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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 I 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 ./Eolian harp, with the clanging metallic stroke as of a bell came forth, as the morning light first shone upon it. From those which stand twenty yards apart on each side of the avenue of sphinxes, you proceed along through a finer row of sphinxes, and sitting figures of basalt, till you come to a grand pile with a magnificent propylon and figures of the gods and Sesostris. This is described

as the Memnonium. Leaving this, wo 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 Hair, 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 victorious with their victims. 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 accompany Achilles to the plains of Troy, and who only excelled him in beauty on those plains.t Or, at almost any great festival of Osiris, or of the overflow of the Nile, at almost any of the feasts of the regeneration of the sun, or at the astronomical feasts, you might have seen the Potipliars 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, have 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.

* See records in Karnac, Champollion, and Wilkinson, t Homer.

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, Kuyunjek, 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 interpretation of the cuneiform inscription, to which Major Rawlinson 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 discovcred 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 intimate connection existed between Assyria and Egypt at that time, 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 Egyptian 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.— Ahnes. — Zodiacs.—Arab songs—Arnaouta.—Cataracts. — Philae. — Nuhia. —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, Caesarion. Reto, the second of the Hermonthite trinity, is giving birth to Hospire, the child of Reto by Mandoo. Cleopatra is represented adoring the Hermonthian bull; Apollo or Mandoo, and Jupiter Amnion were worshipped here. It is of beautiful architecture, 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 towards him, stood awaiting, as I thought, transfixed with fear and resignation. The huge animal was tearing up the ground,

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