served up to us on the leaf of the plaintain, by Chintaman Ráo of Sangalí, one of the Brahmanical princes of the southern Maháráshtra.

To a feast of a character somewhat different from that which I have now noticed, we were on more than one occasion called, at the residence of Dr. Abbott,-the inspection of his valuable collection of Egyptian curiosities. The veritable memorials of the arts and customs of a great and wonderful people there deposited, are most interesting. Many of them would singly form a text for an extended chapter of archaological discussion and illustration. The signet ring of the purest gold, of the priest of Cheops, the founder of the great pyramid, carries us back to upwards of two thousand years before the Christian era. A necklace of Menai, or Menes, the first of Egyptian kings according to Herodotus and Manetho, is probably the oldest article of human manufacture which is now identified. It has much of the form of some of the ornaments worn at present in India, and represented on the figures of its most ancient cave temples. Various other multiformal trinkets of the precious metals,-ear-rings, nose-rings, armlets, anklets, and toelets, serve to show us how the Israelites could borrow from the Egyptians "jewels of silver and jewels of gold." Examples of needles and thread are before us as the implements of the industry of the Egyptian matrons, or perchance,-if the inhabitants of the borders of the Nile had the same prejudices as those of the valley of the Ganges,-of the Egyptian masters of the robes; and specimens of "fine linen," and other kinds of cloth of the highest antiquity, bear witness to their skill in the art of dressing flax, and preparing its cloth, for which they are noticed in Scripture. Articles of pottery, both plain and covered with smalto, remind us, by the form of their construction, that "the potter hath power over the clay of the same lump, to make one vessel unto honour, and another unto

DR. ABBOTT'S MUSEUM OF EGYPTIAN ANTIQUITIES

The numerous images and drawings of the gods of the Egyptian pantheon, human, superhuman, and infrahuman, remind us of the time when the Egyptians worshipped every form of creeping things, and abominable beasts, and all idols," or nastinesses (,)1

"Genii with heads of birds, hawks, ibis, drakes,
Of lions, foxes, cats, fish, frogs, and snakes,
Bulls, rams, and monkeys, hippopotami,
With knife in paw, suspended from the sky;
Gods germinating men, and men turned gods,
Seated in honour, with gilt crooks and rods;
Vast scaraboi, globes by hands upheld
From chaos springing, mid an endless field
Of forms grotesque-the sphinx, the crocodile,
And other reptiles from the slime of Nile."2

JOURNEY FROM CAIRO TO THE RED SEA BY THE DERB EL-BASATIN, AND THE "VALLEY OF THE WANDERINGS."

I SHALL not trouble my readers with many petty details connected with the preparations for our journey through the great desert to Horeb, the "Mount of God," and the lands of Esau and Jacob.

With the advice of Mr. Lieder we engaged Mațeir, the Sheikh of the Aleikát branch of the Tawarah Arabs-the same tribe, by the way, that furnished a guide to Niebuhr during his wanderings in Arabia Petræa-to act as our conductor to Mount Sinai, and to furnish camels for the conveyance of ourselves, our servants, and our provisions, and

PREPARATIONS FOR JOURNEY THROUGH THE DESERT. 107

luggage. For each camel he was to receive two hundred and twenty piastres, a sum considerably larger than what he would have demanded of us, had we been able to inform him that we should allow him to take us thither by the shortest route. He was bound over at the English consulate, to serve us faithfully, and to do his best for our safe conveyance, by a document regularly written out, and sealed, and to which he appended his mark-for, in common with all the Badawin of the Mount Sinai peninsula, he was unable to write-but, from what we observed of his character, I believe that, independently of this ceremonial, he would, in every respect, have done us ample justice. Mr. Smith and I purchased a small tent for ourselves and our young Pársí friend Dhanjibháí, for about six pounds, and one for our servants at a somewhat smaller price. Messrs. Sherlock and Allan, too, clubbed together in the matter of their tabernacle; and Mr. Park having no one to pair off with, had a small one provided for himself. As we contemplated being a considerable time in the wilderness, we laid in a stock sufficient, as we thought, to last us for two months, of provisions of bread, biscuits, flour, preserved meats and soups, beer, porter, coffee, tea, wine, potatoes, onions, oranges, dried fruits, and so forth. We were indebted for its selection and purchase to Mr. Smith, whose forethought and economy we had all occasion highly to commend. Doubting our ability to obtain suitable firewood in the barren regions through which we were to pass, we added to our stores four large sacks of charcoal, which formed the burden of two camels. Our supply of water-calculated to last us a fortnight, till we should reach Wádí Feirán, where we could replenish our skins-required four camels for its conveyance.

As those of our number who had come from India, had had an opportunity when proceeding from Suez to Cairo by the usual route of the transit vans, of examining the part of

the desert which lies to the north of the Mukattam nills, we resolved to return to Suez by the route, lying immediately to the south of that range, the Derb el-Basátín. This we were the more inclined to do, from our anxiety to test, as far as we could from personal observation, the theories of those, who, like father Sicard and our friend Mr. Lieder, have expressed their belief, that it must have been by the latter route that the Israelites marched to the Red Sea on the occasion of the exodus. We had no reason subsequently to regret the choice which we had made, as it gave us an opportunity of examining a part of the country but little explored, and of which very indefinite notions are entertained, as well as of enabling us to collect some information necessary to our forming an intelligent opinion of some of the most important questions connected with Bible history and geography, which have been raised both in ancient and modern times. My notes of our progress I give in the form in which they were originally written, that of the simple journal, interspersing, of course, such remarks connected with them, as may have been suggested by subsequent inquiry and research.

Monday, 6th Feb. 1843.-Throughout the day we have been in great bustle and confusion, on account of our preparation for our departure from Cairo. The Sheikh Mațeir mustered our camels, upwards of two score in number, in the Asbakiyah, near my lodgings, and directed our attention particularly to those which he had set apart as dromedaries for ourselves. He flattered me by saying, that he had been very considerate in my case, and had allotted to me a very handsome young animal, with sundry gay trappings in the form of head-dress, saddle, and ornamental pendants of rope and tasselry, made of the silken hair of its own grandmother, and requested me to test its docility of spirit and powers of progression before leaving the town. As I had no experience of the pilotship of the "ship of the desert," I was