48

HELIOPOLIS.-OBELISK.

CHAPTER V.

Heliopolis.-Obelisk.-Ravages of Time.-A Patriarch.-Shoubra.-The Pacha's Villa.

THE next day we made an excursion to the ancient Heliopolis, the On of the Old Testament (Gen., xli., 45). It lies about two hours ride northeast of the city, upon the edge of the Syrian desert, which has encroached upon the ancient site. The adjacent village of Matariah contains fragments of marble and granite which once adorned the "City of the Sun." It dates back nineteen hundred years before Christ. The selection of the site is said to have been made on account of a fountain of delicious water, which still flows sweet and pure, as it did forty centuries ago, while the great city has vanished. In a garden adjacent to the village is shown an old, gnarled sycamore-tree, under which, if we can believe the legend, Joseph and Mary, with the infant Saviour, rested after their flight into Egypt. Our janizary prepared himself, by ablution in the fountain hard by, for performing his devotions at the noon hour of prayer, which he did with apparent solemnity, kneeling humbly upon his girdle, which served him for a carpet.

The only substantial monument of the glory of Heliopolis that remains is a lone obelisk of red granite, that shoots up some sixty feet from the midst of a cultivated garden. An area about it, some three quarters of a mile long by half a mile broad, is enclosed by a belt of ruins from ten to twenty feet high, the remains of a wall which surrounded the sacred enclosure of the Temple of the Sun. Here, according to tradition,

Moses learned the wisdom of the Egyptians. Here Thales and Pythagoras, Plato and Herodotus, resorted, to draw from the wells of ancient learning, which were full before the brute rock had been struck in Greece. Here dwelt the father-in-law of Joseph, the priest of On. I sat down by a hedge of rosemary, under an orange-tree that bloomed at the foot of this solitary memorial of the old-time city, and could not but muse upon the destructive power of Time. Slowly and stealthily he creeps along, and strikes with sure decay, as he goes, the pride and glory of the earth. The magnificent temple, the college of learned priests, the towering. wall, the vast city-where are they all? To think that Joseph looked upon this obelisk in the days of his power, and Moses in the bitterness of his degradation! And there it stands, solitary and quiet, the only sound of life around it being the gentle hum of countless bees, whose hives of mud are built in the cuttings of the hieroglyphics that cover its sides!

I turned from these oppressive thoughts at length to the beautiful world around me. Passing over rich fields of grain, irrigated by means of artificial canals, we took the way to Shoubra. We saw many horses, tethered to stakes, grazing on the wayside, while their keepers had pitched their tents here and there, as in the days of Abraham. Indeed, as I passed near the door of one of these tents, and saw a venerable gray-bearded Arab, in the flowing Eastern costume, sitting within it, while the younger part of the family were amusing themselves before the tent, on the slope of a grassy bank, I could almost believe that the times of the patriarchs were brought back again.

As we approached Shoubra, the groves of fig, lotus, olive, and orange trees became more abundant and luxVOL. I.-E

50

THE PACHA'S VILLA.

uriant. The ground under them is clean and highly cultivated. The grounds and gardens of Shoubra, the favourite summer residence of the Pacha, are laid out elaborately, but in as stiff and tasteless a style as possible. The formal walks, paved in a kind of mosaic of black and white pebbles, are very tiresome, but the profusion of fruits and flowers exceeds even the imagination that I had formed of Eastern fertility. I could not have believed it if I had not seen it with my own eyes. There are marble fountains and trellised summerhouses, and near the eastern extremity of the garden is a large kiosk, perhaps 200 feet square, built of limestone, plain enough outside, but surrounded within by a gallery supported by marble columns. The walls on which this corridor rests rise several feet above the level of the court, and thus form a vast reservoir, which can be filled at once with water from a large fountain in the centre and many jets from the walls. None of these were playing when we were there.

Fatigued with walking through the grounds, I sat down to rest upon a divan in a fantastic summer-house. My attention was soon drawn to our janizary, who had divested himself of shoes, mace, and sword, and was bowing his forehead to the pavement, with his head towards Mecca. It was the sunset hour of prayer; and the simple Turk, regardless of our presence, worshipped God according to the way of his faith.

We rode from Shoubra to the city along one of the most magnificent avenues, bordered with noble sycąmores, that I had ever beheld. For ten hours we had been in the saddle, often going at full speed; yet our drivers ran on foot the whole way, and among them was a little boy not more than ten

years

old. At the end of our

day's excursion they seemed less fatigued than ourselves.

THE NILOMETER.-LITTLE MOSES.

51

CHAPTER VI.

THE PYRAMIDS.

The Nilometer.-Moses in the Bulrushes.-Officious Guides.-Pyramid of Cheops.-Ascent.-View from the Summit.-A Climbing Arab.-Interior of the Great Pyramid.-Queen's Chamber.-King's Chamber.-General View of the Pyramids.-Relative Positions and Dimensions.-Cheops.Cephrenes.-Mycerinus. Smaller Pyramids and Tombs.-Object of the Builders of Pyramids.—Time of their Erection.-The Sphinx.

SIX Americans of us started on a fine morning, in company, for a visit to the Pyramids. Besides our own servant Said, Mr. Hart, one of our company, had the immortal Paul-immortal, since Mr. Stephens made him so in his book on the East. Arriving on the bank of the river, we embarked our donkeys in one boat and ourselves in another, and crossed the placid Nile, passing just above the upper end of the island of Rhoda, where stands the Nilometer, a graduated pillar by which the annual rise or fall of the river is ascertained. It is kept closed by order of the Pacha, who, it is said, with the true spirit of a speculating grain-jobber, allows no one to see the meter, that he may give such reports as may suit his own trading schemes. Paul pointed out to us a little nook hard by, where, as he expressed it, little Moses was found in the bulrushes by Pharaoh's daughter.

Remounting our donkeys in the mud village of Ghizeh, we emerged from the palms which shade it into a wide, open plain, covered with growing wheat; and, tacking along the narrow ridges thrown up to enclose the water in the fields, we got on pretty rapidly, and in an hour and a quarter reached the base of the great Pyr

52 OFFICIOUS GUIDES.-APPROACH TO THE PYRAMIDS.

amid of Cheops, distant about three miles from the river. Some years ago, a traveller fell from one of the pyramids and was killed; and the accident gave rise to an order from Mehemet Ali, that no one should make the ascent without two guides. There is no danger of his command being disobeyed: not two, but twenty, assail everybody that visits Cheops. Long before we came to the spot, they had descried us, and numbers of them came bounding towards us. As we approached, their numbers and their importunity increased. Happily, Paul, who has much experience in such matters, had provided little slips of paper to serve as checks, and directed each of us to select his men, give them the tickets, and pay none that could not show the voucher. Some fifty or sixty kept on with us, and among them a number of little girls, who, though carrying small water-jars, skipped along like deer, keeping pace with our donkeys.

On our way from Ghizeh we felt the usual disappointment of travellers in regard to the apparent size of the pyramids; but as we drew near to the natural plateau of limestone rock on which they stand, some hundred and fifty feet above the cultivated plain, they began to make a true impression; but it was not until we reached the base of Cheops itself, and looked up the vast side, which seemed to be almost perpendicular, that the enormous magnitude of the pile was realized. The ascent is easily made. An Arab at each hand assists you to mount from one layer of stone to another; and, unless you kick very hard, and more successfully than I did, a supernumerary fellow will push you from behind, in hope of a few paras for his trouble. We reached the top in about twenty minutes. It is a level area of some thirty feet square, the stones at the apex having been thrown