578

PAVILION OF REMESES.

among the ruins of Medeenet Haboo, and the most elaborately embellished. Two lodges flank the sides of the spacious entrance conducting to the pavilion

hundred and sixty-five

of the King. Several of the royal chambers yet remain in a state of tolerable preservation, and are adorned with representations of the scenes of the private life of the Pharaoh. Passing from the pavilion over the dromos of two feet, the first court of the temple, a hundred and thirty-five feet by one hundred, with massive colonnades on either side, is entered by a lofty pyramidal gateway, two hundred feet long, and twenty-nine thick. At the opposite end of the court, another gateway, of similar form and size, rises to a corresponding height. Both sides of each of the propylons, and every part of the colonnades, are adorned with historical delineations, deeply sculptured and vividly coloured. The second court is even more splendid and spacious than the first, and the doorway of red gran

TEMPLES OF MEDEENET HABOO.

579

ite, through which it is entered, is truly superb. The hieroglyphics on its sides are engraved to the depth of two or three inches. The height of this court, "from the pavement to the cornice, is thirty-nine feet. It is surrounded by an interior peristyle, whose east and west sides are supported by five massive columns, the south by a row of Osiride pillars, and the north by a similar number, behind which is an elegant corridor of circular columns, whose effect is unequalled by any other in Thebes."* The circular columns, though only twenty-four feet high, are nearly twentythree feet in circumference; which, with their crowning capitals, the bold and massive entablature, the ponderous beams and ceiling of the corridor, and the close wall of the court, were all embellished with hieroglyphical sculpture.

ness.

The painting, too, was profuse in all directions; and, in many parts, preserved with astonishing freshThe hand of mutilation has wantonly touched the adornments of this splendid court; and the Christians, who, previous to the Saracen conquest, erected a place of worship here, covered the sculptures with stucco. This, however, instead of destroying, was the means of preserving the interesting delineations upon this part of the building; and many striking battle-scenes and ceremonial groups are still exhibited in pristine spirit and beauty.

Wilkinson says: "If the sculptures of the areas arrest the attention of the antiquary or excite the admiration of the traveller, those of the exterior of this

• Wilkinson's Thebes, 60.

580

OFFERINGS TO THE DEAD.

building are no less interesting in an historical point of view."*

The main body of this temple, together with the rooms of one of scarcely less dimensions, a little further to the north, is filled up with the huts and rubbish of the Copts, who, in the days of the empire, resided here in considerable numbers.

• Wilkinson's Thebes, 68.

le

OFFERINGS TO THE DEAD IN PRESENCE OF THE FAMILY OF THE DECEASED.

TOMBS OF THE KINGS.

581

CHAPTER XLIII.

Excursion to the "Tombs of the Kings." — Annoyance of the Relic-venders. Indefatigable Arab and his Jar. - Tomb of Osirei, violated and robbed by Belzoni. - Belzoni's Dinner to his English Friends in the Grave of Pharaoh.Tomb of the Harper. - The oldest Tomb of the Kings.— Temple of Gournoo.-Moonlight View of Karnak.

I WILL not detain the reader with an account of our long rambles among the sepulchres of the vast Necropolis of Thebes, and our explorations of their deep, dark, devious, and violated chambers; the dust and mangled remains of whose sacred deposites strew the rocky sides of the mountain, while the gorgeous tombs from whence they have been sacrilegiously thrust, are now the polluted abodes of the wretched Arabs of Thebes. I will only crave indulgence for some account of a single day's excursion among the incomparable "Tombs of the Kings," and will then resume our descent of the Nile.

At the dawn of day, we were aroused by a multitude of the natives, crowding along the banks, with horses, donkeys, and the relics of the tombs. We put ourselves under the direction of an Egyptian guide, and went on shore. Here we were so hemmed in

582

ANNOYANCE OF RELIC-VENDERS.

on all sides by the resurrectionists, that it was almost impossible to advance a single step. In addition to all sorts of mummies and minute fragments of each, from the head of a king to the tail of a cat, there was a great variety of images, rings, beads, buckles, and bandages on sale; and a robber-visaged, clotheless Arab assailed me with an old jar, which he said I must purchase. I did not fancy it, and declined this preference, although I had little doubt of his assertion that "it was taken from one of the oldest tombs in Thebes."

In order to clear our skirts of these relic-venders, we bought a quantity of their commodities, ere the thought came into our minds that we were six thousand miles from home, and that it was a hundred chances to one that not an article of them all would ever reach the United States. This, however, would have been of little consequence, had the object in view been attained, for the whole cost only a mere trifle. But our situation became little less alarming than that of the fox in the fable; for we had no sooner bought one man's stock, than a hundred more rushed before us, more imperious and importunate than the last, to dispose of theirs. I had purchased the mummy of a hawk; Mr. J. had that of a sacred serpent; and my friend the doctor was importuned to purchase those of a cat and a buzzard;—and here again, furiously pressing forward, and filling the air with the deafening tones of his cracked voice, was the fiend-like object with his jar! It mattered little that I had told him a dozen times I would not pur