This island is now divided into a number of small ones, by calishes being cut through and through it, and, under different Arabic names, they still reach very far up the stream. I landed to see if there were remains of the olive tree which Strabo[102] says grew here, but without success. We may imagine, however, that there was some such like thing; because opposite to one of the divisions into which this large island is broken, there is a village called Zeitoon, or the Olive Tree.
On the 15th of December, the weather being nearly calm, we left the north end of the island, or Heracleotic nome; our course was due south, the line of the river; and three miles farther we passed Woodan, and a collection of villages, all going by that name, upon the east: to the west, or right, were small islands, part of the ancient nome of which I have already spoken.
The ground is all cultivated about this village, to the foot of the mountains, which is not above four miles; but it is full eight on the west, all overflowed and sown. The Nile is here but shallow, and narrow, not exceeding a quarter of a mile broad, and three feet deep; owing, I suppose, to the resistance made by the island in the middle of the current, and by a bend it makes, thus intercepting the sand brought down by the stream.
The mountains here come down till within two miles of Suf el Woodan, for so the village is called. We were told there were some ruins to the westward of this, but only rubbish, neither arch nor column standing. I suppose it is the Aphroditopolis, or the city of Venus, which we are to look for here, and the nome of that name, all to the eastward of it.
The wind still freshening, we passed by several villages on each side, all surrounded with palm-trees, verdant and pleasant, but conveying an idea of sameness and want of variety, such as every traveller must have felt who has sailed in the placid, muddy, green-banked rivers in Holland.
The Nile, however, is here fully a mile broad, the water deep, and the current strong. The wind seemed to be exasperated by the resistance of the stream, and blew fresh and steadily, as indeed it generally does where the current is violent.
We passed Nizelet Embarak, which means the Blessed Landing-place. Mr Norden[103] calls it Giesiret Barrakaed, which he says is the watering-place of the cross. Was this even the proper name here given it, it should be translated the Blessed Island; but, without understanding the language, it is in vain to keep a register of names.
The boatmen, living either in the Delta, Cairo, or one of the great towns in Upper Egypt, and coming constantly loaded with merchandise, or strangers from these great places, make swift passages by the villages, either down the river with a rapid current, or up with a strong, fair, and steady wind: And, when the season of the Nile’s inundation is over, and the wind turns southward, they repair all to the Delta, the river being no longer navigable above, and there they are employed till the next season.
They know little, therefore, and care less about the names or inhabitants of these villages, who have each of them barks of their own to carry on their own trade. There are some indeed employed by the Coptic and Turkish merchants, who are better versed in the names of villages than others; but, if they are not, and find you do not understand the language, they will never confess ignorance; they will tell you the first name that comes uppermost, sometimes very ridiculous, often very indecent, which we see afterwards pass into books, and wonder that such names were ever given to towns.
The reader will observe this in comparing Mr Norden’s voyage and mine, where he will seldom see the same village pass by the same name. My Rais, Abou Cuffi, when he did not know a village, sometimes tried this with me. But when he saw me going to write, he used then to tell me the truth, that he did not know the village; but that such was the custom of him, and his brethren, to people that did not understand the language, especially if they were priests, meaning Catholic Monks.