Alexandria, 2d September, 1815.

I am sorry to say that the cure of my long protracted illness was not so expeditious as the assurances of my physicians at Cairo led me to expect. I had several relapses of my fever; the intense heat contributed to weaken my system still more, nor was my remaining strength supported by any confidence in the medical skill of the persons who attended me: I determined therefore to go to Alexandria, fully persuaded that the sea-breeze, and the society of Col. Missett would powerfully co-operate to the re-establishment of my health. I have now been here for the last sixteen days. Col. Missett’s kind and generous hospitality is too well known to all Eastern travellers, to stand in need of my commendations; the deplorable state of his own health did not prevent him from watching with the liveliest interest over the recovery of mine, and it is to his attentions and the friendly assistance of Dr. Meryon, physician of Lady H. Stanhope, whom her Ladyship had sent here to attend the Colonel, that I attribute my present convalescence. Lady Hester has been occupied travelling over Syria for the last three years, and has established herself at Mar Elias, a convent above Seyda.

I shall leave Alexandria next week and return by way of Damietta to Cairo, where I hope to finish my journals. The worst effects of my fever were shewn in a depression and listlessness which seldom permitted me to take up the pen. I hope however soon to make amends, and to be able to put a speedy term to my stay in Egypt. Convinced as I still am, that the Fezzan route presents fewer difficulties for penetrating into Africa from the East, than any other, my departure from Cairo must depend upon the arrival and redeparture of a Fezzan caravan. I trust that I shall have a less severe trial of patience than that which made me lose nearly a twelve month in Upper Egypt, before I could find an eligible conveyance into Nubia; yet it was to that patience that I owed the success of my journey, and I have laid it down as an invariable rule never to sacrifice security to time, however reluctantly I may submit to the privation of almost every means of instruction, and to the total want of rational society. The latter, which is but feebly felt in travelling, engrosses all one’s leisure thoughts during the tediousness of a long protracted fixed residence in any part of these uncivilised countries.

The city of Cairo has been lately exposed to serious disturbances. The Pasha, after his return from Arabia, attempted to introduce the Nizam Djedid, and began to drill both his infantry and cavalry according to European tactics. The discontent of the troops soon broke out into open rebellion, and Mohammed Aly, who had carried his victorious arms to the remotest parts of the Turkish empire, had the mortification to see his capital exposed to the fury and avidity of his own soldiers, who stripped the greater part of the shops, and sacked all the principal Bazars of the town, after which they retreated quietly to their quarters, having in vain endeavoured to break open the gate of the Frank street. The Nizam Djedid has now been given up, and the Pasha, conscious of the strength of the rebels, has not deemed it advisable to adopt any strong measures of punishment; but in order to conciliate the good will, and in case of need the assistance, of the town’s people, he has reimbursed to them, out of his own pocket, the whole amount of their loss, which has been calculated at four millions of piastres. The rebellion happened during the first days of last month. Many Franks have left Cairo. Several of them have been much ill treated, and shot at by the soldiers, even after the two days of plunder. It was the vulgar belief that the Franks had persuaded the Pasha to the adoption of European tactics.

The Wahabi war draws to a conclusion. The Pasha on quitting Arabia let his son Tousoun Pasha, at the head of his small army, in the northern parts of the country. In April last, during the time of my residence at Medina, Tousoun took possession of the province of Kasyne, a fertile district between Medina and Derayeh, the chief seat of the Wahabi; he fought there several battles with the Wahabi, in one of which Ibrahim Aga, his treasurer, the first officer of his court, was killed after a desperate resistance. This man, who was Governor of Medina during the latter part of my stay there, was a Scotchman, who had been taken at the battle of Rosetta, and who had turned Turk and was become the favourite of Tousoun Pasha, whose life he had once saved in an engagement with the Bedouins. His determined bravery, and faithful attachment to the cause of the Pasha would probably have procured him the rank of a Pasha of two tails, if he had had the good fortune to return to Egypt. Before he fell under the lances of the Wahabi he killed five of them with his own hand. The Chief of the Wahabi, Abdallah Ibn Saoud, was apprehensive that the repeated advantages gained by Tousoun Pasha might cause the principal of his adherents to join his enemy; he therefore commenced negotiations. In the month of June he paid a visit to Tousoun Pasha, and although the articles of peace were not ultimately settled during their conferences, yet little doubt was entertained when the last dispatches were sent off from Arabia that they would soon be concluded. Abdallah Ibn Saoud, in returning to Derayeh, left his own child, two of his brothers, and upwards of thirty of the principal Shikhs of Derayeh in the hands of Tousoun Pasha, as hostages for his good behaviour. Mohammed Aly demands from the Wahabi Chief an enormous sum in retribution of his pillaging the temple of the Prophet at Medina; he endeavours to prevail upon him to do hommage to the grand Signior for the possessions of the Wahabi in Arabia, but leaves him in the exercise of his new religion, provided he takes no further steps for propagating it.

Cairo, 8th February, 1816.

I have the honour of enclosing herewith the journal of my tour through Nubia, from Upper Egypt to Souakin and Djidda. It has been ready for some time, but the hope of the arrival of a slave caravan which is daily expected, had made me delay its dispatch, in order to be able to clear up some doubts from the testimony of these traders, whom I might have examined here with much more leisure and safety than I could do in their own country. The caravan however is not yet arrived, and as I wish this to reach you before the yearly meeting of the African Association, I send it off at present, reserving the additional remarks and notes for a future period. I am busy now in arranging my Arabian journals, which are more voluminous than the enclosed, because I found myself more at liberty, and much less observed at Mekka and Medina than I was in Soudan.

I am sorry to say that my hopes of departing from Cairo are not likely to be quickly realised. No Moggrebyn caravan has arrived, although the yearly epoch of its arrival in Egypt has long passed by. Almost out of patience myself, I am little able to intreat my employers not to lose theirs; but if my former labours have convinced them that I am averse from trusting my hopes to the chances of rash and ill-prepared measures they will also (I hope) have experienced that I am not likely to give up projects to which I have once pledged myself. My success must be the fruit of patience and caution, and I should be wanting in duty both to my employers and myself, as well as in the gratitude which I owe to providence for having hitherto bestowed success upon my patience, if I were now to lose it. I am far from feeling myself comfortable in Egypt, and every private motive engages me to wish for a speedy departure from this country.

Tousoun Pasha, left by his father Aly as governor of Arabia, concluded, in June, 1815, a treaty of peace with the Wahabi. The possession of the whole desert and the far greater part of the Bedouin tribes were given up to them, while the holy cities with their territories were acknowledged as dependencies of the Sultan. The Wahabi promised to put no obstacles in the way of the great pilgrim caravans. But it is contrary to the politics of Mohammed Aly to quell that war entirely, for he knows that as long as Arabia is in an unsettled state, and Mekka in danger, he becomes necessary to the Mussulman world in his governorship of Egypt, of which he might possibly be soon deprived if the Hedjaz was quiet; he has therefore refused to ratify the treaty, and his younger son, Ibrahim Pasha, is now proceeding to Arabia with a new armament of troops. The expenses of the war are covered by the income of Djidda and the great profits accruing to the Pasha from his monopolies in the trade of the Arabian coast. A lucky chance has put me in possession of very interesting papers concerning this Wahabi war, which together with the information I collected in the Hedjaz, will enable me to throw considerable light upon the whole Wahabi sect and their affairs.

For three successive years the plague has raged at Cairo, and great apprehensions are entertained of its return this spring. If it be so I shall neither imitate my Mussulman neighbours in taking no precaution whatever against its attacks, nor the Greeks and Franks who shut themselves up for three or four months in their houses as close prisoners; but I shall leave the infected borders of the Nile, and seek for refuge among the Bedouins. As I have at present completely recovered my health, which I principally ascribe to an excursion through the Delta, after my visit to Alexandria, I do not despair, provided my health keeps pace with my spirits for the next three or four years, to bring my labours to a successful completion.

I send this with a messenger to Alexandria, from whence it will be forwarded by Col. Missett. It has been my peculiar good fortune to have met in Syria and in Egypt with such men as Mr. Barker and Col. Missett. The latter is now on the point of retiring from office, for his infirmities increase rapidly, and the climate of Egypt is little calculated to remove them. His public and private virtues are such as will ever make him regretted by the Europeans of this country, whose zealous protector he has often been, in most trying circumstances, and to many a kind benefactor. I have known few men who treat and know Turks so well as he does. His rigid integrity, his accuracy in business, and his inflexible firmness, are the only checks which Mohammed Aly has experienced in his relations with European governments, for the other Consuls are under such great obligations to him that they never dare uphold their nation’s interests when they are in opposition to those of the Pasha. Nevertheless, the urbanity and generosity of the Colonel’s character conciliated the friendship of all the Turks who were known to him, and he departs sincerely regretted both by Egyptians and Europeans, but particularly by myself, who have always experienced from him the most friendly solicitude.

Cairo, 18th April, 1816.

I depart the day after to morrow for Mount Sinai. The plague has declared itself in this town, and all the Franks are shut up. I should not like to imitate them, and still less to expose myself to the infection. As the disorder is likely to spread among the villages on the Nile, I have thought that I could not do better than retire while it lasts to the Bedouins, who among their many advantages over the settled Arabs, enjoy a total exemption from the plague. I shall endeavour to push on as far as Akaba, and trace the direction of the eastern gulf of the Red Sea, which, as far as I know, has never been seen by European travellers.

Cairo, 1st July, 1816.

I acquainted you in a former letter with my intention to pass the time of the plague in the desert of Sinai. My return to Cairo was about the time when the infection usually ceases. From the convent of Mount Sinai I made an excursion towards the eastern gulf of the Red Sea, which I followed up nearly in its whole length, till I came within sight of Akaba (Elana, not Ezion Geber). Circumstances did not permit me to visit that spot itself, but I could see enough to trace the direction of the gulf as well as of the chains of mountains by which this part of Arabia is linked to Syria. The sea of Elana is much narrower than that of Suez. Close to the shore, on both sides, are high mountains; its main direction is more easterly than is generally laid down upon the maps. Bedouin of the Arabian coast navigate it, in open boats, in which they carry their cattle to the inhabitants of the peninsula for sale, and they fish for pearls in several parts of it. Excepting a small island, called El Deyr, not far west of Akaba, where some ruins are seen, no vestiges of ancient settlers, which could be attributed to the Israelites, fell under my observation. At Wady Fizan (one day and a half S. W. of the convent of Sinai), are some remains of small towns, of the date of the Lower Empire, erected at the time when the monastic order had spread over the whole peninsula, which appears to have contained at that time a great number of convents, forming an establishment much resembling that existing now at Mount Athos. The most interesting antiquities are the celebrated inscriptions of Wady Mekatteb, which have never been fully copied yet; and which are so numerous, that they would afford several days labour even to an experienced draughtsman. I have met with similar inscriptions in many other parts of the mountain, but invariably to the West of Djebel Mousa, which is a strong argument in favour of the belief, that the authors of them were pilgrims coming from Egypt; and not Israelite shepherds, as many have supposed. They evidently appear to be mere names, to which the sign [Digamma-like symbol] is always prefixed. I saw no inscriptions of more than a line or two; it appears that each pilgrim in passing wrote his name, and the inscribed rocks are constantly found on the side of the different great roads, leading from Suez to Djebel Sinai, usually near the resting places, which were chosen where some impending rock afforded shelter from the sun; and where the same convenience still induces travellers to halt. In the lower part of the mountains the inscriptions are cut in sand stone, in the higher upon granite; the characters have no depth, but upon granite even this would be a labour exceeding the strength and leisure of ordinary pilgrims. The want of water, especially about Wady Mekatteb, precludes the idea of an army having passed that way, the soldiers of which might have wished to perpetuate their names. Perhaps some of the drawings of animals, particularly those of camels and mountain goats, (in Arabic “Beden,” which are to this day very common in the mountain) may have been done by the Israelite shepherds; I saw similar drawings, without inscriptions, upon rocks not far from Akaba. Upon the whole these inscriptions appear to me to have a strong resemblance to some I have seen in Nubia, written in the ancient Egyptian current character; some letters at least appear to be common to both. My opinion is that they were the work of Egyptian Christians, or perhaps Jews, during the first centuries of our era. Besides those of Wad Mekatteb, the most numerous and well written, are those at the foot, on the declivity, and at the summit of Djebel Serbal, a high mountain, apparently the highest of the whole chain, situated S. W. b. W. from the convent about forty miles distant, and which, as far as I know, has not been ascended by any former traveller. Many circumstances indicate that its pointed summit was once the object of a pilgrimage. Artificial steps lead up to it, and the inscriptions about the top are innumerable. From what causes this mountain derived its sanctity, I could not learn, neither from the Arabs nor the priests of the convent, who were even ignorant of the ruins of a large convent, situated near the foot of Djebel Serbal.

A botanist would find a rich harvest in these high regions, in the most elevated parts of which, a variety of sweet scented herbs grow. The Bedouins collect to this day the manna, under the very same circumstances described in the books of Moses. Whenever the rains have been plentiful during the winter, it drops abundantly from the tamarisk (in Arabic Tarfa); a tree very common in the Syrian and Arabian deserts, but producing, as far as I know, no manna any where else. They gather it before sunrise, because if left in the sun it melts; its taste is very sweet, much resembling honey; they use it as we do sugar, principally in their dishes composed of flour. When purified over the fire, it keeps for many months; the quantity collected is inconsiderable, because it is exclusively the produce of the Tarfa, which tree is met with only in a few valleys at the foot of the highest granite chain. The inhabitants of the Peninsula, amounting to almost four thousand, complain of the want of rain and of pasturage; the state of the country must therefore be much altered from what it was in the time of Moses, when all the tribes of Beni Israel found food here for their cattle. About the highest part of the peninsula, springs and wells are in plenty; in the middle parts and near the shore water is scarce. The present inhabitants are a motley crowd of Bedouins from all quarters, Arabians, Syrians, Egyptians, Moggrebyns, united at present in three tribes, who are called masters of Sina, and who live like true Bedouins. They are in possession of several fruitful valleys where date trees grow, and where agriculture is practised by a minor set of Arabs, the descendants of Christian families, servants of the convents, who turned Mussulmans in the sixteenth century, and are no longer to be distinguished from their neighbours. To trace the route of the Israelites in this desert becomes very difficult, from the change which the proper names seem to have undergone. I could find very few watering places, whose names correspond with those in the Arabic version of the scriptures, although there are several principal valleys and watering places, which must have been in the time of Moses, as they are now, the main places of resort of the shepherds of this province. About half way from Ras Abou Mohammed to Akaba, lies Dahab. (Deuter. I. i.), an anchoring place, with date plantations, and several mounds of rubbish covering perhaps ancient Hebrew habitations; five hours north of Ras Abou Mohammed lies the harbour of Sherm, the only one on this coast frequented by large ships. In its neighbourhood are volcanic rocks; I could find no others of that description in any part of the Sinai deserts, although the Arabs as well as the priests of the convent, pretend that from the mountain of Om Shommar (about eight hours S. S. W. from Djebel Mousa), loud explosions are sometimes heard, accompanied with smoke. I visited that mountain, but searched in vain for any traces indicating a volcano. The library of the convent of Mount Sinai contains a vast number of Arabic MSS. and Greek books; the former are of little literary value; of the latter I brought away two beautiful Aldine editions, a Homer, and an Anthology. The priests would not show me their Arabic memorandum books, previous to the fifteenth century. From those I saw, I copied some very interesting documents concerning the former state of the country, and their quarrels with the Bedouins.

On my return to Cairo, on the 14th of June, Mr. Salt delivered to me a couple of pocket compasses, and a letter, to my address, which you had ordered to be forwarded to him. This letter was from my mother; and I can find no terms adequate to express my thanks for your kindness in informing my mother of my welfare, and of the satisfaction which my services have caused to my employers. Next to the desire of contenting the latter, that of contributing to the happiness of my mother is the most fervent I have in this world. So flattering a testimony as that which came from you, could not fail to excite in her heart very lively emotions, and has created in mine sentiments of lasting and heartfelt gratitude towards their authors.

I can still give you no hopes of my speedy departure from hence. The time has gone by when the Fezzan caravan might have arrived at Cairo, and I am left in a state of suspense in which I master with difficulty my impatience. My uneasiness encreases by the reflection that this prolonged stay in Egypt may be falsely interpreted in England, by those who do not know me personally. Yet I cannot prevail upon myself to take a false inconsiderate step; and however acute my feelings may be on that score, I will rather expose myself to the temporary imputation of a neglect of duty, than act with rashness and against my conviction. Futurity alone can shew whether I was worthy of the full confidence of my employers, or not. If, as it is said, the great Moggrebyn pilgrim caravan is to pass here on its way to Mekka in October, I may perhaps join it on its return, if no earlier occasion offers. I shall thus be enabled to reach Fezzan by a circuitous route. Of this I shall of course give the African Association further advice, if I should resolve upon it.

Mr. Salt I believe has already acquainted you with our project of conveying the fine granite head of the Memnonium to Alexandria, with the intention of sending it to England, and of offering it in our joint names to the British Museum. You know that beautiful specimen of Egyptian workmanship; the impression which it made upon you and your travelling companions in Upper Egypt, was the chief incitement to Mr. Salt, who had not yet seen it, to engage in the proposed scheme. Mr. Belzoni, a Roman, lately in the service of the Pasha, who is a good mechanician, has had proper machines made here for its transport, and is gone to Gorne to fetch it. Mr. Salt and myself have made a common purse to defray the expenses of the land and water carriage, &c. and have given Mr. Belzoni the necessary instructions. If we do not succeed, our intentions at least were too good to be laughed at, but should the head reach its destination, and become as it deserves to be, an object of general admiration, it will afford me infinite satisfaction to have been a promoter of this enterprize. The heads of the colossi, at Ebsambal (See my journal in Nubia.) bear a great likeness to this, with the difference that they are of sand stone. The expression of the face is the same; perhaps a little more gravity is perceived in those of Nubia, but the incomparable serenity, and godlike mildness are remarkable in both.

Cairo, October 15th, 1816.

I have the honour of transmitting to the Committee of the African Association some papers, forming part of the information obtained by me, during my journey through Arabia. They consist of, 1st. Some further fragments on the Bedouins of Arabia, in sequel to those forwarded on former occasions. 2nd. A history of the Wahabi, and principally of Mohammed Aly’s late campaign in the Hedjaz. 3rd. A few notes to my former journals.

The repeated notices I have transmitted concerning the Bedouins of Arabia, will show how much I am interested about them. I believe that very little of their real state is known in Europe, either because travellers have not sufficiently distinguished Bedouins from Arabs in general, or because they have attempted to describe them without having had the advantage of seeing them at leisure in their own tents, in the interior of the desert. Their nation is the original stock, from which Syria, Egypt, and Barbary derive their present population, and for this reason alone they deserve to be enquired into; but they acquire a still greater interest when we consider, that amidst the utter depravity of manners and morals, and the decline of laws and civil institutions throughout the Mohammedan world, the Bedouins are the only Eastern nation who have preserved unchanged their ancient customs, and the manners of their forefathers and who still continue to be what they were twelve hundred years ago, when their emigrating tribes conquered part of Asia, Africa, and Europe. I am aware that my description of the Bedouins is not calculated to be acceptable to the public in general, as it contains nothing but dry facts: my only object has been to fill up a vacuity in our knowledge of the East, and I flatter myself that those who are interested in obtaining a knowledge of this part of the world will not be displeased at what I have done.

You will forgive my having forwarded the papers in so imperfect a state. Although my general health is at present very good, my eyes are far from being as I wish them to be; and since my severe ophthalmic attacks in Upper Egypt, I have repeatedly suffered from them, and have lately had again a severe inflammation.

I see that Aly Bey el Abbasi has got the start of me in his description of Mekka, but I hope to be able to give some information in addition to his. I have lately had an opportunity of perusing his work; little as I like the style in which it is written and the pretensions of its author, yet I find it incumbent upon me to state, that after a minute examination of it, I find no reason to doubt the general veracity of Aly Bey; what he says of himself in Syria, Egypt, and the Hedjaz, I know to be true, although he has not always thought proper to state the whole truth. I could tell you many anecdotes to prove how little he imposed, with his almost utter ignorance of Arabic, upon the sharp-sighted natives of these countries; but he was perhaps to be excused in fancying that he did, as those who partook of his bounty would be the last to hint to him their real thoughts on this subject, and whether Bey or not, he was a Mussulman, and that was sufficient. His method of travelling was very injudicious; surrounded with so much pomp, it was almost impossible for him to make many interesting observations, for a Turkish grandee is never left alone, and his numerous dependents are spies upon all his actions. The plan which he gives of the mosque at Mekka is very correct; that of the town is much less so, as you will see by comparing it with that which accompanies my description of the city. All his views of Hedjaz and Syria are drawn from memory; that of Wady Muna is the only one slightly resembling the reality. He has made one very curious mistake, which is, that he persuades himself that he was at Mekka, when the Wahabi took possession of that town, an event which happened three years before his arrival there. I am indignant at his daring to question the veracity of Mr. Browne, (by whose side he is a mere pigmy,) upon so trivial a fact as that of the existence of carpets in one of the mosques of Cairo, where I actually saw carpets spread not longer ago than yesterday.

To advert to another more humble African adventurer,—I have lately seen the Quarterly Review of the Travels of Adams to Tombuctou, (which the Africans call Timbuctou,) but not the work itself. From what I have heard related in Egypt, and the Hedjaz, by several Felata Bedouins coming as Hadjis, from the neighbourhood of Timbuctou, by the way of Tunis, I believe that Adams’s description of that town is correct. One of them told me it was half as large as Cairo, and built of low mud houses, such I believe as are common all over Soudan. As to his river, I likewise heard that the Timbuctou river flows westward. The old story, that it is the same river with the Egyptian Nile was also repeated, which of course is in direct contradiction to the former supposition. The truth seems to be, that the ignorant Africans finding the two rivers to resemble each other, in size, in productions, and in the regularity of their inundation, conclude them to be the same. The name of La Mar Zarah, which he ascribes to the river of Timbuctou, I believe to be misspelt for Bahr El Ahmar El Sahára; (بحر الاحمر الصحرا) or the Red River of the Desert.[10] This epithet is perhaps applied to it in the same manner, as Abiadh, Azrak, Akhdar, “white, blue, green,” are given to the different branches of the Nile. La Mar Zarah is said to be of a muddy colour, and the Egyptians describe the Nile by the word Ahmar, at the time when it first begins to rise and to become muddy.

The names of the King and Queen of Timbuctou seem to shew that they are Mohammedans. Woolo seems to be Wouli, which in Arabic, means Governor or Ruler (والي), and is given to all their governors, and Fatima is evidently a Moslim name. That Adams did not see them pray, is no proof to the contrary; he might reside for months at Berber or Shendy without witnessing any sort of public worship. There are however some of his statements which struck me as quite impossible, and convinced me of his want of veracity, at least with regard to them. I can never believe that twenty-three persons travelling on foot, with women and children, can cross a waterless desert of thirty days journey, without any other supply of water than what was loaded upon four camels; nor again, that twenty eight persons could travel in the same manner, for twenty-nine days, with four camels only partly loaded with water. Such powers of abstinence, neither Arabs nor Nubians, nor their camels possess; every person who has travelled in a caravan of camels, will disbelieve such assertions. After eight days the water kept in the best Soudan water skins is partly evaporated, and the remainder, from the continual shaking, is reduced to a thick black mud, which extreme necessity alone can make one swallow. The best camels for transport, known in the countries which I have visited, are the Darfour breed. They are never longer than ten or twelve days on their road to Egypt, without water, and even in that journey many of them perish of thirst. The daily supply of one quart would afford little relief to an animal which when thirsty swallows fifty or sixty, and after several days thirst, one hundred pounds of water. Four camel loads of water would in North-eastern Africa, even among the Nubian merchants, who carefully reckon every pound weight to be loaded upon their camels, be thought a scanty allowance for twenty-eight persons, even if they were mounted on camels, for a journey of five or six days. It is not by a daily allowance of half a pint mixed with urine, that a pedestrian traveller in the sands of Africa can hope to support his strength, through the continued exertions of such a journey; nor shall I ever believe that the Moors are so much superior to the Nubians, although they may be rather stronger than Aly Bey el Abbassi, who was perishing with thirst in a desert of Barbary, of one day’s journey across, fainting at four P. M. after having drank at noon a large draught. Stories of long journeys without water are to be placed in the same class with those of hot winds, overwhelming sands, and the miraculous swiftness of camels, &c. &c. They all originate in the fancy of Bedouins, who at the expense of truth, thus indulge the curiosity of the inhabitants of the towns, gaping at the wonders of the desert. They can be contradicted only by the few who have actually crossed the deserts, while they will be constantly corroborated by those who draw their information only from bragging Arabians or Moors.

I am certain that you take a lively interest in the travels of the unfortunate Seetzen, who was poisoned five years ago in Yemen. His labours, I can assure you, have been very extensive, and conducted in a most enlightened manner. His intimate acquaintance with all branches of natural history was applied with indefatigable zeal to countries the most difficult of access, and he had many times nearly become a martyr to those pursuits, before he met with his ultimate fate. It has fallen to my lot to trace his footsteps, in many hitherto unknown parts of Syria and Arabia Petrӕa, and again in the Hedjaz; these, together with what I heard from the Europeans who knew him at Aleppo, Damascus, and Cairo, as well as from many Arabs on the road, have inspired me with as great a respect for his private character, as the dispersed memoirs of his researches already published, must give every reader for his literary acquirements. Although endowed with a lively fancy, and even with considerable poetical talents, he was a man of plain truth. If sometimes over fond of speculating upon the facts which he had collected, yet I am certain that in stating those facts, he observed the strictest adherence to truth, and I have not the smallest doubt, that if he had lived to publish the mass of knowledge which he had acquired during his travels, he would have far excelled all travellers, who ever wrote on the same countries. Mr. Salt has lately shewn me a letter which he received in 1811, from Mr. Rutland, then factor at Mokha, acquainting him with the death of Seetzen, which had just taken place, and making mention, at the same time, of several papers which he had left as a present to Mr. Rutland, who adds that as they are in German he cannot read them. As Mr. Seetzen would hardly have thought it worth while to make such a present to a person who could so little appreciate its value, I am much inclined to suspect they were only left in his hands as a deposit. Exact designs and descriptions of Mekka and other places, vocabularies of eighteen African languages, &c. are stated to be among the number. Seetzen’s friends at Cairo, according to the common practice of Levantines, amongst whom most of the pseudo Franks established in these parts must be classed, entirely forgot him as soon as he was beyond their threshold, and it thus happened that although his death took place as far back as September, 1811, in the vicinity of Mokha, where it was of public notoriety, and that although since the beginning of 1811, no news whatever had been heard of him at Cairo, yet nobody thought proper to write to Mokha, for further enquiry, and as late as July 1815, nothing was known here of his fate. I then received a letter from Mokha, giving some details of the death of Mr. Seetzen, which I forwarded immediately to Vienna, accompanying it with a letter of my own to Mr. Hammer, which he, without being authorized to it, abridged and published, together with the other paper.

An Italian physician of the name of Cervelli, now established as a merchant at Alexandria, made four years ago some interesting travels in the North of Africa; he was attached to the son of Yousef Pasha of Tripoli, in the capacity of physician, and his patron being sent by his father to reduce Fezzan, the chief of which had been dilatory in the payment of the tribute, Cervelli accompanied the Pasha’s son upon that expedition; they first went from Tripoli by land to Derne, near to which Mr. Cervelli saw the splendid ruins of Cyrene, at least what he supposed to be the remains of that town; they went from Derne to Augila, and from thence to Fezzan, where they remained about six weeks, and then returned over a chain of mountains, where he found snow, (for it was in winter,) by Sokhne to Tripoli.

He heard of two English travellers having been at Fezzan, of whom one died, and the other was never heard of after his departure for Soudan; the name of Hornemann was unknown to Mr. Cervelli. This gentleman, although not a man of letters, possesses natural talents, and a good deal of vivacity and good nature; he told me that he took many notes, that he has not yet drawn up a journal, but that he has some intention of publishing his travels: I never could get him to shew me any of his papers, but I know that he possesses some, together with a few sketches of drawings; as his time is now totally occupied by commercial pursuits, I doubt, whether he will ever have leisure to work up his journal, and therefore, being well persuaded of the interest which his tour would excite, I have done my best to get possession of his papers, and offered him a thousand piastres for them, under the formal promise that if ever they should be published, it should be under his own name. Since his departure for Alexandria, I have charged Mr. Thurburn, formerly secretary to Colonel Missett, and now a partner in the house of Briggs and Co. a gentleman of much information, to renew the negociation with Mr. Cervelli. He has lately informed me, that Mr. Cervelli refuses to part with his papers; but has promised to employ his evenings in arranging them, as he wishes to publish them himself.

I feel the greatest regret, in being obliged to inform you, in closing this letter, that I have no well founded hopes of being able to leave Egypt before next spring. It would be tedious to enter into all the disappointments I have experienced, by the non-arrival of the western caravan. If the Committee believes that I am not a trifler in my duty, they will not doubt that nothing but imperious circumstances could so long detain me at Cairo. If, on the contrary, my prolonged stay in this city should give rise to any doubts of the sincerity of my intentions, I feel that nothing that I could say on the subject could possibly remove them.

Cairo, 20th February, 1817.

By the present conveyance, I have the honour of transmitting to the Committee, my journals in the Hedjaz, together with some notices on the interior of Africa, and a translation from Macrizi, containing some documents on the history and geography of Nubia and the Nile countries; which may serve to illustrate my travels in Nubia.

You will be pleased to hear that the colossal head from Thebes has at last, after many difficulties, safely arrived at Alexandria. Mr. Belzoni, who offered himself to undertake this commission, has executed it with great spirit, intelligence, and perseverance. The head is waiting now at Alexandria for a proper conveyance to Malta. Mr. Salt and myself have borne the expenses jointly, and the trouble of the undertaking has devolved upon Mr. Belzoni, whose name I wish to be mentioned, if ever ours shall on this occasion, because he was actuated by public spirit fully as much as ourselves. The Committee need not be under any apprehension, that this transaction has caused my name to become of public notoriety in Egypt; which would certainly have been the case, if it had been known that I had a hand in the business, for during the fortnight the head remained at Boulak, the vessel was constantly crowded by swarms of visitors, of all classes. Nobody knows that I have had any thing to do with it. The Kahirines ascribe it entirely to Mr. Salt and Mr. Belzoni, who, they say, send it to England to have it taken to pieces, in order to find the invaluable jewel which it contains. The residence of the French Savans in Egypt has not taught them to form better notions, and the same kind of belief which caused the Shikh of Tedmor to resist my carrying off a small mutilated bust, found near the portico at Palmyra, still operates in every part of Egypt.

The peasants of Gourne reported to me, that the French had in vain endeavoured to carry off this head: and that they had even cut a hole in the lower part of the bust, to blow off part of the stone, and render it thus more transportable. I am ignorant for what reason they relinquished that scheme, but it is somewhat curious to find that in the drawing which they have given of that head, in their great work, they have represented it as it would probably have been, after the lower part should have been destroyed.

The discoveries of Mr. Belzoni in Upper Egypt, are too interesting not to deserve notice here. He has half cleared the temple of Ebsambal in Nubia, of the sands that obstructed it. The frontispiece of the temple, which has thus been discovered, is full of hieroglyphics; of the four colossi which stand before it, the face of one only (which I have mentioned in my journal), remains perfect; one of the three others has been reduced by mutilation to a mere lump of rock.

Behind Gourne[11] he has discovered a new tomb of the kings, about one mile distant from the most western “insulated tomb,” as the French laid it down in their map. He says it is beautiful, and larger than any of the others, with a sarcophagus in it. All the paintings are done upon a white stucco, adhering loosely to the wall, and thus easily to be removed.

By digging at Gourne, in the plain between the Memnonium, and Medinet Habou,[12] in a western direction from the two sitting colossi, about half a mile distant from them, he found a mutilated colossal head of granite, of much larger dimensions than the one he carried off, or any other at Thebes, being from ten to twelve feet across the front.

You remember the small pond, within the enclosure of the interior part of the temple of Karnak, towards the side of Luxor,[13] which encircles on three sides an elevated ground. A row of Andro-sphynxes, or whatever they may be called, stand there, which the French had dug up, and of which Mr. William Banks carried off last year the two best. In digging farther on in the line in which these statues stood, Mr. Belzoni has discovered eighteen others, of similar shape, but of much superior workmanship, all in beautiful preservation; he has brought down six of them to Mr. Salt, who had furnished him with money for the express purpose of procuring antiquities; besides the commission to carry off the head. By the side of these figures he has found another statue, of a hard, large grained sand stone: it is a whole length naked figure, sitting upon a chair, with a ram’s head upon the knees; the face and body entire; with plaited hair falling down to the shoulders. This is one of the finest, I should say the finest Egyptian statue I have seen; the expression of the face is exquisite, and I believe it to be a portrait. From the beautiful preservation of all these figures, which is so rare in Egypt, Mr. Belzoni argues, that the Egyptians used this place to hide their idols, when the Persians came to destroy them, and he hopes, in going up a second time to Thebes, to find at the same place other treasures. He has likewise found at Karnak, the four sided monument, with figures in high relief on three sides of it, of which the French talk so highly in their work, and of which they have given a drawing. But it was in quite a different place from that indicated by them, for Mr. Belzoni found it under ground far to the east of the adytum of Karnak. This, with a dozen of Sphinxes, he has been obliged to leave on the shore of the river near Karnak, the boat being already over loaded. The head alone weighs, I believe, from twelve to fifteen tons.

Mr. Belzoni, who is as enterprising as he is intelligent, high-minded, and disinterested, further informs us, that he has dug up the colossus, indicated by the French upon their map of Karnak, as laying on the N. W. side of the abovementioned pond, under the name of “Colosse renversé.” He has turned it up, and finds it to be a torso without head, or feet, about thirty feet in length, of beautiful workmanship; he says that he has seen nothing in Egypt, not even excepting our head, that can be compared to it, as it is a true imitation of nature, not done in the usual hard style, but according to the best rules of art.

If Mr. Belzoni had had a flat bottomed boat at his command, he is confident that he should have been able to float down one of the small obelisks of Philӕ, about twenty five feet in length. He handles masses of this kind with as much facility as others handle pebbles, and the Egyptians who see him a giant in figure, for he is six feet and a half high, believe him to be a sorcerer. Manual labour is so very cheap in Upper Egypt, that a little money goes a great way: the hire for a Fellah per day, is about four-pence; although upwards of one hundred Fellahs were occupied for many days with our head, and that we paid one hundred pounds for the boat only, and made a present to Mr. Belzoni, small indeed, but as much as our circumstances permitted, the total expense incurred by us, as far as Alexandria, does not amount to more than three hundred pounds, and Mr. Belzoni’s whole expedition, to about four hundred and fifty pounds. The Pasha of Egypt is luckily not yet aware of the value of these statues; if he was, he would probably imitate Wely Pasha of the Morea, and ask for passage money, for he extends his extortions over every article of Egyptian produce, and condescends even to farm out the trade of camel and sheep’s dung. Mr. Belzoni, who is known in England as a hydraulic engineer, and is married to an English woman, who has accompanied him to Egypt, entered last year the service of the Pasha, as a mechanic, but not being able to contend with the intrigues of a Turkish court, and too honourable to participate in them, he was dismissed as unfit for his business, and five months of pay still remain due to him. So much for the Pasha’s encouragement of European artists. They are enticed into his service by his emissaries in the Mediterranean, but are soon left to bewail their credulity.

You will find in the notes accompanying my translation of Macrizi, the account of some other very interesting discoveries, in the Eastern mountains of Upper Egypt; and last month, the old and so often visited pyramid of Djize was so well rummaged, that much curious new matter has come to light. Mr. Caviglia, an Italian, and Mr. Kabitch, a German, settled here, formed the project of exploring the well in the great pyramid. In the course of the operation, they have discovered that a continuation of the descending passage leads to a chamber under the centre of the pyramid, and they find that no other well descends into the passage.

I have been led to believe from various circumstances, that this new discovered continuation of the entrance passage was opened in the time of the Khalif who opened the pyramid, and that it has been choaked up ever since. If I am to believe Sherif Edrys, the author of a history of the Pyramids, a book, I believe, unknown in Europe, and which I have lately purchased here, the interior of the pyramid is full of passages and rooms, and several sarcophagi are yet to be discovered. This author wrote in the twelfth century, and himself minutely examined the pyramid.

I cannot dismiss the subject of Egyptian antiquities, without saying a word of Mr. Drovetti’s collection. It is certainly at present the finest of all those extant, in Italy, France, and England. There are few large statues, but great numbers of middle sized, and an innumerable series of idols, scarabees, medals, intaglios, and other articles illustrative of the religion and domestic life of the Egyptians, their dress, furniture, &c. &c. His rolls of papyrus are particularly valuable. He has ten quite entire, three of which are, I believe, the largest ever found in this country, together with a great number of smaller ones; and a large Coptic manuscript, written upon gazelle skin, found in the island of Omke, above the cataract of Wady Halfa. Many large specimens of Egyptian sculpture may yet be obtained, but it will be long before so complete a collection of smaller articles will be collected by one person. Mr. Drovetti has been for twelve years a person of great influence, and even power in Egypt; and his great object has been, to augment his collection, for which purpose he employed people in every part of the country. As it often happens in the Levant, with Europeans, long settled there, mercantile and pecuniary interests have at last got the better of his love for antiquity, and Mr. Drovetti having now turned corn-dealer, is desirous of converting his collection into cash. It would certainly be most desirable to have the collection in England. I believe that it has cost him about fifteen hundred pounds, and is certainly worth three or four times that sum in Europe.

I am in anxious expectation of a caravan for Lybia, and I have been long prepared to start at the shortest notice; I shall now leave Egypt with the more pleasure, because I shall not have to regret the abandoning of my journals in a rude state, which would have been the case if I had departed last year; for it will afford me no small consolation in my future travels, to think that whatever may be my fate, some fruit has been reaped from my pursuits, and that the Association is now in possession of several journals, containing new information upon very interesting countries.