DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.6359#0104
SPHINX.
93
with us a well-armed janissary, who knew how to deal with
them, and whose baton was pretty freely used upon their heads
and shoulders. When we reached our dormitory among the
tombs, the Sheik of the village came forward, and we agreed
with him for the services of two Arabs to accompany us about
the neighborhood, and help us on the following morning to
ascend the great pyramid. This done, Ave sallied forth by
the light of the rising moon, which touched the tops of the
billowy waves of sand, while their hollows were in deep
shadow. A majestic apparition suddenly burst upon us—an
enormous head and shoulders, whitened by the moonlight,
towered above the extremity of one of the sand ravines which
lay in obscurity below, through which, far beneath the chest
°f the statue, dimly peeped out the traces of the winged globe
uPon the tablet formerly buried beneath its paws. The fea-
tures were much mutilated, yet an expression faintly beamed
through them of bland repose and immutable serenity. The
Pyramids in all their vastness arose behind. No assemblage
°f objects could be more awful or imposing. The heaving
sands which surge up and down, like the petrified waves of
a sea, by concealing the base of the Sphinx, and burying the
temple and avenue of approach which formerly led up, cause
it to resemble some mysterious preadamite monarch, or one of
those gigantic genii of Arabian fiction, which make their abode
llt the desolate places of the earth* It is not surprising, there-
ore) that it should, as Wilkinson informs us, be known to the
s,1perstitious Arabs of the present day by the name of Abool-
hol, or < the father of terror' or immensity.
" In its state of pristine perfection, no single statue in Egypt
c°uld have vied with it. When by the labors of M. Caviglia,
the lower part of the figure, which had been covered up by the
93
with us a well-armed janissary, who knew how to deal with
them, and whose baton was pretty freely used upon their heads
and shoulders. When we reached our dormitory among the
tombs, the Sheik of the village came forward, and we agreed
with him for the services of two Arabs to accompany us about
the neighborhood, and help us on the following morning to
ascend the great pyramid. This done, Ave sallied forth by
the light of the rising moon, which touched the tops of the
billowy waves of sand, while their hollows were in deep
shadow. A majestic apparition suddenly burst upon us—an
enormous head and shoulders, whitened by the moonlight,
towered above the extremity of one of the sand ravines which
lay in obscurity below, through which, far beneath the chest
°f the statue, dimly peeped out the traces of the winged globe
uPon the tablet formerly buried beneath its paws. The fea-
tures were much mutilated, yet an expression faintly beamed
through them of bland repose and immutable serenity. The
Pyramids in all their vastness arose behind. No assemblage
°f objects could be more awful or imposing. The heaving
sands which surge up and down, like the petrified waves of
a sea, by concealing the base of the Sphinx, and burying the
temple and avenue of approach which formerly led up, cause
it to resemble some mysterious preadamite monarch, or one of
those gigantic genii of Arabian fiction, which make their abode
llt the desolate places of the earth* It is not surprising, there-
ore) that it should, as Wilkinson informs us, be known to the
s,1perstitious Arabs of the present day by the name of Abool-
hol, or < the father of terror' or immensity.
" In its state of pristine perfection, no single statue in Egypt
c°uld have vied with it. When by the labors of M. Caviglia,
the lower part of the figure, which had been covered up by the