e. We lived for eleven days on melons and water,
besides being momentarily exposed to the musketry of the Arabs and the
fellahs. We luckily escaped with but a few killed and wounded. The
rising of the Nile was only beginning. The shallowness of the river near
Cairo obliged us to leave the xebec and get on board a djerm. We reached
Gizeh at three in the afternoon of the 23d of July.

When I saluted the General, whom I had not seen for twelve days, he thus
addressed me: "So you are here, are you? Do you know that you have all
of you been the cause of my not following up the battle of Chebreisse?
It was to save you, Monge, Berthollet, and the others on board the
flotilla that I hurried the movement of my left upon the Nile before my
right had turned Chebreisse. But for that, not a single Mameluke would
have escaped."

"I thank you for my own part," replied I; "but in conscience could you
have abandoned us, after taking away our horses, and making us go on
board the xebec, whether we would or not?" He laughed, and then told me
how sorry he was for the wound of Sucy, and the death of many useful men,
whose places could not possibly be filled up.

He made me write a letter to his brother Louis, informing him that he had
gained a complete victory over the Mamelukes at Embabeh, opposite Boulac,
and that the enemy's loss was 2000 men killed and wounded, 40 guns, and a
great number of horses.

The occupation of Cairo was the immediate consequence of the victory of
Embabeh. Bonaparte established his head-quarters in the home of Elfy
Bey, in the great square of Ezbekye'h.

The march of the French army to Cairo was attended by an uninterrupted
succession of combats and victories. We had won the battles of
Rahmahanie'h, Chebreisse, and the Pyramids. The Mamelukes were defeated,
and their chief, Mourad Bey, was obliged to fly into Upper Egypt.
Bonaparte found no obstacle to oppose his entrance into the capital of
Egypt, after a campaign of only twenty days.

No conqueror, perhaps, ever enjoyed a victory so much as Bonaparte, and
yet no one was ever less inclined to abuse his triumphs.

We entered Cairo on the 24th of July, and the General-in-Chief
immediately directed his attention to the civil and military organization
of the country. Only those who saw him in the vigour of his youth can
form an idea of his extraordinary intelligence and activity. Nothing
escaped his observation. Egypt had long been the object of his study;
a