and its walls, carefully repaired
by successive ages, were still intact at the beginning of this century.
They described at this time a rough quadrilateral, the two longer sides
of which measured some 1900 feet in length, the two shorter being about
one-fourth less. The southern face was constructed in a fashion common
in brick buildings in Egypt, being divided into alternate panels of
horizontally laid courses, and those in which the courses were concave;
on the north and west facades the bricks were so laid as to present
an undulating arrangement running uninterruptedly from one end to the
other. The walls are 33 feet thick, and their average height 27 feet;
broad and easy steps lead to the foot-walk on the top. The gates are
unsymmetrically placed, there being one on the north, east, and west
sides respectively; while the southern side is left without an opening.
These walls afforded protection to a dense but unequally distributed
population, the bulk of which was housed towards the north and west
sides, where the remains of an immense number of dwellings may still
be seen. The temples were crowded together in a small square enclosure,
concentric with the walls of the enceinte, and the principal sanctuary
was dedicated to Nekhabit, the vulture goddess, who gave her name to the
city.* This enclosure formed a kind of citadel, where the garrison could
hold out when the outer part had fallen into the enemy's hands. The
times were troublous; the open country was repeatedly wasted by war, and
the peasantry had more than once to seek shelter behind the protecting
ramparts of the town, leaving their lands to lie fallow.

* A part of the latter temple, that which had been rebuilt
in the Saite epoch, was still standing at the beginning of
the XIXth century, with columns bearing the cartouches of
Hakori; it was destroyed about the year 1825, and
Champollion found only the foundations of the walls.

[Illustration: 119.jpg THE RUINS OF THE PYRAMID OF QULAH, NEAR
MOHAMMERIEH]

Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a photograph by Emil Brugsch-
Bey.

Famine constantly resulted from these disturbances, and it taxed all the
powers of the ruling prince to provide at such times for his people. A
chief of the Commissariat, Bebi by name, who lived about this period,
gives us a lengthy account of the number of loaves, oxen, goats, and
pigs, which he allowed to all the inhabitants both great and little,
down