Poole, Reginald S.: The cities of Egypt (London, 1882)

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CITIES OF EGYPT.

crown their level tops. The fields are varied alone by
long avenues of stately palms in measured colonnades, or
by the welcome shade of a rare sycamore. Nature does
not transform the scene with a rain-storm or make it
mysterious with vapours. There is neither rain nor
cloud nor any mist. But those unvarying features are
lighted up with ever-changing expression like a sym-
pathetic face which takes its beauty from the influence of
things around, reflecting pain or pleasure, joy or grief.
Each day brings a rhythmic sequence of colour, from the
moment when the long streaks of ruddy light in which
Homer saw the rosy fingers of the Dawn begin to stretch
across the eastern sky, until the olive after-glow reflects
in its mirror the last rays of the sun fallen below the
Libyan waste. But neither for the cloudless sunrise and
sunset, nor for the herald of the one and the rear-guard
of the other, does nature take most care. It is when the
sun is in his strength and all he shines on is only relieved
by the quivering of intense heat, a white heat as of a
furnace, that the shadows are painted with sunset hues,
and the sides of the barren mountains become luminous
with liquid rose and purple and violet, like marvels of
cloudland dropped on the earth. There are moments

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