causeways, upon which the people may travel during the floods. It is only in cases of an extraordinary rise that any villages are destroyed. The inundations, instead of being viewed as a calamity, are considered a blessing, for they are the cause of inexhaustible fertility. After the waters have subsided, the earth is found covered with mud, which has been left there by the river. This mud, which is principally composed of argillaceous earth and carbonate of lime, serves to fertilize the overflowed land, and is used for manure for such places as are not sufficiently saturated by the river; it is also formed into bricks, and various vessels for domestic use. The whole valley of the Nile may be considered as an alluvial plain, formed of the washed-down mud and sand of Central Africa, and it is therefore to these inundations that Egypt owes its existence.
Notwithstanding the overflow of the Nile, the atmosphere of Egypt is extremely dry and healthful. During our winter, the climate of Egypt is delightful. The inhabitants speak with intense affection of the Nile, for to it they owe the verdure of their fields, their food, their drink, and the cotton for their clothing. In its taste the water is delicious and salubrious.
The Pyramids are situated about ten miles from Cairo, in a western direction, and consequently on the farther side of the Nile. The traveler may now have the benefit of a carriage for the journey: formely, the only conveyance was by donkeys. The road leads by Old Cairo, a decayed suburb of Cairo, at two miles' distance, on the banks of the river. The Nile is forded or crossed in boats at the upper end of the island of Rhoda. When within a couple of miles of the end of the journey, a number of frightful-looking Bedouins commonly make a rush from a large village a little way off, as if intent on mischief. They are men anxious to be employed as guides; and they had better be employed at once, to save further annoyance.
The Pyramids scarcely appear to increase in size until you are close up to their base; then their bulk seems enormous, and the distance betwixt one and the other looks like a forenoon's journey. They are four in number in one view—three large, and one small—and are usually known as the Pyramids of Gizeh. They stand on a plateau some forty feet above the plain, and are fairly within the Desert. I do not believe any one who has not visited them has a correct idea of their vast dimensions. The present base of the Great Pyramid of Cheops, as it is called, is 746 feet each way; the mass is estimated at eighty-five millions of cubic feet, and covers an area of eleven acres. Measured by the slope, its height is 611 feet, and its perpendicular height is 461 feet, being 117 feet higher than St. Paul's, London. The age of the Pyramids is unknown, but it cannot be less than three thousand years. And what a waste of human labor in their construction! A hundred thousand men, changed every three months, for twenty years, are said by the Greek writers to have been occupied in their erection!
At a distance, the Pyramids appear to be tolerably smooth and pyramidal; but on coming close to them, they are found to have a ragged and half-ruined aspect, in consequence of the outer coating of stones and plaster having been removed. Their sides in this rough state present the appearance of a series of steps, composed of huge blocks of yellowish-white limestone. The ascent is toilsome, but I made a point of reaching
