and is said to be supported by five hundred granite pillars. The number of it's inhabitants is stated to be 50,000. Cabes, or Gabs, is situated near the South Eastern extremity of the kingdom, on the shores of the Little Syrtis, or Gulf of Cabes as it is now usually called: it occupies the site of the ancient Tacape, at the mouth of the R. Triton, which has lost all the importance once attached to it in connection with the Gardens of the Hesperides, and is now chiefly valued from it's irrigating the plantations of henna, the leaves of which are so much used by the Eastern ladies in tinging their fingers and hands.

THE REGENCY OF TRIPOLI.

79. The Regency, or kingdom of Tripoli, including it's dependancy of Barça, is bounded on the W. by Tunis, on the N. by the Mediterranean Sea, on the E. by Egypt, and on the S. by Fezzan and the Great Sandy Desert: it contains about 141,900 square miles, and 3,250,000 inhabitants. The habitable part of the kingdom consists chiefly of the coast, which for a few miles inland is generally fertile and well cultivated, but the interior of the country is little else than a sandy and barren desert, occasionally traversed by rocky ranges of hills. This state, as well as the rest of Barbary, after having been freed from the Roman yoke, fell successively under the power of the Vandals, Saracens, and the kings of Morocco, Fez, and Tunis; till, weary of their slavery and oppression, they resolved to have a monarch of their own, whom they accordingly chose from amongst themselves. Their new sovereign governed them at first with great equity and moderation, but he no sooner saw himself out of danger, than he began to play the tyrant in his turn, and was murdered: this act of violence led to others, which terminated in the subjection of the kingdom by the Spaniards, and it's subsequent possession by the Knights of Malta. The latter successfully defended themselves for some time against Barbarossa in this their new acquisition, but they were at last induced to surrender it to the Turks, during the reign of Solyman, after which it continued dependant on the Ottoman Porte till the beginning of the last century. At this period, one of the viceroys sent from Constantinople, refused to receive or acknowledge any bashaw appointed by that court: he took the reins of government wholly upon himself, not indeed as independent, but as vassal and tributary to the Grand Seignor, to whom he obliged himself to pay tribute and homage, as an acknowledgment of his subjection and dependance. It is owing to this and the other exigencies of the regency, that the Bashaw of Tripoli loads his subjects with such heavy taxes and extortions, as have reduced the greatest part of the kingdom to the lowest indigence and misery: he is only able to collect them by sending a flying camp of troopers against the poverty-struck natives, for nothing but force, and sometimes exemplary severity, can extort tribute from them. It is likewise owing, as it is thought, to this hazardous dependancy on the Sublime Porte, and to a consciousness of it's own internal weakness, that the regency of Tripoli has shown itself so scrupulously observant of all treaties with other nations, in the midst of the brutal and faithless pirates by whom it is surrounded: it has studiously cultivated the alliance of Great Britain, and such a friendship with other European Powers, as might lead to an interchange of manufactures and merchandize at once mutual and beneficial. The government and religion of Tripoli are in a great measure the same as those of Algiers and Tunis: the sovereign, or Bashaw as he is called, makes shift, by means of the protection he derives from the Porte, to keep up a despotic power, which is frequently stained with every species of crime. He is nominally, indeed, the subject of the Grand Seignor, by whom, at the commencement of his reign, his succession to the crown must be confirmed; but the authority of the Sublime Porte is so little regarded, that he does not hesitate to carry on a system of piracy against it's vessels. 80. Tripoli, the metropolis of the whole Regency, stands near it's Western extremity, on the shores of the Mediterranean Sea: it is built in a low situation, on a narrow neck of land, and is tolerably extensive, but a large portion of the space included within it's walls is unoccupied. The caravansaries, mosques, bazars, houses of foreign consuls, and of the higher ranks of the natives, are mostly built of stone, and regularly whitewashed twice a year; they are generally two stories high, but not equal to those of the same class in Algiers and Tunis. The lower orders construct their houses of earth, small stones, and mortar; they never exceed one story, and have all flat roofs, which serve as a promenade. Tripoli is tolerably well fortified for

a Mahometan town, though it could not long resist the attack of a regular army; it's castle is an irregular square pile, of more confusion than strength. The population of the town does not exceed 25,000, but it varies very much at different times, owing to the intercourse which exists between it and several great cities, as Morocco, Tom buctoo, and Mecca. Farther Eastward are the inconsiderable towns Lebida and Mesurata, the latter of which has given name to Cape Mesurata, forming the Western extremity of the Greater Syrtis, or Gulf of Sidra as it is now called. The shores of this gulf are lined with a number of towns and villages, amongst which Isa, Zafferan, Boosheida, and Karkora are the most important: they are inhabited mostly by pirates and fishermen, who are reduced to the lowest degree of misery and wretchedness, through the exactions of the Bashaw, and the depredations of the Arabs.

81. The Eastern part of the Regency of Tripoli is called Barca, and is governed by a Bey, who is dependant upon the Bashaw, and appointed by him. On it's coast, a little above the N. E. extremity of the Gulf of Sidra, lies Bengazi, the capital of a province of the same name; it has derived it's name from the ancient Berenice, on the site of which it stands, and was formerly a very flourishing place, though now so much reduced that it's population scarcely amounts to 5,000 souls: it stands in the midst of a fertile little district, at the mouth of a small river, fancied by some of the ancients to be the Triton of their mythology, which fertilized the beautiful gardens of the Hesperides. Farther Eastward are Teukera and Dolmetta, formerly two of the most important towns in the ancient province of Cyrenaica; they have now lost all their consequence, as has also Barca itself, which lies a few miles in the interior of the country to the South of Dolmetta, and has given name to the Desert of Barca. Cape Rasat, or Ras Sem, is the Northernmost extremity of Barca, and only a short distance from the famous city Cyrene, the ruins of which are now known by the name of Kuren, or Grenna: hard by is it's port Marsa Susa. Derna, the capital of a district of the same name, and the metropolis of all Barca, is situated about 50 miles to the Eastward of C. Rasat, and derived it's name from the ancient Darnis, on the site of which it stands; it is the residence of the Bey appointed by the Bashaw to manage the affairs of the province, and is said to have been greatly increased and ornamented by the Moors, who settled here after their expulsion from Spain: it contains about 6,000 inhabitants. Beyond this is the Gulf of Bomba, so called from a town and island of the same name: betwixt it and the frontiers of Egypt lie several villages and towns upon the shores of the Mediterranean Sea, but they are all very small and unimportant. In the Southern part of Barca is the district of Augela, which is nominally included under the dominion of Tripoli, though the Bashaw's authority is only acknowledged in the presence of his troops: it's chief town is likewise called Augela, and though in itself a place of but little importance, derives some consequence from lying on the great caravan road between Egypt and Fezzan. Some distance to the Eastward of it, on the Eastern frontiers of the kingdom, is the Oasis of Siwah, a fertile and well watered valley of some extent, hemmed in on every side by barren rocks: it derives all it's interest from being the site of the famous temple of Jupiter Ammon.

CHAPTER XXVIII.

ÆGYPTUS.

1. Ægyptus was bounded on the W. by the Libyan Desert, on the S. by Ethiopia, on the E. by the Arabian Gulf and the Isthmus of Suez, and on the N. by the Mediterranean Sea. It contained 122,000 square miles, but not more than one sixth of this space was inhabited, the remainder being a barren desert. It is still called Egypt by us Europeans, although the natives themselves, as well as the Turks and all the oriental nations, only know it by the name of Misr. This latter appellation is merely a corruption of Mizraim, who was a son of Ham, and settled together with his father in this country, to which he gave his name; hence we generally find Egypt called Mizraim in the Old Testament, although it is sometimes mentioned as the Land of Ham, and Plutarch has observed that the Egyptians, in some of their sacred writings, styled their country Chemia, or Chamia, which is plainly derived from the name of Ham. The origin of the term Ægyptus (AlyvrTOS) is deduced from Ai Captor, or the Country of Caphtor, by which name also, as well as by that of the Caphtorim, we find Egypt alluded to in the Old Testament; and as the Greeks are thought to have derived their word Ala terra, from the Hebrew Ai, so they may have converted Captor into Kórros, and thus faithfully rendered the original Ai Captor by Ala Κόπτου, οι Αἴκοπτος, the land of Coptus, which they afterwards softened into Atyvros Ægyptus. Indeed the original natives of Egypt are called Copts at the present day, to distinguish them from the Arabs and Turks: hence the translation of the Bible used by them (for they profess Christianity, although their worship is degraded by a number of superstitious practices) is called the Coptic translation.

2. The Greeks derived the name of Ægyptus from it's first king Ægyptus, the son of Belus, who gave his fifty sons in marriage to the fifty danghters of his brother Danaus, king of Argos; the latter became jealous of his brother's power, and compelled all his daughters to murder their husbands on the first night of their nuptials. It is said, that during the dominion of the Pharaohs, the only part of Egypt which was so called, was that watered by the Nile, and indeed the remainder of the country was so utterly barren, that, with a very few exceptions, it was altogether uninhabitable: in aftertimes, however, under the dominion of the Ptolemies, it was made to include the whole country between the Arabian Gulf and the two great Oases on the borders of Libya. The Southern frontier was originally formed by the Island of Phila, near the Little Cataract of the Nile, and by Syene, which was considered the border-city of the Egyptians towards Ethiopia, until Cambyses the Persian took from the Nubians a portion of their territory, and added it to Egypt. The Ptolemies, however, being on friendly terms with the rulers of Meroe, resigned the conquered strip of country, and once more made Phile the common boundary: after the fall of Merve, they again took possession of the district thus resigned, which, being subsequently increased by the Romans, was formed into a separate province under the name of Dodekaschoenos, but never reckoned within the limits of Egypt. The boundary towards Palestine3 seems to have been always the same; it ran from the Torrent of Egypt to the head of the Heroopolitic Gulf, as it does at the present day. It was only on the North Western side that the limits of Egypt underwent much alteration, they having been originally fixed at the L. Mareotis and the Plinthinetes Sinus; but the shores of these were more frequented by the Libyan Nomades than by the Egyptians, and therefore remained through all succeeding ages as the natural boun dary between the two nations. But the Persians and those who followed them extended their dominion to the Catabathmus, on the confines of Cyrene, and at length reduced the latter state for a time under their dominion: this increase of territory was considered as a dependancy, and not as a part of Egypt, the Westernmost towa of the country being Parætonium.

3. The history of Egypt may be divided into three great epochs. The first commences with the foundation of the kingdom by Mizraim, B.C. 2188, and ends with the conquest of the country by Cambyses, king of Persia, B. C. 525: the second, during which the Egyptians threw off the Persian yoke and became again subject to the own kings, terminates with the death of Ålexander the Great, B. c. 323, who had reduced it under his dominion: the last epoch includes the reigns of the Ptolemies, and ends with the death of Cleopatra, during the age of Augustus. The first of these Ptolemies, surnamed Lagus, was a man of mean extraction, but from his having been educated at the court of Philip of Macedon, he became one of the confidential attendants of Alexander, whom he followed in his Asiatic expedition: upon the death of the latter monarch, and the consequent division of the Macedonian Empire, Ptolemy obtained Egypt, with parts of Libya and Arabia, as his share. He was succeeded by his descendants through a long period of years, till the time of Cleopatra, who, upon the death of her brother Ptolemy the 13th., surnamed Diony sius, became sole Mistress of Egypt: this beautiful princess, having supported the cause of Brutus, was summoned to Tarsus by Antony, to answer for her conduct, but he became so deeply enamoured of her, that he divorced his wife Octavia, the sister of Augustus, and having publicly married Cleopatra, gave her the greater part of the Eastern provinces of the Roman empire. This behaviour produced a rupture between Augustus and Antony, which ended in the famous battle of Actium, where the latter was defeated in consequence of Cleopatra's flying with sixty ships: Antony,

Χθόνα σύγχορτον Συρίᾳ φεύγομεν,

Si reditum tetulisset is, aut in tempore longo

Captam Asiam Ægypti finibus adjiceret?

Lib. VI. ep. 50.

Eschyl, Suppl. 4.

Catull. LXVI. 35.

The power and extent of the Egyptian Empire under Ptolemy Philadelphus s magnificently set forth by Theocritus, layl. XVII. 81. et seq.

finding his cause desperate, took refuge in Egypt, where he stabbed himself, B. c. 30, and Cleopatra, to avoid falling into the hands of Augustus, poisoned herself by the bite of an asp. From this time Egypt became a Roman province.

4. The Egyptians reckoned themselves the most ancient people in the world, and placed the reign of their first mortal king 17,000 years before the Christian era, or, according to some accounts, even at double that distance of time: prior to this, they had been governed by the gods, all of whom they asserted had been born in their country, and the knowledge of whom had been conveyed from Egypt to every other nation. The great points of their mythology were founded upon philosophical principles, by which they considered the Universe as the highest being, and as producing effects upon all created things by means of the inferior elements: but this elevation of thought was too metaphysical for the comprehension of the multitude, and the priests accordingly represented their deities under various symbols and types, which from being perceptible to the senses, received ready adoration. From the resemblance observable between these and the chief gods of the Greeks and Romans, it has been thought that something of the high antiquity as well as the boasted originality of Egyptian idolatry may be fairly allowed; though how, and when, the former nations obtained their mythological traditions from the descendants of Mizraim, are points not so well agreed upon. The oldest of all the Egyptian gods was Pan, or the universe, but their two chief divinities were Osiris and Isis, the Sun and Moon, who. were represented as governing the whole world by their infinite power. They also worshipped Jupiter, or the quickening spirit; the Earth, the mother of all living, hence called Γῆ μήτηρ, οι Δημήτηρ by the Greeks; the Air, so beautifully represented by the Greeks as the blue-eyed Athene; and Phtha, the element of fire. From these divinities sprang a long line of kings, the most famous of whom was Sesostris, who is supposed to have been a real personage, though many of the actions ascribed to him are fabulous in the extreme. He marched at the head of a numerous army, ambitious of conquering the whole world: he reduced under his dominion a great part of Ethiopia, and Libya properly so called, as well as the adjacent portions of Syria and Arabia; he also built himself a fleet, with which he sailed through the Red Sea and beyond the Straits, rendering tributary all the country through which he passed. But the conquests ascribed to him in Europe, as well as in Asia, in which last country he is said to have penetrated even farther than Alexander the Great, are self-evident exaggerations.

5. Osiris, when king of Egypt, is said to have invented writing and sacrifices, and to have been the first who became acquainted with the motions of the host of heaven, and with the great operations of nature. However this may be, there is no doubt but the Eyptians were amongst the earliest people to discover the apparent path of the Sun and Moon, together with the motions of the other heavenly bodies, and the true length of the Solar year. All this learning appears to have been exclusively in the possession of the priests, who derived from it a power over the people as unlimited as it at first appears incredible; but as it afforded them the means of predicting the various eclipses and many other phænomena of the heavens, as well as of compiling a calendar, the accuracy of which was constantly proved, they must have appeared to the people of their own days as a very superior order of beings, and the immediate agents of the gods. Besides this, they possessed a secret writing, intelligible only to themselves, but exposed to the eyes of the whole world on the gates and walls of their temples: and, though every one beheld it, as we still do at the present day, with wonder and astonishment, yet those only could decipher the sacred characters who had been inducted into the mystery. By means of this they exhibited the mighty actions of their gods, the victories of their mortal kings, the commandments of their religion, and the laws of their country, to the admiring people; who, imagining that still greater secrets had been revealed to their priests, never failed to look upon them with an awe little short of personal adoration. The hieroglyphics were so called by the Greeks, from the two words ispoc sacer, and yλow sculpo, from their being the sacred types of history and mythology, which the priests caused to be carved on the walls of their temples: thus they represented a year by a snake with

Diodor. Sic. I. 11. et seq.-Herod. II. 145.

Nondum flumineas Memphis contexere biblos

Noverat: et saxis tantum, volucresque, feræque,

Sculptaque servabant magicas animalia linguas. Lucan. III. 222.