III. CHAP. is not elsewhere to be contemplated;-a profusion of Nature, amidst her most awful privation; a disciplined army encamped amidst lawless banditti; British pavilions, and Bedouin tents; luxurious gardens, and barren deserts; the pyramid and the mosque; the obelisk and the minaret; the sublimest monuments of human industry, amidst mouldering reliques of Saracenic power. HELIOPOLIS, AND THE PYRAMIDS OF DJIZA. Passage along the Canal-Visit to HELIOPOLIS-Mataréa -Pillar of ON-Style of the Hieroglyphics-Intelligence concerning them their Archetypes-Crux ansata-its meaning explained-Of the Hieralpha and the Testudo-Other Symbols-Kircher-History of the Obelisk-Minerals of the Arabian Desert- Doubtful Origin of Egyptian Jasper-Petrifactions-Dates and Corn-ALMEHS-Of the Alleluia, and cry of lamentution-Voyage to the PYRAMIDS-Appearance presented by the principal Pyramid - Objects seen from the - Nature of the Limestone used in its construction-Extraneous Fossil described by StraboMortar-Labours of the French Army-Theft committed by an Arab-Visit to the interior of the larger Pyramid-Notions entertained of its violation-Its passages-Observation at the Well-Examination of some inferior Channels-Chamber of the SepulchreThe Soros-its demolition attempled--The SPHINX summit it's IV. its surface found to be painted-Discovery of an antient Inscription-Custom of painting antient Statues Extract from Pauw. CHAP. OUR house in Grand Caïro stood in a principal street, near the northern bank of the Canal; so that our djerm, being always at hand, served us, like a gondola at Venice, instead of a carriage; and we frequently used it to visit the different parts of the city accessible by canals. Upon the twenty-first of August, the inundation being nearly at its height, we attempted a passage by water to the utmost extremity of the Amnis Trajanus', in the direction of the Birk el Hadjee, (1) The Khalig, or principal Canal of Caïro, believed to be the TРAÏANOZ ПOTAMOZ of Ptolemy, (Vid. Geog. lib. iv. c. 5.) and called also, by some writers, FOSSA TRAIANA. Savary, upon the authority of Elmacin, an Arabic historian, attributes this work entirely to Omar, and says it was Adrian, rather than Trajan, who caused a canal to be dug near CAIRO. (Lettres sur l'Egypte, tom. I. p. 94. Paris, 1785.) There is, however, reason to believe that Omar's work was merely a restoration of the antient dyke. It extends eastward of the Nile, to the distance of twelve miles, and is terminated by the Pilgrim's Lake. Formerly it was continued to Heroopolis, upon the banks of the Red Sea. This undertaking was begun by Sesostris, carried on by Darius, and finished by Ptolemy Philadelphus. Its last restoration took place in the year 644, under Caliph Omar. (Strabon. Geog. lib. xvii. tòm. II. p. 1140. Edit. Oxon. See also the Notes in the Oxford edition of Strabo.) The history of this great undertaking, in its origin, is thus related by Pliny, who says the design was abandoned through fear of inundating Egypt with the waters of the RED SEA. "Daneon portus, ex quo navigabilem alveum perducere in Nilum (quá parte ad Delta dictum decurrit We IV. or Pilgrim's Lake, which was the first station of CHAP. the great Caravan, in its journey to Mecca. soon found our progress obstructed by the arch of a bridge, which was so low, that our djerm could not pass beneath it, and we were compelled to return. HELIOPOLIS. The next day, having obtained horses and a Visit to Janissary, we set out again, in the same direction, by land, desirous of seeing the remains of HELIOPOLIS, one of the most antient cities of the world of which a vestige can now be traced. More than eighteen hundred years ago, its ruins decurrit LXII mill. pass. intervallo, quod inter flumen et Rubrum mare IV. CHAP. attracted the regard of the most enlightened travellers of Greece and Rome. Nearly thirty years before the Christian æra they were visited by Strato; and his description of them proves that the condition of this once famous seat of science was almost as forlorn then as at the present period. If, as Shaw has ingeniously attempted to prove', the accretion of soil, from the annual inundation of the NILE, "have been in a proportion of somewhat more than a foot in a hundred years," we might search for some of the antiquities mentioned by Strabo, at the depth of six yards below the present surface. But when Pococke visited the place, he observed the fragments of Sphinxes yet remaining, in the antient way leading to the eminence on which the Temple of the Sun stood, between the principal entrance to its area, and the southern side of the obelisk standing before it'. The Sphinxes which Pocoche saw, were, in fact, a part of the identical antiquities that were noticed by Strabo so many centuries before'; whence it is (1) Travels, Second Edition, p. 338. Ch. II. sect. 3. (2) Pococke's Descript. of the East, vol. I. p. 23. Lond. 1743. (5) Διὰ δὲ τοῦ μήκους παντὸς ἑξῆς ἐφ' ἑκάτερα τοῦ πλάτους σφίγγες ἵδρυνται λίθιναι, πήχεις εἴκοσιν, ἢ μικρῷ πλείους ἀπ ̓ ἀλλήλων διέχουσαι, ὥσθ' ἕνα μὲν ἐκ δεξιῶν εἶναι στίκον (στοῖχον) τῶν σφιγγῶν, ἵνα δ ̓ ἐξ εὐωνύμων. “ Per totam vero longitudinem deinceps ex utraque latitudinis parte sunt posita lapide sphinges, |