THEORY OF THE SUBLIME. 397 CCLXXXIX. The details and general aspect of this structure, which spontaneously suggest the idea of a rude and primitive simplicity, would certainly lead me, were I disposed to indulge in conjecture, to consider it more ancient than any other Egyptian or Nubian rock temple. In conception, plan, and sculptured ornaments, it bears a considerable resemblance to the caves of Karli, Elephanta, Ellora, and other hypogea of the Dekkan, formed by superstition in remote ages, when man, pious, but ignorant, sought to draw upon himself the benevolence of the gods by the care and labour he bestowed upon their shrines. Here, more, perhaps, than anywhere else, we discover the means resorted to by the Egyptians to embody their notions of the sublime; including none of those light and airy proportions, by which matter, mounting upwards, like fire, appears to be spiritualised and warmed into thought. Grace, attitude, action, impassioned expression, are wanting. Neither the architecture nor the sculpture ever carries our fancy upwards to Olympian halls, or god-like bowers, or entertains it, amid sunny skies or golden clouds, with visions of ideal beauty. There is an air of grandeur; but it is the grandeur of a gnome. Every thing we beheld is of the earth, earthy; suggesting ideas of strength, mass, solidity, duration, and brute matter acting blindly without a soul; the sublimity, in short, of pantheism, if sublimity can exist independently of all reference to spirituality, and that eternal intelligence which shifts and diversifies around us the manifold shows of this world. 398 DOUBLE SHADOWS. Sunday, Jan. 20. Dakke. CCXC. Quitting, early in the morning, Gherf Hussein, where we had moored the preceding night, we landed on the western bank, and for some time proceeded close along the edge of the water, where the whole breadth of the cultivated land could not have exceeded three or four yards. The bank consists of a series of narrow terraces, rising behind each other; and all these were now covered with lupines in flower, or with a sort of French bean, which, creeping over a hedge of stunted mimosas, forming the line of separation between the sands and the valley, enlivened the whole shore with its beautiful purple blossoms. Travelling slowly along, admiring the richness of this narrow slip of vegetation, we were struck by a curious appearance, perfectly new to us both the sun shining in tropical brightness, our shadows fell beside us, strongly defined upon the ground; but far aloft, upon the mimosa hedge, not less than thirty feet above the river, were two other shadows, faint but distinct, moving as we moved, though they seemed to proceed from some invisible bodies over our heads. For a moment the cause did not present itself; but on turning round, and regarding the Nile, we discovered that the image of the sun, brightly reflected from its glassy surface, and shining upon our bodies like a second sun, produced the double shadows which had at first puzzled us. DESERT LANDSCAPE. 399 CCXCI. Through a break in the mimosa hedge, we climbed up the bank, and emerged into the desert, where the view which presented itself exhibited peculiar beauty. The elements of the picturesque may elsewhere be more strikingly combined, producing more softness, more variety, more grandeur; yet I have seldom beheld a more poetical or delightful landscape. Perhaps, if rigidly investigated, the reason of this might be discovered in causes independent of the combination of the physical objects around. It was the nearest approach I had hitherto beheld to a land wholly uninhabited, to which we involuntarily attach ideas of perfect freedom, tranquillity, and unsophisticated enjoyment. Nothing, we imagine, is there found to interrupt the current of our will, nature herself, upon whose mysterious bosom we sport and flutter like moths, appearing to be subjected to our dominion; and the calm and sunshine, generally prevailing in those latitudes, delude us into the persuasion that in such scenes our passions would also be still, and permit us serenely to taste the unmingled sweets which complete retirement and solitude appear to offer. CCXCII. Whatever may be thought of this fanciful hypothesis, the scene that occasioned the recollection of it was worthy of admiration. But in its simplicity consisted, perhaps, its principal charm, every thing being presented to the eye in vast unbroken masses. On one hand, the interminable surface of the desert, covered with golden sands, ASHMOLEAN OXFORD 400 DESERT LANDSCAPE. swelling into soft undulations at the foot or on the steep slope of lofty pink or rose-coloured rocks, or expanding into vast level plains, smooth as untrodden snow; on the other, the placid blue river, meandering between dark rocks and glittering sands, and bordered with narrow green fields, copses, or tufted groves, marking the site of distant hamlets; and extended over all a tropic sky, glowing in fiery brightness. But the charm of the landscape is not translateable into words. How, indeed, can we represent, with the pale colours of language, the rich harmony, the majesty, the art, the splendour, and, if we may dare so to say, the taste, with which nature has thrown together its various elements, and taught them, as it were, to express at once, by the vast desert and fertilising river, the power and bounty of the Creator? In fact, I felt that there was a moral, a religious beauty in the scene, a loveliness which, elevating the mind, directed it towards the fountain of all beauty and all perfection; and this effect, imperceptibly, perhaps, to ourselves, may be the source of the enthusiastic delight inspired by the contemplation of external nature. CCXCIII. In the heavy sands, through which we toiled with difficulty, we observed the footmarks and dung of animals, such as camels and gazelles; and proceeding some distance along the river, at length turned aside towards the right, and ascended the rocky ridge, in this part of the valley running parallel with the course of the stream. Travellers EXTINCT VOLCANOES. 401 in Nubia rarely quit their boats, except for the purpose of visiting the several ruins, or, if they perform any portion of the journey by land, never deviate from the camel-track, generally found close to the Nile; whch accounts for no mention being made in any of the works recently published of the numerous black conical mountains we now discovered in the western desert, presenting from a distance the appearance of so many volcanoes, which had burned long, and been gradually extinguished. Many were low and inconsiderable, but the peaks of the principal ones seemed to fall very little short of those of Vesuvius, in their elevation above the level of the Several of the more remarkable lying to the south of our position, we returned to the kandjia, with the design of landing when we should have arrived opposite to them. sea. CCXCIV. Accordingly, on drawing near Dakke, we went on shore with Suleiman, armed as usual. The sandy plain lying between us and the mountains, though roughened by many inequalities, appeared at a distance level as the sea. About half a mile from the river the heavy sands terminated, the remainder being hard, firm, stony, and capable of supporting the weight of artillery. From time to time we traversed, in our progress, large patches of ground thickly strewed with variegated pebbles, beautiful agates, and pale cornelians, such as were found by Bell of Antermony on the plains of Mongolia ; and observed the sand marked in various directions |