ead 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 Esne, which I had made my headquarters in Upper Egypt.

I remained at Esne 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 Esne, 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
Tu