Syria and the Holy Land : their scenery and their people : incidents of travel, &cfrom the best and most recent authorities . the remainsof vast works exist totestify. Russegger speakswith great admiration ofan ancient road, cut for alength of a thousand pacesthrough the limestonerock ; its breadth averages20 feet; it is tunnelled inpart, and in part opencutting, varying from 50to 180 feet deep. Theport of the ancient townwas constructed by Seleu-cus Nicator on a scale ofgrandeur more adapted tothe state of modern com-merce than to that of theancients. It was a land-locked basin, which com-mun
Syria and the Holy Land : their scenery and their people : incidents of travel, &cfrom the best and most recent authorities . the remainsof vast works exist totestify. Russegger speakswith great admiration ofan ancient road, cut for alength of a thousand pacesthrough the limestonerock ; its breadth averages20 feet; it is tunnelled inpart, and in part opencutting, varying from 50to 180 feet deep. Theport of the ancient townwas constructed by Seleu-cus Nicator on a scale ofgrandeur more adapted tothe state of modern com-merce than to that of theancients. It was a land-locked basin, which com-municated with the seaby a channel cut through a hill and a high chain of rocks; but thischannel is now entirely closed at the mouth by accumulated sand, and withinby a wall across the mouth of the basin itself, so that the latter has beenconverted into gardens, and an accumulation of earth has been formed, allover its interior, to a depth of several feet. A high, massive wall of cut stone surrounds the whole basin, and remainsstill in a very good state, the foundation being perfect all round, and but a * Irby and Kepse. Roadway cut in the rock. THE TURKMANS. 269 little of the higher parts of this extensive structure injured by time, so thatit might be restored with much facility.* This was one of the projects con-templated by the English engineers of the Euphrates expedition : but whatis still more remarkable, the scheme suggested itself originally to the mindof a Turkish pasha. Anxious to restore Aleppo to its former importance,AH Pasha of Bagdad, who ten or eleven years ago was governor of the formercity, submitted a plan to the Sultan, the outline of which was to open thenavigation of the Euphrates and clear out Seleucia : both were countenancedby the Porte, and something was about to be done, when the Egyptian warput an end to all enterprises of the kind. AH Pasha, who is a liberal andenlightened Turk, fond of Europeans and their customs, knew that so late asthe tim
Size: 1352px × 1849px
Photo credit: © The Reading Room / Alamy / Afripics
License: Licensed
Model Released: No
Keywords: ., bookcentury1800, bookdecade1840, bookpublisherlondonchapmanandha
