ome of the stones are more than a yard high. It is estimated that
this mighty monument, which Abraham may have looked upon, contains
enough stone to build a wall around the frontier of France. Of the Seven
Wonders of the World, the Pyramid of Cheops alone remains. The other
attractions here are the Granite Temple, and some tombs, from one of
which a jackal ran away as we were approaching. I got back to Cairo
after dark, and took the eight o'clock train for Assouan.

This place is about seven hundred miles from Port Said by rail, and is
a good sized town. The main street, fronting the river, presents
a pleasing appearance with its hotels, Cook's tourist office, the
postoffice, and other buildings. Gas and electricity are used for
lighting, and the dust in the streets is laid by a real street
sprinkler, and not by throwing the water on from a leathern bag, as I
saw it in Damascus. The Cataract Hotel is a large place for tourists,
with a capacity of three hundred and fifty people. The Savoy Hotel is
beautifully located on Elephantine Island, in front of the town. To
the south of the town lie the ancient granite quarries of Syene, which
furnished the Egyptian workmen building material so long ago, and still
lack a great deal of being exhausted. I saw an obelisk lying here which
is said to be ninety-two feet long and ten and a half feet wide in the
broadest part, but both ends of it were covered. In this section there
is an English cemetery inclosed by a wall, and several tombs of the
natives, those of the sheiks being prominent.

Farther to the south is a great modern work, the Nile dam, a mile and a
quarter long, and built of solid masonry. In the deepest place it is one
hundred feet high, and the thickness at the bottom is eighty-eight feet.
It was begun in 1899, and at one time upwards of ten thousand men were
employed on the works. It seemed to be finished when I was there, but a
few workmen were still engaged about the place. The total cost has been
estimated at a sum probably exceeding ten millions of dollars. There are
one hundred and eighty sluices to regulate the out-flow of the water,
which is collected to a height of sixty-five feet during the inundation
of the Nile. The dam would have been made higher, but by so doing Philae
Island, a short distance up the river, would have been submerged.

The remains on this island are so well preserved that it is almost a
misnomer to call them ruins. The little island is onl