The Pharaohs are forgot,
Their works confess them not:
Pass, hero! pass,—poor straw upon the gulf of Time!”
It will be remembered how Napoleon’s disastrous Egyptian campaign ended; and how he secretly embarked for France, and read during his passage both the Bible and the Koran with great assiduity.
Among the interesting memorials of Mary Queen of Scots at Holyrood Palace, Edinburgh, there remains the Sun-dial placed in the centre of the palace-garden, and usually denominated “Queen Mary’s Dial.”
It is the apex of a richly-ornamented pedestal, which rests upon a hexagonal base, consisting of three steps. The form of the ‘horologe’ is multangular; for though its principal sections are pentagonal, yet from their terminating in pyramidal points, and being diametrically opposed to each other, again connected by triangular interspaces, it presents no fewer than twenty sides, on which are placed twenty-two dials, inserted into circular, semicircular, and triangular cavities. Between the dials are the royal arms of Scotland, with the initials M. R., St. Andrew, St. George, fleurs-de-lis, and other emblems. This memorial carries us back nearly three centuries, when Holyrood was a palace
Where “Mary of Scotland” kept her court.
[8]. The Town and Country Magazine, edited by Albert Smith.
[9]. N. T. Heineken; Notes and Queries, 3d series.