SALT MINES IN THE DESERT. 237 at once explained to us the cause of that extraordinary number of small shallow pits, which we had at first attributed to wild beasts. This poor solitary creature was crouching down, with a simple implement in her hand, digging for salt, which is here found not above three inches below the surface, dazzlingly white, and pure; and the mine, if properly worked, might supply all Egypt, and yield a very large revenue to the Pasha. We each purchased of her a small quantity, and I added to the price of it a trifling present, for which she was exceedingly thankful. CLXV. The stone which from afar we had supposed to be but one block, was found, upon drawing near, to consist of three pieces, the largest of which is of extraordinary magnitude, by far the most prodigious mass of solid rock I have ever seen. It rests on the summit of a high mound, and appears to have been formerly surrounded by a wall; for immense quantities of broken brick are scattered around. No doubt the Egyptians had entertained the design of converting it into a monolithic temple, for its northern face still presents some appearance of sculptured metopes, in the form of bulls' heads, though time has obliterated much of their labour; but had the intention been fulfilled, it would greatly have surpassed in dimensions the celebrated monolith of Saïs. At the foot of its northern and southern face a semi-arch, probably once completed with masonry, 238 SITE OF CYNOPOLIS. has been hollowed out; from which it is probable that it was originally surrounded with a low colonnade, like the cloisters of a nunnery; from an opening cut at the top of its western face, I moreover imagine it to be hollowed out within; but as it is at least sixty feet in height, and perpendicular on all sides, we could not determine this point, being unable to cast up stones sufficiently large to enable us to hear the sound of their fall. Its length is about sixty, and its breadth between thirty and forty, feet. CLXVI. Another enormous rock, on the summit of a hillock commanding an extensive view over the wide plains of the Hermopolitan Nome, has been hewn into numerous chambers, niches, altars, &c., together with a rude negro-headed sphynx. Between these rocks and the river are many large mounds, consisting chiefly of brick and pottery; among which several excavations appear to have been recently made. Here we picked up a small bronze coin, but too much defaced to allow of our making out the image or superscription. These mounds undoubtedly mark the site of some ancient city, most probably of Cynopolis; but to ascertain this point it would be necessary to undertake many laborious excavations. On descending to the river, we found a party of Arabs seated in a circle, feasting and making merry at the foot of a palm-tree. Here a series of rocky promontories, black and honey-combed, project into the Nile, or hang beetling over its waters. Numbers of tamarisk DATE FORESTS OF SEMELúd. 239 trees, of diminutive growth, sprung from their crevices; and the edge of the stream below is feathered with the golden willow. On this spot we saw a grashopper, about two inches in length, so exactly of the colour of straw, that it was not to be distinguished from it in hue on the strictest comparison. CLXVII. Crossing from this point to the western bank, in order to make round the island of Surarieh, by the wider and deeper channel, we walked on to the large and populous village, or rather town, of Kolokosaneh, where we found coffee-houses, and almé of the most dissolute kind; and proceeding thence by clean pathways leading through gardens and mimosa woods, over a country richly cultivated with wheat, dhourra, and sugar-cane, here springing up at the foot of the loftiest date-trees, we arrived at Semelúd, a large and thickly peopled town, with a mosque and noble minaret, towering aloft, white and glittering, among a forest of palms. Still further to the west was a wood of the same trees, but with their intervals so completely filled up by an undergrowth of acacias, tamarisks, and mimosas, that the whole appeared, at a distance, like the rich masses of verdure of an English forest. Night and mooringtime approaching, we struck into a narrow pathway leading to the Nile. It was a lovely evening, soft and balmy as June, the south wind having died away to a gentle breeze, which wafted far and wide the perfume of the bean-fields, now in full blossom, 240 THE MOUNTAIN OF BIRDS. mingled with the mild fragrance of the ripe dhourra, which the husbandmen were threshing with long sticks in the fields. A rich old Turk, mounted on a well-fed black donkey, and followed by an attendant with a fine led horse, travelled with us for several hours. The boys, playing on the greensward about the different villages, saluted us civilly as we passed, with the salam aleycum, to which we returned the customary aleycum salam! They appeared to be well fed and happy; a thing of rare occurrence in Egypt.. We reached the banks of the river a few hundred yards to the north of the point where the gloomy frowning cliffs of the Gebel et Teir, or " Mountain of Birds," hang over the Nile; and there moored for the night. Monday, Dec. 24. Hawartah. CLXVIII. The land in this part of the Hermopolitan Nome is in many places covered with a tall sedge, which looks as verdant and beautiful as sugar-cane. The peasants, early in the morning, were busily at work in the fields, some getting in the dhourra, others. preparing the ground for another crop. The Egyptian plough, though originally invented by Osiris, is perhaps the rudest instrument of its kind now in use, consisting merely of three pieces of wood, of which two form the handle and the third the share. No iron is used in its construction, excepting a small band which keeps together its several parts. Two cows or bullocks yoked together by a long beam of THE BIRD MOUNTAINS. wood, from the centre of which the 241 plough is sus The animals pended, draw the rude machine along. at work in the fields through which we passed, being refractory, or unused to the labour, constantly ran out of the right course, and drew from their director, who was ambitious of exhibiting his best skill before the strangers, the opprobrious epithet of kelb, or " dog," which an angry Arab applies indiscriminately to man or beast. The ploughman was followed by an older man, his father or master, who, with a light kind of hoe or mattock, broke the rough clods left among the furrows a very necessary process after such imperfect tillage. CLXIX. The vast perpendicular cliffs of the Bird Mountains, now in the morning sun no longer gloomy, continue for some miles to confine the course of the stream towards the east, until at length a sinuosity in the river leaves between it and their base a narrow strip of ground, which is brought into cultivation. A little to the north of the village of Gebel et Teir, there is a break in the chain, where the rocks bend inward in a semicircle, about the centre of which they have been shattered, rent, and bored by the labour of man; and on the small sandy plain lying between the horns of this half moon, we saw the ruins of an ancient wall, which seems to have extended from mountain to mountain, filling up the space left open by the retreating of the rocks. In the face of the cliffs were numerous catacombs or grottoes, to examine which we here crossed the Nile. It soon |