DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.4372#0050
34
to have been once well inhabited and endowed. It is defended
by a handsome outer Avail of hewn stone; but has long been en-
tirely deserted. We found among the ruins the fragment of a
Greek inscription with the name of Diocletian.
Foiled in this attempt to pass the Cataracts with our boat, Ave
had endeavoured, Avhen on our second visit to Elfi Bey, to dispose
him to assist us on our journey onAvard by land. He called a
native of Derde, one of the most considerable toAvns on this
side of Ibrim, and questioned him as to the practicability of the
undertaking. We Avere concerned to receive from him every kind
of discouraging information, from the difficulty of the roads, and
the inhospitably of the inhabitants. A Shekh of the Ababde re-
peated the same thing, and described the several narroAV passes
of the Nile, Avhere the mountains, approaching each other from
the East and West, place every boat that attempts the passage at
the mercy of the inhabitants ; some of Avhom at these spots are
armed with muskets. The Bey also added, that, as yet, the people
higher up are extremely disinclined to the introduction of any
foreigners Avhatevcr among them, and assured us, that about
eight years ago, Hassan l>ey Gedaoui, then in Upper Egypt,
and exiled from Cairo by Murat and Ibrahim, had sent forty of
his best Mamalukes among them, avIio were all put to the sAvord.
Many other alarming stories of this kind were added, and tre-
mendous descriptions of the danger of the rocks, the Cataracts,
and the people ; most of them probably unfounded, but all tend-
ing equally to sIioav that none whom avc had consulted intended
to let us advance any further. One added, that had it not been
for the Bey's presence, they should not even have allowed us to
penetrate thus far. Some of these difficulties Ave owed to our escort
of English soldiers, which, as its first movements alarmed Elfi,
and drove him beyond the Cataracts, had now spread the alarm
over
to have been once well inhabited and endowed. It is defended
by a handsome outer Avail of hewn stone; but has long been en-
tirely deserted. We found among the ruins the fragment of a
Greek inscription with the name of Diocletian.
Foiled in this attempt to pass the Cataracts with our boat, Ave
had endeavoured, Avhen on our second visit to Elfi Bey, to dispose
him to assist us on our journey onAvard by land. He called a
native of Derde, one of the most considerable toAvns on this
side of Ibrim, and questioned him as to the practicability of the
undertaking. We Avere concerned to receive from him every kind
of discouraging information, from the difficulty of the roads, and
the inhospitably of the inhabitants. A Shekh of the Ababde re-
peated the same thing, and described the several narroAV passes
of the Nile, Avhere the mountains, approaching each other from
the East and West, place every boat that attempts the passage at
the mercy of the inhabitants ; some of Avhom at these spots are
armed with muskets. The Bey also added, that, as yet, the people
higher up are extremely disinclined to the introduction of any
foreigners Avhatevcr among them, and assured us, that about
eight years ago, Hassan l>ey Gedaoui, then in Upper Egypt,
and exiled from Cairo by Murat and Ibrahim, had sent forty of
his best Mamalukes among them, avIio were all put to the sAvord.
Many other alarming stories of this kind were added, and tre-
mendous descriptions of the danger of the rocks, the Cataracts,
and the people ; most of them probably unfounded, but all tend-
ing equally to sIioav that none whom avc had consulted intended
to let us advance any further. One added, that had it not been
for the Bey's presence, they should not even have allowed us to
penetrate thus far. Some of these difficulties Ave owed to our escort
of English soldiers, which, as its first movements alarmed Elfi,
and drove him beyond the Cataracts, had now spread the alarm
over