visit to my friends at that inhospitable place. This I was told he would do upon the slightest intimation. He, unfortunately, however, happened to be out upon some party; but I was lucky in getting an old Greek, a servant of his, who knew I was a friend, both to the Bey, and to his Patriarch.

He brought me about a gallon of brandy, and a jar of lemons and oranges, preserved in honey; both very agreeable. He brought likewise a lamb, and some garden-stuffs. Among the sweetmeats was some horse-raddish, preserved like ginger, which certainly, though it might be wholesome, was the very worst stuff I ever tasted. I gave a good square piece of it, well wrapt in honey, to the Rais, who coughed and spit half an hour after, crying he was poisoned.

I saw he did not wish me to stay at Melawé, as he was afraid of the Bey's troops, that they might engage him in their service to carry them down, so went away with great good will, happy in the acquisition of the brandy, declaring he would carry sail as long as the wind held.

We passed Mollé, a small village, with a great number of acacia trees, intermixed with the plantations of palms. These occasion a pleasing variety, not only from the difference of the shape of the tree, but also from the colour and diversity of thẹ green.

As the sycamore in Lower Egypt, so this tree seems to be the only indigenous one in the Thebaid. It is the Acacia Vera, or the Spina Egyptiaca, with a round yellow flower. The male is called the Saiel* ;

* The name, Sont, is Coptic, as is Saiel; it signifies hard.This is the shittim wood of the scriptures; shittim is the plural, and means trees of the acacia. It is peculiar to the Hebrew dialect of the Arabic to leave out the letter n, before consonants. E.

from it proceeds the gum arabic, upon incision with an ax. This gum chiefly comes from Arabia Petrea, where these trees are most numerous. But it is the tree of all deserts, from the northmost part of Arabia, to the extremity of Ethiopia, and its leaves the only food for camels travelling in those desert parts. This gum is called Sumach in the west of Africa, and is a principal article of trade on the Senega among the Yalofes.

A large plantation of dates reaches all along the west side, and ends in a village, called Masara. Here the river, though broad, happened to be very shallow; and by the violence with which we went, we stuck upon a sand bank so fast, that it was after sunset before we could get off; we came to an anchor opposite to Masara the night of the 19th of December.

On the 20th, early in the morning, we again set sail, and passed two villages, the first called Welled Behi, the next Salem, about a mile and a half distant from each other, on the west side of the Nile. The mountains on the west side of the valley are about sixteen miles off, in a high even ridge, running in a direction south-east; while the mountains on the east run in a parallel direction with the river, and are not three miles distant.

We passed Deirout on the east side, and another called Zohor, in the same quarter, surrounded with palms; then, Siradé on the east side also, where is a wood of the Acacia, which seems very luxuriant ; and, though it was now December, and the mornings especially very cold, the trees were in full flower. We passed Monfalout*, a large town on the western shore.

* Deirout and Monfalout are both Coptic names, the first having before it the feminine article, ti, which the Arabs uniform

It was once an old Egyptian town, and place of great trade; it was ruined by the Romans, but re-established by the Arabs.

An Arabian author says, that, digging under the foundation of an Egyptian temple here, they found a crocodile made of lead, with hieroglyphics upon it, which they imagined to be a talisman, to prevent crocodiles from passing further. Indeed, as yet, we had not seen any; that animal delights in heat; and, as the mornings were very cold, he keeps himself to the southward. The valley of Egypt here is about eight miles from mountain to mountain.

1

We passed Siout, another large town, built with the remains of the ancient city Isiut. It is some miles inland, upon the side of a large calish, over which there is an ancient bridge. This was formerly the station of the caravan for Sennaar. They assembled at Monfalout and Siout, under the protection of a Bey residing there. They then passed nearly southwest, into the sandy desert of Libya, to El Wah, the Oasis Magna of antiquity, and so into the great desert of Selima.

Three miles beyond Siout, the wind turned directly south, so we were obliged to stay at Tima the rest of the 20th. I was weary of continuing in the boat, and went on shore at Tima. It is a small town, surrounded like the rest with groves of palm-trees. Below Tima is Bandini, three. miles on the east side. The Nile is here full of sandy islands. Those that the inundation has first left are all sown; these are

ly pronounce d: and the last Ma, which signifies the place. They were probably written Ti-eroouti and Ma-m-faloout.

* Messoudi.

E.

Itin. Anton. p. 14. apud Bertii Theat. Geo. Vet.; Sioout is rather Lycopolis, so called by the Greeks, from the wolf being worshipped there.

chiefly on the east. The others on the west were barren and uncultivated; all of them mostly composed of sand.

I walked into the desert behind the village, and shot a considerable number of the bird called Gooto, and several hares, likewise, so that I sent one of my servants loaded to the boat. I then walked down past a small village called Nizelet el Himma, and returned by a still smaller one called Shuka, about a quarter of a mile from Tima. I was exceedingly fatigued with the heat by the south wind blowing, and the deep sand on the side of the mountain. I was then beginning my apprenticeship, which I fully completed.

*

The people in these villages were in appearance little less miserable than those of the villages we had passed. They seemed shy and surly at first, but, upon conversation, became placid enough. I bought some medals from them of no value, and my servants telling them I was a physician, I gave my advice to several of the sick. This reconciled them perfectly. They brought me fresh water and some sugar-canes, which they split and steeped in it. If they were satisfied, I was very much so. They told me of a large scene of ruins that was about four miles distant, and offered to send a person to conduct me; but I did not accept their offer, as I was to pass there next day.

The 21st, in the morning, we came to Gawa, where is the second scene of ruins of Egyptian architecture, after leaving Cairo. I immediately went on shore, and found a small temple of three columns in front, with the capitals entire, and the columns in several separate pieces. They seemed by that, and their slight proportions, to be of the most modern of that species

*It is called Hamseen, because it is expected to blow all Pen

tecost.

of building; but the whole were covered with hieroglyphics, the old story over again, the hawk and the serpent, the man sitting with the dog's head, with the perch, or measuring-rod; in one hand, the hemisphere and globes with wings, and leaves of the banana-tree, as is supposed, in the other. The temple is filled with rubbish and dung of cattle, which the Arabs bring in here to shelter them from the heat.

Mr Norden says, that these are the remains of the ancient Diospolis Parva; but, though very loth to dif fer from him, and without the least desire of criticising, I cannot here be of his opinion. For Ptolemy, I think, makes Diospolis Parva about lat. 26° 40', and Gawa is 27°, 20', which is by much too great a difference.

There are two villages of this name opposite to one another; the one Gawa Shergieh, which means the Eastern Gawa, and this is by much the largest; the other Gawa Garbieh. Several authors, not knowing the meaning of these terms, call it Gawa Gebery; a word that has no signification whatever, but Garbieh means the western.

I was very well pleased to see here, for the first time, two shepherd dogs lapping up the water from the stream, then lying down in it with great seeming leisure and satisfaction. It refuted the old fable, that the dogs living on the banks of the Nile run as they drink, for fear of the crocodile.

All around the villages of Gawa Garbieh, and the plantations belonging to them, Meshta and Raany, with theirs also joining them (that is all the west side of the river) are cultivated and sown from the very foot of the mountains to the water's edge, the grain

* The latitudes of places in the Thebaid, as laid down by Ptolemy, and the modern geographers, differ in many instances considerably. E.