DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.12664#0040
THE PYRAMIDS.
33
brawny shoulders under the bottom of the vessel,
heaved her off the sand-bank. Near this we
passed a long line of excavation where several
hundred men were then digging, being part of the
gigantic work of draining the Delta, lately under-
taken by the pacha.
Towards the evening of the fourth day we
came in sight of the " world's great wonder," the
eternal Pyramids, standing at the head of a long
reach in the river directly in front of us, and almost
darkening the horizon; solitary, grand, and gloomy,
the only objects to be seen in the great desert be-
fore us. The sun was about setting in that cloud-
less sky known only in Egypt; for a few moments
their lofty summits were lighted by a gleam of
lurid red, and, as the glorious orb settled behind the
mountains of the Libyan desert, the atmosphere
became dark and more indistinct, and their clear
outline continued to be seen after the whole earth
was shrouded in gloom.
The next morning at seven o'clock we were
alongside the Island of Rhoda, as the Arab boatmen
called it, where the daughter of Pharaoh came
down to bathe and found the little Moses. We
crossed over in a small boat to Boulac, the harbour
of Cairo, breakfasted with Mr. J-, the brother-
in-law of my friend, an engineer in the pacha's ser-
vice, whose interesting wife is the only English
lady there, and mounting a donkey, in half an hour
I was within the walls of Grand Cairo. The trav-
eller who goes there with the reminiscences of
33
brawny shoulders under the bottom of the vessel,
heaved her off the sand-bank. Near this we
passed a long line of excavation where several
hundred men were then digging, being part of the
gigantic work of draining the Delta, lately under-
taken by the pacha.
Towards the evening of the fourth day we
came in sight of the " world's great wonder," the
eternal Pyramids, standing at the head of a long
reach in the river directly in front of us, and almost
darkening the horizon; solitary, grand, and gloomy,
the only objects to be seen in the great desert be-
fore us. The sun was about setting in that cloud-
less sky known only in Egypt; for a few moments
their lofty summits were lighted by a gleam of
lurid red, and, as the glorious orb settled behind the
mountains of the Libyan desert, the atmosphere
became dark and more indistinct, and their clear
outline continued to be seen after the whole earth
was shrouded in gloom.
The next morning at seven o'clock we were
alongside the Island of Rhoda, as the Arab boatmen
called it, where the daughter of Pharaoh came
down to bathe and found the little Moses. We
crossed over in a small boat to Boulac, the harbour
of Cairo, breakfasted with Mr. J-, the brother-
in-law of my friend, an engineer in the pacha's ser-
vice, whose interesting wife is the only English
lady there, and mounting a donkey, in half an hour
I was within the walls of Grand Cairo. The trav-
eller who goes there with the reminiscences of