heir accounts to have fallen short of the reality. At
the time of the Persian invasion under Cambyses, Memphis had supplanted
Thebes; and the Ptolemys afterwards removed the seat of empire to
Alexandria. At present, its site presents only a few scattered villages,
consisting of miserable cottages built in the courts of the temples. The
ancient structures, however, remain in a state of wonderful
preservation. Almost the whole extent of eight miles along the river is
covered with magnificent portals, obelisks decorated with most beautiful
sculptures, forests of columns, and long avenues of sphynxes and
colossal statues. The most remarkable monuments, the ruins of which
remain, are the temples of Carnac, Luxor, the Memnonium or temple of
Memnon, and the temple of Medinet Abu. The tomb of Osymandyas, the
temple of Iris, the Labyrinth, and the Catacombs lie on the western
side of the Nile. In the interior of the mountains which rise behind
these monuments, are found objects less imposing and magnificent indeed,
but not less interesting--the tombs of the kings of Thebes. Several of
these were opened by Belzoni, and were found in great preservation, with
mummies in the sarcophagi, as well as dispersed through the chambers.

Such was ancient Thebes--a city so populous that, according to ancient
writers, in times of war 10,000 soldiers issued from each of her hundred
gates, forming an army of 1,000,000 men. That these magnificent ruins
are the remains of "the city of an hundred gates,"--"the earliest
capital in the world," cannot be doubted. According to the measurements
made by the French, their distance from the sea on the north, is 680,000
metres (850 miles), and from Elephantine on the south, 180,000 metres
(225 miles)--corresponding exactly with the 6,800 and 1,800 stadia of
Herodotus. The circumference of the ruins is about 15,000 metres (171/2
miles), agreeing with the 140 stadia given by Diodorus as the
circumference of Thebes. The origin of the name of this celebrated city,
as well as the date of its foundation, is unknown. According to
Champollion, who deciphered many of the inscriptions on these ruins, the
Egyptian name was _Thbaki-antepi-Amoun_ (City of the Most High), of
which the _No-Ammon_ of the Hebrews and _Diospolis_ of the Greeks are
mere translations; _Thebae_, of the Greeks is also perhaps derived from
the Egyptian _Thbaki_ (the city).

THE TEMPLE OF CARNAC.

The largest of the temples of Thebes, a