. The crescent and the cross; or, Romance and realities of eastern travel. ns, once gardens,perhaps, or populous thoroughfares; but now thelonely Arab goatherd, or the wolf, is the only dis-turber of their silence. Not a village is in sight, buta belt of the richest vegetation borders the river;waving corn, some green some golden ; lupines inflower, beans, and other fragrant blossoms. This isbordered by a line of rushes, and then the desertspreads abroad its interminable tracts of low sandyundulations. We are now approaching the utmost boundary ofancient Egypt, beyond which lay Ethiopia, where
. The crescent and the cross; or, Romance and realities of eastern travel. ns, once gardens,perhaps, or populous thoroughfares; but now thelonely Arab goatherd, or the wolf, is the only dis-turber of their silence. Not a village is in sight, buta belt of the richest vegetation borders the river;waving corn, some green some golden ; lupines inflower, beans, and other fragrant blossoms. This isbordered by a line of rushes, and then the desertspreads abroad its interminable tracts of low sandyundulations. We are now approaching the utmost boundary ofancient Egypt, beyond which lay Ethiopia, whereJupiter used to dine once a year, in a quiet way,with the religious fashionables of that respectablenation. As we approach the ancient Syene, the hills growloftier and darker. Palm groves again ornament thevalleys, enormous masses of granite shoot up from theriver, a pretty villa appears on the left, a ruined castleon the right, and we come into sight of the mostromantic spot of Egypt, which seems, like an artfultragedy, to keep its best scene for its last. ASSOUAN. 199. CHAPTER XXII. ASSOUAN, AND THE CITIES OF EGYPT. We have passed over cities in song renowned ;Silent they lie with the desert around:We have passed oer the river whose tide hath rolledAll dark with the warrior-blood of old. F. Hemans. Assouan, called in Coptic Soiian, which meansan opening, stands at the entrance of the Valley ofthe Nile. Here the river, narrowed into a rockychannel, displays a sportiveness and activity else-where unknown to it, except among the island of Elephantiua, very rich in very brokenruins, divides the river opposite the town; shadedwith palm-trees, and carpeted with gay weeds,it seems still to lay claim to its ancient epithet ofthe Isle of Flowers. A grove of palms stands 200 ASSOUAN. between the modern town and the river ; and aboveand beyond this grove tower dark-red granite chffs,crowned with ruins, that give it a very picturesqueappearance. Beyond this lie traces of t
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