THE HOUSE OF PHARAOH.

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ly at right angles with it. The bottom of this river, as, for distinction, it may be called, was paved for the better preservation of its water from waste and filth, and its sides were faced with a wall of hewn stone. Considerable remains of the walls and pavement, and some large flagstones belonging to a paved way that ran along the side of the river, remain, as do the foundations of several bridges which spanned its channel.

The chief public edifices occupied the banks of the river and the high ground farther south, as their ruins sufficiently show. One sumptuous edifice remains standing, though in an imperfect and dilapidated state. It is on the south side of the river, near the western side of the valley, and seems to have been a palace, rather than a temple. It is called Pharaoh's house, and is thirty-four paces square. The walls are nearly entire, and, on the eastern side, are still surmounted by a handsome cornice. The front, which looks toward the north, was ornamented with a row of columns, four of which are standing. An open piazza, back of the colonnade, extended the whole length of the building. In the rear of this piazza are three apartments, the principal of which is entered under a noble arch, I should think thirty-five or forty feet in height. It is an imposing ruin, though not of the purest style of architecture, and is the more striking as the only edifice now standing in Petra.

A little east of this, and in a range with some of the most beautiful excavations in the mountain on the east side of the valley, are the remains of what appears to have been a triumphal arch. Under it were three passages, and a number of pedestals of columns, as well as other fragments, would lead to the belief that a magnificent colonnade was connected with it.

A few rods south are extensive ruins, which probably belonged to a temple. The ground is covered with fragments. of columns five feet in diameter. Twelve of these, whose

pedestals still remain in their places, adorned either side of this stately edifice. There were also four columns in front and six in the rear of the temple. They are prostrate on the ground, and I counted thirty-seven massive frusta of which one of them was composed.

Still farther south are other piles of ruins-columns and hewn stones-parts, no doubt, of important public buildings. I counted not less than fourteen similar heaps of ruins, having columns and fragments of columns intermingled with blocks of stone, in this part of the site of ancient Petra. They indicate the great wealth and magnificence of this ancient capital, as well as its unparalleled calamities.

These sumptuous edifices occupied what may be called the central parts of Petra. A large surface on the north side of the river is covered with substructions, which probably belonged to private habitations. An extensive region still farther north retains no vestiges of the buildings which once covered it. The same appearances are observable in Thebes, Athens, and Rome. Public wealth was lavished on palaces and temples, while the houses of the common people were slightly and meanly built, of such materials as a few years, or, at most, a few centuries, were sufficient to dissolve. Thebes, Athens, and Rome are the only ancient cities I have seen which contain as many piles of ruins that evidently belonged to public edifices, as are to be found in Petra, independent of the displays of taste and magnificence which constitute its peculiar character. The ruin here is more complete, perhaps, than anywhere else in the world, but enough remains to demonstrate the height of wealth and grandeur to which this city attained, as well as the completeness of its overthrow. Nothing is left standing but the ruinous palace which I have described, the skeleton of the triumphal arch, and a part of a singular-looking column, which has lost its capital and several of its upper frusta. Everything else is fallen, and lies in confused heaps, or scattered in solitary fragments upon the ground. The mountain

torrents which, at times, sweep over the lower parts of the ancient site, have undermined many foundations, and carried away many a chiseled stone, and worn many a finished specimen of sculpture into unshapely masses. The soft texture of the rock seconds the destructive agencies of the elements. Even the accumulations of rubbish which mark the site of all other decayed cities have mostly disappeared; and the extent which was covered with human habitations can only be determined by the broken pottery scattered over the surface or mingled with the sand-the universal, and, it would seem, imperishable memorial of populous cities that exist no longer. These vestiges, the extent of which I have taken a good deal of pains to trace, cover an area one third as large as that of Cairo, excluding its large gardens from the estimate, and certainly very sufficient to contain the whole population of Athens in its prosperous days.

I have spoken more fully upon the architectural remains of Petra, and the existing evidence that its rocky surface was once covered with human dwellings, because, in the accounts which I have read, little regard is bestowed upon this subject, the attention of the writer, as well as the reader, being carried away and absorbed by the excavations which, having more successfully resisted the ravages of time, constitute at present the great and peculiar attraction. These excavations, whether formed for temples, tombs, or the dwellings of living men, surprise the visiter by their incredible number and extent. They not only occupy the front of the entire mountain by which the valley is encompassed, but the numerous ravines and recesses which radiate on all sides from this enclosed area. They exist, too, in great numbers in the precipitous rocks which shoot out from the principal mountains into the southern, and still more into the northern part of the site, and they are seen along all the approaches to the place, which, in the days of its prosperity, were, perhaps, the suburbs of the overpeopled valley.

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SITUATION OF THE TOMBS.

Were these excavations, instead of following all the sinuosities of the mountain and its numerous gorges, ranged in regular order like the houses of a well-built city, I am persuaded they would form a street not less than five or six miles in length. They are often seen rising one above another in the face of the cliff, and convenient steps, now much worn, cut in the rock, lead in all directions through the fissures, and along the sides of the mountains, to the various tombs that occupy these lofty positions. Some of them are not less, I think, than from two hundred to three or four hundred feet above the level of the valley. Conspicuous situations, visible from below, were generally chosen; but sometimes the opposite taste prevailed, and the most secluded cliffs, fronting towards some dark ravine, and quite hidden from the gaze of the multitude, were preferred. The flights of steps, all cut in the solid rock, are almost innumerable, and they ascend to great heights, as well as in all directions. Sometimes the connexion with the city is interrupted, and one sees in a gorge, or upon the face of the cliff, fifty or one hundred feet above him, a long series of steps rising from the edge of an inaccessible precipice. The action of winter torrents and other agencies have worn the easy ascent into a channel for the waters, and interrupted the communication.

The situations of these excavations are not more various than their forms and dimensions. Mere niches are sometimes cut in the face of the rock, of little depth and of various sizes and forms, of which it is difficult to conjecture the object, unless they had some connexion with votive offerings and religious rites. By far the largest number of excavations were manifestly designed as places for the interment of the dead; and they exhibit a variety in form and size, of interior arrangement and external decorations, adapted to the different fortunes of their occupants, and conformable to the prevailing taste of the times in which