended from where we are to Dongola, 
 beyond the second cataract, ruled the predecessors of Rameses 
 the Great, whose names are written in the tablet of Abydos. Of 
 their structures, their surmounting capitals built as long before 
 Rameses as the apostles of Christ were anterior to us, of Aby- 
 
62 
 
 VOYAGE UP THE NILE. 
 
 dosj of Memphis, nought remains. Thebes was then an un- 
 settled plain. The superstructures of Rameses the Great, and 
 Osiren at Abydos, at Aboosimhoul, at Thebes, built upon these, 
 still give an idea of the glory of Egypt throughout the valley 
 of the Nile. A pyramid of Cheops or his contemporaries, a 
 granite sanctuary * of Ositarsen, or a tomb cut in his time,t and 
 such solitary records as the tablet of Abydos, alone attest their 
 existence or their history. Like Babylon, like Babel, like the 
 localities of young earth, their sites are the ruins of their em- 
 pires, and we look at them alone through the dim glass of 
 their successors of thirty centuries ago — to whom they were 
 yet, by ages and siecles, an ancient race. 
 
 While at Abydos I could not but rehearse the ages that 
 had passed in Egypt’s earlier time over that spot. The 
 ancient This, it alone of all Egypt, save Memphis, stood as the 
 locality of the first founders of Egypt. We do not conceive it 
 necessary to go to Wady Haifa with Miss Martineau, and look 
 over into Dongola to see this. We can contemplate from this, 
 as a 2^oi7it de depart^ the dynasties of Egypt. Here before the 
 Augustine age of Rameses, and his father Osiren, (who built 
 these kingly halls,) lived the earlier dynasties, who were as 
 much anterior, says Bunsen, to Rameses or Sesostris, as 
 Augustus was to our era. The excavations of Messrs. Salt 
 and Bankes have thrown true light upon the history of 
 Egypt; the tablet of Abydos contained the name of Sesos- 
 tris as its last name, and is the grand regulating touchstone — 
 the Doomsday Book of Egyptian Chronology. I ran over in 
 my mind the history of this age before Abraham came into 
 Egypt ; of those who built here before the building of the 
 pyramids, and who lived here at This, upon whose foundations 
 
 * Karnac. 
 
 t Beni Hassan. 
 
ABYDOS AND ANCIENT EGYPT. 
 
 63 
 
 Rameses built, as the tower of London is built upon Caesar’s 
 foundations. ^^Here once stood a flourishing empire 1” From 
 here what civilization had its rise ! I once thought the age of 
 Sesostris ancient ; how ancient Herodotus thought it, but how 
 modern it seems ; what a Periclean advance upon his prede- 
 cessors, standing here upon the ruins of This. He built here ; 
 and when you creep into the inner parts of these old temples, 
 and the palace where his statue was found — into places so filled 
 that you cannot enter, where Miss Martineau said she sent in 
 the Arabs to count the alabaster columns ; when you look at 
 these walls, covered with sand, you sigh, that Rameses should 
 have looked upon the ruins of his predecessors as we look 
 upon his. The distinctness of the bas-reliefs and figures is 
 such, and the paintings so beautiful and so delicately exe- 
 cuted, that you would fancy you were in Pompeii, or Hercu- 
 laneum, or some remains of an era of eighteen centuries, 
 instead of one of three thousand years. 
 
 Here doubtless Menes, or his successors of the first and 
 second dynasty, established their seat as the capital of Upper 
 Egypt, as they settled first at Memphis, and thence proceeded 
 up the Nile, (for, ethnologically and historically, the fable of 
 Meroe and the descent has been exploded.) Five thousand 
 five hundred years ago, (according to Bunsen’s questionable 
 chronology,) Menes turned the course of the river Nile, making 
 the change so spoken of. 
 
 Abydos was on the road to the Great Oasis ; Ethiopia had 
 early been settled, and hence here This was the favorite site 
 by which it attained its grandeur. The other remains at 
 Abydos are only some mounds and rubbish ; and, save these 
 remains of the palace, there is nothing. But a locality older 
 than the pyramids — a locality older than any site save Mem- 
 
64 
 
 VOYAGE UP THE NILE. 
 
 phis — how it grows on one ! Let us turn to Miss Martineau’s 
 work for the recapitulation of the history. Abydos, like 
 Luxor, and Gournou, part of Karnac, and most of Thebes, 
 was built by Rameses, and his father Osiren, who has dedi- 
 cated the temple to Osiris ; and the whole area is sacred to 
 him. But where were the Hebrews while Rameses was 
 building here ? Joshua* was vanquishing those nations of Pal- 
 estine and Syria who were opposed to the Jews. Of these cir- 
 cumstances there can be no doubt. The tablet of Abydost of 
 the predecessors of Sesostris agrees perfectly with all the 
 monuments in the orders of reigns and dates, which is more 
 than can be said of the only other royal story of Egypt of 
 Manetho, and is in accordance with the temples. How unfor- 
 tunate for the early tales of Egypt, that the beginning is 
 broken away. What might it not teach us of the patriarchs 
 and earlier prophets ? But we turn away from this interesting 
 place, from its dust-covered mounds, its sand-covered palace, 
 and its flapping bats. Why does not Mohammed Ali clear 
 this out as he has so well done Dendera and Esne 'I How the 
 sandstone roof shines in the sun, as if in hope of the memory 
 of Rameses being better represented. We leave the clear 
 sculptures and paintings with regret, among which was the boat 
 of which Miss Martineau speaks. The ride from the temple 
 to Balliani is like the ride from Girgeh to Abydos. The sweet 
 perfume of the fields, the bright sun, the happy and indus- 
 trious people going to and returning from the fair fields, crops 
 of vetches, wheat, barley, lentils, flax, the Egyptian bean and 
 sugar-cane, enchanted me the whole way. Miss Martineau, 
 St. John, and all writers, have dwelt on the beauty of this 
 
 Champollion. 
 
 t Miss Martineau. 
 
LIFE ON THE NILE. 
 
 65 
 
 plain. Farewell to thee, Abydos ! well art thou called Arabat 
 el Matfoun (Arabat beneath the sands). 
 
 On our return from Abydos I met my boat at Balliani and 
 there being a settlement of the Alni6 here, I was forced to see ] 
 again this exhibition as a pastime, while waiting for my boat. ' 
 I stopped here both going up and coming down. It is a small 
 place with only one or two mosques. 
 
 Rouda^ and a sugar manufactory . — Passing this place 
 we stopped a moment. Piles of sugar-cane were lying upon 
 the shore and guarded by Arab soldiers. It had been brought 
 here by the boats, and we could not purchase one stick for 
 love or money. In the sugar manufactory bones are used to 
 heat the boilers, and rags and papyri, and the remains of 
 Egypt’s necropolis. 
 
 So we go ; manufactories and steam engines on the site of 
 tae towns of Rameses, and the Setorsasens. Any thing but 
 ranroad and steamboat on the beautiful old Nile. 
 
 Such IS our life on the Nile. A strange, rare luxury it is, 
 unlike any thing else in the world. Now you can take your 
 gun and go on shore, and though the middle of January, walk 
 through a rich plantation of dourra or the bearded wheat, 
 or maize, or some fragrant field of the plenteous land. A 
 mound or dike separates you from the view ; you jump over 
 it, and find yourself in the town of some ferocious dogs or 
 hospitable Bedouin. Now you are tired and wander back to 
 your boat, popping over a few birds to save your reputation. 
 Now you sail by a mountain filled with the caves of anchor- 
 ite Eremites. Now you go ashore at a town where there is a 
 market and an assemblage of Gwawazie. Now an ancient 
 Egyptian structure of the Pharaohs. Now a pile of the 
 Romans. Now you sketch the picturesque mountains. Now 
 
 E 
 
66 
 
 VOYAGE UP THE NILE. 
 
 you study the formation of the strata. Now ’tis a pipe. Now 
 coffee. Now a tale from your dragoman. Now a song from 
 your Arabs. Now a boat passes laden with pottery from Geneh. 
 Now another with slaves from Darfour. Now one with the 
 Sultan’s flag, and the wives of some Turk. Now a crowd of 
 trading Arabs, whom our boatmen hail and try to excel in 
 blackguardism, in Arab style. Now groves of palm alone to 
 gaze at. Now picturesque landscape of acacia groves, villages 
 with their eternal dove-cotes, and the date-tree, all along the 
 shore, ever having under them a clay-built village or Belled^ 
 and ever beautiful. Now your boatman cries, Timseach^ “ a 
 crocodile,” and has his spear ready or your gun, hut is always 
 too late. I never could shoot one, but always fancied, as does 
 every one, “ that 1 hit himP The dryness of the atmosphere 
 is a great peculiarity. Meat of a sheep that I gave my boat- 
 men at Osiout has hung nearly a week in the open sun and 
 air and not spoiled, though it is as warm as summer. 
 
CHAPTER II. 
 
 Visit to the temple of Dendera. — The walk through the doom-palm Villages. — 
 Crossing the river. — First sight of temple. — Rubbish. — Ruins. — The temple. — 
 The effect of the front. — Columns. — Countenance of Athor the Egyptian 
 Venus. — The idea of the temple. — The ruined temple. — Grand temple. — Ty- 
 phonium. — Sculptures of the gods. — Sunset from the temple. — Evening in the 
 temple. — The supper. — The Bedouin camp. — The bivouac. — The fires. — 
 The watch-dog. — Canopus and the southern cross. — Mussulman virtues. — 
 The women. — The morning. — The Repast. — Second visit to Dendera. — The 
 smaller temple posterior. — Historical part of the temple. — Sculpture of Cleo- 
 patra and the Ptolemies, Alexander, &c. — View from the mound. 
 
 After landing at Dishna, about four leagues south of Geneh, 
 I started on a very bad donkey, with one of the boatmen, to 
 visit the temple of Dendera. After an hour I sent back the 
 donkey, and proceeded on foot through the delightful groves 
 of doom palms, of which Juvenal speaks in his satires. 
 About two hours before sunset, we crossed the river in a ferry- 
 boat, and after walking an hour, beheld on a distant mound 
 of rubbish, the far-famed temple of Dendera. Another hour’s 
 walk carried us through fields of barley, beans, vetches, and 
 lentils, and over the mounds of rubbish which completely 
 surrounded and partly concealed the temple. But what an 
 awful feeling of grandeur struck upon me, when, without wait- 
 ing to go round through the portico, I bounded down the wall 
 and stood before the striking fabric. There on the ceiling move 
 
 / 
 
68 
 
 VOYAGE UP THE NILE. 
 
 along the heroes and gods, the priests and kings, the great 
 and good and powerful of Egyptian mythology and story. 
 There are the colors that have stood the storms of eighteen 
 centuries, and along the better protected roof, the winged 
 globes are repeated, gliding into one another, surrounded by 
 stars, where the blue is so fresh that I half imagined myself in 
 the Senate chamber, in the capitol of my own land. Above 
 the capitals, Isis, in the character of Diana, receives offerings 
 of the priests. Further on, in the next entrance, she sur- 
 mounts the beautiful capitals. This is more indistinct than the 
 pronaosj and is probably the ancient Egyptian temple erected 
 to Athor ; the pronaos having been erected afterwards and con- 
 secrated to the Roman Venus, in a. d. 65, by Tiberius Caesar. 
 I will not describe the several rooms through which I passed, 
 one opening upon another in more or less distinctness, the 
 sanctuary and side chambers, nor that passage seemingly into 
 the ground, where after crawling along with a light, and driv- 
 ing away the bats, I saw the most distinct sculptures of the 
 whole temple, the sweet face of Isis, and the wonderful artis- 
 tical beauty in the countenances of the priestesses, following 
 me in my dreams days after ; nor the staircases, the proces- 
 sion of priests, the feasts, the beautiful forms of Egypt reclin- 
 ing on their delightful couches, the heroes in their sacred 
 boats, the zodiacs above, and the place of the statue below. 
 All these are for the guide books. 
 
 But I pass to consider the philosophical idea of the whole, 
 the purpose for which the temple was erected. Athor has 
 been defined by St. John as that principle in Nature by which 
 things naturally assimilated to each other are brought together 
 for the production of new and beautiful forms. 
 
 This principle, the generative power of Nature, was a 
 
. ATHOR. 
 
 69 
 
 beautiful and divine goddess with the ancient Egyptians. As 
 the fount of all creation and beauty, Athor was worshipped. 
 That power which produced and continues the human race, 
 the mystery of conception and birth growing out of beauty 
 and love in our race, and with which the animals are like us 
 endowed ; which in the vegetable creation, as the seed decays, 
 and the 'pollen and anther are brought together, produce the 
 new germ : this creative power of Nature was Athor. It was a 
 sweet woman ; a beautiful form — a woman and mother ! To 
 this power was the temple erected — beauty, love, creation ! 
 
 Her face — the sweet form of a woman, in which the Egyp- 
 I tians embodied that idea, surmounts the capital. The Roman, 
 when he came, welcomed the idea, and associated it with his 
 goddess, who was worshipped as the same power ; he conse- 
 crated it to his Yenus ; though a less philosophical idea, and 
 more material attributes, belonged, to his divinity. He placed 
 the Roman coitfure on the Egyptian head-dress, which deforms 
 it still. From her (Athor’s) bosom too issues the world ; and 
 before your eyes, in distinct sculptures, glide the universe, the 
 heroes, the processions of sacred boats, the priests and gods. 
 On they move, and your eye follows them — the gods of the 
 olden time. Osiris, covered with his plumed helmet; Isis, 
 smiling with her sweet face, and budding form ; Horus, 
 the son of the beautiful heroic wedlock. Further on, the 
 spirit of the creative power is exhibited ; love and pleasure 
 reign, musical processions, festivals, otferings and sacrifices to 
 the gods ; priests carrying fruits and flowers ; Isis, Osiris, 
 Horus, receiving gifts ; monarchs returning from victories with 
 I the rich spoils of time, speaking their names in cartouches in 
 ^ the living stone ; and with whom the Ptolomies, the Cleo- 
 I patras, the Caesars, are proud to mingle their own. 
 
70 
 
 VOYAGE UP THE NILE. 
 
 Now comes birth. Isis, or Nature, in her many attributes 
 and presiding powers, here appears in the character of nurse, 
 or the Lucinian Diana. Here, with the infant in her arms, 
 she receives offerings from the priests : this is repeated above 
 the p?' 07 iaos, above the facade, full in all the capitals. Go 
 where you will, it is some modification of the same idea. 
 
 In reviewing the effect of the temple, I was struck with 
 one conviction — the^superiority of the ideas of divinity among 
 the Egyptians to all the other so-called heathen nations. 
 "Whether, degenerating directly from the patriarchs and the 
 true God, they were less sunken in their ideas than the Greeks 
 and Romans, certain it is that their worship was higher. It is 
 not the worship of mere sensual pleasure — it is the sacred 
 idea of love, generation, and birth combined. The rites were 
 not such as required the prostitution of virgins as at Ephesus, 
 in Greece, at the temples of Venus ; it is the sacred institution 
 of wedlock — not Venus presiding over awful profane pollu- 
 tions. No ! it is Isis in the character of chaste Diana. The 
 sweet face of Athor smiles upon you, not with wanton temp- 
 tation, but with half-maternal benignity. The artistical power 
 in the female statues is not displaying the charms of the cour- 
 tezan. Nowhere is the smile of Isis that of the harlot : it is 
 all that makes marriage sacred. They might have written 
 above, 
 
 ‘To Beauty, Love and Wedlock, Creation, and Birth. 
 
 I read several hieroglyphics, among which I noticed that 
 the names of Cleopatra, and her son Csesarion, were the latest. 
 I noticed also the names of Antoninus Pius, Trajan, and several 
 other Roman Emperors. In searching for the name of 
 
DENDERA. 
 
 71 
 
 AOTKRTRj autocrator^ Emperor, indicating the name of 
 Claudius^ or iVero, (who are designated on all the Egyptian 
 medals thus,) and which Le Lorrain had left when he de- 
 tached the zodiac, and carried it to Paris, I could see that 
 some one [Frenchman in all probability) had endeavored 
 to deface the remaining part. I had a clear idea of the zodiac 
 in Paris, which I had often been to the Bibliotheque to 
 examine, and satisfied myself that the deception was exactly 
 what Champollion describes in “Fourier and Napoleon.” But 
 who can deface the marks of Roman sway in the entire 
 edifice ? the ceiling of the planisphere, and names, surnames, 
 cartouches^ titles, symbols of Tiberius, Claudius, Nero, and 
 Domitian.* 
 
 The moon was far up when I came out of the temple of 
 Dendera. The boatman advised me to go to the Sheikh-e- 
 Belled at Dendera, as the people in the villages were reckless, 
 and the modern town had a very bad reputation. We walked 
 up the river hank two miles, until, reaching a wide plain, we 
 came among numerous flocks of Bedouins, and one noble- 
 looking old man of one party attracted me to the fire they 
 were sitting around. A thought struck me to pass the night 
 there, and going among them, I claimed their hospitality. As 
 my approach aroused them, one seized a pickaxe sort of 
 weapon ; but my manner instantly assured him that I was a 
 harmless intruder. Summoning my best Arabic, I went up 
 and saluted the old man and his four or five sons, whose 
 wives were sitting in the tents around, and whose sons’ sons (for 
 they all had a family likeness) were sitting with him around 
 the fire. I represented myself a hadgi or wandering pilgrim, 
 exploring the hirhehs or temples, and that I was poor, and 
 
 * See Appendix, Note A, 
 
72 
 
 VOYAGE UP THE NILE. 
 
 begged to stay there for the night. The green grass and a 
 mat, before which a bulwark of woven straw was placed, 
 seemed the only chance for a bed, as I knew I ought not to 
 think of looking near the women and their tent, and I was de^ 
 termined to trust to their disposal of me. He seerrced to thank 
 Allah for the opportunity of performing one of the Mohamme- 
 dan rites of hospitality, and I could now seejhat the women 
 in the tent were busy making bread, and the elder sons, the 
 husbands, milking the cows, preparing coffee, <fec. I had 
 meanwhile been given the best place on the mat, and the old 
 patriarch was doing his best to look what he could not say. 
 Luckily, I had Marcel’s vulgar Arabic dictionary in my pock- 
 et, and we had an interesting conversation. I could not but 
 think, as I saw his venerable hairs, his noble brow, and his 
 numerous posterity, and their camels, cows, sheep, goats, 
 calves, (fcc., two hundred in number, I should say, — 
 of Abraham sitting at the tent at the Cool of day. I had 
 seen one of them praying, and his silent, real devotion, 
 unlike the affected manner of the displaying Moslems I had 
 usually seen, would have done credit to the most devout 
 Christian. I knew they had Abraham and the prophets, and 
 I ventured to remark to him that “ Abraham once entertained 
 strangers, and had entertained angels unawares ; and, though 
 he might be pretty free of the honor of having an angel in 
 his presence now, that I still trusted God would reward his 
 hospitality as he did the patriarch.” He seemed to be highly 
 pleased at the flattering comparison I had made of him to the 
 “father of the faithful,” laughed at my conceit about the 
 angel, and swallowed some other stories of his resemblance to 
 the old Chaldean Bedouin. 
 
 I should have thought of my own romantic position in the 
 
TEMPLE OF EDFOU. 
 

 # ^ 
 
 m 
 
 
 
 •Ai 
 
 3<’L" 
 
 J 
 
 I 
 
BEDOUIN BIVOUAC. 
 
 73 
 
 camp of a Bedouin, and prospect of a blanket of those bright 
 stars that were glittering above me, had not the dignity of the 
 old Bedouin ; the absence of staring among the women ; the 
 silent condppt of all the men ; their respect to their father ; their 
 politeness and delicacy to me ; the refreshing repast of milk 
 and eggs and warm bread they set before me ; their apology, 
 that it was all they had ; their breeding, that would have 
 adorned the table of a pacha ; their quiet, restrained mirth at 
 my failing with my fingers in getting the warm bread and 
 eggs into my mouth without crumbling them ; their fragrant 
 Mocha cotfee, and sweet perfume of their Syrian tobacco ; 
 their noble forms ; their dignified and healthy frames ; their 
 tall height ; their bronzed color ; the tout ensemble of the 
 scene, — so carried me away that I forgot myself Then I had 
 come among them pretending to be poor and without a para, 
 though I had money secreted in my breast ; pretending to be 
 defenceless, though I had a pocket pistol ; of a difierent reli- 
 gion, and yet, though late in the evening, they unhesitatingly 
 cook me supper of their best, give me their best mat, and 
 cover me with their best cloak, thanking God in their prayers 
 for the opportunity to exhibit one of their sacred laws of hos- 
 pitality. And when, during the whole night, after I had laid 
 down and pretended to be asleep, I found one keeping guard 
 all night, and renewing the fire now and then, driving the 
 mosquitoes away from me, and doing all he could for my 
 comfort, — I could not but feel, as I gazed up at the bright 
 Canopus and the constellations that brighten only this clime 
 that borders on the tropics, that God had made men to live 
 thus ; and the simple devotion of these noble Bedouins, their 
 reverence for the patriarchs, their virtue, was as sweet an 
 incense to the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, as the 
 
74 
 
 VOYAGE UP THE NILE. 
 
 noblest chant that ever echoed through Westminster Abbey, 
 though Handel or Beethoven were leaders — as the most gor- 
 geous display in St. Peter’s — the most favorite Christmas ser- 
 vice in Trinity. Here, as I gazed at the bright stars, I fancied 
 myself a young Chaldean in the tent of the sons of Shem, or 
 a Sabean of that Ethiopia which is only a step from me now. 
 It is so sweet an oblivion of all past — of every thing but God, 
 patriarchs, and young creation ! The silent flocks are sleep- 
 ing under the bright moon ; the soft air is without a drop of 
 moisture ; the camels are around ; the Arabs, wrapped in their 
 burnooses, sleeping ; the moon shining in the face of the old 
 Sheikh, which, with his long, spotless, majestic beard, was 
 turned towards me ; and I, stranger from a land thousands of 
 miles away, whose white, pale face seemed like linen among 
 their bronzed countenances, was falling into as sweet a slum- 
 ber as, when a boy, I did after closing the window from a 
 moonlight gaze at my own native hills. I thought of another 
 wanderer, whom I have followed through the bright iGgean, 
 on the shores of Spain, in Italy, through the Alps and the 
 Pthine ; and I have seen the first part of the dream : 
 
 “ the gentle hill 
 
 Green, and of a mild declivity ” — 
 
 at Annesley Hall, near Newstead Abbey, and now I was like 
 him — a boy sprung to manhood : 
 
 ■ “ In the wilds of fiery climes had made himself a home, 
 
 And his soul drank their sunbeams ; 
 
 * * * by his sleeping side 
 
 Stood camels grazing, and some goodly steeds. 
 
 And a man clad in a flowing garb, did watch the while, 
 
 While many of his tribe slumbered round ; 
 
DENDERA. 
 
 75 
 
 And they were canopied by the blue sky, 
 
 So cloudless, clear, and purely beautiful. 
 
 That God alone was to be seen in heaven.” 
 
 Next morning I astonished the Arab by giving him all the 
 money I had and several of my articles, gloves, handkerchief, 
 &c. He accompanied me again to the temple, and we explored 
 some other passages. I read several other records not copied 
 by either Champollion, Salt, or Wilkinson. The Arabs 
 followed me, blessing me. Two hours after we arrived at the 
 river and nearly opposite Gheneh. I now saw my boat on the 
 opposite side, and after shouting some time we brought it over, 
 and I prepared myself by a warm bath, a delightful slumber, 
 a breakfast, and was ready for the modern town of Gheneh — 
 such a contrast to ancient, solitary Dendera. The mind can 
 never be too clear to appreciate the transitions of ages and 
 localities on this stream. 
 
CHAPTER III. 
 
 Gheneh and its bazaar. — Abyssinians. — Turco-English Consul. — Dr. Cuni. 
 
 “ Sabean odors from the spicy shore 
 Of Araby the blest” 
 
 Milton. 
 
 Landing at Gheneh I walked through the bazaar ; a crowd of 
 the Red Sea boatmen were there from the port of Kosseir, with 
 which this is connected, and through which English pass to 
 and from India, and Arabs of Arabia have kept up their inter- 
 course with the Nile. Many Arabs, hundreds of the Hajji 
 pilgrims returning from and going to Mecca, here an Italian 
 hakinij there a Jew or Greek, who had lost himself in this 
 obscure land, and above all the numerous Abyssinian men and 
 women (who may be seen hereabout in perfection) interested 
 me. I was passing through a street which seemed made up 
 of the Abyssinian Gwawazie or dancing girls, and a crowd of 
 Turks were collected before a coffee-house, where a pretty one 
 was dancing ; I was invited by several to make the usual con- 
 tribution of fifty or one hundred piastres, and see an exclusive 
 performance, but I hurried back to my boat and started on. 
 
 Gheneh is a great place for the manufacturing of pipes, and 
 some of the finest clay-pipes I ever saw were for sale at the 
 rate of two for a penny. Here you may buy the perfumes 
 and gems of rich Arabia, and many rare articles of India and 
 
GHENEH. 
 
 77 
 
 the isles of the Indian Sea. Dr. Cuni, a French Consul and 
 physician, to whom I had a letter from the author of “ The 
 Wanderer,” who sojourned here on his return from the far 
 Southeast, gave me the most oriental marks of hospitality, 
 and nothing hut Thebes would have carried me away. I 
 could not but look with interest upon his wife and bright-eyed 
 child, that might have adorned any saloon in Paris, far 
 removed here from the houses of European refinement, but 
 preserving all the cultivation of polished Parisian life. The 
 Doctor showed me a crocodile, just killed and stuffed, which 
 was well called by him the crocodil enorme I for such a mon- 
 ster I never saw. There is an English Yice-Consul here, a 
 Turk, but I did not see him. Taking a hasty, but most 
 delicious Turkish bath, for which I paid the enormous sum of 
 two piastres, and a fair wind springing up, I was on my way 
 to Thebes. The two boats of my three English, Scotch, and 
 Dutch friends, with whom I dined at Osiout, just now hove in 
 sight below ; and I found I had no reason to spur up An- 
 tonio, or the Arab men, for the rival spirit animated both, and 
 they were as anxious as I was that the American colors on 
 the Nile should excel in the race. On we sped, and I found 
 my little boat was a famous sailer. We rounded the river 
 here, and entered the sunny, smiling Thebaid. The boats 
 Avere determined to pass me, and I had unfortunately 
 one boatman ashore, as he had crossed from Gheneh, 
 and passed to Aboo Girgeh, upon the west bank, to see his 
 relatives there. I had to take him in, but it took me but a 
 moment ; as we passed a rocky point, he was ready, and 
 jumped on board. On we went, passing Guoos, or Coos. 
 Coos, the Apollonopolis parva, smaller city of Apollo of the 
 Greeks, is here ; and Negadeh, where was the city of Maxi- 
 
78 
 
 VOYAGE UP THE NILE. 
 
 mian, and a Coptic Bishop, and once a powerful Coptic 
 colony, of which all travellers speak — but who would stop at 
 them when Gebel Gournou is in sight in the distance, and we 
 are so near mighty Thebes ! Here in times of earliest Egypt 
 Osiris lived. At Coptos were celebrated the sacred rites of 
 Isis, and here were legends of her. It was said here she 
 bewailed the loss of her husband Osiris. At Took, we gained 
 a beautiful view of the mountains, and a break in the valley 
 discovered some of the finest scenery on the Nile ; and there, 
 in the distance, is the lofty mountain of Gournou ; and soon 
 we will gain the view of Gebel Luxor. Thus, then, the 
 object of all my aspirations, the reward of all my difficulties 
 of travel, is attained. Thebes, Luxor, Karnac, are within 
 less than twenty-four hours’ voyage. All my spirit was, how- 
 ever, in the race. * The boats gained upon me, but until 
 sunset my colors were triumphant; finally, however, their 
 boats came up. We saluted with our flags at half-mast, and 
 in a few minutes put to the shore, where I accepted my 
 friend’s invitation to come into his boat. We passed gayly the 
 evening before Luxor, and, while dreaming on the divan at 
 midnight, I felt the boat stop. 
 
 The next morning I was greeted by Luxor’s famed temple 
 as I issued from the cabin. I was soon there, and could 
 scarcely disagree with my Scotch friend, who returned to the 
 boat with a long, sad face, saying, there was nothing to see 
 but a very fine obelisk ; that he thought there was something 
 to see, but there was nothing : and, indeed, when you see 
 Luxor, it loses much of its impressiveness from the barking 
 dogs, and modern Turkish towns, and Governors and Gwa- 
 wazie, and Arab huts, that guard every approach ; and filthy 
 Arabs about it. 
 
LUXOR. 
 
 79 
 
 But the impression, as you approach for the first time on 
 the north side a temple of ancient Egypt, for I had never seen 
 one before, and see those half-buried statues, and that obelisk, 
 whose fellow in proud grandeur towers above ihe palaces, even 
 of Napoleon, in the Place de la Concorde in Paris ; when you 
 trace that battle scene of Sesostris, defaced so by Persian van- 
 dalism ; when you wind up that worn staircase and stand on 
 the top, passing the names of Osiren and the great Raineses, 
 seen for the first time, and look around over the wide plain of 
 Thebes to Karnac and its city of ruins ; not all you have ever 
 read of travellers’ descriptions or paintings can equal this sub- 
 lime impression. 
 
 It was, as I have said, morning, and my boat lay beneath 
 the great temple of Luxor. It was a proud moment as I hur- 
 ried over the stairs, and stood before the time-worn portico. 
 The battles of the conquering Sesostris are still sculptured on 
 the walls ; the helmeted statues are still grand. The obelisk 
 is still beautiful, but lonely, as if the loss of its brother, which 
 the French Emperor had carried to Paris, had tamed its pride.* 
 I clambered to the summit of the edifice ; I gazed over the 
 plains of Thebes on the opposite side of the Nile. The 
 statues of Memnon stand clear in the morning light. Behind, 
 the ruins of Memnonium, so called, invite to the beautiful 
 repository of Egyptian art. To the north are the temples and 
 palaces of Medinet Habou, and behind them all, the mountain 
 where sleep the queens. To the northwest lies Gournou, with 
 its less distinct ruins, and behind El Assasif, the sacred valley 
 of the temple of the Dair, and the tombs of the priests and 
 
 * Since writing the above at Luxor, I have again seen the obelisk of the Place 
 de Concorde at Paris, surrounded with the paltry trappings of the fHe of May 
 How insignificant they seemed, and what a profanation of Luxor ! 
 
80 
 
 VOYAGE UP THE NILE. 
 
 sages of old Egypt ; and over that lofty mountain, is the 
 deserted valley of Biban el Memlook and the wonderful tombs 
 of the kings. Between them and us are the plains of Thebes ; 
 we are gazing upon it from the ancient Diospolis. Its walls, 
 its hundred gates, its twenty thousand chariots ! What we sse 
 is all that remains. The Nile flows on as when Luxor was 
 founded by the people who survived the flood. This barbaric 
 structure upon which we stand has the impress of ages. The 
 name of Sesostris is upon the walls ; his conquests cover the 
 temple. It is the least interesting of the ruins of Thebes ; 
 and yet, when you look at its single obelisk transported to 
 Paris, towering, as it does, above the temples there, who can- 
 not feel how noble was the aim of the ancient Egyptians ! 
 We mount the other side of the temple ; my Champollion’s 
 Grammar and Dictionary are faithful, and I can read the 
 hieroglyphics, the secrets of more than thirty centuries. The 
 architecture strikes you as rude, like the Etruscan architecture 
 of Italy ; like the rude works of a primeval age, the first en- 
 deavor of a race to build structures. It is more rude than 
 Medinet Habou, or even Southern Dair, and only the structure 
 at Gournou, which bears the name of King Osiren, the father 
 of Sesostris, can at all compare with it in antiquity. 
 
 But the temple of Luxor, whose columns so strike you 
 from the ruins, is too well described for me to say any thing 
 new here. Engravings and paintings have made it familiar. 
 It is beautiful when seen from the river, but disgusting from 
 the huts about it; half of the sculptures are covered by 
 wretched Arab huts, where you gain admission through the 
 miserable entrances. Dogs are barking at you for being a 
 Christian, and women barking at you for backsheesh ; taken 
 all together, it spoils the eflTect of the whole. There is none 
 
LUXOR. 
 
 bi 
 
 of that noble solitude, that sublimity of desolation, which 
 ' makes Karnac such a stupendous poem : and imprints it in 
 I characters of sublimity ever on your soul. 
 
 I Through Arab huts and barking dogs, and not less trouble- 
 some vendors of antiques, we hurry to the still noble columns 
 of the great temple of Luxor. How magnificent the capitals ! 
 How perfect, still, the chambers ! Here in one is the birth of 
 Osiren, who founded it; there the conquests of a Pharaoh. 
 Part of the temple one side of an Arab town ; the other, frag- 
 mentary chambers, distant from each other. Fancy would 
 group them together, and give some idea of the original vast- 
 ness of the edifice. The columns still show its grandeur, — the 
 space it occupies, its vastness. The palace was built by Osi- 
 ren, the father of Sesostris. 
 
 Karnac^ Temple of Ammon. 
 
 till within soar 
 
 Of towering eagles, to all the birds he seems 
 A Phoenix, gazed on by that sole bird. 
 
 When to inshrine his relics in the sun’s 
 Bright temple, to Egyptian Thebes, 
 
 He flies.” 
 
 Milton. 
 
 But we had seen from the temple of Luxor, the distant 
 temples and obelisks of the city of Karnac, standing a mile 
 from us in all the distinctness of a noble modern city ; and 
 yet all we saw was of Ancient Egypt, and a city three thou- 
 sand years old. Among the groves of date- trees, and in that 
 wide, rich plain, terminated by the beautiful Arabian moun- 
 tains, it has slept for thirty centuries. What a contemplation ! 
 
 4 ^ 
 
82 
 
 VOYAGE UP THE NILE. 
 
 Those forests of doom palms have seen how many countless 
 generations of Moslems beneath their shade, and yet how 
 many generations of groves have grown and decayed in sight 
 of the city of the great temple ! 
 
 We are riding from Luxor to the city of Karnac. We are 
 on the road where on each side stood the sphinxes, gods, the 
 whole way. There are a few here yet, some expressive in 
 their lion body ; for their strength is the only attribute they 
 possess. Their heads, their intelligence, their divinity is gone. 
 The subdued body speaks only of Egypt’s conquered gods. 
 
 I stood before one’ of the porticoes of Karnac. The gods 
 are there •: Osiris in dignity, Isis in rich, gorgeous beauty, the 
 conquering king, the gifts, the rites, the offerings, the accept- 
 ance by the gods, Egypt’s oft-told tale. 
 
 In the Meneptheum, the figures are still distinct and deep. 
 The conquests of Meneptha the First, are there. Time’s 
 impress is clear. 
 
 In the grand court of the temple of Karnac, I realized one 
 of the sublimest visions of my youthful fancy. A court of 
 ruins, the single fallen column, the unbroken silence, the 
 sculptured wall, the broken colossal statues, the ruins around, 
 above, beneath. I stood mdeed among the ruins of empires 
 of the world’s youth. In the distant columns of the awful 
 temple, an owl was hooting. I sat upon a pillar and gazed. 
 It was Byron’s dream. My Arab with his spear and flow- 
 ing beard completed the picture. 
 
 Among the forests of lofty, beautiful columns in the great 
 hall of the temple of Karnac, I passed hours. It is beyond 
 description. The names of the heroes and kings are number- 
 less, the scenes on the walls, the colossal sculptures, the pas- 
 
KARNAC. 
 
 83 
 
 toral scenes, the battles, the perspectives, the halls of columns, 
 some fallen on each other, — how vain to enumerate — to 
 describe ! I have seen it by sunrise. I have been there at 
 mid-day, at sunset, and by the light of the pale moon. I have 
 scared the jackal from the ruins, and heard the hyena howl, 
 and among the things of beauty that will ever be in my 
 remembrance as a joy for ever, is Karnac, by moonlight. 
 
 Karnac ! The mind recoils from a description, and prefers 
 to say nothing ! The day spent there on our way up was so 
 glorious, my solitary sojourn at sunset and in the evening 
 such ; the first view from far-oif Luxor (two miles) of a city of 
 ruins, a forest of obelisks and temples and antique columns — 
 the whole approach — so grand, the eflect so overpowering, 
 and the solitude so magnificent, the Hall of Columns so stu- 
 pendous, that I dare not venture on detailed description. 
 
 It is a conception answering the highest idea of art ; it is 
 'perfect in its kind ; it is the grandeur of desolation — so com- 
 plete, like that circle^^ of beauty in the soul pictures of Guido 
 Rene, in the Holy Family of Correggio, in the cartoons of the 
 masters. A perfect completeness, it lies, unexcelled in majes- 
 ty, in extent, in those fertile plains of the Thebaid. A greater 
 traveller than I am, says, “There is nothing like it in tlie 
 world.” 
 
 I threw away my Champollion ; I forgot its details, de- 
 spised its history, knew no story of Jupiter Ammon ; but for 
 hours, leaning on the stones before that. forest of three hundred 
 and sixty columns, contemplated the grandeur of the scene. 
 I had seen nought of Thebes as yet, but stayed, and stayed, 
 and revisited it four times, and never fully drank in the glori- 
 ous poetry, never filled my soul with the true “ genius of 
 the place.” It is awful ! overwhelming ! overpowering ! 
 
84 
 
 VOYAGE UP THE NILE. 
 
 But the time came when I rehearsed all its stories of Osir- 
 tasen and the Pharaohs of the patriarchs — the Rameses, the 
 Pharaohs of the Mosaic period — of Sesostris, of Shishak, of 
 the Ptolemies, and Alexander. And when No- Ammon, with all 
 its poetry of ruin, and all its glory of history, seemed grander 
 and nobler than ever ; the temple of Ammon and Jupiter al- 
 most as grand as when all this Diospolis was in her highest 
 splendor, and those broken sphinxes around were perfect ; 
 those painted halls fresh from the pencil, and the idols crowned 
 with garlands, and the temples filled with vessels of gold and 
 silver, and crowds stood in those stately groves to wait for the 
 virgin clothed in white to be led forth a victim to Father Nile : — 
 When No- Ammon told me, in her ruin, in her history, in the 
 painted hieroglyphics on her walls, the confirmation of the 
 historians and prophets of a people, whom God chose to 
 be a scourge for the cruelties and the crimes which, among 
 so much splendor, Thebans allowed, to pollute themselves ; 
 I felt the true beauty of the work over whose ruin, with 
 folded arms and bended stature, I stood mournfully musing. 
 
 To view Karnac historically, you must begin with the 
 ancient granite structure between the Propylori on the east 
 and the Hypostyle hall of grand columns. This, built by Osir- 
 tasen I., 1920 b. c, ; or, according to Bunsen, 1000 before Moses, 
 or 2573 b. c. ; was added to by Thothmes, 1710* b. c., whose 
 names may be found upon the walls. The space between 
 had four obelisks, of which one is erect, and the rest fallen 
 and in fragments. Passing the Propylon and remains of two 
 statues of Rameses II., we pass an obelisk thirty feet high, 
 v/hich (Champollion says) was erected by a lady ; when ap- 
 
 ♦ We use the chronology of the Septuagint, remarking that Bunsen and his 
 aehool differ many hundred years. 
 
KARNAC. 
 
 85 
 
 pears the wall of old stones, the granite gateway, in which you 
 still see the place for the kings. We mounted this, and looked 
 down into a deep place ; the granite is finely polished and set. 
 
 The granite Sanctuary^ after the grand Hall of Columns, 
 is one of the finest parts of Karnac in its preservation. The 
 ceiling is as blue, and its golden stars as distinct, as if painted 
 yesterday. The cartouches are beautifully colored, and the 
 most conspicuous have the beetle-marked name of Thothmes 
 III. Names of travellers from all parts of the world cover 
 this beautiful hall. It is built of Syene granite, highly pol- 
 ished : writers have dwelt upon the infamous and voluptuous 
 uses of this sanctuary ; the obscene pictures and rites I leave 
 to them. Suffice it to say, that Lepsius has carried away 
 some of the most conspicuous of them to decorate the museum 
 of his royal master in Berlin, where they, will doubtless form 
 a cabinet, like the secret museum in the Borbonico from 
 Pompeii at Naples, to amuse the royal, refined purity of the 
 Prussian Prince, as does the other that of King Bomba Laz- 
 zaroni. The Sanctuary or Treasure-house took its name 
 from the discoveries and excavations of Lord Belmore. Some 
 of the oldest granite blocks are after this ; and you descend 
 deep into a grass-grown and low, seeming sanctuary, where I 
 saw a huge serpent, and avoided the rank grass that grows 
 there. A long forest of ruins — temples, shafts of columns, 
 capitals, end in a huge gateway of gray granite stretching 
 to the north, where you find the finest sculptures of the Greek 
 era, and whose lofty proportions, and elegant devices and 
 hieroglyphics, tell the once majestic extent of the famed tem- 
 ple of Jupiter Ammon. Pedestals of two obelisks we pass, 
 and another miniature hall of the Grand Hall, but which is 
 said to have been its model, called the Chamber of the Kings, 
 
86 
 
 VOYAGE UP THE NILE. 
 
 and of great antiquity, carries us to a portico commenced 
 by Alexander, and unfinished ; and after, some Egyptian col- 
 umns, twelve of which are standing, carry us to the site of a 
 Christian church ; from the roof you may get a fine view, and 
 form some idea of what was the great temple of Jupiter 
 Ammon. Below was a court filled up with huge heaps of 
 stone, where were two sitting statues of Thothmes, and a 
 fortified gateway, by which the inhabitants of Karnac on the 
 southeast approached. Far in the distance towered the moun- 
 tains ; west of this, to the river, were the walls of two temples 
 having the name of Rameses II., with a little grove of trees 
 between them, and some sphinxes. 
 
 The colossal sitting figures of white, which are in a direct 
 line with the central avenue leading to the gate of Shishak, 
 are of beautiful sculpture, and so perfect that I thought they 
 were of marble, and Greek art of the time of Alexander. They 
 represent a naked figure, with a sort of kilt about the loins, 
 and a girdle around the waist ; they are formed of a single 
 block of white crystallized sulphate of lime. The other stat- 
 ues are similar, but constructed either of higher-polished black 
 syenite, or of red pudding-stone, like those at Gouinou. The 
 names on the accompanying walls show dates four thousand 
 years ago. 
 
 Here, by this lake, were palaces surrounded by houses of 
 brick, stuccoed within and without, inclosed by courts, vine- 
 yards, and gardens, and adorned with alcoves, fish-ponds, 
 statues, and painted obelisks. 
 
 Through a still standing avenue of sphinxes among 
 groves, we pass to another field of ruins belonging to the old 
 city of Karnac. 
 
 One of the most interesting parts of Karnac is perhaps the 
 
KARNAC. 
 
 87 
 
 least visited. It lies to the east, toward the Arabian Chain, 
 and is called the temple of Typhon the huge idol dwarf pol- 
 lutes it with his image. Near is an artificial lake, extending 
 around, and inclosing on three sides the ground where once 
 doubtless stood a palace. Now there stands there but a court 
 of lions’ statues, and statues in black granite, crumbling away 
 among images of sphinxes and female statuary. Around this 
 the artificial lake reflected in clear water the ruins of an 
 ancient temple, and palace of old Egypt. Upon this you may 
 shoot your game, and fancy what Karnac was. Statues of 
 sphinxes, with women’s heads, fill the plain around. The 
 temple of Typhon stands but a short distance ofl* between us 
 and the grand temple of Karnac. Who can gaze here, and 
 not feel the genius of the place ? 
 
 The nearest part of the temple towards you is that of the 
 time of the Greek Emperors, where stood the two still perfect 
 Greek statues in white limestone. 
 
 What must have been this lake when, surrounded by 
 palaces, crowds of happy creatures gathered in these courts, 
 and wound among this rich forest of sphinxes and lions’ 
 statues, among the sculptures of females, and rare mystical 
 monsters ? Such was this sweet lake as now : this was a 
 garden — then youths and maidens were here : 
 
 “ In drapery like woven snow 
 These nymphs were clad ; and each below 
 The rounded bosom loosely wor 
 A dark blue zone or bandelet, 
 
 With little silver stars all o’er 
 As are the stars at midnight set. 
 
 * Typhon, the hideous dwarf— a devil ; he strikes you as a devil. See Leviticus 
 xvi. ; Agazil ; also Bahr, Ewald, Hengsteaberg, Tholuck. 
 
VOYAGE UP THE NILE. 
 
 While in their tresses braided through, 
 
 Sparkled that flower of Egypt’s lakes, 
 
 The silvery lotus, in whose hue 
 
 As much delight the young moon takes 
 As doth the day god to behold. 
 
 The lofty bean flower’s buds of gold ; 
 
 And as they gracefully went round 
 The worshipped bird, some to the beat 
 Of Castanets, some to the sound 
 Of the shrill Sistrum timed their feet. 
 
 While others at each step they took, 
 
 A tinkling chain of silver shook,” 
 
 And thus it is, one is ever thrown back upon the past here. 
 To be in the present is beautiful, fascinating. Who can look 
 upon these Arabian mountains from Karnac, their picturesque 
 grandeur against the lovely sky, and the rich fertility of the 
 intervening landscape, without thanking God for its beauty ? 
 And who can see that sunset, standing on Karnac, near the 
 hills that encircle Thebes, 
 
 “ While Nilus rolls his crystal way between,” 
 
 without thrills of joy such as few feel in their lives, — and this 
 pure, glad atmosphere, of the Thebaid ! where is there 
 aught like it ? 
 
 To-day is market-day in Luxor. Go there, would you see 
 modern Turkish life in Egypt. There you may view the 
 Governor, the haughty Janizary, the reckless Arnaout soldier, 
 the white-robed Arab, the Gwawazie beseeching you to enter, 
 the thousand costumes of this peculiar land. And yet who 
 would accept a Turkish governor’s invitation, when he has an 
 evening to spend in Karnac ? 
 
 The obelisks, the one grand^ and beautiful in its distinctness, 
 
KARNAC. 
 
 89 
 
 and another still standing, and those scattered broken around, 
 bear the names of the Pharaohs,* and one says it was erected 
 by the king Thothmes II. to his sister, Amense. He was the 
 predecessor of Pharaoh of the Exodus. Perchance this com- 
 memorated the noble Egyptian dame who saved the Hebrew 
 child and Jewish lawgiver. 
 
 On we go through propylea and porticoes of this immense 
 ruined temple. Here are the names, there the deeds of the 
 different Pharaohs. 
 
 Climb those walls, and look into that deep granite pit, 
 through those huge walls. This was the sanctuary ; the Per- 
 sian conqueror destroyed it, the Macedonian Philip vowed to 
 rebuild it. Alexander fulfilled the vow. Here are the walls 
 and columns of white marbles, that men are now burning to 
 make into lime. 
 
 Farther on, we have gone through the ruins of a city : — 
 and this was but one temple. Descend into the deep grass 
 where lurk the serpents, and the hyenas find refuge, and 
 follow the still brilliantly told stories of the Egyptian kings. 
 Thence to the grand propylon, to the most eastern side. 
 
 Turn to the east, and clamber those hills of rubbish, and 
 gaze on the noble plain ; and to the south, and see the length 
 of mins you have passed through, and further look at another 
 propylon and the most southern portico, and its fine sculptures, 
 the sphinxes that led northward to the river. 
 
 Come back to the ruins and go to the north, through 
 another vast, ruined propylon, with fallen colossi on the other 
 side. 
 
 Go further on, where, before a portico of deep sculptured, 
 beautiful granite, stand two statues in spotless forms, worthy 
 
 * See Champollion’s Grammaire Egyptienne, p. 277. 
 
90 
 
 VOYAGE UP THE NILE. 
 
 of being called Apollo’s, and whose sculptures tell the glory 
 of the Macedonian rule in Egypt, and you have not half seen 
 the temple of Karnac ; and when you have seen all and filled 
 up with your fancy, much, you have not then, half seen the 
 temple of Karnac. 
 
 Through the bright sunlight of this burning day, I have 
 been among the stupendous and mysterious records of this 
 once proud temple of Karnac — a city of ruins still. 
 
 The innermost part of the propylon is filled with travellers’ 
 names. Here Englishmen from India record their names with 
 Americans from St. Louis. The names of the Thothmes 
 cover the walls as you advance ; how dark, how time-worn, 
 and yet how magnificent ! The granite sanctuary so fast 
 crumbling away, and yet so old, built a thousand years be- 
 fore Moses,* is overpowering. 
 
 The Palace Temple increases the Christian’s satisfaction. 
 Here no Christian can come and not feel that his faith is on the 
 foundation of the apostles and prophets, and is from God. 
 Here are the conquests of Sethos ; and his greatest conquests 
 sculptured in the highest artistic beauty, as distinct on these 
 walls as if done yesterday. I have distinctly made out the 
 conquests of the Shepherds. The hieroglyphics above his 
 figure in the chariot are an interesting story.f 
 
 After, follow very beautiful sculptures ; the story is Sethos 
 routing the Arvadites. Sethos is also represented routing the 
 Scythians, whose Coptic name in enchorial, answering to the 
 hieroglyphics, is the same as the Hebrew ; a representation is 
 seen also of the captives of the Arvadites, whom Sethos has 
 discomfited. Sethos is represented in a car drawn by beau- 
 tiful horses, routing the Jebusites. 
 
 * At least, so soys Bunsen. 
 
 t Champ. Dictionnaire Egyptienne. 
 
SCRIPTURE PROOFS FROM KARNAC. 
 
 91 
 
 Sethos is also represented routing the Canaanites. His 
 victories over Canaan are recorded. “ He desolates the land of 
 Canaan,” says one inscription. All these, I believe, are spoken 
 of by Osborn, but what an advantage to find such a proof and 
 illustration of Scripture as the whole history of his con- 
 quest presents ! Here are shown the conquest of Sesonchis 
 over Rehoboam. In the Palace Temple in the next picture 
 Sethos is routing the an unknown nation ; these are sup- 
 posed to be the Canaanites. He next is routing the Syrians, 
 and his triumphs are splendid ; afterwards the Arvadites are 
 routed. The additions of Rameses the Great follow next.* 
 
 Passing from the obelisk to the propylon, we find on the 
 walls of the hall, a representation of two ram-headed boats, 
 with the sacred ark in procession. On the south side these 
 sculptures are beautiful. After the battle scene on this side, 
 the king and his prisoners are returning to the Nile, which is 
 marked by crocodiles. 
 
 King Osiren is dragging prisoners before the Theban 
 trinity. A hawk is hovering over a human sacrifice ; and 
 among the lists of the countries captured, are Mesopotamia, 
 Bahrien, and Joudahmelek, kingdom of the Jews ; a hero kill- 
 ing a chief with a spear, like Hector and Achilles. A people 
 of Jewish physiognomy are storming a fort. 
 
 The story of Shishak is represented here, but only three 
 captives bound to a stake remain ; we leave that to the proofs 
 of Scripture-prophecy from the monuments.” Among the 
 names of places conquered, are Canaan, Megiddo, Kingdom 
 of Judah, Valley of Hinnom, Petra, the dukes of Edom, 
 Bethlehem, (Birch,) House of Millo, (1 Kings, ix. 15,) City of 
 Hebron, (Num. xxx. 22,) also the names of the god Be], (see 
 1 Kings xviii. 27,) Astarte, &c. 
 
 * See Grammaire Egyptienne, p. 511. 
 
CHAPTER IV. 
 
 West Thebes. — Medinet Habou. — The first small temple, and its histories. — The 
 second larger temple — the Roman part. — The Christian church — palace — . 
 temple of Thothmes I. and Thothmes II. — Thothmes Mceris. — The palace 
 residence of Rameses Meiamoum. 
 
 I LEAVE to the pages of Murray’s Handbook, Conder’s Egypt, 
 Miss Martineau, and the numerous writers who were my 
 guides, the description of this beautiful ruin of Egyptian art : 
 and those who would satisfy themselves by mathematical 
 proof, I refer to Champollion’s Grammaire and Dictionnaire 
 for the translation of the inscriptions, names, and dates. 
 
 Thothmes I. was the original founder, and his temple re- 
 mains. Thothmes II. and Thothmes III. continued the work ; 
 whose names and cartouches are still colored very distinctly, 
 though the rooms are so low that you must stoop to enter. Built 
 in the time of Joseph, you look upon this part with interest. 
 Champollion, in his “Egypt under the Pharaohs,” and his 
 “ Letters,” has dwelt upon this part. The three courts of the 
 magnificent palace erected by Rameses III., (the same, ac- 
 cording to Diodorus, with Mendes or Moeris ;) the historical 
 bas-relief battle scenes ; the portico, adytum — inner temple 
 dedicated to Osiris ; the Tank, and lion-headed statue of Isis ; 
 the splendid battle scenes, boat processions ; priests recording 
 offerings to the gods, and victims ; the procession of the Ark ; 
 the chains of sacred “ keys of the Nile ;” the lion-attended 
 
PALACE, MEDINET HABOU. 
 
 93 
 
 Rameses in battle ; the lion hunt ; the naval fight on the out- 
 side ; the Birket Hahou, or Lake of the Dead ; the rubbish- 
 covered ruins, — have all been described again and again. 
 But where can one end the description of this fine temple, 
 which has records of the Pharaohs,* Ptolemies, Caesars, and 
 Christians'? which latter covered the walls with mud, and 
 erected a church, whose pillars still stand. 
 
 The architecture of Medinet Habou is so grand, the paint- 
 ings so gorgeous, the colors so perfect, the battle scenes so 
 distinct, the histories and monarchs so interesting, I could 
 not but admire the temple. Turning to the north, we left the 
 grand court where the Christian church stood, and ascended 
 some steps standing on the top of the temple. What a stu- 
 pendous view ! Thebes stood before us, and we were in the 
 most properly Theban structure. Shamy and Damy were to 
 the northeast, in the middle of the plain ; the lofty mountains 
 in our rear; and the far distant ones, that towered to the east 
 behind Karnac, bounded the unequalled view ; and Nile, 
 flowing on as she has ever flowed, giving wealth and lux- 
 uriance around. 
 
 Again, from our boat, moored on the west side, I gallop on 
 these fine horses of Thebes, with our guide, over to Medinet 
 Habou. I entered the palace of Medinet Habou.t The gods 
 at the entrance are carved exquisitely out of the light brown 
 stone. The Theban triad, Ammon, Mouth, Chons — Osiris, 
 Anubis, all are there. I stood and gazed out of a window. 
 What a scene ! The figures so royal ! There is a queen sit- 
 ting before her husband, the king Osiren, who is coying with 
 her ; — a family picture of the Pharaohs. Here was the win- 
 
 * Champollion’s Grammaire, pp, 321, 329. 
 t Ibid., pp. 251, 289, 290, 311, 366. 
 
94 
 
 VOYAGE UP THE NILE. 
 
 dow where the kings and queens have leaned and gazed out, 
 on so many a bright sunset evening, over this plain. How it 
 annihilates three thousand years to stand here, in this royal 
 palace ! The oriel window in Kenilworth, where Leicester 
 used to gaze on the plain — that seems old ; so does the Bourg 
 Schloss castle and its window of a German baron, on the 
 mount above Baden. But here ! in the palace of a Pharaoh ! 
 to see his love scenes, his domestic scenes, his portraits ! It 
 is a tribute to the eternity of art, 
 
 “ For the artist never dies.” 
 
 The floor is broken down, but you can distinguish where the 
 second story is, where this chamber stood, with its window. 
 Others of the chambers are uninjured. 
 
 The fallen pillars strewn through the wide and beautiful 
 courts ; their capitals, of the highest architectural beauty, cov- 
 ered with sculpture and polished ; the grandeur of its passages, 
 colonnades, battle scenes ; and the ancient palace temple of 
 Pharaoh, attract you. But still I was ever called back to the 
 palace residence of Raineses Meiamoum, whose painted ceil- 
 ing, of an azure ground, was studded by golden stars, almost 
 as fresh as Roman Dendera. The distinctness of the sculp- 
 tures, the warlike deeds of this descendant of Sesostris, please 
 you. True, the ram-headed deity, Ammon Ra, the first of the 
 Theban triad at the gateway, detracts from the beauty of the 
 effect, (upon which Mrs. Romer dilates ;) but who could not, 
 like her, forget it in the sculptures and processions, so well 
 preserved and so old ? 
 
 Medinet Habou has a Christian temple in Greek style 
 within its walls ; but what is even that, with its Greek col- 
 umns, to the testimonies on its walls in favor of Scripture 
 
MEMNONIUM. 
 
 95 
 
 truth ? The battle scenes go round the whole, fully answer- 
 ing Richardson’s and Condor’s descriptions, which were my 
 guides through it. Among the most interesting is Rameses 
 smiting the Hittites. He appears shooting them with his 
 arrows, while the name above relates the story : “ He smote 
 them.” The priest is above, recording the number of the 
 captives ; the hands cut from each are falling in a shower at 
 his feet. The hearts of the Hittites faint within them, for 
 Rameses pursues them as a young lion pursues his prey. 
 Give yourselves to mirth ; I am to Egypt what the god Men- 
 don has been ; I have vanquished the companies. Ammon 
 Ra, my father, subdued the whole world under my feet, and 
 I am king on the throne for ever.” 
 
 For other inscriptions, refer to Champollion. 
 
 Manetho confirms this, and also the inscriptions which say 
 he drove them to the bounds of Syria. 
 
 The Memnonium I visited next. 
 
 After riding round the grand entrance, or propylon, I 
 went leisurely to exploring the battle scene on the river side. 
 From this magnificent piece I turned, and rode my horse to 
 the fallen statue of Osmandyas. Its grandeur, the beautiful 
 polish of the black Syenite granite, the deep-cut cartouche 
 upon the arm, the broken foot — how grand ! how startling ! 
 
 . The next, properly the palace of Rameses, how beautiful !* 
 It represents Sesostris’s conquests, and those of Sethos, his 
 brother, and predecessor. Entering, you see that magnificent 
 fabric called the hall of Osiris, four colossal figures of whom 
 form the columns ; — those of Ipsamboul, can scarce be grander. 
 Afterwards you enter a passage, passing through broken 
 
 * Among the conquests, Sethos, his brother, is represented as having taken 
 Punon, a station of the Israelites, near Mount Hor. (Numbers xxxiii, 43,44.) 
 
96 
 
 VOYAGE UP THE NILE. 
 
 torsos, some standing, some fallen down, of beautiful sculpture ; 
 and proportion, displaying art and preservation that no Par- 
 thenon can boast of. How splendid a ruin ! 
 
 On through this temple of art, the victorious hero, the 
 builder sovereign of the palace is ever before you ; now himself 
 receiving, now offering gifts to the gods, who are sculptured j 
 so finely : and now you enter a building of light stone struc- i 
 ture, and finer sculpture. The victorious conqueror is here 
 too. ' He sits, with his queen by his side, on the right hand of ' 
 the opposite wall as you enter, but he has returned from a ' 
 richer, a more genial clime, than even this sunny Said — from 
 the region of tropical Asia. His captives have a Perso-Indian 
 head-dress, and his companions are bearing trees, whose 
 thick foliage, and hanging fruits, show the rich luxuriance of 
 an equatorial growth. A cameleopard, as finely sculptured 
 as if by an artist of the Zoological Gardens, forms part of the 
 spoils of the conquered India ; and the priests of Thoth 
 stand with tablets, recording his victories, and the number of 
 victims he has slain, on the fruit of a tree ; and his pencil has 
 half painted his cartouche. 
 
 And that door, where led that 7 Take up Diodorus ; he 
 describes all you have seen — battles, statues, colossi, and all : 
 and what stood here in that door, leading toward the moun- 
 tain ? There, where ruins are fast disappearing, stood that 
 glorious library of Thebes, and the Grecian coming hither, 
 like us, a traveller, found written over the famous threshold, 
 inscribed in golden letters, (would that it were written there in 
 bright diamonds !) the magical words : 
 
 “ Medicine for the mind — pharmacy for the soul.” 
 
 What a joy that here princes, priests, sages, and their 
 
MEMNONIUM. 
 
 97 
 
 scholars, hierophant and neophyte, came to consult the Phy- 
 sician of the soul — that bright letters were the glory of palaces 
 of Egypt three thousand years ago. Where is that library, 
 that refreshed the intellect of the court of Rameses the Great ? 
 The wise men of his realm were great still, as their figures 
 show, in all that is noble of race : for the deluge had not long 
 left the world green, and the patriarchal nobility of the young 
 creation had not wholly degenerated. Where are those trea- 
 sures of the intellect of Thebes and Diospolis ? Alas ! all 
 gone. Perchance they formed a bonfire for Cambyses without 
 the ancestral halls ; perchance, like the Alexandrian treasures, 
 they lit a Mohammedan bath. The rituals written here are 
 preserved only in coffins of the dead, or give renown to an 
 European museum ; while coffin, ritual, mummy, and all, form 
 the fuel to prepare many an Arab’s dinner: and the noble 
 papyri, the genealogies, the records of the high and beautiful 
 civilization of these antique and once gorgeous palaces, are all 
 gone. 
 
 Would I picture a proper device for Egypt, it should be 
 the priest of Thoth, with reed and torch inverted, gazing at 
 this desolate ruin, where the Grecian philosophic traveller 
 found wisdom, and “ balsam for the soul.” 
 
 With a heart too full for utterance, I turned back, and 
 mounted my horse. You shed tears by the tomb of a loved 
 one, but if they pour down your cheeks here, it is from mingled 
 sorrow at the desolation, and exultation at the thought that 
 you are made in the image of a race that was so great, so 
 civilized, and knew so well the powers of the mind and the 
 secrets of the soul thirty centuries ago. 
 
 From such a past, and its contrasts with the battle scenes, 
 
 we turn away, for its true glory redeems the blood-marked 
 
 5 
 
98 
 
 VOYAGE UP THE NILE. 
 
 victories of Sesostris’s conquering car. For the value of art, we 
 sigh at the foolish childishness of Cambyses in destroying so 
 much, and wonder that so much remains where he attempted 
 to destroy the whole. It is a noble, a beautiful work ; so 
 thought Siculus, so thinks Warburton — so thinks every one : 
 we would as soon attempt to describe the “ Venus de 
 Medici.” 
 
 Such a beautiful architectural wreck is that magnificent 
 pile the Memnonium ! From the majestic portal that faces the 
 statues of Memnon and the Nile, through its whole extent, till 
 you reach the lofty rock entrance in the rear ; from the battles 
 to the victories; they tell of triumphs that put to shame 
 Napoleon, and show the ridiculous vanity of a conqueror, 
 whose energy claims admiration, but whose cruelty and 
 vanity are but ill redeemed by such beautiful art. Do the 
 noble Colossus, in its breadth excelling the height of four 
 ordinary men ; the sieges, the astronomical figures, which tell 
 the date, 1322 b. c. ; the olferings to Mendes ; the six courts, 
 and richly sculptured chambers ; the remains of the 200 
 columns which once stood here, some of which still stand, and 
 others adorn the museums and galleries of the world ; the 
 crumbling Propylon, of which two hundred feet are still entire ; 
 the Dromos, or Portico ; the Osiris Court, and its statues of the 
 god with crossed sceptre ; the basaltic figures and gigantic 
 statues of Sesostris ; the Pronaos, and Great Hall, with its 
 nine compartments, its mythological processions, its offerings 
 to the Theban Triad, its chambers with the budding lotus 
 capitals, its ark processions of the priests, its ceiling of stars 
 and astronomical processions and sacred boats, sacred birds, 
 winged globe, crocodiles ; Nepthis, and the mysterious em- 
 blems of the Hierophants : — do all these at all redeem the 
 
VOCAL STATUE OF MEMNON. 
 
 99 
 
 vanity or cruelty of the great hero, who has been so often 
 historied ? Such was the vanity of conquest then, such the 
 animal pursuit of war, such the beastly triumph of victory. 
 Will the world ever give hope of advancement, while such 
 passions and their rewards mark distinction among the race ? 
 Sesostris conquered India, Napier the Scinde, and Russia the 
 Hungarians. It is all the same ; whether India, China, or 
 Mexico ; — a has-relief^ a 'paintings a statue — the conqueror 
 sitting in glory the victim handcuffed at his feet, a priest 
 of Thoth, or Isis, writing his victories on the tree, a Congress 
 passing a “ vote of thanks,” an assembly “ decreeing that he 
 has deserved well of his country,” a Parliament feeing a poet 
 laureate, or a Q^ueen giving a baronetcy, earldom, or the 
 garter ; it is all the same ; — this is that glory,” which those 
 who think of a Howard, in his labors of love, view as only 
 the blood of history’s shambles. 
 
 How beautiful to stand at sunrise before the statue of 
 Memnon ! Your fancies are so rich, and you can find music 
 in your soul there at such an hour, if none come from 
 Memnon. Here you see, — leaping from your horse’s saddle 
 upon the pedestal, — the testimonies of the lady friends of 
 Hadrian, and many travellers, in Greek and Latin, who heard 
 the voice. Perhaps you modestly cut a letter of your own 
 name on the calf of the leg; perhaps, like Sir Gardner 
 Wilkinson, you have the courage to climb to the breast, to see 
 the rock where the priest concealed himself who kept up the 
 sound, and the rock which sounds like struck brass. I 
 contented myself with striking the leg, and fancying it had a 
 ringing sound ; but that is mere moonshine, for 
 
 Hushed is that strain 
 
100 
 
 VOYAGE UP THE NILE. 
 
 and Memnon’s music but lives in the poetry that in every age 
 has been written upon its note. Strabo, iElius Gallus, and 
 Diodorus, were happy men, and they were not like us from 
 America, who came further, and fared worse. 
 
 The usual ideas come up here — the time-worn statues ; 
 what kingdoms have they outlasted, what revolutions out- 
 lived, defying time and tlie Persian destroyer! Continents 
 have been settled from bound to bound ; worlds discovered, 
 civilized, ruined — still they stand historians of the ages and 
 the cBons. Coming from a land which has in no fabric, 
 at least that I have seen, a stone or timber that belonged not 
 to a quarry or forest three hundred years ago, the very idea of 
 these statues made my soul widen and widen, and my imagi- 
 nation stretch so, to think they were of time and history, and 
 yet only half of time ; and this earth’s history : and then I 
 thought of the world’s stars and their histories ; and then I 
 thought of long, long agone creation — and then eternity — and 
 God ! And Memnon’s music then seemed spheral music, for 
 it brought me to God by conclusion and comparison ; and I 
 was never satisfied till I stood before the statue of Memnon : 
 and now as I sat on my horse, and thought what it had been 
 there, and oft since in my mind, low whisperings came to my 
 soul, 
 
 “ from that immortal sea 
 Tliat brought us hither 
 “ I saw the children play upon the shore, 
 
 And heard its mighty waters rolling evermore.” 
 
 And standing liere, we can picture to ourselves more than 
 elsewhere the grandeur of ancient Thebes, with her hundred 
 gates; she who sent forward to the Trojan war the hosts of 
 the nigruntis MemnonisP 
 
STATUE OF AMENOPH OR MEMNON. 
 
 101 
 
 Here stood the two statues at the entrance to a grand 
 court of statues, that extended to the Memnonium under the 
 mountain. The whole plain to the mountain has fragments 
 of statues, all lying in a line. 
 
 And the road to the river, where lies our boat, and over 
 which we are just to spur our horses, had, doubtless, another 
 court. This was the royal street of Thebes, mentioned in the 
 papyri of ancient Thebes. What was this in the time of Osiren 
 and Memnon ! What a field of buildings and temples you 
 looked over, towards the palace of the descendants of Rameses 
 and Sesostris, now the ruins of Medinet Habou ! How glori- 
 ously rode the triumphing kings along that royal way, as 
 they returned from the conquests ! How many answering 
 sounds around met Memnon’s music at the morning light ! 
 How desolate the plain now ! How many ages of desolation 
 since then ! 
 
 From Medinet Habou you proceed north to the valley of 
 Hadj Achmed, and in a side of the mountain are a few tombs 
 of the queens. The way is wild, strewn with rocks, and 
 filled with precipices ; the mountain gaps of a sterile and 
 desert appearance. In the most terrible gorges of Switzerland 
 or Scotland I have never seen nature so awful as in this pass. 
 It would be a fit place for a Pandemonium to be laid in. Here 
 the robber might well find his home ; and our guide’s spear, 
 which he now and then turned towards us, brandishing, 
 seemed a reliance. I mentioned to my friend that I had left my 
 pistols, and he replied that it was the very time we needed them. 
 
 In the valley of Hadj Achmed lie the tombs of the queens. ' 
 These we visited, after Medinet Habou and the southern Dair. 
 The tomb of dueen Taosri, who married /Sethos, first king of 
 the nineteenth dynasty, we explored, and it is one of the finest 
 
102 
 
 VOYAGE UP THE NILE. 
 
 in Thebes. Most of the monuments speak of that king’s 
 inheritance in her right. Champollion quotes many of the 
 inscriptions in his Grammar. This was 1269 b. c. Sethos 
 erected the avenue of sphinxes at Karnac, and the small 
 chambers of the front area, and was predecessor to Osiren II. 
 and Amenophis. 
 
 Among the most distinguished, is that of Amunmeit^ or 
 Amun-tmei^ daughter of Amunoph. 
 
 The tomb of Glueen Tayri, or Teari, is shown. I also 
 entered one of the wife of Amunoph III., and also a tomb of 
 the favorite daughter of Rameses V. The tombs are not satis- 
 factory, as you have to stoop even when in the best part, and 
 they are like the catacombs of Alexandria. They have been 
 injured by fire. The painting is not fresh, as in Biban-el- 
 Memlook. In the tomb of Gueen Theti is some interest.* 
 
 The tombs of the priests lie in the valley of El Assassif, 
 which you see from the mountain precipice above the valley 
 of Biban-el-Memlook, stretching below to the south of the tem- 
 ple of northern Dair, and in the way to the Memnonium. They 
 are made up of the private sepulchres of the rich Thebans, the 
 largest and finest of which is that of the celebrated priest and 
 prophet Petamenoph and his family ; his name is at Medinet 
 Habou. 
 
 The pitfalls all along, in what was the necropolis of an- 
 cient Thebes, and where modern Thebes finds her fuel in the 
 mummy cases and papyri chambers cut in the rock, orna- 
 mented with fine paintings, show manners and customs which 
 you do not see in the tombs of the kings. Some of these are 
 highly illustrative of Scripture; and Hengstenberg, Osborn, 
 and others, have dwelt upon them. Some of the entrances 
 
 * See Champollion’s Grammaire Egyptienne, pp. 27G, 408, 394, 357, 404. 
 
GOURNOU. 
 
 103 
 
 are very perfect — cut in the rock, and ornamented with paint- 
 ings and sculptures ; and in some you have to enter a la Bel- 
 zoni. Here you may unroll mummies and read their history : 
 and very fine ones are found here, though the difficulty is, to 
 get them through the custom-house. The scenes in some are 
 finely depicted — the threshing and hunting scenes. 
 
 And the thousand marks of the nothingness of men is so 
 exemplified here ! — a Pharaoh’s ribs cooking an Arab breakfast ! 
 
 “ To what strange uses do we come at last ! ” 
 
 The subject is not pleasant, and has been over- written. 
 
 The small temple of Isis behind the Memnonium was 
 considered by travellers of the last decade to be the oldest 
 monument in Thebes ; — this, and the granite sanctuary 
 in Karnac. This temple is really beautiful and perfect. 
 It is approached by a mountain passage. Several pits 
 are to be seen near. It is a mile from Medinet Habou. 
 Numerous ruins may be seen on the way to it, all along the 
 plain. 
 
 Gournou is considered by many to contain some of the 
 oldest monuments in Thebes. The sculptures, for the most 
 part, bear the name of Osiren. Colossal statues of Rameses 
 II. and of other monarchs, and fragments of other statues, are 
 scattered throughout the plain. The most striking ruin is that 
 of Aerebek, the architecture of which is in the same style as 
 Medinet Habou. The columns are made of lotus-reeds bound 
 together ; and the names of Meneptha I. and Osiren are scat- 
 tered over them. This style of architecture adorns the oldest 
 ruins in Thebes. The pronaos has like piazzas of three 
 columns each ; and on the walls, which are crumbling away, 
 figures of Osiris with his scourge and crook in his hand, the 
 
104 
 
 VOYAGE UP THE NILE. 
 
 hatchet, the ark, the lotus fruit, the winged globe, the serpent, 
 fine bas-reliefs, offerings to the deities, among whom is Am- 
 mon Ra, the ram-headed deity, from which we suppose that 
 Jupiter Ammon was worshipped here, as also at Karnac. Here 
 was the hall of assembly of ancient Thebes. Here the The- 
 ban senate discussed the policy of government, receiving the 
 decrees of the hierarchy, who governed here, as well as in the 
 temple of Jupiter Ammon. The ruin, when seen by day, 
 appeared simple and beautiful ; and afterwards, when return- 
 ing by moonlight, at midnight, from the tombs of the kings, 
 the pale light threw shadows through its halls, wrapping the 
 dim figures and names in a splendor, which accorded well 
 with their antiquity and obscurity. 
 
 Near these ruins lies the beautiful village of Gournou, 
 which, among the Arab villages of Egypt, is perhaps the most 
 attractive. It is extremely well built, and surrounded by 
 fertile groves, like the ruins in the midst of a plain of lux- 
 uriant corn-fields, and fields of as fertile crops and fruits as 
 when Osiren had his palace residence here, three thousand 
 years ago. 
 
 A part of Gournou, which is fronted by the pillars of 
 lotus reed, it is said was built by Menephthah L, and his son, 
 Rameses the Great. One of the inscriptions, “ Meneplithah 
 Barei, son of the Sun, constructed this habitation for years.” 
 Here Menephthah offers flowers to the Theban Triad.* 
 
 We visited next the temple Dair, which in its construction 
 by the Gliieen Amunmeitgori, tells some interesting histories of 
 Egypt. 
 
 Just under the lofty precipice, which is above the Biban- 
 el-Memlook, and from which one of the most awful prospects 
 
 * See Grammaire Egyptienne, p. 441, 159. 
 
AN ADVENTUPvE. 
 
 105 
 
 in the world may be seen — I mean the deserted solitude of the 
 valley of tombs behind, and the magnificent desolation and 
 fertility combined of the plain of Thebes in front — lies the 
 temple of Dayr el Bayr, or the “ Temple to the North.” I have 
 already spoken of the ruined avenue of sphinxes which led to 
 it from the Memnonium ; near it is the or sacred in- 
 
 closure, of one of the most ancient of temples. It was 
 supposed to communicate with the tombs of the kings, and 
 Dr. Yates says with the tomb of Sammis. Dr. Richardson 
 considers it, with the small temple of Isis behind the Memno- 
 nium, to be one of the most. ancient fabrics in Thebes. At the 
 end of the avenue of sphinxes formerly stood some obelisks, 
 which you can barely trace. 
 
 The gateway of the temple is of fine architecture, and in 
 several of the chambers there are granite tablets, or steles^ 
 which have been described by Champollion. 
 
 On the way • to the ruins of Gournou are fragments of a 
 colossal statue, formerly, as it is supposed, of Rameses II. 
 The whole way is strewn with fragments of statues. 
 
 Returning from Gournou by moonlight, with the guide, 
 while galloping along the desert, near what the rubbish and 
 bricks denoted as the site of a ruined town, in a most desolate 
 and dreary cemetery, with a few turban headstones, my horse 
 started at a fierce growl, or snarl, from an animal before him* 
 Riding on, I saw a horrid sight ; a wild dog had just been 
 feeding on a carcass of what seemed in the moonlight to have 
 been the body of a newly buried Arab, but it might have been 
 the carcass of some other animal : and this sight, so common in 
 the desert outskirts of Egypt, would hardly have attracted me 
 or the horse, had not another more ferocious beast just ap- 
 proached, and whose glaring eyes, and whining, screeching 
 
 5 ^ 
 
106 
 
 VOYAGE UP THE NILE. 
 
 howl, told me that it was the hideous hyena. Two vultures 
 and some buzzards were shrieking above, and stooping down 
 at intervals. The dog was scarcely willing to relinquish his 
 unhallowed feast, even for so hideous a visitor ; and, while 
 peeling the flesh from the leg, “as ye peel the fig when the 
 fruit is fresh,” the hyena, snapping at him, seized another part 
 of the carcass. At this hideous struggle, horrid as it was, I 
 gazed an instant, but I saw a jackal, who had snuffed the 
 carcass, bounding up, and as instantly away ; and in two 
 minutes a distant, horrid roar came upon the wind. By this 
 time the guide had ridden up with his spear, and cried, 
 “Howaga, Assed ! saba ! ! a lion ! a lion !” We were now 
 with both our horses on the full run ; and when I thought of 
 all the tales of jackals informing lions of prey, and considered 
 our danger, I could almost feel the lion leaping upon my 
 horse’s back, his hot breath behind, and his claws tearing the 
 flesh off my back. But our terror was changed into joy at 
 seeing in the distance before us the white turbans of some 
 horsemen, and we soon distinguished the tarbouches and dark 
 robes, and gleaming pistols and harness of two Effendis of 
 Luxor, of the Governor’s, or Kaschid’s house, who had been 
 upon a ride over to Gournou, and were returning to their 
 boats to cross the river. Our galloping up, and terror at the 
 lion, only seemed to amuse them, as their attendants prepared 
 their arms ; but the old Effendi assured me, “ Mouch assed^^^ 
 (it was no lion :) and I thought that only perhaps the horrid 
 hyena, or wild dog’s howl, had even magnified the guide’s 
 fears as well as mine, into a lion’s roar. We soon reached our 
 boats. 
 
CHAPTER V. 
 
 Visit to Biban-el-Memlook. — Tombs of the Kings. 
 
 We left the valley of Hadj Achmed in the evening for a moon- 
 light ride over to the Tombs of the Kings. A more wild, 
 romantic ride I scarce ever had ; the lone mountain and the 
 sterile rocks are unlike any scenery I have ever seen, save the 
 Pass of the Splugen in Switzerland, and the gorges of rock, 
 and flint, and limestone exhibit such desolation of nature as I 
 have never seen approached in any scenery in the world---the 
 valley of Hinnom itself could scarce surpass it. Half way up 
 the mountain we reached Lepsius’s tomb, so called because he 
 opened it ; the figures are fresh and beautiful, and paintings 
 almost fascinating; the entrance is a mere hole which you 
 have to squeeze through. Lepsius has taken from here some 
 figures as a reward to his sovereign, for the munificent expense 
 which the King of Prussia incurred to make these excavations. 
 Lepsius’s firman ran in the express words, “ to go where he 
 pleased, to take what he pleased, and do what he pleased.” 
 In no place are his mutilations more apparent than in the 
 tombs of the kings ; the finest processions interrupted, the best 
 figures cut away, while the wide, gaping space remains to at- 
 test the vandalism of the work. In the same spirit of obliging 
 his royal master, the king, Chevalier Bunsen dedicates his 
 work to him in return for his scientific commission. Would 
 
108 
 
 VOYAGE UP THE NILE. 
 
 that the use made of that expedition in the hands of Lepsius 
 and Bunsen, might lead to a fair exposition of Scripture truth 
 from the monuments, instead of being tortured by ex 'parte 
 revelations of them to wild chronological conclusions. 
 
 We soon started again on foot to cross over the mountain, 
 and a more dreary, solitary walk up peaks, along precipices, 
 fearful gorges below, and the moon shining bright as day, 
 could not be imagined. The guide, far before us, was leading 
 the way with his long spear ; and the boys, trying to keep the 
 tinder, looked like little demons. We reached a point looking 
 down iiito the deserted valley of Biban el Memlook, and soon 
 arrived at No. 17, Belzoni’s celebrated tomb, and the Arab boys 
 having wonderfully preserved their fire, we were soon, with 
 each a lighted candle ill his hand, descending the handsome 
 staircase, which opens from the wayside of the desolate moun- 
 tain into its halls of paintings and histories. This beautiful 
 work of the Theban sextons has been admired and described 
 again and again. We were delighted all the way down the 
 staircase with the processions of sacred boats carrying the soul 
 along, and as our eyes flew from one beautiful, or mystical, 
 or expressive object to another, we exclaimed that it was far 
 the finest part of Egypt. Certainly of all the monuments, it is 
 best preserved. Soon we meet the name of Osiren, the father 
 of Sesostris, for whom this tomb was constructed ; then follow 
 the mythological processions — the allegory of the sun through 
 the hours, figures of the winged globe and the scarabaei, sacri- 
 fices of bulls and human sacrifices, female forms and faces on 
 the columns, that almost induce you to fall in love with their 
 complexion and beauty. I cannot here, for want of time and 
 illustration, go through the halls and chambers that open one 
 upon the other. The paintings are copied with fine exactness 
 
BELZONrS TOMB. 
 
 109 
 
 in Wilkinson’s last works, and Rosellini, and fully described in 
 the guide-books of Egypt. Hours were spent in it in most 
 rapturous enjoyment. In some places the painting is left unfin- 
 ished. In the celebrated Hall of Beauty, is the beautiful zodiac 
 which decorates the ceiling, and the sacred boat and the last 
 judgment where Osiren is brought before Amenti, and his offer- 
 ings to the Theban triad are rehearsed, as the best of his deeds 
 to recommend him to benignity ; you see it distinctly, and the 
 fire that the Arab makes on the floor of straw, lights up the 
 bright colors like day. The names of several Americans, and 
 names from every part of the world are read on the walls 
 in the chambers after the second descent ; Champollion and 
 Lepsius have defaced it by their destructions. 
 
 To see the tombs is to see the completion of Egyptian my- 
 thology and philosophy ; their belief, the aim of their life and 
 ambition. They seem rather a palace than a tomb ; the colors 
 are as bright as if of yesterday. 
 
 In these tombs the procession of four different people, so 
 often described as four Egyptians, called the Rotno^ and of 
 three other species, receives additional interest, from the same 
 name having been found by Mr. Layard in Nineveh. 
 
 I recall the entering descent of the staircase, the serpents 
 representing Kneph, the spirit of good taking the body, the 
 sacred boats, the Theban triad, the procession, sacrifices of the 
 bull, &c. The beautiful figures of the Egyptian women and 
 their noble expression of countenances : — the American, Eng- 
 lish and French names, and the devastations of Lepsius and 
 Chtlmpollion are here. Then the interior room, astronomical 
 ceiling, and judgment of Amenti follows. 
 
 In this tomb we see on the walls figures painted of the 
 Egyptian queens’ lovely faces ; their beautiful dark hue pos- 
 
110 
 
 VOYAGE UP THE NILE. 
 
 sessing a novelty to us from the land of pale faces that en- 
 hanced the charms these pictures display as well as the 
 statues of the budding beauty of Isis and Athor, which we 
 have seen ; and the hue left by the sun upon their cheeks, 
 seemed but an earnest of the ardor that must have kindled 
 their hearts : 
 
 “ The imbrowning of the fruit that tells 
 How rich within the soul of sweetness dwells.” 
 
 Bruce’s Harper’s tomb, which is No. 11, suggests the 
 idea : 
 
 “ And oh be blessed, ye men of yore, whose toil 
 Hath for her use scooped out of Egypt’s soil 
 This hidden Paradise — this mine of fanes. 
 
 Gardens and palaces, where pleasure reigns ; 
 
 In a rich sunless empire of her own. 
 
 With all earth’s luxuries lighting up her throne, 
 
 A realm for mystery made, which undermines 
 The Nile itself, and ’neath the twelve great shrines 
 That keep Initiation’s holy rite. 
 
 Spreads its long labyrinth of unearthly light ; 
 
 A light that knows no change. 
 
 Its brooks that run. 
 
 Too deep for dny, its gardens without end ; 
 
 Where soul and sense by turns are charmed, surprised. 
 
 And all that bard or prophet e’er devised. 
 
 For man’s Elysium, priests have realized.”^ 
 
 Alciphron. 
 
 After Belzoni’s tomb this is doubtless the most beautiful. 
 Though the name designates it as the tomb of Amunmeses, 
 and his queens, it was built also for another monarch of the 
 twenty-first dynasty. On the columns figures and portraits of 
 
BRUCE’S HARPER’S TOMB. 
 
 Ill 
 
 beautiful ladies speak the elegant figures and features of the 
 two queens ; the expression of Madame the Q.ueen of Amun- 
 meses, both face and form, fills you with the highest delight 
 — colors so fresh, figure so tall, and graceful ; indeed, 
 Madame had good reason to be proud of her artist, and the 
 artist proud of his subject. This must be a mistake ! Ra- 
 phael’s touch is here — it was some master of his period that 
 did this ! Titian’s colors outlasted by thousands of years ! 
 01 i art ! art ! you are eternal here. Some of the paintings are 
 like the frescoes of Belzoni’s tomb — some are intaglios. Here 
 I found several of the names of my friends of Cairo, Alexan- 
 dria, and Europe, among the hieroglyphics of the Pharaohs. 
 The harper is here in a little room like a Catholic shrine, of 
 which there are numbers in this tomb. It reminds me of David 
 and his minstrelsy. • Stories of the king are in the large room, 
 his processions, his mythology, his judgment, his sarcophagus. 
 In one room there are seats for a divan^ like a Roman csenabu- 
 lum, the purpose of which I have explained in another place.* 
 Here were feasts in the sight of the dead, a sacrifice of a 
 human victim, freshly painted stories, and paintings, where the 
 master’s hand left off, to recommence to-morrow — and the mor- 
 row took thought for the things of itself ! Such were the un- 
 derground palaces which this king prepared for his memory ! 
 The broken columns attest the persevering mutilations of Cham- 
 pollion and Lepsius, whom the inscriptions of German, French, 
 and English travellers reprobate. One couplet unjustly ridi- 
 cules Sir Gardner Wilkinson : a space is filled with names of 
 persons of wealthier position from New- York, and other cities, 
 and England. Here you may see the oxen treading out corn,t 
 
 * See lines by the Author. 
 
 t Deut. 2 CXV. 4 ; Isaiah ixx. 24 ; Matt. iii. 12 ; Psalm i. 4. 
 
112 
 
 VOYAGE UP THE NILE. 
 
 labors of the husbandmen, gatherings of fruits and grain, a 
 monlv-ey eating fruit, ploughs drawn by oxen two abreast, (the 
 same used now in Egypt,) orchards, gardens, field sports, arts, 
 trades, manufactures ; sowers carrying seed in baskets ; * men 
 transporting pillars and marble sculpture ; a crowd trans- 
 porting a colossal statue ; slaughtering cattle, casting metals, &c. 
 
 The tomb of Psammis, son of Pharaoh Necho, is one of the 
 most magnificent in Thebes. It is 309 feet long, and contains 
 the scenes of early Egyptian history, and the most beautiful and 
 rich paintings. Most of all the tombs it was covered with mys- 
 tical and idolatrous figures. The sacred boats, and sacred ser- 
 pents, with their legs and human feet, and the Theban Triad, 
 monsters, mysteries, astronomical and hierophantic processions 
 of men carrying serpents, boats, mummies lying on a couch 
 with serpents’ heads, a barrow resting upon a snake, which 
 people carried, emblematic of Kneph, or Cnuphis — the good 
 divinity ; the king offering to Anubis, Aroeris, Isis, Osiris, 
 Ammon, Mouth, Chons — are all seen here. In one room is a 
 well, or pit, which Belzoni explored thirty feet, and where 
 doubtless there was a subterranean passage, in which the 
 priests entered, and held their licentious rites after the tomb was 
 closed up; in the same style as the story in “Bel and the Dra- 
 gon” relates. In the same room is the procession of Persians, 
 Greeks, Jews, Egyptians, who are here to attest the victories 
 and swell the triumph of Pharaoh Necho. The negroes are 
 as distinct as those you would find in our streets, and the 
 Jews as well marked as those of Chatham-street. Twelve 
 steps lead again into the corridor, in which the names of 
 Nechao and Psammuthis occur : Isis gives tokens of favor. 
 
 * 1 Kings xix. 17; Deut. xxii. 10; Job i. 14, 15; xxiv. 3 ; Prov. xx. 4 ; 
 1 Sam. xiv. 4. 
 
HIEROPHANTS— NEOPHYTES— INITIATION. 
 
 113 
 
 A handsome chamber follows : the king is offering to Anubis, 
 Isis, Osiris; then comes a procession of captives, twelve long de- 
 corated square columns, on which I saw the name of a New- 
 York distinguished scholar a chamber, with the hero at his 
 devotions ; a human sacrifice, with some of the heads struck 
 off ; and one mutilated fallen column in a room for couches. 
 
 Every variety of animals — elephants, bears, leopards, 
 panthers, lynxes, giraffes, are seen ; one man striking a croco- 
 dile ; a bull-fight ; one man numbering cattle, while his master 
 and men are practising archery ; a number of people, like 
 Jews, are making bricks.t Here Egyptian overseers are over- 
 looking the laborers, and among the rest a human sacrifice. 
 Time will not suffice to enumerate the thousand illustrations 
 of the Bible contained in these tombs. In the pages of Hengs- 
 tenberg, Yates, and Osborn, they are referred to and dwelt 
 upon. ' 
 
 Forms and figures of beauty, luxurious couches, and 
 fauteuils, as if inviting to rest ; arm-chairs, and chaises 
 longues on a sort of pedestal, ascended by steps ; a wooden 
 bed-support ; tables, with lions’ paws for feet, like a modern 
 piano ; footstools, all are here. 
 
 Here is the economy f of the householder; the butcher 
 slaughtering the ox, the cook cutting up the joints of meat, 
 the caldron suspended over the fire, the beggar at the door 
 waiting for his share. 
 
 The young neophyte, like Orpheus, passed through fire, 
 water, air ; and the danger, being magnified to try his courage, 
 when it came to the point proved to be no danger at all. It 
 was only a humbug to try his j)luck ; and the priest, clapping 
 him on his back, said, “You are a good fellow, and will make 
 
 * Dr. A n t Hengstenberg. t Mrs. Romer. 
 
 H 
 
114 
 
 VOYAGE UP THE NILE. 
 
 one of us. Here is wine ; here the food of pigs, calves, goats, 
 which we keep for food, but for idols ostensibly to the herd.” 
 This Plato — this Orpheus, when they came here, went 
 through. Such was Mithra’s cave ; such the night myste- 
 ries — the Orphic egg of the great temple ; such Eleusis and 
 its trials ; such Elysium and its rewards. The priests waved 
 their wands, and conjured, for the herd’s benefit, monsters 
 into gods ; 
 
 “ While Reason like a grave-faced mummy stands, 
 
 With her arms swathed in hieroglyphic bands.” 
 
 These things account for the mesmerism which we see in the 
 tombs at Thebes. The priest is there represented as making 
 the mesmeric passes over his subject. Their great Hermes was 
 Joseph, who gained from his Chaldean ancestors — which they 
 transmitted through the family of Shem — that knowledge of 
 astrology and other subjects which were probably at that day 
 imperfectly known in Egypt. He was their great Hermes. 
 Such were the secrets of the priests at Heliopolis, where Joseph 
 married the high priest’s daughter ; such the arcana of Mem- 
 phis and the city of the dead ; such “ Diospolitan craft and 
 Heliopolite lore.” 
 
 Among their mysteries was the great zodiac, which, the 
 priest interpreted to the neophyte, showing the track of the 
 sun among the spheres, the simple laws of astronomy which 
 our children all know, the feasts in honor of his coming in 
 the spring, and the songs of sorrow at darkness, the mysteries 
 of Sais. Here also was their secret reign of eternal life, 
 which we see the priests showering over the king at Medinet 
 Habou — a mere sign of creation, artfully disguised by the 
 
MYSTERIES— ISIS. 
 
 115 
 
 priests ; as also their names and signs, by which they con- 
 cealed plain truths, making them mysteries for the vulgar. 
 
 Moses learned these from the sacred college who presided 
 over the twelve shrines ; but as they had learned much from 
 the Hebrews — and their highest astrological knowledge was 
 from Ham (Canaan), whom they adored, as well as Shem, 
 under the name of Vulcan or Phtha, the first of their gods — « 
 Moses gave more than he received. Of their secret rites, 
 cheats, of animal worship, dbc., we have explained all that in 
 our articles on the tombs of the kings. 
 
 Here the mystic wisdom of the Egyptians depicted the 
 history of the soul ; the winged globe with a serpent ; rays of 
 glory descending from above ; the deluge of the banks by the 
 sacred river, the Nile ; and the Theban beetle, as he comes 
 forth after the waters have passed away, and the first sunbeam 
 falls upon his regenerated wings. Here you may see the 
 mysterious nature of animal worship, and the refined theology, 
 which those who suppose idolatry is impossible to man think 
 is veiled under its forms. 
 
 Every shrine throughout Egypt was consecrated to a 
 particular faith. At Esne it was Latopolis, the worship of 
 liatona, or Buto, or Diana ; at Panopolis it was Mendes, the 
 goat with the refulgent star on his breast ; at Arsinoe it was 
 the crocodile, with a costly gem in its loathsome ears, and 
 rich bracelets of gold encircling its feet. 
 
 Here were the emblems of death, — a lotus branch broken 
 in two, and a small bird winging its flight from the spray. 
 
 When I stood before the dark black statues of Isis in the 
 sculpture gallery of the Louvre, and in the temple at Pompeii 
 before the statue of white marble, I could well understand the 
 
116 
 
 VOYAGE UP THE NILE. 
 
 secret influence of that basaltic sculpture when placed before 
 the neophyte, after his trials, which were managed by ma- 
 chinery, and it seemed as if sweet Nature was being revealed 
 to him, and she would seem like a god. 
 
 In a mere sketch like this, it is a thankless task to rehearse 
 
 the pictures and their subjects represented in these tombs. The 
 
 artist, by his labors, has brought them to Europe, and to us. 
 
 They remain there, tomhs in name, in purpose, but in beauty 
 
 and preservation, the finest national monument and record 
 
 that the earlier nations of the world have left. But a few 
 
 years since, and the thresholds of some had not been crossed 
 
 for thirty centuries ; that granite sarcophagus contained the 
 
 body of a sovereign of ancient Egypt ; and, great and lordly 
 
 as he was, he is only an ornament now of a glass case in a 
 
 British museum, glanced at as a mummy! and forgotten: 
 
 and yet he has accomplished his end, and is preserved, and in 
 
 the hands of those who will preserve him. His horror at 
 
 being damp^ moist, unpleasant hodyJ'‘ as M. Mantalini 
 
 expressed it, was only a natural one, and has been' well 
 
 expressed by the greatest of Anglo minds, Shakspeare : | 
 
 ^ ' 
 
 “ Aye ; but to die, and go we know not where ! 
 
 To lie in cold obstruction, and to rot ! 
 
 This sensible, warm motion to become 
 A kneaded clod ; and the delighted spirit, 
 
 To bathe in fiery floods, or to reside 
 In thrilling regions of thick ribbed ice ; 
 
 To be imprisoned in the viewless winds. 
 
 And blown with restless violence about the pendent world ! — 
 
 ’Tis too horrible !” 
 
 Then let us not so ridicule the poor Egyptian sovereign, i 
 He despised the mere marble monument that might tell his vir- 
 
TOMBS OF THE KINGS 
 
 117 
 
 iues to the world ; but he left a monument that historied his 
 nation to the latest generation. Greater than marble, those tem- 
 ples ; than letters were, these tombs of those kings. And if he 
 furnished a subject for a literary reunion in London, he kept his 
 body nevertheless for 3000 years. Mummy now, he was nev- 
 ertheless more knowing, in one respect, than any sovereign of 
 the world. So let him go. Not one of the tens of thousands 
 of boobies in London, of louts from the provincial towns, 
 but has stared at the poor mummy ; and many have gaped 
 with open eyes at his tomb. And yet. Oh king, live for ever ! 
 That is, may thy body last as was thy idea of existence. The 
 world has only stood six thousand years, and thy body and thy 
 tomb have lasted two-thirds of it, nearly, and probably will the 
 rest. Where is that soul of thine. Oh king ? — Oh king, where ? 
 
 The tomb of Memnon, No. 9, shows a long series of paint- 
 ings, representing the progress of the sun through the upper 
 hemisphere, (alluding to the image of the king through his 
 lifetime,) and on the opposite or western panels the progress of 
 the sun in the lower hemisphere — (the image of the king 
 after his death.) Thus Diospolitan priesthood shadowed the 
 history of the soul, drawing an analogy between moral light 
 and darkness. This and the others show, that at this era the 
 Egyptians possessed the idea of the immortality of the soul. 
 They are fully decorated, showing that the Pharaohs com- 
 menced the tomb, carrying it on with their reigns, and con- 
 tinuing it during their lifetimes. 
 
 No. 1, is the tomb of Rameses IX. One of the inscrip- 
 tions is in Ohampollion’s Grammar, p. 478. No. 3, is of 
 Rameses III. No. 4, is that of Rameses VIII. No. 6, is 
 the tomb of Rameses VII. No. 5, is the tomb of Chamed. 
 [n the tomb of Rameses VI., Champollion’s Grammar, p. 263, ^ 
 
118 
 
 VOYAGE UP THE NILE. 
 
 288, translates inscriptions. No. 8, according to Wilkinson, is 
 the tomb of King Pthamen. No. 14, was the tomb of Prince 
 Raineses, not a king, called Rameses Mondauk. The tomb 
 of Rameses V. has also copies of many of its inscriptions in 
 the Grammaire, pp. 427, 186, 414, 425, 484, 483, 426, 519, 
 459, 419, 490. I read most of the inscriptions of his 
 titles and history by its aid. 
 
 No. 7, as some say, is that of Rameses IV., or according 
 to Wilkinson, Rameses II. ; here, baking in its perfection is 
 represented. In the kitchen scenes, I saw represented many 
 of the facts of Scripture of which Hengstenberg speaks. In 
 the altars I saw those to which Champollion, Rosellini, and 
 Osborne have called our attention. The baker carrying the 
 fruits on his head, I distinctly made out, illustrating the 
 butler’s and baker’s dreams, and many other passages of 
 Scripture."^ No. 14, the King Pthasephthah, who inherited in 
 right of his Q,ueen Taosri. I saw the intaglio so celebrated, 
 the Pharaoh attended by Anubis, and broken sarcophagus. 
 In No. 16, I entered the tomb of Rameses I., the father 
 of Osiren, and grandfather of Sesostris. What a contrast to 
 that of his son ! The tomb of Siptha was commenced by 
 that monarch with great magnificence, but he never lay in it. 
 It was finished by his successor Remeri, whose sarcophagus 
 was there. An author thinks that this Siptha, whose queen 
 was Taorsi, or Thaosr, and whose tomb I visited among those 
 of the Hadj Achmed, and who was the last of the eighteenth 
 dynasty, was the Pharaoh of the Exodus. Nolan gives the 
 same reason for its being Amunoph. Of the four tombs on 
 the west valley of Thebes, of which Wilkinson speaks, that 
 
 * See Rosellini. 
 
TOMBS. 
 
 119 
 
 .of Amunoph III. is the best. These, though more distant, are 
 as well worth visiting as those we have seen. 
 
 In the valley El Assassif are the tombs of the priests. 
 
 The tomb of Rochscere bears the cartouche of Thothmes 
 IV., the fifth king of the eighteenth dynasty. Rochscere 
 was a high court officer of that king. You may see a fine 
 picture in the tomb, of men with the heard and physiognomy 
 of the Hehreios^ making brick and some transporting clay, some 
 mingling it with stone ; some taking out bricks and placing 
 them in rows, exactly as in a modern brick furnace ; others 
 having a yoke of wood on their backs tied with ropes, taking 
 bricks to burn. Four persons are seen who are evidently 
 Egyptians in form and color. Rochscere was overseer of the 
 public buildings, and had charge of all the works.* See what 
 is said of Egyptian aliens, Deut. xxix. 10. Hengstenberg 
 alludes to this tomb in his work. 
 
 In a part of one tomb is a history referring to the disper- 
 sion of mankind, proving that the Egyptians possessed from 
 the foundation of their mythology the Mosaic history of the 
 Hebrews — that they acknowledged, we hence infer — Shem as 
 their first god, Pthah or Vulcan. One /o^w5-marked cartouche 
 represents the name of Egypt ; another, Javan or Japhet ; 
 another Ham, or Cush or Canaan, whom they worshipped, and 
 Misraim his son, whence the settlement of the Nile and name 
 of Egypt, Misr. 
 
 Time will not permit me to enumerate the tombs of the 
 priests and private individuals, which are scattered throughout 
 the vast necropolis. Some, far the most ancient in Thebes, 
 are nearly all fully described by Wilkinson in his hand-book. 
 Their beauty is not inferior to those of the kings, and the 
 
 * See Numbers, jd. 4. 
 
120 
 
 VOYAGE UP THE NILE. 
 
 light they throw on the customs of their country and Scripture 
 ^ truth — full of distinctness. 
 
 Thebes . — But we cannot contemplate the plain of Thebes 
 as it is now, and as the English sportsman does (who comes 
 up the Nile to shoot, and missing his club and London life, 
 thinks it a great “ bore”), who gazes at its ruins as so many bits 
 of rubbish — we must on the contrary carry away from Thebes 
 a picture in our mind, a picture complete, as it once was, 
 complete as we would from London, or Rome, or Naples. 
 Thus you can look at Athens, and why not at Thebes ? We 
 have travellers’ books and descriptions from Homer down, and 
 can identify them, Greek geographers with French and English. 
 Now let us see if we can have Thebes, and on our horse we 
 will have a morning ride. We start from our boats along the 
 avenue of Crio sphinxes, which lead from the temple of 
 Luxor in Diospolis. Along through these sphinxes, the priests 
 carried the sacred ark and the statues of their gods, in the 
 immense Serpentine road, which formed a magic circle, leading 
 around this side of the river, till it passed through all the 
 temple and reached the bank again, completing the magic 
 circle, and there crossed over to Luxor. Our road along the ^ 
 sphinxes leads us to the two colossal statues erected by and 
 bearing the name of Amunoph III., called Shamy and Damy 
 by Arabs, from one of which, called the vocal statue of Memnon, 
 a low musical sound, like the note of a soft ^olian harp, with the 
 clanging metallic stroke as of a bell came forth, as the morn- 
 ing light first shone upon it. From those which stand twenty 
 yards apart on each side of the avenue of sphinxes, you pro- 
 ceed along through a finer row of sphinxes, and sitting figures 
 I of basalt, till you come to a grand pile with a magnificent pro- ^ 
 pylon and figures of the gods and Sesostris. This is described j , 
 
THEBES AS IT WAS. 
 
 121 
 
 as the Memhonium. Leaving this, we turn northwards 
 (through what is now the valley Assassif of the Arabs, and 
 strewed with torsos and fragments of enormous statues), 
 through a row of noble statues of the Amenophs, Sesostrises, 
 Osirens, &c., and at the end of this causeway come to 
 a splendid gateway, and reach the above described Northern 
 Dair, and passing through a long avenue of sphinxes, we 
 come to a number of obelisks. By an avenue of sphinxes we 
 go to the two colossal sitting statues of Sesostris, and reach 
 the old palace of Rameses II. at Gournou. Gournou seen 
 (described above), we return to the water’s edge by the avenue 
 of Crio sphinxes to the great propylon of Karnac, crossing the 
 river by bridge or boats, as the mode may then have been. 
 
 Had you been here in the time of Shishak, you might have 
 seen the 1200 chariots, and 60,000 horsemen, reviewed upon 
 these plains ; and with the priests carrying sacred emblems at 
 their head, passing through these routes, and embarking for 
 Joudah Amelek^'‘* or Judea, or Syria; or returning vic- 
 torious with their victirhs. Had you been here in the time of 
 Sesostris you might have seen his triumphal car, with kings 
 of Europe, Asia, and Africa, chained ; and bearing spoils 
 from India, cameleopards, and trees and fruits of the tropics, 
 (you may still see them painted in the Memnonium,) gems and 
 gold, and ivory, gracing his triumph. Had you been here, in 
 the time of the Trojan war, you might have seen the elegant 
 form of Memnon, standing erect in his car, and his 200 
 chariots, and 20,000 horsemen, which were levied to accom- 
 pany Achilles to the plains of Troy, and who only excelled 
 him in beauty on those plains.t Or, at almost any great fes- 
 
 ♦ See records in Karnac, Champollion, and Wilkinson. 
 
 t Homer. 
 
 6 
 
122 
 
 VOYAGE UP THE NILE. 
 
 tival of Osiris, or of the overflow of the Nile, at almost any of 
 the feasts of the regeneration of the sun, or at the astronomi- 
 cal feasts, you might have seen the Potiphars carrying their 
 ark, and emblems peculiar to their order, through the royal 
 street, which we have just left, till they re-entered Karnac 
 with songs of rejoicing, and music of the cymbals, and harps 
 and drums. Perhaps it is only a procession of hierophants 
 that greets you now, and the neophytes, clothed in white, 
 liave learned mysteries which Moses learned, and are about 
 to be consecrated ; the priests of Thoth are bearing the sacred 
 books of the Memnonium, or the lamps of the sacred fire. 
 But we can fancy here for hours, and have our fancies aided 
 by history. 
 
 Here, where colors seemed first taught, sublime art has 
 placed four thousand years ago pictures that are fresh and 
 bright to this day. What beauty of art, what interest of 
 history, still attracts to these wonderful paintings ! The place 
 seems not a tomb, but a festal hall. What a list of beautiful 
 stories these paintings tell ! what a glory of art ! what a scene 
 of delight the twelve chambers and corridors of Belzoni, and 
 the other tombs ! 
 
 One of the most happy conclusions with reference to the 
 records in the monuments of Egypt is the confirmation which 
 they receive from the new discoveries at Khorsabad, Kuyun- 
 jek, and Nimroud, by Mr. Layard ; and the translation of the 
 inscriptions by Mr. Birch, and the other distinguished scholars 
 of the Asiatic Society, who have proceeded in that interpreta- 
 tion of the cuneiform inscription, to which Major Rawlinson 
 I found the key. Alike with the Assyrian names found in 
 Karnac, names of Assyrian tribes, as the Rotno, which is in 
 Belzoni’s tomb, &c., there are Assyrian coincidences discov- 
 
ASSYRIA AND EGYPT. 
 
 123 
 
 ered in the statistical and other tables at Karnac ; and also, 
 still more interesting, several cartouches newly laid open in 
 the ruins of Nineveh. The names of Shishak, his sons 
 Shapud and Osorchon ; Nimrot, the son of Osorchon II. As 
 to these names of the Egyptian kings of the twenty-second 
 dynasty being found in Karnac, it is certain that most inti- 
 mate connection existed between Assyria and Egypt at that 
 ame, Solomon having previously married the Egyptian* 
 monarch’s daughter, and Jeroboam finding refuge at Shishak’s 
 court. Bible history, and Egyptian and Assyrian monuments, 
 prove that the countries were at peace ; probably the Egyp- 
 tian monarchs caused Egyptian artists to execute their names 
 in the sacred characters. 
 
 Layard’s discovery relates perhaps to an occupation of 
 Egypt by Assyrians. The likeness of Ken and Astarte of 
 the Egyptians is illustrated. 
 
 In the British Museum ‘are the flowers worshipped '*^by 
 Rameses III., the Assyrian Egyptian goddess. On a Turin 
 tablet, she is called Alste, or Adesh. 
 
 * 1 Kings xi. 40. 
 
CHAPTER VI. 
 
 Hermonthis or Herment. — Adventure with a bull. — Esne. — Governor. — Temple. — 
 
 Alines. — Zodiacs. — Arab songs. — ^Arnaouts. — Cataracts. — Philae. — Nubia. 
 
 — Abyssinia. 
 
 Not far from Thebes on our way to Esne is another Roman 
 temple of Herment or Hermonthis, built by Cleopatra, in honor 
 of her having given birth to her son, Csesarion. Reto, the 
 second of the Hermonthite trinity, is giving birth to Hospire, 
 the child of Reto by Mandoo. Cleopatra is represented ador- 
 ing ^he Hermonthian bull ; Apollo or Mandoo, and Jupiter 
 Ammon were worshipped here. It is of beautiful archi- 
 tecture, and the pleasant conviction I have experienced 
 at Dendera and Esne, of the completeness of Scripture 
 truth, has made every Roman site interesting to me. The 
 zodiac is hardly less interesting than those of Dendera and 
 Esne. We were walking along here, when we met with an 
 incident which accorded well with the worship of the place. 
 A ferocious bull had just broken the rope that had fastened 
 him to the stump of a palm-tree, and one of my boatmen with 
 his bright red tarbouch, seemed to arouse his indignation. 
 The hideous roar with which he bounded at him, enlisted 
 alike my fears and interest for the poor Berber, who, turned to- 
 wards him, stood awaiting, as I thought, transfixed with fear 
 and resignation. The huge animal was tearing up the ground, 
 
ADVENTURE WITH A BULL. 
 
 125 
 
 first with one horn and then with the other, and nearing him 
 every instant. (He was the very largest of his species, and 
 might have been a good representative of Apis, his ancestor, | 
 and all of these animals are fine at Hermonthis, and of a noble ' 
 breed of cattle.) But, preserving his dignity as a deity but 
 poorly, the worshipped divinity of Hermonthis (in times when 
 the Greek Strabo voyaged here) was now kicking up the dust, 
 and nearing every leap the poor Arab, who was already in my 
 fancy gored. We held our breaths in intense excitement. I 
 wished for my gun to put a ball through the animal’s heart ; 
 •but the Arab was wiser than we thought him, for as the 
 animal was within two feet of him, he jumped directly at his 
 front, and grasped his horns. It was done so quickly and 
 handsomely, and changed our intense eagerness for his escape 
 into such a hearty roar of laughter at his agility, that I could 
 only compare it to Waterton’s escape from an alligator, by 
 leaping on his back and riding him ; or a negro dodging a 
 shark in Port Royal harbor. But he held the bull fast, though 
 he pawed and leaped ferociously, till one of the Arabs unloos- 
 ing the strip of cotton from his tarbouch, which formed his 
 turban, tied his feet together, and bound him fast to a date-tree. 
 
 The scenery from Thebes to Esne has some bold character- 
 istics, and one rock over the river, upon which stands a con- 
 vent, has outlines of beauty which would vie with the High- 
 land precipices of Scotland. The boatmen were highly 
 excited at reaching Esne ; my reis having a wife and chil- 
 dren there, and the rest all “ intimate friends.” They were 
 singing all night to the gals of Esne, almost in the same 
 way that the sailor does to the New- York gals when bound 
 home. As for ourselves, we were too much interested in the 
 zodiacs, and bishops and temples of Esne, to feel their enthu- 
 
126 
 
 VOYAGE UP THE NILE. 
 
 siasm, butwe had some curiosity to see the Alme dance in its 
 perfection, by women who had been favorites of Ibrahim and 
 Abbas Pacha. Tiie temple was the first sight ; the capitals are 
 beautiful, made of the lotus leaf; but how it looks after 
 Thebes ! What a half Roman, half Egyptian species of archi- 
 tecture ; and then the columns covered with dog deities, and 
 that disgusting animal worship in the sculptures, showing such 
 degeneracy of art under those vile Ptolemies and Emperors. 
 It was the city of Latopolis, city of the Fish, who was worship- 
 ped here ; some say of Latona, or Bubastis, or Diana. Cer- 
 tainly the chaste Diana is not the deity here now, neither do 
 travellers come here to worship her. The eighteen hundred 
 ladies Avho are sent up here, by Mohammedan Mollahs, 
 virtuous, pious priests of Turkdom, would tell you, that they 
 did not knoiu any such lady. The temple has been cleared 
 out, though huts surround it, and you must stoop to enter. It 
 is used as a warehouse by the Pacha. Several mummies are 
 lying here, but they would not allow us to have one. Tlie 
 view of Esne towards the mountains after walking through the 
 town, is exquisite ; it has a rich fertile plain and many beauti- 
 ful situations. On the opposite side is a sand bank, and a troop 
 of horsemen with the bright trappings of a Turk distingue, are 
 starting to cross the desert of Ababdie and thence to Berenice, 
 and across the Red Sea. In the burning sun their weapons and 
 the sand shone with a powerful glare. Berenice had great 
 commerce once, and with Kosseir was the great port for cross- 
 ing the Red Sea. I liad seen in the temple the tendency of 
 Roman art here, which had even degraded Egyptian, and 
 found all the doubts urged by Fourier futile. The temple 
 bears the works of most corrupt mythology, and dog-headed 
 divinities cover its walls. 
 
ESNE.— ALM^S. 
 
 127 
 
 On the portico of Esne, whose astronomical zodiac is judged 
 to be far older than that of Dendera, I distinctly read the 
 names of the Roman Emperors Claudius and Antoninus Pius, 
 with which Champollion fixed irrevocably the age of the 
 zodiacs, and refuted the infidelity of Dupuis and his colleagues, 
 that then fashionable infidelity in Paris, which is not respec- 
 table now even there : but Letronne, in his Critical and 
 Archaeological Observations upon the Zodiacs,” has sufficiently 
 gone over the ground, and with his able classical archaeological 
 learning, given much interest to a question, which requires 
 only a boy’s glance at the temple and architecture of Esne to 
 settle. In his notice of the zodiac painted upon the mummy 
 coffin of Trajan’s time, he proves that all the zodiacs date 
 from that Emperor’s time. 
 
 The evening of our arrival at Esne was set apart by my 
 friend’s dragoman for a great exhibition of the Alm4s. So- 
 phia, of whom Warburton speaks so feelingly, had grown old. 
 Coutchuchany was not to our liking, as being too popular ; 
 but Hanim seeming to combine a certain kind of reputation 
 with a not too great publicity, to her house we accordingly 
 repaired, to see a fantasia. Several girls had assembled 
 there — Circassian, Arab, Turkish ; some pretty, and dressed 
 in loose trousers and closely fitting jackets, their heads orna- 
 mented with abundance of gold coins. Their singing or 
 chanting rather pleased us ; it was a sad and interesting tune. 
 Their dancing I could never greatly admire, though some of 
 their motions are difficult and extraordinary. The quantity 
 of aqua vitce. they drank positively disgusted us ; and the only 
 thing at all interesting, was the shrewdness of a member in 
 purloining the wine and brandy which had been provided 
 
VOYAGE UP THE NILE. 
 
 128 ' 
 
 from my friend’s boat for the dance, before it reached tho 
 dancing-room. 
 
 Qur curiosity upon the subject led to the explanation by a 
 little Georgian girl, whose dancing and singing was far better 
 than that of any, as to how it was disposed of. She could not 
 speak a word of any language we could understand. She 
 had been banished from Cairo or Alexandria, as the eighteen 
 hundred women of Esne were, for too unrestrained construction 
 of Turkish conjugal relations ; but had been brought up in 
 Stamboul, and was a present from a Bey there. She succeeded 
 in showing us, by the most expressive gestures and flashings of 
 the eye, that our dragoman had given the stores of wine and 
 brandy to Hanim^ as a gift of friendship ; and at the conclu- 
 sion of her story, looked into my face, and uttered, “ Wallah 
 thayeeh ” — “ By Allah ! that is a good joke, is it not ?” 
 
 The Arnaouts scattered through Esne are the terror of all ; 
 but I saw only ten or a dozen prowling about, and am rather 
 inclined to think that Warburfon’s romantic incident with 
 them borders upon the imaginative. Those I saw gathered 
 around the Governor’s house were a wild-looking set of dogs, 
 not at all doing justice to their brother Albanians who had so 
 charmed me in the Gulf of Corinth. As to Thackeray’s* 
 recommendation, that Mohammed Ali should serve them up 
 the same sort of breakfast that he did the Mamelukes, I 
 think it would be a very foolish affair, for the poor Greeks 
 who are scattered through Egypt have the worst enemies in 
 their own vices and passions. 
 
 The Bishop of Esne is one of the noble pillars of the Chris- 
 tian Church of Egypt. He has enjoyed a high reputation for 
 many years ; and I have heard many Copts speak of him in 
 
 * Comhill to Cairo. 
 
ESNE. 
 
 129 
 
 terms of affectionate respect. The convent church is conspicu- 
 ous here. He has educated many of the young Copts, who 
 have perfected, under the Rev. Mr. Leider, and his lady, at 
 Cairo, their knowledge of true Christianity and English. 
 
 Just out of Esne are tombs, some of Christian martyrs, and 
 doubtless of some who fled from Medinet Habou. 
 
 The Pacha’s daughter is here, in her steamboat ; and we 
 take a walk down the sands to look at the plain of Esne be- 
 hind. She is now old, but has been a handsome woman. 
 
 My friend took my firman and called upon the Governor, 
 who received him kindly, stocked his boat with coal, and 
 refused to receive any money ; which your dragoman always 
 interprets as a polite invitation for you to send him in return a 
 watch, or a gun or pistol, or powder flask. So, you see, the 
 Turkish Pachas are knowing fellows, and in “cutehess” they 
 might almost compare with the “ down-easters ” of our own 
 land. I have seen several instances of this peculiar kind 
 of generosity, for which these Turkish Governors are distin- 
 guished ; and, not being overstocked with watches, guns, or 
 pistols, I let the Governor” alone. My friend was welcome 
 to my firman, and, with a very expensive powder flask, and 
 some few pounds of shot and powder, managed to get off 
 from the Governor pretty well : so I did not get the laugh on 
 him I expected. 
 
 Among the songs of the Almehs, were many which have 
 been translated by St. John, Warburton in his “Crescent and 
 the Cross,” and Lord Lindsay ; and though they have drawn 
 somewhat from fancy, I would not attempt to improve them. 
 The famous one of the Arab girl chiding her lover, he has 
 dwelt upon. There was one in particular that struck me, 
 where she says her lover has gone on a far pilgrimage to 
 
130 
 
 VOYAGE UP THE NILE. 
 
 Mecca. It is accompanied by a chorus of several voices to 
 the sound of the Sakia, and with a dance is significative of 
 the ideas. 
 
 Esne is the last frontier town in Upper Egypt. The last 
 of the properly Egyptian temples are at Edfou ; and, though 
 we wished to see sacred Philae, Elephantina, the colossi of 
 Ipsamboul, the temples of Dair, and the beautiful piles of 
 Dakke ; still the heat of Esne — for it was now February — and 
 a pain in the eyeballs, that led me to fear a touch of oph- 
 thalmia, made me anxious to return, as there was nothing 
 that I so prized as my eyes. Turning back from the grottoes 
 of Eilythias, which have been well described by travellers, 
 where the threshing song is represented : 
 
 “ Tread ye out for yourselves. 
 
 Tread ye out for yourselves, 
 
 The straw ; 
 
 For men who are your masters, 
 
 The grain,” &c.; 
 
 we turned back to Thebes, already half unexplored. Oppo- 
 site the town of Esne, and a short distance above, stretches a 
 wide plain, and here we saw a caravan starting on the great 
 desert. A Turkish officer at Esne, who was with the Pacha’s 
 daughter, was with them ; and the beautiful trappings of his 
 suite were glittering in the sun. They .were crossing down 
 to the great oasis. 
 
 The scenery above Esne is peculiarly beautiful, the moun- 
 tain rocks are distinct, and contrast with the desert most 
 admirably. 
 
 A traveller, who had been to Ipsamboul, one of our Scotch 
 friends, who left us above Esne, on his return to Alexandria, 
 
ABYSSINIA. 
 
 131 
 
 told me, were he going again he would not go above Thebes. 
 One certainly gets all in Karnac that any one can find of 
 stupendous grandeur. I had seen there, and at Dendera 
 and Esne, memorials of the palmiest days of ancient Egypt, 
 and the eighteenth dynasty. I had seen the decline from 
 that period. I had seen the latest, even down to Roman sway, 
 and began to think of returning. 
 
 We saw here some of the Bishareh, who diifer from the 
 Ababdie Arabs, both of whom are 'to be seen here in the bazaar. 
 
 Abyssinia . — 
 
 “ By Meroe’s isle, whose shadow half way falls.” 
 
 Above Egypt, of which we have reached, at Esne, the last 
 frontier town, lie many places of interest. PhilaB, with its 
 temples ; Elephantina, Dadour, and Dehod ; Kalabshe Dirr, 
 Guerf Hassan, Korosko, and Ipsamboul ; Dakke, the stronghold 
 of Egyptian magic; Wady Haifa, where not only Burckhardt, 
 Belzoni, and Lord Lindsay, but thousands of English travellers 
 have recorded their names ; Aboosimboul, with its colossi, its 
 temple of Hathor. Wady Sibou, and those places upon which 
 the guide-books are scant, the history little known, the history 
 little read ; — all these, as well as those between us and 
 the first Cataract, the beautiful temple of Edfou — the most 
 beautiful in Egypt ; the quarries of Hajjar Silsilis, and 
 the quarries of Egypt’s architecture, the cataracts — all these 
 I leave to my readers, and the interesting works of War- 
 burton and Lord Lindsay. Nubia, Dongola, Sennaar, and 
 then comes Abyssinia, with its capital. Meroe, where Can- 
 dace of the New Testament reigned [Acts). Hoskins has 
 described it in his Ethiopia. Beyond, the country is rich from 
 its Christian history ; the king of Thau, Sabela Selasse, cails 
 
132 
 
 VOYAGE UP THE NILE. 
 
 himself descendant of Solomon and Q,ueen Sheba. All this, 
 and a hippopotamus hunt at Khartoum, the junction of the 
 White and Blue Nile, I leave, as well as the giraffe hunting 
 in the mountains of Gondar, to English and American * 
 travellers. 
 
 After this, we would speak of the source of the White 
 Nile, which a friend of mine, M. D’Abaddie, has, with his 
 two brothers, all French gentlemen of fortune, been employed 
 in investigating, and which he has pretty conclusively settled. 
 He has spent ten years there, and his results have far excelled 
 those of Major Harris.! The region of El Hamyra, where he 
 traces the source of the White Nile, has been fully laid down 
 before the Geographical Society ; and whoever will investigate 
 the subject, will find in the discussions of Dr. Beke and Mr. 
 Ayrton, of the Geographical Society of London, all upon the 
 subject. His Christian discoveries are full of interest, and he 
 denies the existence of cannibals, or anthropophagi^ in that 
 country. He describes his difficulties in that region most 
 picturesquely ; the impossibility of procuring provisions par- 
 ticularly — where in one place he could not procure even a 
 sheep. I have been much interested in his accounts, as well 
 as in those of some Frenchmen I met in Cairo, who had just 
 returned. Shendy, and its king Tiger, Shenda, Dongola. 
 Sennaar, and Khartoum, in Nubia, where the Pacha’s garrisons 
 are ; the Blue Nile and White Nile, have been fully described. 
 
 There is another Abyssinian traveller,! of a noble family 
 
 * Dr. Anderson last year went to Wady Haifa. 
 
 t His exploration of the Diddesa branch, which is separated by the Dolmus 
 from the Andah desert. He penetrated to the Kaffa and Sura tribes, who are 
 enemies. The yet unexplored part of the White Nile lies between D’Abadie, 
 Yeouker-isle, and d’Amaud’s Yeouker ferry. 
 
 t Mr. P 8. 
 
DOWN THE NILE. 
 
 133 
 
 in England, of a large fortune and extended circle of friends, 
 whose virtues of heart have been rendered too susceptible 
 only by intercourse with exacting English society, and who 
 for reasons, which only show the noble texture of his charac- 
 ter, has absented himself frorn England for years, and spent 
 his life in the most distant part of Abyssinia. With only his 
 dragoman and servants, he dwelt here in his hut. He was so 
 useful to the people, whom he treated as a father, that he 
 became their confidant in all their troubles. Before him 
 they came when their flocks were menaced by robbers, or their 
 little stores menaced by the tyrannous exactions of the Pacha’s 
 soldiers, who occasionally penetrated to their frontier. He 
 was chosen a king among one tribe, and in all his relations 
 with that rude people governed himself by the same rules of 
 society and honor, as in his own country, in England. He 
 has been long known in Egypt, particularly in Cairo, by a 
 numerous circle of friends, and I am proud to add my name 
 to the list. 
 
 Should these pages ever meet his eye, I trust it will be on 
 his own estate in Nottinghamshire, and among the civilized 
 advantages of a land to which he is an honor. 
 
 We turned our boat and descended the river. We had 
 seen all, and all we had to do was to float down. Now we 
 would visit some town on the shore for provisions, or an Alm4 
 dance, or a bath, and always found alike interest and amuse- 
 ments. On leaving Thebes several English boats had arrived 
 there, and two American flags, one of which belonged to an 
 Episcopal clergyman. We passed two boats also with an Eng- 
 lish flag, in which were two brothers of a distinguished English 
 name. But the weather was becoming unpleasantly warm in 
 the Said, and it would be high time for Palestine and Syria. But 
 
134 
 
 VOYAGE UP THE NILE. 
 
 why explore them ? I would not step a foot into Syria, with- 
 out exploring alike with Balbec and Palmyra, also Nineveh, 
 Babylon (or Hillah) and Persepolis ; and for the caravan route 
 from Aleppo to Bagdad, which is the only mode of crossing 
 the Syrian desert, and reaching Babylon, and the sites of 
 Assyrian and Chaldean sway, I am not prepared. Nineveh,'' 
 Babylon, Persepolis, what testimonies ye can bear to Scrip- 
 ture ! and yet are these alone ? Are there not in my own land 
 testimonies alike, in the sepulchral mounds, in the ruins of 
 Central America, Chiapas, Yucatan, in the temple of the Sun, 
 and the mythology of the Aztecs, in the geology of the Mis- 
 sissippi? Now then to America, that land of prosperity, 
 Christianity and truth ; and as they turned my boat, I thought 
 of those rarely quoted lines : 
 
 “ Lives there a man with soul so dead, 
 
 Who never to himself hath said, 
 
 This is mine own, my native land : — 
 
 Whose heart within him never burned. 
 
 As homeward he his footsteps turned. 
 
 From wandering on a foreign strand ?” 
 
 How many who have never tried it, have spoken of the 
 intolerable boat voyage of the Nile ; but to me and many others 
 who have been through it, it was nothing but pleasure. All 
 along before, we had been leaving Europe and civilization, and 
 sailing far into the past, into the regions of time, “ where he so 
 sadly overcometh all things, and sitteth semi-somnous on a 
 pyramid, and looketh into old Thebes, and mumbleth some- 
 thing.” But now with sadness I saw one city after another 
 passed, and each one bringing us nearer Cairo and civilization. 
 
 * Layard’s Nineveh was not then published. 
 
DOWN THE NILE. 
 
 135 
 
 How I was planning with Suleiman, another visit, to come 
 with my wife, should I by that time have one ; and supposing 
 that, by that time, he would have soared from the command of 
 a Sandal to that of a Cangia Dharhieh^ or germ* Inshal- 
 lah,” all the Arabs replied, and each one vowed to go with 
 us if I came to the farthest sources of ^the Nile, in Abys- 
 sinia or Ethiopia. I stopped a moment at Gaw or Antaeopolis. 
 
 GaWj or A ntceopolis . — I did not expect much here from 
 the accounts of all travellers, though I landed ; the wind 
 seemed to be lessened ; I rambled over the site and few ruins 
 of Antaeus, the dog-devoured huntsman demigod, whom the 
 Greeks have worshipped. At Gau-el-Kehyr or Great Gau, 
 there are a few ruins, while at Gau-el-Gharbieh or West Gau, 
 there are scarcely any ; the richness of the wheat crops here, 
 now in maize, green and flourishing, confirmed the account of 
 the grain wealth of this region since the times of the 
 ancients. The groves an woods were all full of game 
 then, and here Antaeus and his hounds (they thought) chased 
 the prey. St. John mentions the decay of ruins since Dr. 
 Richardson’s time, but since then they have dwindled to a 
 few stones and bricks. 
 
 We stopped at diflerent towns besides. Tel-el-Amarna and 
 its grottoes, of which little can be said. Indeed, I would look 
 at no antiquities after Thebes, save for research, and where 
 you can find most of them copied in Wilkinson and Rosel- 
 lini, it is lost time. Float down then, and think of home, and 
 
 * The largest boats on the Nile measure 280 feet in length, these are the 
 germs for grain and inundations — the travellers’ boats, are the maash, dashabeh, 
 cangia and sandal, having cabins, divans, &c. Osiout is the great boat-building 
 port, and -we sec every variety here down to the maadil or ferry-boat, and the 
 garih or fishing-boat. 
 
136 
 
 VOYAGE UP THE NILE. 
 
 the objects and purposes of life. “Look no longer mourn- 
 fully into the past ; go forth to meet the future without fear.” 
 There is a wide field in the new and opening world of our 
 land, and we dream no longer. 
 
 What do we owe to Egypt ? I would not have seen in 
 the Holy Land any evidences of the source of worship ; but 
 here, on the Nile, I saw the Hebrews ; in Beni Hassan the 
 customs from which theirs sprung ; in the tombs of the kings 
 in Biban-el-Memlook, the faith which was taught them by 
 Joseph and Moses. 
 
 I have not so fully investigated the hieroglyphics as to 
 speak confidently upon many points ; and I think such a use 
 as Lanci and others have made of their knowledge is of little 
 value, involving one in numerous mental difficulties, finding 
 here and there abundant allegories, fancied resemblances, &c. 
 But the real use of the hieroglyphics, — the names, dates, and 
 plain histories, which one can now determine without a doubt, 
 is no loss of time. I can never regret the use they have been 
 to me in settling these, more than the Hebrew, more than any 
 other language, by the records on the permanent works, the 
 enduring monuments. 
 
 The convents from this down the Nile, have been dwelt 
 upon by travellers. Numerous Christian ecclesiastics have fled 
 in earlier times here, and built in the natural grottoes of these 
 mountains a refuge and a home. John of Lycopolis at Sciout, 
 and among some of those above us, St. Athanasius, fled hither 
 from the persecutions of Julian the Apostate, and his Arian 
 enemies. Perchance, here he composed that creed so famed. 
 The Italian begging monks of the Gebel-el-Teir have been 
 spoken of by Warburton, St. John, Dr. Richardson, Dr. Olin, 
 and Stephens. I saw none of them. From the convent above, 
 
DOWN THE NILE. 
 
 137 
 
 it is said you may get a distant view of Mount Sinai. Here is 
 the Egyptian Esdraedlon, where Typhon and Osiris are to 
 fight in the last day, champions in the cause of creation. 
 
 Walking ashore with my gun, I saw a specimen of the 
 ichneumon, or rat-catcher ; which, since the time of the Pha- 
 raohs, has been common in Egypt. 
 
 I have, I believe, seen specimens of all the animals in my 
 walks along the Nile, — hutfaloes, sheep, goats, dogs, cats, the 
 wolf, fox, and jackal ; every thing but the lion. Stephens 
 has an account of a hyena that jumped on to his boat. I 
 have seen few travellers in Egypt who had seen any ; hut I 
 have fancied I have heard their cry often in the distance. 
 Since Barnum^ of the Museum, has had his agents in Egypt 
 hunting for hyenas and enormous crocodiles, I presume the 
 race have become almost extinct. I have seen tlie lynx ; the 
 jerboa, a species of kangaroo; and as to birds, have shot 
 at the ibis and wild goose, pelicans, vultures, falcons, wild 
 ducks, pigeons, hawks, eagles, buzzards ; and all the night 
 birds, — owls, bats, &c. 
 
 Minieh we visit again on our way down, and find it not 
 much changed. Some rare stories of the new sway of Abbas 
 Pacha reach us here ; and the reappointment of Governors in 
 these provincial towns, and the characters of his choice, fully 
 demonstrate what his future sway will be. On we continued, 
 and a fine wind and current is taking us nearer and nearer to 
 Cairo. What conflicting emotions ! How long since we have 
 seen or heard European news ! and yet we are not at all anx- 
 ious, for the valley of the Nile has been so interesting ; and 
 now we are fairly down, we regret that we did not go higher, 
 to Abyssinia or Ethiopia. However, there is much yet untrav- 
 elled in the world, and we have not yet seen the luxuriant 
 
138 
 
 VOYAGE UP THE NILE. 
 
 scenery of the Amazon, or the volcano mountains of Brazil 
 and the Andes. 
 
 It was a lovely night ; and gliding along, I could almost 
 imagine myself the young Greek of the “Epicurean,” save 
 that, alas ! the prospect of no beautiful priestess, like her of 
 the shrine of Isis, was cheering me with hope, like him, 
 
 “ on one of those sweet nights 
 
 When Isis, the pure star of lovers, lights 
 Her bridal crescent o’er the holy stream ; 
 
 When wandering youths and maidens watch her beam, . 
 
 And number o’er the nights she hath to run 
 Ere she agaim embrace her bridegroom sun.” 
 
 i 
 
 And where are the shrines of Isis that graced the banks, and ' 
 in subterranean temples extended to Lake Moeris ? | 
 
 Let us back again, through revolutionary Europe ; through 
 a Rome without a Pope, an Italian republic persecuted by its | 
 sister republic ; through a France governed by the shadow | 
 of a name. 
 
 The wind carried us by noon past Benisoef, and before night j 
 we passed the false 'pyramid. Soon Dashoor and Abousir 
 pyramids hove in sight ; after, the well-marked and terraced, 
 mound-like Saccara pyramids. Then Fostat, once a great 
 Mohammedan city ; and in the haze of twilight, far to the 
 north, Ghizeh, and Cheops’ mighty works. 
 
 Late in the evening, we approach the outskirts of Cairo. 
 How beautiful the river for miles before reaching Cairo ! — 
 with the palaces, and military schools, and colleges, and insti- 
 tutions, and hospitals, with which the banks are lined. Music 
 floats along the sacred river; Rhoda and her sacred tradition j 
 
 again; and we are again among the Nile shipping near | 
 
 Boulacq. 
 
NIGHT ADVENTURE ON RETURN TO CAIRO. 
 
 139 
 
 It was past twelve o’clock, p. m., on one of the latter days 
 of February, when I ordered my boatmen to haul in at the very 
 place I had embarked from forty days before, near the transit 
 office. Stephens speaks of his finding Cairo like home ; but 
 his impressions could not compare with mine. Boulacq seemed 
 to me like New- York. I rushed on shore with Antonio, de- 
 termined to reach Cairo, gates, guards, no password, to the 
 contrary notwithstanding. The sound of the sakia and some 
 late fantasia^ an old Turk returning with his attendant and 
 light from a prolonged carouse, were all that broke the silence. 
 In vain I urged Antonio to go with me to the gate ; he only 
 said it would cause our arrest and expose us to ridicule. I 
 returned to my boat, but sleep I could not. I rose again : the 
 moon was like day. Antonio was snoring. To sleep that 
 night at Shepherd’s hotel I was determined ; I called my tall 
 cook, the Turk Beekra. On we started for Cairo or Masr. 
 He understood only Arabic. We passed the well-remembered 
 spots on the road from Boulacq, which I remember promenad- 
 ing one night with a noble young Englishman, now in Damas- 
 cus. Two men were before us. They might be Arabs ; we 
 had heard of murders without the walls. We walk slowly 
 and silently along ; they before us. They cross the bridge, we 
 follow. Ten minutes, and we gain on them as they approach 
 the gate. They give the password, and the gate opens. We 
 rush forward just as they are passing through, to gain admit- 
 tance, by pretending to be of their party ; but imagine my sur- 
 prise, when they accosted me with Mr. , how do you 
 
 do ?” Those whom I had avoided as Arab vagabonds, were 
 two English acquaintances who resided at Cairo, returning 
 
 from dinner with Dr. W 1 and Mr. M n, of New-York, 
 
 who were at Rhoda, on their way up. I hurriedly inquired the 
 
140 
 
 VOYAGE UP THE NILE. 
 
 password. “Koursoumakhah,” they answered, and we stepped 
 within the gate, congratulating ourselves on the providential 
 meeting that seemed almost romantic, for I could not have 
 passed the gates that night had I not met them ; for as Abbas 
 Pacha had returned, they were very strict. In five minutes I 
 was in Shepherd’s, and shortly asleep in the old familiar hotel. 
 
CHAPTER VII. 
 
 Cairo. — View from Esbekiah. — Abbas Pacha. — Illuminations. — Women in the 
 
 East. — Defterdar Bey. — A Moslem Lucrezia Borgia. — Memphis. — Pyramids. 
 
 — Sacred tradition. — Alexandria. — Farewell to Egypt. 
 
 How beautiful the view from our hotel top in the Esbekiah at 
 sunset ; the thousand objects of interest studding the love- 
 liest of landscapes ! To the east, over the sea of mosques 
 and oriental houses, lies the citadel with its mosque on the 
 spot of its founder’s crimes. Below is the square of Esbekiah, 
 with its trees and planted walks and gardens, now lighting up 
 with a thousand lamps in illumination of the return of Abbas 
 Pacha. Around, towards the desert, the old mosques, and 
 spires, and ruins, and tombs of the Cairo of the Caliphs. 
 Further on, old Cairo with its beauties, and by it the thousand 
 palaces of the Beys and Pachas, that hang over the beautiful 
 Nile, and Rhoda with its beauties and associations. Further 
 on to the west, stretch the plains of Memphis, where stood 
 the first of Egypt’s cities, and conspicuous against the. rich 
 glow of an Egyptian sunset, the awful, lofty pyramids. 
 Never could we turn to objects of more interest, of modern or 
 ancient times. Down the landscape floats the Nile,~Boulacq, 
 Cairo’s port, and farther to the south, the beautiful avenue of 
 Shoubra, and the palace and gardens of Egypt’s lord. Near 
 is the Coptic and Jewish quarter of modern Cairo. Towards 
 the citadel lies the Turkish quarter, with its mosques, its 
 bazaars, its baths, and around through the near streets, the 
 
142 
 
 VOYAGE UP THE NILE. 
 
 thousand objects that tell of the rich orientalism o»f the city. 
 And the air is so delightful ! Not, perhaps, what the air of 
 Upper Egypt is, nor such as ten days since I breathed on the 
 plains of ruined Thebes and Esne, nor such as cheered my 
 lungs, as I sailed up and down the lovely, lovely Nile ; but a 
 rich atmosphere of delight, nevertheless. 
 
 Feb. 16th, Abbas Pacha returned from Constantinople to 
 Cairo. He had been there to visit the Sultan, after receiving 
 from him the appointment of Hatti Sheriff. His entry into 
 Cairo was brilliant, with the cortege of carriages and retinue 
 of mounted cavaliers. The city was all joy ; and in the 
 evening, all the principal streets and bazaars' were brilliantly 
 illuminated. In the Esbekiah were the fireworks. Those of 
 every nation, and many riding on camels, were thronging the 
 thoroughfares in the most picturesque costumes. The turbaned 
 Turks, in crowds on foot ; the Caireen women, the Copt in his 
 white and muslin ; and the Jew in his dark, close-fitting robes, 
 the Bedouin in his wild desert dress, the Arabs in the burnou- 
 ses ; boatmen of the Nile, E'ffendis on horseback, with armed 
 attendants and blacks, less distinguished Caireens on donkeys, 
 Arab women with simple dress and unveiled faces, and num- 
 berless Franks with ladies, and alone, formed a panorama as 
 you walked through Cairo, worth seeing. It was a joyful 
 evening, — and how well behaved the people, — how different 
 from an European or American holiday ! How little drunken- 
 ness and bad conduct ! Surely Christians might come to the 
 East to learn manners. “I never saw,” says an English 
 gentleman, “ such courtesy, such good-humor, such an absence 
 of rudeness, and such happiness, in any city.” Indeed it was 
 beautiful. 
 
 Defterdar Bey; that pious member of the Geographical 
 
DEFTERDAR BEY’S DAUGHTER. 
 
 143 
 
 Society of Paris, and his daughter. Among the many stories 
 told of the ferocity of this wild beast in human shape, not the 
 I least interesting are those of the tamed tigers he kept on the 
 divan beside him, and which frequently amused themselves in 
 devouring his Nubian slaves. His daughter lived upon the west 
 I side of the river in her palace, and it was her common amuse- 
 ment to walk through the streets of Cairo, and if she saw a 
 I young Frank who attracted her attention, she would send her 
 I eunuch to bid him follow her. Were he unfortunate enough to 
 I do this, he never returned from her house. One young French- 
 I man, upon whom she thus cast her eyes, was thus bidden by 
 I a eunuch, and not daring to disobey the summons from, such a 
 I powerful person, took the precaution of arming himself with 
 pistols. After passing the night in her harem, in the morning 
 I she parted with him most atfectionately, and giving him pre- 
 : sents to disguise her intentions, as she had doubtless done fre- 
 
 quently to her previous lovers, he left the harem, and two of 
 the eunuchs accompani'ed him to the top of some stairs, which 
 he perceived led rather mysteriously down a dark passage. 
 Suspecting foul play, and observing both of the eunuchs had 
 their hands on their sword-hilts, he pulled out both pistols, 
 
 ! and ordered them to lead the way. This they did, and on 
 arriving about half way down, he perceived a sort of landing- 
 place, or trap-door, which was raised, and below ran the 
 river. Here the eunuchs paused, and drew their swords ; 
 but he cocked his pistols, and placing one to the ear of each, 
 ordered them to proceed. Upon reaching the bottom, he 
 leaped from the steps, while they ran back to get assistance. 
 He was unable to cross the river, and, as it was scarce day- 
 light, succeeded in getting into the outskirts, and concealed 
 himself in the straw in an old hut of a ruined village about a 
 
144 
 
 VOYAGE UP THE NILE. 
 
 mile up the river. He heard the voices of several of the black 
 eunuchs, who had traced him through the villages by the 
 , barking dogs, but remained quiet till night, when, proceeding 
 further up the river, he crossed there in a boat ; and going to 
 the Mokaattam mountains, arrived at Cairo on the other side 
 next day, having not dared to enter a village for food. He 
 went immediately to the French Consul, and told his story ; 
 but what would his protection have been to one who had the 
 character and secret of the daughter of Defterdar Bey in his 
 hands ? and any “ dog of a Christian” would be easily dis- 
 posed of. So, upon the advice of the Consul, he left Cairo, 
 and went to Alexandria, where he took passage for France. 
 The disappearance of many young and handsome Franks, 
 more adventurous than prudent, was thus accounted for ; and 
 this was the last instance known of one who had been in 
 danger of being sacrificed to gratify the passion and save the 
 reputation of this Egyptian “Lucrezia Borgia.” Franks in 
 Egypt were not protected as now, and the despotic and 
 ferocious will of the daughters and sisters of the Beys and 
 Pachas, particularly under the Mamelooks, caused many a 
 parallel circumstance. 
 
 The Indian mail across the Isthmus has made Egypt a 
 progressive country. But Turkish rule keeps back their im- 
 provement. The contractors for the route at the stations on 
 the desert, have to give large sums, backsheesh^ to the Pachas 
 or Beys, or they throw obstacles in their way. 
 
 Among the plagues of Egypt and the routes to Syria are the 
 dragomen. There is an understanding always between the 
 hotels and the dragomen, and hence one is as apt to have a 
 bad as a good one. The best way to get dragomen, is to ask 
 some one in Cairo to whom you have letters. The English 
 
CHARACTER OF ABBAS PACHA. 
 
 145 
 
 travellers from England and from India always spend some 
 days in Cairo, and frequently v/eeks. This furnishes you 
 always with society for the length of time you choose to 
 remain. Returning from the Nile and in your way to Syria, it 
 is always customary to take a house, as you have all necessary 
 articles. The expense of a trip up the Nile will vary from 
 $250 to $500, according to your boat ; and $250 would cover 
 the journey from Cairo over Syria to Damascus. Colonel 
 Outram was one of the English residents last winter in Cairo, 
 and went up the Nile. He, as resident of Baroda, in India, 
 enjoyed almost absolute power. Life and death being at his 
 will, as are the Rajahs’ lives or deaths at the Governor General’s. 
 His quarrel with Lord Napier, and the Scinde affair, is well 
 known. 
 
 The increase of English influence in India is more and 
 more apparent. “ The character of Abbas Pacha,” says a late 
 traveller, “ before he was Pacha, exhibits a union of ferocity 
 and vice, for which we find a parallel only in the Roman Em- 
 perors.” The worst vices of the worst Turks degrade him. 
 In his new palace, built at Cairo, his absolute power is made 
 to minister only to his pleasure. Seyd Pacha, though wanting 
 in mind, would have made a far more hopeful governor. 
 Of the other sons of Mehemet Ali, one was conspicuous in the 
 storming of the Chateau d’Eu, at Paris, last winter ; and the 
 others, as I have said, on attempting to return to Egypt, were 
 sent away by Abbas, for fear they should promulgate some of 
 thOv‘se revolutionary opinions which they had learned in France. 
 Just before leaving Alexandria, several of the ships of the 
 Egyptian fleet were reported to have been sold by Abbas to the 
 Sultan. 
 
 Some of the finest society at Alexandria is that oi the 
 1 
 
146 
 
 VOYAGE UP THE NILE. 
 
 wealthier Greeks. The lady of one of the transit agents, a 
 GreeKj is beautiful. The famous banker, Sitzy, has often been 
 spoken of. Many a face of Greek outlines would not do dis- 
 credit to the reputation of the ancient Corinthians. 
 
 In the custom-house at Alexandria, and Boulacq, the port 
 of Cairo, you see an air of business, and a crowd that has in- 
 terest from the oriental costumes of those engaged in it. In 
 the Pacha’s offices are those miserable Italians and French, 
 who exercise most contemptible authority upon all imports 
 and exportations of antiquities, although your baggage is al- 
 lowed to enter more easily than in the Italian or French 
 Doganas. These French renegades and Italian tools of his, who 
 are scattered through the country as Beys, Governors, Lieu- 
 tenants or Hakims, are fine Arabic business men, and in many 
 cases use their power with more moderation than their supe- 
 riors ; but what system of agriculture can thrive when the 
 Pacha holds the allodium^ giving out his land to the peasants, 
 and furnishing them with cattle and seed, requiring them to 
 give him a part as his right, and to sell the rest at the price 
 he may dictate ? Will not the inhabitants ever aim at dupli- 
 city and deceit,^ and concealment ; and all ambitious industry, 
 which would otherwise be a spur to these naturally perse- 
 vering and bright Arabs, be thus checked ? And that system 
 of horrid enlistment^ or pressing of the people into the military 
 b^" conscription, has been dwelt on. Every other Egyptian 
 has an eye put out, or a forefinger cut off*. To prevent this, 
 the Pacha made a one-eyed regiment. It would seem that 
 ophthalmia were curse enough. The poor, poor Egyptian, 
 always cursed, always plagued ! 
 
 He was not without the religious feeling, ever. In the 
 dawn of history, we see him a worshipper. The poor, de- 
 
WOMAN IN THE* EAST. 147 
 
 graded man of the Nile, when he saw the sun rising driving 
 away the mists — the glorious sun — giving life, drying the 
 mud, warming the crocodile’s egg, the seed, into life — the 
 good, bright sun, making his toil productive, and putting 
 warmth into his limbs, — he raised up his hands and wor- 
 shipped it. It was a worship of gratitude and love. It is on 
 their first names, their first cartouches, the Sun-Father ; then 
 the twenty-six gods or stars. To him it was the generator 
 and regenerator ; and as for immortality, as soon as the idea 
 was fully taught, under the Ptolemies, to the people, the 
 destruction of life by suicide was incalculable. ‘‘We shall 
 leave,” they said, “ this world of suffering and oppression, of 
 ophthalmia, and of poverty, and we shall go to a better ; for 
 no life can be worse.” Poor, poor Egyptian ! under thy Pha- 
 raoh Moeris — under thy Abbas Pacha — I have an exceeding 
 great respect for thee, even in thy mud hut — even in thy 
 home that thou scrapest in the bank, with the single clay 
 utensil that thou hast. Thou never earnest from the mud of 
 the Nile, though thy body was made of red earth. There is a 
 part of thee that has lived before the sun — that will live when 
 it rises not. 
 
 Women in the East . — My remarks on this subject are few 
 and far between. I love women — but I never found them in 
 the East. I found only the old, withered hag of the harem, 
 who is every where to be seen in the streets ; and occasion- 
 ally caught glimpses of the pretty Odalisque^ whose face was 
 never to be seen unless enveloped in the yaschmak. To him 
 who lives in his imagination and in the past, as he who goes 
 to Egypt must, for the time women are a nonentity. Wo- 
 man-woman with soul, that other part of man — she is never 
 
148 
 
 VOYAGE UP THE NILE. 
 
 to be seen in the beautiful East, unless by chance an English 
 lady traveller strays there, or one from our own bright land. 
 
 True the Pachas have toys — the Beys, the Turks, all 
 have toys ; they dress them in silks, in rare tissues ; they feed 
 them with sweetmeats ; and the fatter they are, the more they 
 prize them. They have, and so have we, dogs whom we treat 
 thus ; we have canaries whom we cage ; and these are your 
 women in the East. 
 
 Cairo, in the eight weeks that I have spent in it, before 
 going up, and now, is exhausted : and now for the voyage 
 down the river to Alexandria. This is a simple affair. Twenty- 
 four hours does it, and you have no hed^ which is the bore. 
 Thackeray, in his squih about the East, “ Journey from Corn- 
 hill to Cairo,” fully dilates upon it. The voyage was not four 
 days, as when I came up from Atfeh, and I have not so much 
 time to observe the formation of that Delta. I am not a geo- 
 logist, but I believe that six thousand years ago, Nubia was 
 as well endowed with soil as Egypt, and that the Creator 
 did not^ as the geologists say he did, (sneeringly,) make that 
 Delta at the creation ready-made; but that six thousand 
 years has formed it — Lyell and others to the contraiy. I am 
 supported in my opinion of this by eminent geologists with 
 regard to the Nile, if not the Mississippi. 
 
 After passing Shoobra, and bidding farewell to the Pyra- 
 mids for ever, we wind through the luxuriant fertility of this 
 valley, through the palm groves that we gaze on for the last 
 time. Dr. Lallemand, Memhre de V Institute is on board, and 
 his wife and son, and Mr. Danton. I had seen their names in 
 the tombs of the kings, and we compared notes. Observing th** 
 Mahmoudieh canal winding like the Nile, I was struck wid^ 
 a remark M. Lallemand quoted from the Turks ; viz., that the . 
 
DOWN THE NILE. 
 
 149 
 
 had purposely made it so, because they did not wish to excel 
 God in making it straight ; and this was Turkish philosophy 
 in medicine and every thing else, viz., ‘^Laissez faire.” 
 Numerous India Englishmen are on ' board ; passing a vil- 
 lage with mosques, I heard a servant remark to her com- 
 panion, that those mosques were idols which the Turks had 
 erected to their gods. At Atfeh, we entered the Mahmoudieh 
 canal, which looks as it did nearly four months ago. The 
 same crowd of Arab boats, the same Arab row, the same line 
 across the canal, the same transit agent. Farewell, then, to 
 the Nile, for ever, beloved, sacred river — to thee and thy sweet 
 waters, for which, like the exile, we would sigh till we drink 
 again. May these ever gush from the emerald mountains 
 beyond Meroe ; may the wonders of art ever adorn thy banks, 
 and this be the only steamer that ploughs thy waves where 
 Moses was found, and Cleopatra’s barge floated with its oars 
 of silver. 
 
 Alexandria came in sight towards sunset, (after winding 
 down the bank of Lake Mareotis, which is alive with its wild- 
 fowl,) with its pillar, its distant obelisk, its consular flags, its 
 tall shipping. We land where we embarked to go up the Nile 
 with our solitary Arab boy and boat, and an omnibus whirls 
 us into the square before the Hotel d’l’Europe. 
 
 The admittance of Nile waters into Lake Mareotis has 
 made the city much more healthy. Shooting game there, 
 you perceive the noxious exhalations proceeding from it. 
 
CHAPTER VIII, 
 
 Alexandria. — The Frank quarter. — Pompey’s Pillar. — The Obelisks. — Thothmes. ; 
 — The Pharos. — Obelisk of alabaster to Mohammed All. — News from France j 
 — Celebration of Proclamation of Republic by French. — Expulsion of Pope j 
 from Rome. — America and California — President Taylor and new Cabinet. — I 
 Anxiety for home. — The row of buildings belonging to Ibrahim Pacha. — i 
 Alexandrian society. — Bankers, merchants. — English — English Church. — 
 New Church building. — Catholic Convent, and new Catholic Church. — Chev. ' 
 d’Anastasi’s museum — its use to Egyptian science. — Mr. Harris’s museum. — 
 Russian Consulate — Russian vessels of war — Dockyards. — Egyptian fleet. — 
 Saracenic ruins, walls, towers. — Ruins temple Arsinoe. — Catacombs ycleped 
 Cleopatra’s baths. — Site and ruins of Sarapeum — site and ruins of library — 
 Site of Theatre. — Palace. — Canopus’ baths. — Bazaar. — Promenades. — Italian 
 Church and Italian beauties. — The Italian Opera and Cafes. — Italians and 
 Levantines. — Rides. — Sayd Pacha’s Palace. — Orange groves, and exquisite 
 view. — Arab city imder the Caliphs. — Mosque of a thousand and one columns. 
 
 — Canopus. — Supposed tomb of Alexander. — Turkish quarter, and customs. — 
 Mohammed Ali’s palace and gardens. — Alexandria under the Ptolomies — 
 Cleopatra — Antony — Pompey. — Old Egypt’s splendor. — Aboukir, and Nelson’s 
 field of victory. — Abercrombie — Bazaars, and Moggrebyn Arabs. — Modem 
 Alexandria. — Two sons of Ibrahim Pacha. — Arab soldiers. — Etesian winds. — 
 Cameo of Naples, “ Tazze Farnese.” — Homeward bound. — Farewell to 
 Egypt. — Candia, or Crete. — Straits of Messina, Mount Etna, Coast of Italy, 
 Spezzia, and quarantine. — Tuscan soldiers. — Lombardese. — Austrians. — Italian 
 liberty. — Marseilles. — Avignon. — Lyons. — Paris. — Zodiacs. — France, and a 
 President. — Bibliotheque. — Assyrian Museum. — London. — Chevalier Bunsen. — 
 
 “ Egyptologists,” British Museum. — Mr. Birch. — Layard. — Nineveh. — Major 
 Rawlinson. — Voyage home. — New- York Bay. 
 
 Next morning we were promenading this motley city, or 
 riding about on our donkey to see the lions ; which, to avoid 
 
ALEXANDRIA. 
 
 151 
 
 enumeration, we have placed at the head of our chapter. In 
 the bazaar you may see numbers of the Moggrebyn Arabs and 
 those from the Libyan desert ; and though you feel it excess- 
 ively dull and unoriental after Cairo, still the Nile and desert 
 Arabs, Turks, Syrians, Bedouins, English, French, Italians, 
 Jews, Greeks, Russian and American officers and sailors, the 
 large English commerce, and English captains and sailors, 
 make it almost as variegated a city as San Francisco must be. 
 
 The museum of medals, &c., belonging to that fine Egyp- 
 tian scholar and antiquarian, Mr. Harris, has been frequently 
 spoken of; and the museum of C. d’Anastasi, the Swedish 
 Consul-general of Egypt, now in London, has furnished many 
 Scripture illustrations and proofs. 
 
 “ Nam qua Pellaei, gens fortunata Canopi.” 
 
 Georgics IV. 285 . 
 
 Canopus, built on the western side of the Nile, was termed 
 Pellgean, from Pella, in Macedonia , the birth-place of Alexan- 
 der. Canopus on the west, and Pelusium on the east, are de- 
 scribed in the Georgies of Virgil. In the catacombs, on 
 the plains, in the few old ruins, (among which are the baths of 
 Cleopatra, and at which there is nothing to see,) are all to be 
 seen of the once great city of Alexander. His tomb was 
 here, but nothing else. And yet African as Alexandria looks, 
 when you first arrive from Europe, now, returning from four 
 months up the Nile, it seems more European than Europe. 
 Walking with M. d’Abaddie, who was so many years in 
 Abyssinia, I could not but be amused at his saying of it with 
 contempt, “ This European, ^^7^oriental town !” 
 
 Near the docks is the site of the temple of Arsinoe, and 
 while exploring this, you can glance at the fine palaces, 
 
152 
 
 VOYAGE UP THE NILE. 
 
 whose latticed harems hang over the water. The pillar, 
 called Pompey’s Pillar so erroneously, was erected by Publius 
 in honor of Diocletian. Some suppose an equestrian statue 
 stood upon it ; but to me it seemed only to be one of a number 
 of columns of an edifice, and I supposed it belonged to the 
 Sarapeum. Here, it is said by Adrian, in his letter to Servian, 
 that both Christian Jews and Gentiles worshipped Jupiter 
 Serapis. 
 
 About the time that I reached Alexandria, two sons of 
 Ibrahim Pacha were returned ; and Abbas not liking their 
 presence, very coolly gave them orders to leave in twenty- 
 four hours. The French steamer was forced to return with 
 them. The Pacha, on his return from Constantinople, as well 
 as from Mecca, just before his accession, made the engineers 
 many splendid presents. The engineers of the steamers hold 
 the rank of naval officers in the Egyptian fleet, and wear the 
 insignia. 
 
 There was enough to wear out a few days at Alexandria : 
 there was Mohammed Ali’s fine palace, and there were the 
 Arab baths ; there was Mr. Harris’s collection, and shooting, 
 with a Greek, along Lake Mareotis. There was the Italian 
 Theatre and the Italian Cafe ; there was Canopus’ and 
 Cleopatra’s baths ; and the picturesque shore, and a gallop 
 along the bay of Aboukir ; and there was the English Church 
 on Sunday, and a pleasant Sunday evening walk along 
 the road to Rosetta Gate and the Cleopatra obelisk ; and then 
 there was Pompey’s pillar, and the ruins of the library ; the 
 Turkish bazaar, and the Arab bazaar ; and silk-dealers of 
 rohes, and embroidery from Damascus ; and Greek dealers 
 in Roman antiquities ; and the French Consul, and the Fetes 
 da Republique ; and the English merchant fleet, and the 
 
GREEK ALEXANDRIA. 
 
 153 
 
 English Consul ; and fresh news from California, and my 
 own dear land. Not a day was without its many scenes of 
 interest. 
 
 Now a regiment of Arab soldiers file through the streets ; 
 now a Dervish meeting ; now an overland mail from England, 
 and you fancy you are walking down Regent Crescent in 
 London ; now from India, and you can see Calcutta afloat ; 
 now a French steamer, and a crowd of French adventurers, 
 leaving the new republic for the republic's good. I have 
 been more than four months in Egypt, and it is not yet a bore. 
 
 I would gladly, if time permitted, build up old Greek Alex- 
 andria as it was, out of the ruins. I amused my fancy with 
 the picture of the past, when Cleopatra ruled, and 
 
 “ The barge she sat in, like a burnished throne 
 Burned on the water : the poop was beaten gold, 
 
 Purple the sails, and so perfumed, that 
 
 The winds were lovesick with them ; the oars were silver.” 
 
 Antony and Cleopatra. 
 
 Alexandria, whether it be Greek, Roman, Christian or Patriar- 
 chal, Saracenic, Turkish, French, English, or that of the family 
 ruling thee now : — It is all in history. Here in the days of the 
 Greek Emperors a scene is described. Along the banks of 
 the green island in the middle of the stream, lay anchored 
 the galleys of the principal traders, large floating bazaars, 
 bearing each the name of its owner, emblazoned in letters of 
 flame over its stern. Over the decks were spread out in gay 
 profusion the products of the loom and needle of Egypt, rich 
 carpets of Memphis, and likewise those variegated veils, for 
 which the female embroiderers of the Nile are so celebrated, 
 and to which the name of Cleopatra lends traditional charms. 
 
154 
 
 VOYAGE UP THE NILE. 
 
 In each of the other galleys was exhibited some branch of 
 Egyptian workmanship, vases of the fragrant porcelain of On ; 
 cups of that frail crystal, whose hues change like those of 
 the pigeon’s plumage ; enamelled amulets graven with the 
 heads of Anubis, and necklaces and bracelets of the black 
 beans of Abyssinia.” Such was the Alexandria of the Greeks ! 
 
 It was after the season of Etesian winds, whose beneficent 
 influence the Egyptians represented by angels ; — I recalled 
 the celebrated Egyptian cameo in Naples, in which Homs, 
 Alexander and Ptolemy are represented, and the Etesian winds 
 Avith their veils. The exquisite beauty of the sculpture of 
 this vase, which is called the Tazze Farnese^ I remembered 
 with pleasure. 
 
 No such luxury is seen here now, but you may see the rich 
 houses of the modern Greek, or of the transit agents, English 
 merchants, consuls and Levantines ; you may see the fine 
 palace of Mohammed Ali ; the palace and luxuriant orange 
 groves of Seyd Pacha ; you may see the English vessels of 
 war and merchandise, and American frigates ; threatening 
 Russian consuls and Russian brigs ; you may see the rich 
 vegetation along Lake Mareotis, and thriving commerce in 
 modern Alexandria, re-establishing her magnificence, and 
 repaying to Egypt the lessons of science and philosophy, and 
 art and luxury that she has taught the world. 
 
 The Greeks pride themselves upon some relics said to be 
 of St. Catharine, who suffered martyrdom. Their church and 
 cemetery, like that at Cairo, is well worth visiting. 
 
 I shall bid my reader farewell with an incomplete chap- 
 ter, to which I give him only the headings. In the pages of 
 guide-books and travellers, he will find these places all de- 
 scribed, and what interest have these Avhen Paris invites to her 
 
VOYAGE HOME. 
 
 155 
 
 repositories of books and art. We long again to saunter through 
 tlie Jardin d’Hiver, or the concerts of the “ Conservatoire,” or to 
 hear the rich tones of Alboni at Her Majesty’s, in London ; to 
 see Marie Taglioni, or Carlotta Grisi starring it in the “ Lost 
 Pleiad,” or Caroline Rosati in “ La Prima Ballerina,” and to 
 hear the soft tenore of Mario or Moriani, or rich bass of 
 Lablache and Tamburini. Paris, London, those hbmes of 
 science, where you can travel in your arm-chair, in your 
 Assyrian museums and Asiatic societies, in your saloons of 
 savans ; — why linger in dusty old Egypt longer ? 
 
 For the mounds and records of our own land, for Uxmal, 
 and Chiapas, and Yucatan, for California and its progressing 
 civilization, which he who first struck his spade in the Sacra- 
 mento so little foresaw ; for proofs of Scripture among the 
 Mexicans, the Peruvians, for the luxuriant scenery of the 
 Amazon, and ail that Humboldt has laid open in North and 
 South America : for America ! let us leave the time-honored 
 land with thankfulness for the truths that she has taught us. 
 I bade farewell to Egypt. In a few days we made the coast of 
 Candia or Crete, and saw the green mountain where Jupiter 
 was fabled to have been born. One bright morning we stood 
 under clear Mount Etna, a familiar mountain which I had 
 scanned on Sicilian ground before. Messina was underneath, 
 the scene of Neapolitan massacres. A few days brought us 
 to Spezzia in Italy. Quarantine over, to Marseilles, Avignon, 
 Lyons, Paris, Old Egypt’s relics there, juggling zodiacs, dusty 
 tomes in her Bibliotheque — ^London and her museums I faith- 
 fully explored; but this time with pleasure, for Egypt had 
 become part only of a grand w'hole of faith. 
 
 It was a bright Sunday morning in August, that I sallied 
 from my hotel in Broadway, and crowds of well-dressed men 
 
156 
 
 VOYAGE UP THE NILE. 
 
 and women thronged the thoroughfares of this busy, Christian 
 city. Through the aisles of Trinity the organ was pealing, 
 and voices went up chanting praises to Heaven. As I stepped 
 in, the lesson was reading in Deuteronomy, chapter iv, and 
 of parts of it, the words seemed meant for me. “But the 
 Lord hath taken you and brought you even out of Egypt. 
 If from thence thou shalt seek the Lord thy God, thou shalt 
 find him, -if thou seek him with all thy heart and all thy soul,” 
 &c. Yes, what is conviction of truth, from science, from his- 
 tory, from Scripture, if we follow not in our lives the com- 
 mandments of God, and the teaching and example of our 
 Divine Master ? 
 
 Reader, my wanderings among ruins will occupy you no 
 longer, unless Nineveh, Babylon, Persepolis, Chiapas, Yucatan, 
 or Mexico should entice me to their palaces, sepulchres and 
 mounds. 
 
APPENDIX. 
 
 A. 
 
 Astronomical Monuments in Egypt. 
 
 There were at Esne, Dendera, Hermonthis, tombs of the kings. 
 Two were at Dendera, at the portico of the great temple ; two at 
 Esne. The four contained the twelve zodiacal constellations, of 
 which the signs succeeded according to modern zodiacal interpreta- 
 tions. 
 
 Twelve constellations are placed upon a plane which stretches 
 two parallel ways, forming a spiral curve or ellipsis, which you see 
 in the zodiac at Dendera, and which is now in the royal library at 
 Paris. Virgo or the Virgin is the first in that of Esne. Leo first 
 in that of Paris. After Desraix brought to France the “ discovery,” 
 they found an astronomical phenomenon ; the first sign of each zodiac 
 is that of the solstice at the time when the two temples were con- 
 structed. The temple of Dendera, when the two solstices are at the 
 sign of the Lion, according to this rule, dates 4000 years before our 
 epoch, and that of Esne 7000 years, having the sign of the Virgin. 
 The zodiacs have in their order a date from 5000 to 10,000 years, 
 and yet the temples which contained these, pictures are nearly the 
 most modern in Egypt. This was the report to Napoleon, by his 
 librarian ; Dupuis’s opinion is given. 
 
 Laborde admitted that the first signs were those of the zodiacs ; 
 effaced the Virgin at Esne ; placed the solstices at the left of the 
 Lion ; gave 3500 years to Esne, and 2000 less to Dendera. La- 
 borde considered the temples at Esne and Dendera, as the memorials 
 
158 
 
 VOYAGE UP THE NILE. 
 
 of the successes of Alexander. See Fourier, “ ressume litteralre de 
 ses recherches sur les antiquities astronomiques de I’Egypt.” Fourier 
 says the Egyptian sphere carries us back to the twenty-fifth century 
 before the Christian Era. At this time, observations made known 
 the first elements of Astronomy. The epoch of the restitution,* he 
 then dilates upon. Flere is the origin of their laws and most ancient 
 rites. 
 
 Recherches sur les sciences et le government de V Egypt. — Fou- 
 rier, in his description of Egypt, says an epoch which differs 
 little from two thousand years has preceded the construction of the 
 temple of Dendera, and that is posterior to that of Latopolis or Esne.. 
 These temples belong then (as the epoch of the zodiacal institution 
 2500 years, b. c.) to the civil history of Egypt. The monarchy then 
 existed in all its forms, obeying wise and constant laws. Experi- 
 ence had fixed the principles of government and cultivated arts 
 from time immemorial. They had produced the monuments of Esne, 
 and reproduced them in the temple of Isis, at Dendera. Fourier 
 concluded, therefore, that at the twenty-fifth century before the 
 Christian era, the Egyptian monarchy was flourishing by know- 
 ledge of laws, manners, and arts, and reasoning that the sphere and 
 calendar of two zodiacs was instituted, and therefore, at the twenty- 
 first century, b. c., the temple of Esne and its zodiacs was constructed, 
 that Dendera was built after this epoch. Hence, if these temples, 
 which were the most modern in Egypt, were built 2100 b. c., to what 
 a distance back could the dates of such buildings as Karnac and 
 Thebes be carried. The French fashionable infidelity was on the 
 tiptoe of delight. Biot the astronomer, thought he could recognize 
 astronomical features still more strange in the zodiac. The French 
 philosophers already began to talk of 10,000, 20,000 years for 
 Egypt’s history, and the materialist to claim that the earth always 
 existed. The zodiac was brought to Paris. Geologists, deists, atlie- 
 ists, all were delighted, and Scripture revelation they supposed had 
 received its death blow. 
 
 Alas ! “ the tongue of a dog was made medicinal to a sickly Laza- 
 rus,” and this lie in the same way proved useful to diseased trutli. 
 The discovery of the Rosetta Stone and the hieroglyphic alphabet by 
 
 * See Nolan’s remarks upon the restitution in Egyptian Chronology. 
 
APPENDIX. 
 
 159 
 
 Champollion, in Sept., 1822, lightened all doubts. The temples of 
 Dendera and Esne were shown to have been built in the Roman age 
 of Egypt, and they bear the names of the emperors, Hadrian and 
 Antoninus. “ Autocrator” had been cut off from the zodiacs when 
 brought to Paris. On Esne, the names of Claudius, Titus, Domitian, 
 Trajan, Antoninus, and Septimus Severus, were found, thus proving 
 that it was built in the first century before Christ, and yet Fourier 
 claimed 2000 years. At Dendera, even in the most ancient Roman 
 part, you find the name of the last Cleopatra, and a list of the sover- 
 eigns who after her had assembled to.its construction, viz. : Augus- 
 tus, Tiberius, Caius, Claudius, Nero. Besides the names which were 
 ^ound sculptured upon them according to the design published by the 
 French Commissioner of Egypt, was an imperial Roman title of 
 Claudius and Nero.* 
 
 Having obtained a familiarity from Champollion’s Grammaire 
 and Dictionaire, and Wilkinson, with the signs and records 1 should 
 find there, I saw the names clearly in an instant of these Roman 
 Emperors. But the impression I received was so lively from the 
 first glance at the temples of both Dendera and Esne that they were 
 Roman, that I think any classical schoolboy would recognize the same. 
 I felt how paltry were the efforts of the French infidels, how malicious 
 their attempts by such scientific jugglery to cast a doubt upon the 
 word of God. True science and true philosophy will only find ir, 
 the glorious works of the Almighty, and true historical records of the 
 race, the glorious confirmation of his word. All that these men have 
 done, and all that kindred Chronologists or Geologists can do, has 
 only brought and will continue to bring greater truths to light. • By 
 the persevering efforts of the French skeptics we gained the farther 
 knowledge of the hieroglyphics which Champollion gave us, and 
 the Egyptian scholars of the day, who detract in any manner from 
 the completeness of Scripture, only awaken a spirit that leads to 
 farther Scripture proof and continued confii'mation. 
 
 * For a conclusion of the history of this matter, see Champollion Figeac* 
 Fourier, and Napoleon, and Chronology. 
 
160 
 
 VOYAGE UP THE NILE. 
 
 B. 
 
 Christianity and the Church in Egypt^ Ancient and Modern. 
 
 Mr. Leider, the English Missionary in Cairo, and rector of the 
 Episcopal Church in the Place Esbekiah, which I frequently attended, 
 may be almost said to be at the head of the Coptic Church in Cairo. 
 The Coptic patriarch calls him his father, allows the young Copts to 
 go to his school, and sanction§ the distribution of tracts of the Church. 
 His scholars in the nizam dress add interest to the service by read- 
 ing clearly the English. He has studied fully the Coptic language, 
 and says that it bears a relation to the Sanscrit alone of all living 
 languages. As to affinities with the Gipsey language, the name of 
 Copt is doubtless derived from yvm: or vulture, the name of Egypt, 
 and in the Copt you perceive characteristics of the ancient Egyptians. 
 In the finely chiselled features of a young Copt in Cairo, educated 
 by Mr. Leider, 1 could see a resemblance to one of the Egyptians in 
 the tombs of the kings which showed all the marks of the same race. 
 The head of the Church, the patriarch of Alexandria, like the patri- 
 arch of the Greek Church, answers to the Pope of Rome, deriving his 
 descent from St. Mark, and is at the head of a church that has nobly 
 preserved its unity for eighteen centuries, which Athanasius has 
 adorned ; (but we leave this to Church History ;) he has now little left 
 but his title. He is elected by the fathers of St. Anthony or the con- 
 vents of the Natron lakes. Next him is the Mutram or bishop, who is 
 appointed by the Egyptian patriarchs ; one is sent to Abyssinia to pre- 
 serve its branch there. The superiors of the convents are called 
 Gommos, next to the bishop ; and the monks or priests have the 
 title aboona or fathers. 
 
 The Copts have the character of being avaricious, sensual, and 
 hypocritical. They dress in black turbans and robes and seem a 
 blasted race. Some are very rich, and have several wives and 
 slaves. One living next to our hotel on the Esbekiah, had a beauti- 
 ful odalisque, who sometimes came to the window adorned with gold 
 and jewels. Some are officers of the government. They frequently 
 embrace Moslemism for a valuable marriage, and many Moslem cor- 
 ruptions have crept into their service, which, like their ancestors’ 
 
APPENDIX.. 
 
 161 
 
 religion (the Egyptian), is administered by the priests in a Coptic 
 tongue, not understood by the people. In Cairo they are scribes, 
 tailors, jewellers, and perfumers, and club in one profession in differ- 
 ent places. 
 
 Still corrupt as the Church is, we cannot but look upon it with 
 interest. In their fasts, the longest of which is Lent, and their 
 libraries of the Church fathers, and in the stern integrity in which 
 for certainly thirteen centuries, and perhaps eighteen, they have 
 maintained their religion, we must look upon them with hope. 
 
 Of the seven convents which alone remain of the numbers once 
 in Egypt, the two of St. Anthony and St. Paul, seventy-six miles 
 across the desert from Benisooef, (whose patrons are St. Anthony of 
 the Thebaid and St. Paul or Mar Bolus, by whom they were founded,) 
 and the convents of the Natron lakes, St. Macarius, and Dayr Sur- 
 iam (built by Honnes a holy personage), Amba Bishoi and Dayr 
 Baramous, the latter rather Greek and the rest Coptic, and of the 
 Arabic, Coptic, Syriac MSS. which they possess ; Curzon in his 
 narrative of the Levant and Wilkinson in his Hand-Book fully treat. 
 Their fasts are long, they must never marry unless with virgins, they 
 reject images but regard pictures. There are other convents through- 
 out the Nile, a visit to some of which I have described. Here the 
 priests marry, but are much respected. These are Gebel Coskam 
 in Upper Egypt; Dayr el Adra or Gebel-el-Tayr, Bibbeh, Boash, 
 Negadeh, Aboo Honnes, Amboo, Samoud, in the Fayaum ; Girgeh, 
 Abydos, Ikhmim, Mellawi, Sook Feshieh, near Menoof ; Amba 
 Shnoodah, near Soohajz; the Red and White Monastery El 
 Shenood.* 
 
 The White Monastery El Shenood . — This monastery is visited from 
 Soohajz. It was founded by the Empress Helena, is built in the style 
 of an Egyptian temple ; a long oblong building with a cornice. It 
 stands alone with scarce a tree about it in a wide vast plain. It was 
 with difficulty that I could get admittance. The monks have sepa- 
 rate cells, and these are in the sides of the building. We found only 
 
 a few books of the Romish service here. I had half promised my 
 friend of the propaganda at Ikhmim, that I would visit this monastery. 
 It is perhaps the only building in the world at present, where Christ’s 
 
 * In this convent I was shown the name of St. Athanasius written in Coptic. 
 
162 
 
 VOYAGE UP THE NILE. 
 
 religion is practised in a church of ancient Egyptian style of build- 
 ing. It is sometimes called the Dair or temple. This, as well as the 
 convents of the Natron lakes, and those of Tahta, and Girgeh, and 
 Thebes, and Negadeh, have been fully described by Curzon, in his 
 monasteries of the Levant. The monks are willing to receive do- 
 nations from you, and the manner they have of showing this here, as 
 well as in all those up the river, makes you feel as if they were hardly 
 of your religion. 
 
 Beside these convents, there are three in the city of Cairo, two 
 at old Cairo, one of which has beautiful gardens, where the patriarch 
 resides, and a beautiful view. And in one the grotto is shown where 
 the virgin lived : 
 
 “ Under a palm-tree by the green old Nile, 
 
 Lulled on his mother’s breast the fair child lies. 
 
 With dove-like breathings and a tender smile. 
 
 Brooding above the slumber of his eyes. 
 
 While through the stillness of the burning skies, 
 
 Lo, the dread work of Egypt’s buried kings. 
 
 Temple and pyramid beyond him rise. 
 
 Regal and still as everlasting things. 
 
 Vain pomps ! from Him with that pure flowing cheek. 
 
 Soft shadowed by his mother’s drooping heart.” 
 
 I would not put aside the traditions that in this grotto the Saviour, 
 with his mother and Joseph, had rested while in Egypt. That 
 at the sycamore-tree which grows near Heliopolis they stopped, or 
 that at this fountain they drank. It is a pleasant old tradition, cer- 
 tainly as good and authentic as many of those which the Roman 
 Catholic priests get up at Jerusalem. 
 
 The Church of St. George. There stands a convent where they 
 show you the grotto of St. Sergius, and where, says tradition, Mary 
 and Joseph lived and slept. Near lives the patriarch of Alexandria. 
 
 There is one convent at Alexandria, which is called the convent 
 of St. Mark. The Copts here pretend that they possess the head and 
 body of St. Mark, but Leo Africanus says, that the Venetians carried 
 it away. It is filled with paintings of his martyrdom and mission. 
 


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