em as gigantic blocks up which stout ladies are
being "boosted"--sorry, but there is no other word--by heated dragomans.
As we draw near we see that the blocks _are_ fairly big. Nearer
still--what is that crawling about on the edge of the great cone? Hullo,
it's a man, and there is another and another. They do look small. Why,
there is one who has reached the top; he is not to be compared with a
fly so much as a midge--who would have thought it? We are close under
now and I find that the block by which I am standing is the height of my
shoulder, and I am fairly tall. This must be an exceptional one, but--it
isn't! They are all the same! Watching the men clambering up above,--men
who we now see are English soldiers dressed in khaki,--we can understand
why they seem to find the ascent so difficult--each block is shoulder
high and requires much strenuous exertion to surmount. They cannot
stride from one to the other as on a flight of stairs. One man is
exhausted and gives up half-way, and a cheerful Cockney voice comes down
from above telling him to "put his beck into it!" He'll need it.
Standing thus and looking up we get some idea of the enormous size of
the Pyramid, which makes its blocks look small by contrast. It is
bigger, far bigger than one expected. This is the largest of all, built
anything between 5000 and 6000 years ago, as the tomb of King Cheops. He
built it for himself by cruel forced labour crushed out of starving men;
he intended that his body should lie like the kernel of a nut in this
mighty shell.

As we pass beyond it we see another, farther off in the desert sand, and
yet another. We are accustomed to speak of the Pyramids as if these few
at Gizeh were all, but there are others scattered about Egypt, though
they are less known and visited.

Then, quite unexpectedly, we come upon the Sphinx. It is in a hollow in
the sand like the nest children scoop out for shelter on the seashore,
only vastly greater. As we struggle round the yielding rim, with the
powdery sand silting over our boot-tops, we feel something of the wonder
of it thrilling through us. Let us sit down here facing it by these
broken stones, where we can be a little sheltered from the chilly wind
and gritty sand. We are looking at the oldest thing in Egypt. You will
see farther south many splendid examples of amazing age but nothing to
equal the Sphinx. When Abraham came down into Egypt the Sphinx was old
beyond the memory of man! When King