I was about to climb the mountain to rejoin my guide and the camels, when I fell in with what is yet visible of four immense colossal statues cut out of the rock at a distance of 200 yards from the temple. They stand in a deep recess excavated in the mountain, and are almost entirely buried beneath the sands, which are blown down here in torrents. The entire head and part of the breast and arms of one of the statues are yet above the surface. The head has a most expressive youthful countenance, approaching nearer to the Grecian model of beauty than that of any ancient Egyptian figure I have seen. Indeed, were it not for a thin, oblong beard, it would pass for a head of Pallas. This statue measures seven yards across the shoulders, and could not, if in an upright posture, be less than sixty-five or seventy feet in height. The ear is one yard and four inches in length.
On the wall of the rock in the centre of the four statues is a figure of the hawk-headed Osiris, surmounted by a globe; beyond which, I suspect, could the sand be cleared away, a vast temple would be discovered, to the entrance of which the colossal figures serve as ornaments. I should pronounce these works to belong to the finest period of Egyptian sculpture, and that the hieroglyphics are of the same age as those on the temple of Derr.
I continued my journey along the west bank of the Nile, and in the course of several days inspected the ruins of all the known ancient temples and early Greek churches. Summing up my impressions of the temples, I would say that we find in Nubia specimens of all the different eras of Egyptian architecture and history, which indeed can only be traced in Nubia; for all the remaining temples in Egypt, that of Gorne, perhaps, excepted, appear to have been erected in an age when the science of architecture had nearly attained to perfection.
III.—Across the Nubian Desert
I reached Assouan on March 30, after an absence of thirty-five days, having travelled at the rate of ten hours each day. On April 9, I proceeded to Esné, which I had made my headquarters in Upper Egypt.
I remained at Esné till the spring of 1814, waiting for an opportunity to start with a caravan of slave-traders towards the interior parts of Nubia in a more easterly direction than I had been in my journey towards Dongola. At the end of February I heard that a caravan was on the point of starting from Daraou, three days' journey north of Esné, for the confines of Sennaar, and I determined to accompany it and try my fortune on this new route without any servant and in the garb of a poor trader.
The start was made on March 2, 1814, and from the first day of our departure my companions treated me with neglect, and even with contempt. Although they had no idea I was a Frank, they imagined that I was of Turkish origin, an opinion sufficient to excite the ill-treatment of Arabs, who bear the most inveterate hatred to the Osmanli. From the small quantity of merchandise I had, they considered I was a trader running away from my creditors, but I succeeded in convincing them that I was travelling in search of a lost cousin who had made an expedition to Darfour and Sennaar in Nubia, in which the whole of my property was engaged.
At Wady el Nabeh, the wells of which have a great repute all through Nubia, and which we reached on March 14, we met a band of Ababdes driving thirty slaves before them, which they were taking to sell in Egypt. In general, I found the dreaded Nubian deserts—as far as Shigré, at least, which we reached on March 16 with difficulty, on account of shortage of water—of much less dreary appearance than the great Syrian desert, and still less so than the desert of Suez and Tyh. The high mountains of Shigré consist of huge blocks of granite heaped upon one another in the wildest confusion.
During the whole march we were surrounded on all sides by lakes of mirage, called by the Arabs "serab." Its colour was of the purest azure, and so clear that the shadows of the mountains which bordered the horizon were reflected on it with the greatest precision, and the delusion of its being a sheet of water was thus rendered still more perfect. We experienced great suffering from the reckless waste of water and the dryness of the wells which were expected to yield supplies; and so serious did it become that twelve of the strongest of the camels were selected to hasten forward to fetch a supply of water from the nearest part of the Nile. They returned the following morning from their desperate mission, bringing with them plentiful supplies of the delicious water of the Nile, in which we revelled, enabling us to reach Berber on March 23, the whole desert journey having taken us twenty-two days.
The governor of Berber, which consists of four villages, is called the mek, and is nominated by the king of Sennaar. He, however, exercises a feeble authority over the Arabs. The people of Berber are a handsome race. The men are taller, larger-limbed, and stronger than the Egyptians, and red-brown in colour. The features are not those of the negro, the face being oval, and the nose perfectly Grecian. They say, "We are Arabs, not negroes." The practice of drunkenness and debauchery is universal, and everything discreditable to humanity is found in their character.