Hawks, Francis L.: The monuments of Egypt: or Egypt a witness for the Bible (New York, 1850)

CHAPTER IV.

Climate of the valley of the Nile.—Extreme dryness.—General appearance of
Egyptian ruins.—Temples, tombs.—Arts of design in ancient Egypt.—Princi-
pal localities on the Nile.

It may serve to make more intelligible what follows, to
advert here to the general appearance of the Egyptian ruins,
the arts of design as exhibited in painting and sculpture, and
the climate of the valley of the Nile. We must therefore
detain the reader for a short time with the consideration of
these.

Egypt is a valley lying between two ranges of mountains,
that extend from south to north; and is bounded also, on
three of its sides, by deserts. The mountains are of no great
elevation; on the east are the deserts of Arabia, interrupted
only by the comparatively narrow waters of the Red Sea;
while on the south and west stretches out the vast expanse of
sand known as the Libyan desert, reaching on the south into
the heart of Africa, and on the west, to the shores of the
Atlantic. The position of Egypt, therefore, is marked by a
striking peculiarity. It is in the centre of the largest tract of
uninterrupted sterility and sand, on the face of our globe;
and, as one of the consequences of its position, rain in Lower
Egypt (which is the only Egypt spoken of in the Mosaic his-
tory) is generally said to be altogether unknown. It has,