scroll; part of his breastplate can be seen, which bears some resemblance to that worn by the high priest of the Jews. The solid block of stone, out of which the figure has been cut, is square behind, and covered with hieroglyphics. On one side of the block, immediately behind the left limb of the statue, there is a female figure carved in relief, probably the king's daughter. If the mounds of this deeply-interesting locality were opened, and the numerous remains which they inclose were examined, much additional light would undoubtedly be thrown on the history of ancient Memphis, if not also on that of God's ancient people. Nowhere is it so likely as here that traces of their presence in Egypt, perhaps even of the events connected with their deliverance from its yoke of cruel bondage, should be found. But unless the Government of France or England should take the work in hand, it is never likely to be done;-it would be too expensive a task for private enterprise. The statues we saw are of a close-grained silicious limestone, which the modern Egyptians are more likely to burn for use, than to preserve as relics of an age and history of which they are profoundly ignorant. As we sat among these ruins, we read from the book of the prophecies of Isaiah, "the burden of Egypt;" and felt how true it is, that though heaven and earth shall pass away, no word of God shall pass away till all be fulfilled.

After passing through Mitrahenny, a large village not far from the Nile and quite near to the mounds of Memphis, the donkeydrivers urged us to proceed more rapidly, lest night should overtake us before we got back to Cairo. The road was good, and we cantered along to please them for five or six miles. We were now passing through the great palm forest we had seen afar off, the day before, from the citadel of Cairo. The palms were most of them from fifty to sixty feet in height, and afforded a most agreeable shade. Every tree in the forest seemed to be carefully watered from the adjacent Nile. At the north end of this forest, we rode down to the river, hired a large boat, embarked, donkeys and all, and sweeping out into the stream,

glided down to Old Cairo. A heavy thunder-storm was rolling across the valley and threatened to overtake us, but it did not come our way. By taking to the river, we saved the time and the fatigue of riding six or seven miles round a great bend which it makes at this point, and enjoyed, besides, the seasonable refreshment of drinking copious draughts of its world-famous waters. Landing at Old Cairo, and remounting our donkeys, we reached, at half-past six in the evening, the Hotel d'Orient of Cairo, or Musr, as the Egyptians still call it, and which is evidently the singular form of the Mizraim of Scripture. There were of old, as now, two Egypts-the upper and the lower; and hence the name Mizraim, or the Egypts. It was no small privilege to have enjoyed the look we had gotten of the one, though we had no prospect of being able to visit the other.

But the great subjects and scenes of the day must not allow me to forget our poor donkey-boys, who did so much for our comfort. They had been on foot since four o'clock in the morning-running, dancing, singing in the hot sun the entire day, and seemed, after all, as fresh when they entered Cairo as when they left the pyramids. There was something very taking about the merry-hearted little fellows. "You know my donkey name?" said the one who had the special charge of my wife's very pretty gray, as we were trotting along near Mitrahenny. "My donkey name Steamboat, him very good donkey!" And running to its head, and putting his ear to its mouth, he looked up with a sly twinkle in his laughing eye to its rider. "You know what my donkey say? My donkey say, Good lady, give me oringhis.” And when the orange was immediately tossed to him, catching it in the air, and making sundry somersets along the ground, he bounded off to his companions to proclaim his triumph. In short, the extraordinary activity of these boys, their half-roguish humour, their intense love of fun, and their bright, sparkling eyes, drew one's heart towards them and made one sigh to think of the unpromising future that lay before them. With such mental and physical capacities as they seem to be endowed with,

what might not be made of these poor Arab boys! But the soul seems to die out of them as they grow up. The want of mental culture, the personal and political servitude in which they are doomed to live, and, above all, the utter absence of all the elevating, and sanctifying, and sustaining influences which flow from the blessed religion of Christ, seem to dwarf the poor Arab's mind, and keep him in a state of intellectual childhood all his days.

Next morning, after an early stroll through the crowded streets and bazaars, we left Cairo, and returned by rail to Alexandria. We were glad to find all well with our patient in the yacht. He was going on, under the kind care of one of the ladies who remained in the yacht, as favourably as the nature of the case admitted of. But time and perfect quiescence were indispensable to a complete cure. It was arranged accordingly, under medical advice, that he should be left at Alexandria for three or four weeks, in the house of Dr. Philip, who was both a missionary and a medical practitioner, and who was so good as take him in charge. So soon as we should reach the coast of Palestine, one of the yacht's crew was to return to Egypt, and to bring him by the French steamer to Tripoli, in time to meet us when we should have completed our approaching tour through Syria.

Our last day in Egypt was the Sabbath. In the forenoon we attended public worship in the English Episcopal church; and in the afternoon I had an opportunity of conducting divine service, and preaching the Word to a little company of Scottish Presbyterians, under the roof of my friend Mr. Fleming, an eminent merchant of Alexandria. We had been but a week in Egypt, but that week was worth a twelvemonth in ordinary lands.

LEAVING ALEXANDRIA.

75

CHAPTER II.

The voyage from Alexandria to Jaffa-First sight of Judea-The landingThe town of Jaffa-A bird's-eye view of the land about to be visitedRide to Ramleh-First night in Palestine.

ON Monday, the 20th of April, 1857, we bade adieu to Egypt― the land of the Pharaohs-the house of ancient Israel's bondage. It was about an hour after noon when we weighed anchor, and began to creep cautiously out, through the long and intricate channel of the harbour of Alexandria, where shoals and sunken rocks are uncomfortably numerous, and where the singular clearness of the water makes them appear much nearer the surface than they really are. The wind was both light and bare; and only such a vessel as the St. Ursula, able to walk when necessary into the wind's eye, could have contrived, in the circumstances, to make her way so cleverly to sea. A fine ship yacht, which had been lying near us, went out an hour before, towed by a tug-steamer, and had already gained a good offing, and set all sail for Jaffa before we had passed the light-house. Her people had been "jawing" our men the night before, and telling them they would take the news of our coming to the Syrian coast. Bound as we were for the same port, a race was inevitable. It was slow work so long as we were entangled with the long line of reefs on the one hand, and with the little island of Fort Marabout on the other. Till we got fairly out of the grips of the land, our course kept us close-hauled; but no sooner had we made a little sea-room, where we could slack away a few points off the wind, and take a little more of the now freshening breeze into our canvas, than we began to shorten rapidly the distance between us and our rival. About two hours afterwards, when we were sitting below, Mr. Cairney called down the open skylight of the saloon-"Will you come on deck, and take a

look at the Sylphide?" Already we had her right abeam, and by sunset she was nowhere. We had dropped her beneath the horizon. We paid, indeed, that same evening a rather smart penalty for taking so much of the wind, and for shaving the land so close as we had been doing. Early in the evening we had passed Nelson Island, and the Bay of Aboukir, where, in 1798, Napoleon's fleet was destroyed, and along with it all his fond dreams of Oriental conquest. We were then lying a course that should have carried us clear, by a good many miles, of even the most projecting point of the coast line, and in this course we had run on till about nine o'clock. We had assembled in the saloon for evening worship, when we were suddenly startled by that most horrible of all sounds at sea, the sound beneath one's feet, that tells in a moment that the ship's keel is in contact with the bottom. Four or five times in succession, as she was let down by the sea, the same grating sound was heard. Her head, had, of course, on the instant been put about, and as the lead-line was kept incessantly going, it needs not to say how eagerly we listened, as the man sang out-"half three three fathoms-four-by the mark five-no bottom at seven." Hurrah we are clear. As she rounded off when the helm was first put down, the sea over the quarter was all a-wash upon the bank, the edge of which we had grazed. It was a narrow escape in a tideless sea like the Mediterranean; and we did not fail, when we again descended into the saloon to resume the service in which we had been so rudely interrupted, to offer our united and heartfelt thanks for the signal deliverance.

On looking into Admiral Smith's Memoir of the Mediterranean, a work of the highest authority on that sea, and which formed part of my travelling library, a passage turned up which seemed to throw some light on this occurrence. When describing the action of the current which sweeps eastwards along the shores of Egypt, he takes occasion to point out the influence it exerts in drifting onwards, accumulating, and finally depositing the large quantity of alluvial substances which are brought down