. Voices from the Orient; or, The testimony of the monuments, of the recent historical and topographical discoveries, and of the customs and traditions of the people in the Orient, to the veracity of the sacred record. lse and the cataracts. For five or sixmiles the route extended over a barren waste, and then be-tween granite hills. Masses of granite rock were piled up in themost fantastic shapes. Imagination could fashion them intogreat fortresses or black giant guards watching over Nubia,the Nile, and the desert from the dawn of creation. Hiero-glyphics, royal cartouches, and Greek inscript
. Voices from the Orient; or, The testimony of the monuments, of the recent historical and topographical discoveries, and of the customs and traditions of the people in the Orient, to the veracity of the sacred record. lse and the cataracts. For five or sixmiles the route extended over a barren waste, and then be-tween granite hills. Masses of granite rock were piled up in themost fantastic shapes. Imagination could fashion them intogreat fortresses or black giant guards watching over Nubia,the Nile, and the desert from the dawn of creation. Hiero-glyphics, royal cartouches, and Greek inscriptions aboundeverywhere. From the mainland I crossed in a small boat,manned by two Egyptians and a Nubian, to the sacred islandof Philae. The Egyptian name signified the place of thefrontier, and was the southern boundary of Egypt; the Greeksseem to have translated the Egyptian Pilak into $i\<u, thebeautiful. The scenery is fine, the small islands near Philaethat have been connected with the religion of the ancientEgyptians, the rocky shores, the surging cataracts, the com-parative purity of the Nile water, and in the distance, palmtrees casting a friendly shade over the small and poor villages, X r1 Oas « ST. £ MW JHBHtei;|,|iP| 164 THEBES AND ITS SPLENDID MONUMENTS. form a scene on which the traveller loves to gaze, arid one nobfound elsewhere in Egypt. The temple of Philse is modern,belonging to the age of the Ptolemies. The trinity of Phihewas Isis, Osiris, and Horus. The island is interesting, for it wassacred from the times of the great kings of the eighteenth landing, I ascended among trees, that line the shore by anarrow pathway, then over mounds of broken pottery and mar-ble columns, and the foundations of houses. None were allowedto visit this sacred island except the priests, who were alwaysanxious to keep their mysteries from the eyes of the people. Thisis seen from the number of dungeon-rooms, without windows orthe faintest ray of light; and an island
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Keywords: ., bookcentury1800, bookdecade1880, booksubjectmiddlee, bookyear1884
