" At the end of this portico, one enters into a peristyle more beautiful than the former. On a stone is engraved the history of the war of Osimondui. against the revolted inhahitants of Bact•ia. The facade of the front wall shows this prince attacking ramparts, at the foot of which rims a river. lie combats advanced troops, having by his side a terrible lion, which defends him with ardour. The wall on the right presents captives in chains, their hands and ptivate parts cut off, in order to stigmatize their cowardice. On the wall to the left, different symbolical figures, very well sculptured, recall die triumphs and the sacrifices olOsinit aiduo on his return Irmo this war. hi the middle of the peristyle, at the place where it is exposed, an altar was prepared, com posed of it single stone of marvellous size, and of workmanship. In short, against the bottom wall, two colossuses, each of them of' one block of' marble, and -10 feet high, are seated on their pedestals. One cremes out of this admirable peristyle by three gates ; one of them between two statues, the two others aro on the sides; they lead to an edifice 200 feet long, the roof of which is supported by S columns. It resembles a magnificent theatre; several figures in wood represent a senate employed in distributing justice. On one of the Walls one observes :10 senators, and in midst of them the president of justice, having at his feet a collection of books, and the figure of Truth with her eyes shut, suspended at his neck. ( )1Ie passed thence into a square surrounded by palaces of different fi•ms, where Were seen carved on the table all sorts of dishes which could flatter the taste. In one of them, Osinionditt% clad in a magnificent dress, was offering to the gods the gold and silver he drew yearly from the mines of Egypt. Below was written the value or this reVellae, Willell 71111oillited to 3.2 milliotts of silver minas. Another palace contained the sacred library, at the entrance of Which, one read those words: Remedies for the Soul. A third contained all the divinities of Egypt, with the king, who offered to each of them the suitable presents; calling Osiris, and the princes his predecessors, to witness that he had exercised piety toward: the gods and justice towards men. By the side of the library, in one of the most beautiful buildings of the place. were to be seen twenty tables surrounded by their beds. on which reposed the statues of Jupiter, Juno, and Osimondue. Ills body is thought to be deposited in this place. Several adjoining buildings preserved the representations of all the sacred animals of Egi pt. From these apartments one mounted to the king's tomb, on the top of which was placed a crown if gold, a cubit wide, and 3u15 round. Eaelt cubit answered to one of the year, and the rising and setting of the stars fin' that day was er•aven on each of them, with such astrological observations as the superstition of the Egyptians attached to them. It is said that Cambyses carried off this circle when he ravaged Egypt. Such. according to historians, was the tomb of Osimondmc. which surpassed all others, both by its extent, and by the labour of the able artists employed On it." Upon this passage Savary remarks, `• I dare not take upon me to warrant all these facts. advanced by Diodorns Sleuths ott the authority of preceding writers ; for in his time the principal part of these buildings no existed. I admit even that all these wonderful decsriptions would pass fin. pure chimeras in any other country ; but in this fruitful land, which seems to have been first honoured with the creative genius of the arts, they acquire a degree of proba bility. Let us examine what remains to us of these monu ments, and our eyes will compel us to believe in prodigy. Their ruins are in heaps, near to Meclinet _Abort, in the space of half a league's circumference. The temple, the peristyles, the vestibules, present to the eye nothing but piles of ruins, amongst which rise up some pyramidal gates, whose solidity has preserved them from destruction ; but the numerous colossuses described by Diodorns, are still subsisting. though mutilated. That which is nearest to these ruins. composed of yellow marble, is buried two-thirds of its height in the earth. There is another in the.same line, of black and white marble, the back of which is covered with hieroglyphics for 30 feet in length. In the space hetwen them, trunks of cohnnns and broken statues cover the ground, and mark the continuation of the vestibules. Farther on we distinguish two other colossal statues, totally disfigured. A hundred Wises from them, the traveller is struck with astonishment at the sight of two colossuses, which, like rocks, are seated by the side of each other. Their pedestals are nearly equal, and formed of blocks a granite 30 feet lung, and lb feet wide. The smallest of these colossuses is also of a single block of marble ; the other, which is the largest in Egypt, is formed of Live courses of granite, and broken in the middle; it appears to have been the statue of Osimondue, fUr one sees two figures cut in relieve, the length of his legs, and ss Mich are about one-third of his height. These are the mother and the daughter of this prince. The other colossus, ss hich is one stone, and which corresponds with the dimensions of Diodurus Siculus, represented also the mother of the king.
Co give you an idea of the gigantic stature of' the great colossus, it is enough to tell you, that his foot alone is near 11 feet long, which answers exactly to the seven cubits of Diodorus. This statute, the half of which remains upon its base, and is what Strabo calls the statue of Memnon, uttered a sound at the rising of the sun. It possessed formerly great renown. Several writers have spoken of it cs ith enthusiasm, regarding it as one of the seven wonders of the world. A multitude of Greek and Latin inscriptions, that are still legible, on the base and the legs of the colossus, testify that princes. generals, governors, and men of every condition, have heard this miraculous sound." The following account of a portion of the above, which is given somewhat more in detail, is from Wilkinson.
Following the edge of the cultivated land, and about 180 yards to the west of this building, are two mutilated statutes of Nemeses II., of black granite, with a few sub structions to the north of them ; and '710 yards farther to the west, lies, in the cultivated soil, a sandstone block of IZemeses III., presenting in high relief the figure of that king, between Osiris and Plinth; 1,400 feet beyond this, in the same direction, is a crude brick enclosure, with large towers, which once contained within it a sandstone temple, dating probably from the reign of the third Thothmes, whose name is stamped on the bricks, and who appears to have been the contemporary of Aloses.
" Other fragments and remains of crude brick walls proclaim the existence of' other ruins in its vicinity ; and about 1,000 feet farther to the south-west, is the palace and temple of Remese: II., erroneously called the Al mint nium : a building which, for sy111111et•y of architecture and elegance of sculpture, eau vie with any other monument of Egyptian art. No traces are visible of the dromos, that probably existed before the pyramidal towers which Ismail the faynde of the first hypiefitral area, a court whose breadth of 150 feet, exceeding the length by nearly 13 yards, is reduced to a more just proportion, by the introduction of a double avenue of columns ou either side, extending from the towers to the north wall. In this area, on the right of a flight of steps leading to the next court, was the stupendous Syenite statue of the king seated Im a throne, in the usual attitude of these Egyptian figures, the hands resting on his knees, indicative of that tranquillity which he had returned to enjoy in Egypt, after the fatigues of victory. But the fury of an invader has levelled this monument of Egyptian grandeur, whose colossal fragments lie scattered around the pedestal, and its shivered throne evinces the force used fbr its demolition.
" If it is a matter of surprise how the Egyptians could transport and erect a mass of such dimensions, the ineatis employed for its ruin are scarcely less wonderffil ; nor should we hesitate to account 1b• the shattered appearance of the lower part by attributing it to the explosive force of powder, had that composition been know at the period of its destruction. The throne and legs are completely destroyed, and reduced to comparatively small fragments, while the upper part, broken at the waist, is merely thrown back upon the ground, and lies in that position which was the conse of its fall; nor are there any marks of the wedge, or other instrument, which should have been employed for reducing those fragments to the state in which they now appear. The fissures seen across the head, and in the pedestal, are the work of a later period, when some of theso blocks were cut for millstones by the Arabs, but its previous overthrow mill probably be coeval with the Persian invasion. To say that this is the largest statue in Egypt, will convey no idea of the gigantic size or enormous weight of a mass, which, from an approximate calculation, exceeded, when entire, nearly three times the solid content of the great obelisk of Karnak, and weighed about Sb7 tons, 5 hundred weight and a half " No building in Thebes corresponds with the description given of the tomb of Osymand vas by Ilecat mum. Diodorus, who quotes his work, gives the dimensions of the first or outer court, two plethra, or 181 feet S inches English, agreeing very nearly with the breadth. but not the length of that now bell ore but the succeeding court, of few pleth•a, neither agrees with this, nor can agree with that of*any other Egyptian edifice ; since the plan of an Egy ptian building invariably requires a diminution, by no increase of dimensions, from the entrance to the inner chambers; and while the body of the temple, behind the portico, retained one uniform breadth, the areas in front, and frequently the portico itself, exceeded the inner portion of it by their pro jecting sides. The peristyle and 'columns in the form of living beings.' roofed sitting statues, and triple entrance to a chamber supported by columns, agree the approach to the groat hall of this temple. The largest statue in Egypt can scarcely be looked for but in the build ing before us, yet the sculptures to N‘ Ito]) he alludes, remind us rather of those of "Al edeenet ; nor is it impossible that either Ilecatieus or Diodorus have united or confounded the details of these two edifices.