passage is itself hardly credible, and we transcribe it here:

"When Hecateus of Miletus was at Thebes, about 500 B. C., he spoke, as Herodotus tells us, to the priests of Amun, of his genealogy, declaring himself to be the sixteenth in descent from a god. Upon this, the priests conducted him into a great building of the temple, where they pointed out to him (as afterwards to Herodotus) the statues of their priests. Each high priest placed a colossal wooden statue of himself in this place during his life, and each was the son of his predecessor. The priests would not admit that any of these was the son of a god. From first to last they were of human origin; and here, in direct lineal succession, were 345. Taking the average length of human life, how many thousand years would be occupied by the succession? 345 high priests, in a direct line from father to son! According to the priests, it was nearly 5,000 years from the time of Horus. They further informed Herodotus that gods did reign in Egypt, before they deputed their power to mortals. They spoke of eight gods, who reigned first-among whom was one answering to Pan of the Greeks; then came twelve of another series; and again twelve more, the offspring of the second series and of these Osiris was one; and it was not till after the reign of his son Horus, that the first of these 345 high priests came into power. From Osiris to king Amasis, the priests reckoned 15,000 years, declaring that they had exact registers of the successive lives which had filled up the time. Such is the legendary history, as it existed 500 years before Christ. We can gather from it thus much- - that the priests then looked back upon a long reach of time, and believed the art of registering to be of an old date."

We are certainly amused and surprised, that an intelligent lady could place the slightest reliance on this "exalted fable; or regard it in any other light than one of the African "night's entertainment." Priests generally live long. It is a rule in all countries. Their supplies are tolerably sure. Their avocations are often light. They have placid minds, free from care, above anxiety, and removed from the strugglings of ordinary existence. There were 345 colossal wooden statues, representing 345 successive priests, who were all fathers, and who, upon an average, must have lived for fifty years, because each priest was succeeded by his son, who must have attained the years of manhood before his father's death in each case; for we are bound to suppose that boys were not inaugur ated into the priesthood, and certainly were not made "high priests." The number of colossal wooden statues (345) multiplied by

Herod. ii. 143. Herod. ii. 145.

+ Herod. ii. 144, 146.

the average duration of 50 years for each life, gives a period of 17,250 years preceding the date assigned for the visit of Hecatæus of Miletus to Thebes, which is said to have occurred 2,300 years before the present day. We have thus a period of 18,550 years that the world has existed, and men have lived in an organized state; lived in cities, with a large temple, and employing gravers in wood, who could produce colossal statues of that material; but we are led to believe that men existed in simpler circumstances, ere they erected cities, before they built temples, consecrated high priests, and engraved in wood. This prefatory period may be taken, on a modest assumption, at 1,000 years; and thus we reach a period of 20,550 years that the world has existed. We are living, according to this wooden chronology, anno mundi 20,550 at the very least, or perhaps we should say anno hominis; for, as to the world, nobody pretends to guess now when it may have been created; but 20,550 years would be far too modern insultingly modern for its present pretensions. Three or four pages farther on, the tourist most unconsciously gives this pretty theory, derived from wooden blocks, a heavy blow, when she says, page 154:

"When the Pyramids were built, it was a thousand years before Abraham was born, and the plain of Thebes still lay bare.”

And if it still lay bare, what are the 345 generations of high priests, whose colossal wooden statues were placed in its great temple only 2,300 years since? We can form a very accurate calculation of the date of Abraham's birth, because, since his time, there has been a genealogical tree preserved. The patriarch is within the range of recorded and written history; and Miss Martineau will surely admit that the Bible is a tolerably accurate historical work, from the days of Abraham; preferable even to Herodotus.

This authoress is very much indisposed to believe in miracles. She is hard to convince on these topics. That is the characteristic of one modern school. It consists of most talented and amiable persons, who, nevertheless, are wise in their own conceit; and then we know the consequence. They compensate for stiffness of belief in one particular, by the most absurd credulity in others. They differ from mankind in general quite as much in their readiness to believe, as in their proneness to doubt. The fiction of the priests that we have quoted involves a long succession of surprising miracles. We are told to believe, in the first place, that colossal wooden statues

could be preserved in the atmosphere of Egypt for some fifteen thousand years; and we are not inclined to believe that statement. This, however, is only one miracle. There is something more wonderful still in the fact, that three hundred and forty-five men, descending in ordinary generations, lived each to middle years, without any break, and had each a son competent to occupy the office of high priest, and therefore arrived at mature years before his father's death. The miraculous nature of this wonderful line of fathers and sons exceeds any other wonder that men have been expected to believe during the existence of romance. We may be reminded that the tourist does not want her readers to believe the story; for she says, "we can gather from it thus much that the priests then looked back upon a long reach of time, and believed the act of registering to be of an old date." We could have gathered that fact from many other circumstances which occurred five centuries before the Christian era; and we were not under the necessity of resorting to a monstrous fiction, in order to pick up this information. But we cannot exactly permit this apology for the introduction of the fable to pass, because it stands in the position of evidence to a sweeping assertion. We shall quote the sentences immediately preceding the extract regarding the colossal wooden

statues :

"For our first glimpse into ancient Egyptian life we must go back upon the track of time, far farther than we have been accustomed to suppose that track to extend. People who had believed all their lives that the globe and man were created together, were startled when the science of geology revealed to them the great fact, that man is a comparatively new creation on the earth, whose oceans, and swamps, and jungles, were aforetime inhabited by monsters, never seen by human eye but in their fossil remains. People who enter Egypt, with the belief that the human race has existed only six thousand years, and that, at that date, the world was uninhabited by men, except within a small circuit in Asia, must undergo a somewhat similar revolution of ideas. All new research operates to remove further back the date of the formation of the Egyptian empire. The differences between the dates given by legendary records and by modern research (with the help of contemporary history) are very great; but the one agrees as little as the other with the popular notion that the human race is only six thousand years old."

We may observe, that the popular notion on this subject is also the scriptural notion, and the fabulous narrative of the priests of Amun, which follows immediately after this statement in vol. i., at page 150, as we have copied it in a preceding page, is hardly

| strong enough to overthrow this belief. The scripture history of the creation carries the views taken by Dr. Chalmers, and by other theologians, on geology; but it will not bear this new view, that men have existed on the earth for a much longer period than six thousand years.

Scripture and science, as far as science is applicable to chronology, before the birth of Abraham, and the foundation of Thebes, very distinctly contradict this statement, which Miss Martineau supports by the fabulous history of three hundred and forty-five wooden blocks! At any rate, the favorite tradition of Ireland, that Pharaoh's daughter came into that island, introducing at once the civilization and the learning of Egypt, is far more rational than Miss Martineau's opinion regarding the antiquity of the Egyptians, which squares more precisely with those ascribed to Chinese doctors, than to the views of intelligent persons in modern times. There can be no doubt whatever that the Celtic nations preserved, in their wanderings westward, more of the oriental customs than any of the other races by whom Europe has been peopled; and we believe that the Celtic Irish, and their relatives in Scotland, have maintained for a much longer period the observances of the East, than any other members of the great Celtic family, located in different European kingdoms. Even their festivals, now fast wearing out, had an oriental origin and significance. The scholar and the traveller had little difficulty in tracing the traditions and the worship of ancient Asia in the festivals and observances of modern Europe, in some of its most neglected districts. The similarity of the original funereal dirge amongst the Egyptians and the original Irish, is only one of the very many evidences to our common origin. The progress of Christianity, of civilization, is obliterating many of those proofs that existed in the community and affinity of manners and customs observed amongst nations far removed from each other, and between whom there could have been no intercourse for many centuries. The Irish funereal wail- the wakes for the dead- and even the attendance of female mourners on funerals, are customs that are fading fast before the increased intercourse of the people with Britain, and their slow but gradual imitation of British practices.

We regret that there should be painful characteristics in common, not only between the ancient, but also between the modern Irish and the modern Egyptians. We have already quoted the rate of wages paid to the Egyptian laborers in Ibrahim Pasha's sugar factories; and we notice, by some of the Irish provincial

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journals, that men have, during the present harvest, offered to engage themselves for twopence, and even for one penny per day and their food. This lamentable statement accouuts for a considerable portion of the keen discontent prevalent in the southern districts of Ireland. Egypt is still a densely peopled country, although the exactions and military discipline of Mehemet Ali have reduced, rather than increased the number of its inhabitants. On their way to the caves of Djebel, the tourists felt that they had never seen so rich an expanse of country”: –

66

“The rich green, spreading on either hand to the horizon, was prairie-like; but I never was, in Illinois, on a height which commanded one hundred miles of unbroken fertility such as I now saw. And even in Illinois, in the finest season, there is never such an atmosphere as here gave positive brilliancy to every feature of the scenery. A perfect level of the most vivid green extended north and south, till it was lost in haze, but from the mere inability of the eye to take in more; and through this wound away, from end to end, the full blue river. To the east, facing us, was the varied line of the Arabian hills, of a soft lilac tint; seventeen vil lages, overshadowed by dark palms, were set down beside the river, or some little way into the land; and the plain was dotted with Arab huntsmen and their camels, here and there, as far as the eye could reach. Below us lay the town, with its brown, flat roofed houses, relieved by the palms of its gardens, and two or three white cupolas, and fourteen minarets, of various heights and forms. Between it and us lay the causeway, enlivened by groups of Arabs, with their asses and camels, appearing and disappearing amidst the thickets of acacia which bordered it. Behind all lay the brilliant Djebel with its glowing yellow lights and soft blue shadows. The whole scene looked to my eyes as gay as the rainbow, and as soft as the dawn. As I stood before the cave, I thought nothing could be more beautiful; but one section of it looked yet lovelier when seen through the lofty dark portal of an upper cave. But there is no conveying such an impression as that."

The descriptive passages in this work form its most valuable pages. The facts that come directly under the writer's eye are carefully noted; and then we need not say that the descriptions are drawn forcibly and clearly. No other writer brings out more distinctly the leading features of landscape-the singularities of manner and custom, and all those facts that a reader wants to know regarding places and people out of his or her circle. Those casual commentaries that form often the best parts of similar works, on existing life and institutions, are done in a kind and approving spirit. They are often valuable. It is in the mist of antiquity, or the mazes of speculative

inquiry; that Miss Martineau wanders astray. There is no lady more competent to draw the world as it is; but often the cleverest people misapprehend their own powers-often those who rise up to reprove bigotry in others hug it closely in their own breasts; and those who profess to be before their age in intellect, and too acute to be cheated into the belief of anything without the range of their senses, and, they say, inconsistent with their reason although the proper term would be incomprehensible to their reason - are often not only extremely credulous themselves, but, from lamentable and ludicrous credulity in others. their position, to a great extent the cause of

ess.

as

That is the unfortunate case with this authorNo writer could carry from the East more lively representations of men, and scenes, and facts as they exist to be seen by any traveller. Very few writers bring keener perception to bear upon the characters and habits of the living generations in the countries that she has visited. If her work were confined to

these departments, it would form one and a half volume of the richest reading that we have on Egypt and the East. These are the departments where Miss Martineau excels, and we believe they are those that she undervalues. We have the utmost respect for the talent and genius of the many females whose works shed a lustre on our literature and language; but they do not appear to find in abstract inquiries that field best suited for their peculiar powers. This is, however, the field that Miss Martineau is most desirous to occupy. She has all the tendency towards it Like the great theologian of another century, that is naturally felt for forbidden ground. Harvey, she loves to meditate amongst the tombs; and there she is sure to lose her way. Amongst the tombs of the past, or the cradles of the future, she delights to linger, until the dim spirits of the scenery throw their glamor over her intellect, and she is found hazarding the strangest guesses, or making the most unlikely prophecies, and supporting them with evidence-courteously, it may be so termed - totally inapplicable, or perhaps entirely alien from the subject in hand. Thus, at page 58, volume 1st:

"In the pits of these caves were the mummies lying when Cambyses was busy at Thebes, overthrowing the Colossus in the plain."

It may be so. The mummies may have been there then. We cannot prove that they were then the bodies of active living beings, or that they had not then come into existence; but we might say more for either view than could be reasonably said against it. There is

no satisfactory evidence on the subject for either supposition, and happily its absence is of no importance; but here is a statement made, calculated to affect the great argument of the work respecting the antiquity of the ancient Egyptians, without the slightest support in testimony, or in reasoning. There are many similar blemishes.

The travellers first saw Thebes upon the shortest day; and their admiration of this metropolis in ruins, was enthusiastic. Its antiquity pleased the tourists. Referring to the Trojan war, world-celebrated through all time in Homer's poem, she says:

"And at the time of these wars, this Thebes was a city of a thousand years, and these battle pictures now before our eyes were antiquities, as our cathedrals are to us. Here we are standing before one of the hundred gates through which Homer says the Theban warriors passed in and out; and on the flanks of this gateway were sculptured the achievements of the ancestors of

these warriors."

It is quite clear that Miss Martineau believes in the hundred gates as a literal, accurate, arithmetical statement! She will not allow a poet the benefit of figurative language- -a hundred to signify "many"- - unless he be a Scriptural poet; and historians to whom she imputes figurative language, and where numbers are concerned, figurative language alone. Still it is curious, that even at Thebes, probably enough the oldest ruins in the world, the traveller or the scholar meets nothing to support the idea that the race of men are more ancient than the Scriptures say. The party did not remain long at Thebes, while ascending the river, but they examined the ruins more minutely on their downward voyage. They passed Christmas-day at Aswán, on the frontier between Egypt and Nubia, opposite to the island of Elephantine - "half rubbish, half verdure." They were thus enabled to eat their Christmas dinner at the first cataract, and there, they tell us, their Christmas morning was like a July morning in England. But then the legacy of vermin was before them. The plagues of Egypt have not yet spent their force. Begging is a prevalent vice of the modern Egyptians, even when charity is unnecessary, and the whining "boksheesh" is hopeless. We wonder that this fact did not strike the tourists as another coincidence between Egypt and Ireland. Aswán abounds not less in beggars, than Irish country towns were wont to do when a conveyance of any description was stopped to change horses. They emerged in clouds from every lane, and when the conveyance was either a car or a carriage, it was absolutely surprising by what

means they gained a knowledge so rapidly of its arrival. This vice in Irish travelling is passing fast away. The Poor-law is drying up the practice of bestowing promiscuous charity. It need not, therefore, lessen real benevolence; but ere many years pass, that law will materially change Irish habits. There was something to be seen, however, at Aswán, and all the Egyptian towns, that has not been known in Ireland for centuries. With all its misery, Ireland is less stained by the gains of slave-holding than any other European country. Slaveholding is not an Irish crime:

"The bazaars looked poor; and I believe the traffic is chiefly carried on elsewhere. We saw two slave bazaars. One was an enclosure on the rising ground above our boat. The slaves here were only five or six, and all children-all under sixteen years of age. They were intelligent and cheerful looking; and I recognized, at the first glance, the likeness to the old Egyptian countenance and costume. The girls had their faces uncovered, and their hair in the Ethiopian fashion-precisely that which we see in the old sculptures and paintings. One little girl was preparing the pottage for their supper, very cleverly and earnestly. She was said to be fif teen, and £15 was the sum asked for her. The other bazaar was on the outskirts of the town, and near our boat. It contained, when we saw it on our return, a dozen boys, and about fifteen girls. Most of the girls were grinding millet cakes. They were freshly oiled, in good plight, between two stones, or kneading and baking and very intelligent looking, for the most part. Some of them were really pretty in their way— in the old Egyptian way. They appeared cheerful and at home in their business; and there can scarcely be a stronger contrast, than between this slave market and those I have seen in the United States. The contrast is as strong as between the serfdom of the Egyptian, and the freedom of the tries; and, of course, the first aspect of slavery American inhabitants of the respective counis infinitely less repulsive in Egypt than in America. What I learned, and may have to tell, of the life of the modern Egyptians, proves, however, that the institution is no more defensible here than elsewhere.”

Miss Martineau has been in the desert, and she never has been lost in a good snow storm on a Scottish muir or mountain; for she says:

"I thought of poor Hagar here, and seemed to feel her story for the first time. I thought of Scotch shepherds lost in the snow, and of their mild case, in comparison with that of Arab goatherds in the desert."

We quote an instance of this lady's solid good sense on all matters that come directly under her perception. If she could only be kept out of dreams, and the folly of supposing herself called upon to rectify the world's views

on things too great for her, there would be few more useful writers, and apparently not many more careful housewives :

"The next morning I rose early to damp and fold linen, and I was ironing till dinner time, that we might carry our sheets and towels in the best condition to the Kaudja. No one would laugh at or despise this who knew the importance, in hot countries, of the condition of linen; and none who have not tried can judge of the difference in comfort of ironed linen and that which is rough dried. * If any lady going up the Nile should be so happy as to be able to iron, I should strongly advise her putting up a pair of flat-irons among her baggage. If she can also starch, it will add much to her comfort, and that of her party, at little cost of time and trouble."

*

Miss Martineau thinks highly of the Americans in this respect, and says:

"I always thought in America, and I always shall think, that the finest specimens of human development I have seen are in the United States, where every man, however learned and meditative, can ride, drive, keep his own horse, and roof his own dwelling; and every woman, however intellectual, can do, if necessary, all the

work of her own house."

Physiologists hold the Americans to be an inferior specimen of human development; and notwithstanding the determination of this lady not to be convinced otherwise, there is no doubt of their statement, although, in subsequent ages, as the soil may be cleared, it may qualified.

be

The travellers nearly met a fatal accident at the Cataracts. After reaching the top, the rope broke, and their boat was carried back by the weight of water, but they were safely extricated.

The Nubians greatly interested the tourists, and earned their good opinion as an industrious elass, fighting for a living with the desert; but they were in Nubia only for five or six days.

We have remarked already that a large portion of the three volumes is occupied with learned discussions and dissertations, which can only be given in them, on the authority of more learned investigators than the authoress, so far as they are of material value; and when they degenerate into speculation, they are utterly valueless. This lady insists upon our believing that, generally, the numbers stated in Scripture are fause; and she takes so much from the Bible in that and other ways, that it would be wiser and preferable to reject it entirely. The enthusiasm of their visitor for the tombs, the pyramids, and the ruins of Egypt, leads her into errors unpardonable in a critic of high pretensions. In reference to the monumental records, she says, page 179, vol. i.:

"While we take to heart the terrible loss [of the written records], let us take to heart also the

value of the resource, and search for the charm which may remove the spell of dumbness from these eloquent old teachers."

We cannot see how their eloquence can be thus vouched for, while they remain dumb; and there is a bad taste in thus associating together dumbness and eloquence. At another page (188), while recording her joy that the priests said there were forty-seven tombs in some one place, the authoress adds

"Whose will be the honor of laying them open? not in the Cambyses' spirit of rapine, but in all honor and reverence, in search of treasures which neither moth nor rust can corrupt, nor thieves carry away."

Literally, thieves have been very much in the habit of carrying away monumental treasures and works of art from Egypt, as from other conquered or deserted lands: but we think it better not to apply those ideas to ancient sculpture that are used to express sacred objects, on which, so far as they accord with her opinions, the writer places great value. Strange folly it is to believe implicitly the chisel of an unknown cutter of tombstones, and refuse to believe records preserved with the utmost care through every generation!

Immediately afterwards we have the following announcement :

How came the authoress to know that Manetho "did fully tell" those things that she describes, since but "a few unconnected declarations have reached us?" Miss Martineau, notwithstanding her hatred of what she calls superstition, when evinced by her own countrymen and countrywomen, narrowly escaped actual idolatry in her own person, though she considers that error scarcely so culpable as "bibliolatry" or bible loving, reverencing "the entire bible." Speaking of the Egyptian statues, she says:

for their having been once worshipped, but to "The difficulty to us now is, not to account help worshipping them still."

The difficulty of patiently reading through large portions of this work is at least extreme. Moses is one of the characters admired by Miss Martineau, and yet, according to her judgment,