DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.4393#0228
210 A THOUSAND MILES UP THE NILE.
floods and emblazoned with royal cartouches of extraordi-
nary size, it seems to have attracted the attention of pil-
grims in all ages. Kings, conquerors, priests, travelers,
have covered it with records of victories, of religious festi-
vals, of prayers, and offerings, and acts of adoration. Some
of these are older by a thousand years and more than the
temples on the island opposite.
Such, roughly summed up, are the fourfold surround-
ings of Philae—the cataract, the river, the desert, the
environing mountains. The Holy Island—beautiful, life-
less, a thing of the far past, with all its wealth of sculpture,
painting, history, poetry, tradition — sleeps, or seems to
sleep, in the midst.
It is one of the world's famous landscapes, and it
deserves its fame. Every sketcher sketches it; every trav-
eler describes it. Yet it is just one of those places of
which the objective and subjective features are so equally
balanced that it bears putting neither into words nor
colors. The sketcher must perforce leave out the atmos-
phere of association which informs his subject; and the
writer's description is at best no better than a catalogue
raisonnee.
floods and emblazoned with royal cartouches of extraordi-
nary size, it seems to have attracted the attention of pil-
grims in all ages. Kings, conquerors, priests, travelers,
have covered it with records of victories, of religious festi-
vals, of prayers, and offerings, and acts of adoration. Some
of these are older by a thousand years and more than the
temples on the island opposite.
Such, roughly summed up, are the fourfold surround-
ings of Philae—the cataract, the river, the desert, the
environing mountains. The Holy Island—beautiful, life-
less, a thing of the far past, with all its wealth of sculpture,
painting, history, poetry, tradition — sleeps, or seems to
sleep, in the midst.
It is one of the world's famous landscapes, and it
deserves its fame. Every sketcher sketches it; every trav-
eler describes it. Yet it is just one of those places of
which the objective and subjective features are so equally
balanced that it bears putting neither into words nor
colors. The sketcher must perforce leave out the atmos-
phere of association which informs his subject; and the
writer's description is at best no better than a catalogue
raisonnee.