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Like Tyre of old, it was the point of exchange for the eastern and western world. Diodorus, who visited the city just before the downfall of the empire of the Ptolemies, says, that it contained, according to the registers, more than 300,000 free citizens.

The remains of Old Alexandria are surrounded by a double wall, flanked with lofty towers. They are an almost shapeless mass of rubbish, in which are discerned fragments of broken columns, pieces of wall, cisterns, choked up with earth, pieces of pottery, glass, etc. There are five gateways or entrances into this enclosure. Of the two granite obelisks, called Cleopatra's Needles, one is still standing; the other is lying prostrate on the ground. These obelisks formed the entrance to the palace of Cesar, as it is called, though it is most probable they were removed from some of the ancient cities of Egypt thither. Near these obelisks is part of a tower, called, "The Tower of the Romans." About the cen

tre of the enclosure stands the mosque of St. Athanasius, on the cite of a Christian church erected by this patriarch during the fourth century. In this mosque the beautiful SARCOPHAGUS, of Egyptian Breccia, which is now in the British Museum, was discovered. The cisterns, mentioned for keeping Nile water, are still in a great measure preserved; they consist of vaulted chambers, supported by columns which form arcades of two or three stories. The interior walls are covered with a thick red plaster which water cannot penetrate. The level of these cisterns varies, but some of them are from fifteen to eighteen feet below the level of the sea. When the French invaded Egypt, the number in use was 207, and there were about 100 more known to exist. The only remarkable monument between the wall and the Lake is the column called "Pompey's Pillar." This column stands on a mound of earth about forty feet high, which contains remains of previous constructions. According to a Greek inscription on the plinth of the base, on the west side, it appears to have been erected (though probably not for the first time) in honour of the emperor Diocletian, by a prefect of Egypt, whose name cannot be further deciphered than that it begins with P O. The foundation of the pillar appears to have been frequently examined, probably in hope of finding treasures; it is, perhaps, owing to this cause, that the column is inclined about seven inches to the south-west. this direction, on the other side of the canal, are some catacombs, cut in a small elevation of a sandy calcareous stone:

In

and farther south in the calcareous rock that faces the sea, are discerned numerous excavations, in the sides of which niches are formed. These formed part of the Necropolis of Old Alexandria. The most spacious of these excavations, which in common with the rest, communicates with the sea by a narrow passage, is about 3830 yards from the column. In the interior there is a great number of chambers and passages, which, judging from the style in which they are cut in the rock, are of Greek origin. This monument was doubtless intended for a king.

The history of this city is very remarkable. From B. C. 323 to E. c. 30, when it fell into the hands of the Romans, it was the residence of the Greek kings of Egypt, the resort of commerce, and of many foreign nations, especially Jews, and it was also the centre of the scientific knowledge of that day. Of the five wards into which the city was divided, two were entirely occupied by Jews, and they had, besides, residences dispersed in the other quarters. They enjoyed, as will be seen in the history of that period, full civil privileges, and had a prefect or governor of their own. Alexandria sustained much damage in the campaigns of Julius Cesar, B. C. 48. From B. c. 30, to the Arab conquest under Omar, A. D. 640, who, it is said, found forty thousand Jews paying tribute there, Alexandria was still a flourishing city under the Roman, and afterwards under the eastern empire. The Christian religion was early adopted there, and it became one of the strong holds of the true faith. Clemens, Origen, Athanasius, and others of equal note in the Christian church, flourished at Alexandria. In 969, the Fatemite caliphs seized on Egypt, and built New Cairo, from which time Alexandria declined still more, and sunk to the rank of a secondary city. The discovery of the route round the Cape of Good Hope, A. D. 1497, tended still further to diminish the importance of Alexandria; so that at the present day, the city that bears its name no longer enjoys its wonted celebrity, though it appears to have recovered in some slight degree from its downfall by a revival of its commerce. The Roman power partly restored Alexandria as the channel of commerce with the east, but when their power was broken, it ceased.

ARSINOE.

This city stood at the head of the western branch of the Red Sea, and near the termination of the canal which unites

the Red Sea, and the Eastern branch of the Nile. It was founded by the second Ptolemy; and Pliny states, that it derived its name from Arsinoe, his sister. Its name was changed afterwards to Cleopatris. It was chosen for a sea port; but though vessels anchored there, and rode secure from the violence of the sea, its exposed situation, and the dangers they encountered in working up the narrow extremity of the gulf, rendered it less eligible for the Indian trade than either Myos Hormos, or Berenice. Its chief advantages were the convenience of establishing a communication with the Nile by a canal, and the shortness of the journey across the desert in that part. The town of Arsinoe gave its name to a nome, or one of the ancient provincial divisions of Egypt, which corresponds to the modern Faioum. The old name of the town was the "City of Crocodiles," that animal being, as we are told by Strabo, highly reverenced there.

ABY'DOS.

Aby'dos was a city of Upper Egypt, the remains of which are found near two villages, Elkherbeh and Harabat, about six miles from the west bank of the Nile N. lat. 26° 12'. The chief building which still remains is nearly covered with sand, but the interior is in good preservation. This edifice is constructed of limestone and sandstone. It is said that arches are found in the interior, similar to those of brick which Belzoni describes at Thebes. The numerous apartments in this building, and the style of decoration, show that Abydos was once a place of importance. Some conjecture that it was a royal residence. When Strabo visited Egypt, about the commencement of the Christian era, Abydos was a mere village; but he learned that the great building was called Memnoneion or palace of Memnon, and that tradition assigned to Abydos a rank in ancient times next to Thebes. There was a canal leading to the city from the river; but besides this communication with the main stream, Abydos had the advantage of standing on the large canal running northward, which is known by the name of the Rahr Youssuf.

On an interior wall of a building at Abydos, not belonging to the great edifice, a kind of tablet, or genealogy of the early kings of Egypt, which is generally called the table of Abydos, was discovered. This tablet consists of three compartments lying horizontally one above another; and each compartment has been divided into twenty-six rectangles, so that

the whole once contained seventy-eight rectangles. Each of these rectangles contains an elliptical ring, or cartouche, such as may be seen on the Egyptian monuments in the British Museum; and each cartouche contains various figures, which are generally supposed to indicate the names or titles of sovereigns. The lowest of the three compartments contains, in the nineteen rectangles which are complete, the title and name of Rameses the Great; the same prænomen, or title, and name, having each, probably, been repeated thirteen times in the whole twenty-six rectangles, of which seven are erased. Deducting these twenty-six, there remain in the other two compartments fifty-two rectangles. The fifty-first and fiftysecond contain the title and name of a Rameses, who may be a predecessor of Rameses the Great. The cartouches prece

ding these are thought to be the titles of kings: this is very probable, for the forty-seventh is the same as that on the great colossal statue at Thebes, and on the entire colossal statue in the British Museum, which is Amenophis u. in Manetho's catalogue.

BERENICE.

Berenice was a port on the west side of the Red Sea, at the bottom of a bay, which is described by Strabo under the name of Acathartus. Belzoni describes the place which he takes to be the site of Berenice as being a little south of the parallel of 24°, in which D'Anville concurs. Ptolemy gives the latitude of Berenice at 23° 40', which is also the latitude of Syene. The town, according to Belzoni, measured 1,600 feet from north to south, and 2,000 from east to west. A small temple of Serapis, built of soft calcareous and sand stone, in the Egyptian style of architecture, is 102 feet long, and 43 wide. A part of the wall which was uncovered by digging was sculptured with well executed figures in basso-relievo, in the Egyptian style; on the wall hieroglyphics were also discovered.

The town of Berenice was built or restored by Ptolemy Philadelphus, who called it after the name of his mother, the wife of Lagus, or Soter. The town was very extensive, and though the harbour was neither deep nor spacious, its position in a receding gulf tended greatly to the safety of the vessels lying within it, or anchored in the bay. A road led thence direct to Coptos, furnished with the usual stations, or hydreumas; and another, which also went to the emerald mines,

joined, or rather crossed it, from Apollinopolis Magna. When Strabo visited Egypt, the Myos Hormos seems to have superseded Berenice; but the latter, in the later age of Pliny, was again preferred to its rival. From both these ports the goods were taken on camels, by an almost level road across the desert to Coptos, and thence distributed over different parts of Egypt. In the time of the Ptolemies and Cesars, those suited for exportation to Europe went down the river to the city of Alexandria, where they were sold to merchants who resorted to that city at a stated season

MYOS HORMOS.

The Myos Hormos, called also Aphrodite, and, according to Agatharchides, the Port of Venus, stood in latitude 27° 22', upon a flat coast, backed by low mountains, distant from it about three miles, where a well called the Fons Tadnos supplied the town and ships with water. The port was more capacious than those of Berenice and Philoteras; and though exposed to the winds, it was secure against the force of a tempestuous sea. Several roads united at the gates of the town, from Berenice and Philoteras on the south, Arsinoe on the north, and from Coptos on the west; and stations sup plied those who passed to and from the Nile with water and other necessaries.

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"Many other ports," says Mr. Wilkinson, "the Portus Multi of Pliny, occur along the coast, particularly between Berenice and Kossayr ;* but though they all have landmarks to guide boats in approaching their rocky entrances, none of them have any remains of a tower, or the vestiges of habitations." They teach the beholder the important lesson, that nothing on earth is enduring; and that

"He builds too low, who builds below the skies."-Young

TENTYRA.

The ruins of Tentyra are supposed to be those seen at Amara, about a mile from the river Erment. It stood in the midst of a large plain, and seems to have been between three and four miles in compass. The ruins of two ancient buildings are still to be seen there. The inhabitants of this city

Myos Hormos ceded its place to this town, which was afterwards called Philoteras, and was resorted to after the Arab conquest.

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