yS EGYPT AND THE SOUDAN.

and sought to reach this place of safety whence they might be forwarded to Cairo.

Wild and weird — or, as Miss Martineau called it, "fantastic and impish" — is the scenery from Assouan towards Philae. The most remarkable features of the route are the inscriptions and hieroglyphics on the rocks, intended to commemorate the expeditions of some notable persons who had reached this point in safety. The view of Philae itself has been often described, and the aspect of the place is beautifully picturesque, though its most ancient monuments are little older than the times of the foundation of Alexandria, the chief object being the ruins of the great temple of I sis, which with its necessary buildings must once have nearly covered the island. The author of the Crescent and the Cross, speaking of the view of Philae from the opposite shore, says, " All round us towered up vast masses of gloomy rocks, piled one upon the other in the wildest confusion; some of them, as it were, skeletons of pyramids, others requiring only a few strokes of giant labour to form colossal statues that might have startled the Anakim. Here spreads a deep drift of silvery sand, fringed by rich verdure and purple blossoms; there a grove of palms intermingled with the flowering acacia; and there, through vistas of craggy cliffs and plumy foliage, gleams a calm blue lake, with the sacred island in the midst, green to the water's edge, except where the walls of the old temple city are reflected. Above those shrubtangled and pillared banks were tall pyramids; columns airy, yet massive in their proportion; palms, and towers, and terraces.

Beyond the island the lake glimmers through the ruins, and the whole scene of peace and beauty is frowned over by a girdle of rugged mountains, all scattered, and dark, and desolate." " Elephantine," says another writer, " lies in the river, from the foot of the cataract stretching down in front of Assouan about a mile, and is nearly half a mile in breadth. Its surface is a mass of ruins, shapeless and hideous. Ruin sits triumphant here.

Not even the ploughshare of ancient history, which has run over so many ruins, could prevail here to penetrate the mass. A small part of the island is cultivated, but a large portion still remains in