ll this enterprise, donkey boys yell, and camels make
their unearthly cry, while I, who am mounted on a donkey, scarcely look
to the right or left, lest I go over "Abraham Lincoln's" head.

We have left the museum and are on the road leading to Cairo, the Champs
Elysee of this capital city. Tuesdays and Sundays the gay world is met
on this thoroughfare. We overlook the port of old Cairo to see all we
have described, besides dahabehis from Nubia and Soudan with goods and
passengers. The ferry passing between Bedrashen and old Cairo is full to
overflowing. Men, women, Bedouin negroes, asses, camels overburdened
with merchandise, cages of fowls, and fruit in kouffas; people
gesticulating and grumbling in an inconceivable manner--all this
confusion we pass through to reach our hotel to dream of our journey to
the pyramids the following day. Our dragoman secures an open carriage
that seats four persons, besides the coachman and himself on the
coachmen's seat. We are told that twenty years were consumed in building
the great pyramid, costing 600 talents (the Hebrew weight 94 lbs.) in
Hebrew money; 100,000 men were employed on the works, and were changed
every three months. They say nothing changes in the valley of the Nile;
the Fellah has always bent the spine to the stick. Lives innumerable
were sacrificed by the Pharaohs in building for themselves, and others,
tombs that time could not change, and where thieves could not break
through and steal. How all earthly plans are frustrated. Now the hidden
places of the pyramids are laid bare. The museum at Boulah contains the
mummied forms of the builders, and the entrances to their sepulchres
are open to bats and men. I did not ascend the pyramids farther than to
look into these excavations. This effort was most exhausting, even when
assisted by these athletic Arabs, and the demand for backsheesh was
overpowering. The sheik, under whose patronage these coolies work,
stands looking on without intervention until your dragoman is forced to
appeal to him to quell the disturbance, but we could see that he berated
those who were delinquent in making their demands good. The sphinx near
by can be reached either by camels, who stand in readiness to convey
you, or you can walk. We prefer the latter rather than to have another
bombardment for backsheesh, but waiving, as we did, all assistance but
our dragoman, we were followed by these wretched persecutors. There is
in this colossal figure a