ated Egypt under the present
government more than all the pillage and massacres and internal feuds of
the followers of the Mameluke Beys.

On those numerous occasions when the carpenter had nothing else to do,
he used to come and talk to me; and endeavour to count up, upon his
fingers, how often he had "_eat stick_;" that is, had been beaten by one
Turkish officer or another for his inability to pay the tax to the
Pasha, the tooth-money to some kawass, the forced contribution to the
Nazir, or some other expected or unexpected call upon his empty
pocket,--an appendage to his dress, by the by, which he did not possess;
for having nothing in the world to put in it, a pocket was clearly of no
use to him. The carpenter related to me the history of the ruined Coptic
monastery; and I found that its library was still in existence. It was
carefully concealed from the Mahomedans, as a sacred treasure; and my
friend the carpenter was the guardian of the volumes belonging to his
fallen church. After some persuasion he agreed, in consideration of my
being a Christian, to let me see them; but he said I must go to the
place where they were concealed at night, in order that no one might
follow our steps; and he further stipulated that none of the Mahomedan
servants should accompany us, but that I should go alone with him. I
agreed to all this; and on the appointed night I sallied forth with the
carpenter after dark. There were not many stars visible; and we had only
just light enough to see our way across the plain of Thebes, or rather
among the low hills and narrow valleys above the plain, which are so
entirely honeycombed with ancient tombs and mummy pits that they
resemble a rabbit warren on a large scale. Skulls and bones were strewed
on our path; and often at the mouths of tombs the night wind would raise
up fragments of the bandages which the sacrilegious hand of the Frankish
spoilers of the dead had torn from the bodies of the Egyptian mummies in
search of the scarabaei, amulets, and ornaments which are found upon the
breast of the deceased subjects of the Pharaohs.

Away we went stumbling over ruins, and escaping narrowly the fate of
those who descend into the tomb before their time. Sometimes we heard a
howl, which the carpenter said came from a hyena, prowling like
ourselves among the graves, though on a very different errand. We kept
on our way, by many a dark ruin and yawning cave, breaking our shins
against the fallen sto