DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.4393#0340
322 A THOUSAND MILES UP THE NILE.
It seems that when the khedive* entertains distinguished
guests and sends them in gorgeous dahabeeyahs up the
Nile, lie grants them a virgin mound, or so many square
feet of a famous necropolis ; lets them dig as deep as they
please; and allows them to keep whatever they may find.
Sometimes he sends out scouts to beat the ground ; and
then a tomb is found and left unopened, and the illustrious
visitor is allowed to discover it. When the scouts are un-
lucky, it may even sometimes happen that an old tomb is
re-stocked ; carefully closed up ; and then, with all the
charm of unpremeditation, re-opened a day or two after.
Now Sheik Rashwan Ebn Hassan el Kashef told us that
in 1869, when the empress of the French was at Abou
Simbel, and again when the Prince and Princess of Wales
came up in 1872, after the prince's illness, be received
strict orders to find some hitherto undiscovered tomb,f in
order that the khedive'sguests might have the satisfaction
of opening it. But, he added, although ho left no likely
place untried among the rocks and valleys on both sides of
the river, he could find nothing. To have unearthed such
a birbeh as this would have done him good service with
the government, and have insured him a splendid back-
shish from prince or empress. As it was, he was repri-
manded for want of diligence, and he believed himself to
have been out of favor ever since.
I may here mention —in order to have done with this
subject—that besides being buried outside to a depth of
about eight feet, the adytum had been partially filled inside
by a gradual infiltration of sand from above. This can
only have accumulated at the time when the old sand-drift
was at its highest. That drift, sweeping in one unbroken
line across the front of the great temple, must at one time
have risen here to a height of twenty feet above the pres-
ent level. From thence the sand had found its way down
the perpendicular fissure already mentioned. In the cor-
ner behind the door, the sand-pile rose to the ceiling, in
shape just like the deposit at the bottom of an hour-glass.
I am informed by the painter that when the top of the
* This refers to the ex-khedive, Ismail Pasha, who ruled Egypt
at the time when this book was written and published. [Note to
second edition.]
f There are tombs in some of the ravines behind, the temples,
Which, however, we did not see,
It seems that when the khedive* entertains distinguished
guests and sends them in gorgeous dahabeeyahs up the
Nile, lie grants them a virgin mound, or so many square
feet of a famous necropolis ; lets them dig as deep as they
please; and allows them to keep whatever they may find.
Sometimes he sends out scouts to beat the ground ; and
then a tomb is found and left unopened, and the illustrious
visitor is allowed to discover it. When the scouts are un-
lucky, it may even sometimes happen that an old tomb is
re-stocked ; carefully closed up ; and then, with all the
charm of unpremeditation, re-opened a day or two after.
Now Sheik Rashwan Ebn Hassan el Kashef told us that
in 1869, when the empress of the French was at Abou
Simbel, and again when the Prince and Princess of Wales
came up in 1872, after the prince's illness, be received
strict orders to find some hitherto undiscovered tomb,f in
order that the khedive'sguests might have the satisfaction
of opening it. But, he added, although ho left no likely
place untried among the rocks and valleys on both sides of
the river, he could find nothing. To have unearthed such
a birbeh as this would have done him good service with
the government, and have insured him a splendid back-
shish from prince or empress. As it was, he was repri-
manded for want of diligence, and he believed himself to
have been out of favor ever since.
I may here mention —in order to have done with this
subject—that besides being buried outside to a depth of
about eight feet, the adytum had been partially filled inside
by a gradual infiltration of sand from above. This can
only have accumulated at the time when the old sand-drift
was at its highest. That drift, sweeping in one unbroken
line across the front of the great temple, must at one time
have risen here to a height of twenty feet above the pres-
ent level. From thence the sand had found its way down
the perpendicular fissure already mentioned. In the cor-
ner behind the door, the sand-pile rose to the ceiling, in
shape just like the deposit at the bottom of an hour-glass.
I am informed by the painter that when the top of the
* This refers to the ex-khedive, Ismail Pasha, who ruled Egypt
at the time when this book was written and published. [Note to
second edition.]
f There are tombs in some of the ravines behind, the temples,
Which, however, we did not see,