CHAPTER XLI--THE GREAT PYRAMIDS.--IN THE KINGS’ BURIAL CHAMBERS.

_A Visit to the Great Pyramids--A Fellah not a Fellow--Sakkiehs and Shadoofs--A File of Camels and Donkeys--A striking Spectacle--A horde of Arabs--Troublesome Customers--The Great Pyramid--How we climbed it--A Giant Stairway--Dimensions Extraordinary--The lost Arts--Standing on the Summit--The Judge’s Predicament--Arab Cormorants--What we saw from the top of the Great Pyramid--Wonderful Contrasts--Performance of an Arabian Acrobat--A race down the Pyramid Stairs--A perilous Descent--Penetrating the Interior--The King’s Chamber--A dusty Receptacle of Coffins--The Sphinx--A mysterious Statue._

EVERY visitor to Cairo makes at least one journey to the famous pyramids of Gizeh, and generally takes an early opportunity to make it. Until within a few years there was considerable labor and fatigue to the excursion as it was necessary to ride there on donkeys, and the whole trip required not less than five hours of saddle exercise. There was also the necessity of crossing the Nile on a ferry boat, and as there was generally a crowd of men, boys, camels, and donkeys at the ferry, the journey across had a reasonable amount of excitement in it. Now you ride to the Pyramids in a carriage and along a macadamized road, and you cross the Nile over an iron bridge that is a great improvement upon the ferry.

At my first visit we made up a party of twelve and therefore took three carriages for which we paid twenty francs each carriage, quite a reasonable price compared with hack fares in America.

We started about nine o’clock, after crossing the river found {514}ourselves among the fertile fields that produce many of the vegetables consumed in Cairo. Fellahs were at work in these fields, some of them very scantily clad, particularly those who manipulated the _sakkiehs_ or water lifters. A _sakkieh_ is a very primitive machine and consists of a pole and bucket supported like the old fashioned well-sweep of America. The term _sakkieh_ is applied to all the apparatus for raising water, but the proper name for the Egyptian pole and bucket is _shadoof_. The _shadoof_ is very ancient, as it is represented on the walls of the tombs constructed three or four thousand years ago.

We met troops of camels and donkeys laden with green provisions for Cairo; the majority of them carried freshly cut grass for the sustenance of donkeys, horses, and camels, piled in great loads that half concealed the animals that bore them. The grass thus cut is sold quite cheaply, and as many as four or five crops can be taken from the land in the course of the year. The fertility of the Nile soil exceeds that of any land I have ever seen elsewhere; the lower Mississippi with all its richness is far behind it.

Although good roads have been provided here burdens are still carried almost entirely on the backs of animals, very few carts being in use. Almost the only vehicles visible here are the carriages of tourists going to or from the Pyramids or visiting one of the Khedive’s palaces. There is a fine palace on this side of the Nile known as the Gezereh, and there are two new palaces in course of construction. In spite of the tightened money market and the general absence of cash, the Khedive continues to make extensive outlays on palaces and their adornments. He has several sons, and it is desirable that each shall have a home of his own.

As we drive towards them the Pyramids fill the horizon, or rather they rise very prominently out of it. When we are yet an hour’s drive from their base they seem not more than ten minutes away, an optical delusion, partly attributable to the clear atmosphere and partly to the great size of the structures themselves. A house two stories in height stands at the foot of the first pyramid, and by observing what a slight speck it makes against the great mass you can form an idea of what is before

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{517}you. Long before we are near the Pyramids our carriage is surrounded by Arabs, bent on serving us in some way, or at all events in wringing money from us. They follow the carriage at a run and have no difficulty in keeping up with us. Most of them run bare-footed and keep their great clumsy shoes in their hands as the least fatiguing way of carrying the burdens.

At the edge of the fertile land the road ascends an elevation and here it is necessary for us to dismount and walk as the track is covered with sand that has blown from the desert and makes the ascent very difficult for a loaded vehicle. The horses have all they can do to take the empty carriage up the slope and the drivers are obliged to use the whip very freely.

We came to a halt on the broad open space below the Great Pyramid, and the drivers immediately removed and unharnessed their horses, and took out the poles of the carriages. The Arabs flocked around us to make bargains for the ascent; there are some thirty-five or forty that stay here to serve-travellers, and they have a fixed tariff for the ascent and the journey into the interior You pay two shillings to the sheik of the tribe for the ascent and two more if you go inside, and for this he furnishes you with two or more men to assist you. Half a dozen will volunteer to accompany you but two are quite enough.

A friend had told me what to do so I stipulated that only the two men to serve, me should come near me otherwise I should pay nothing. I required the sheik to select the two and away we started. A boy carrying a gargolet of water followed us, and I found him desirable and consented that he should accompany me. The unusual exertion gives one a dryness in the throat that it is well to alleviate occasionally.

The Great Pyramid is built on a rock platform, about a hundred feet above the level of the plain below; from a very early period, it was one of the cemeteries of Memphis, and at the present day the remains of tombs are scattered all around, most of them being buried in the sand. The stones for building the pyramid came from the other side of the Nile, and were ferried over in boats to the end of a causeway that was built to facilitate their transport to the place where they now lie.

As it now stands, the pyramid consists of a series of steps {518}from two to four feet high, and very few of them are less than three feet. To make the ascent, you yield yourself into the hands of the two Arabs appointed to accompany you; they stand above, and lift you up by the arms, at the same time indicating where you are to place your feet.

Imagine a series of steps as high or higher than an ordinary dining-table or writing-desk.

And then remember that you must ascend on these steps a perpendicular height of four hundred and eighty feet.

Originally, when completed, the pyramid had a casing of granite and limestone fitted into these steps, so that an ascent was impossible. The casing has entirely disappeared, having been removed for building purposes in Cairo at the time of the Caliphs; on the second pyramid, part of the casing still remains, though, broken in places, and gives an idea of the beauty of the whole, before the work was injured.

And now a few figures; skip them if you like, and don’t say anything about them.

The great pyramid is seven hundred and forty-six feet long, and four hundred and eighty feet high. It covers an area of five {519}hundred and thirty-six thousand square feet, or nearly thirteen acres. Its solid contents are calculated at eighty-five million cubic feet. How much do you suppose that is?

Well, you could build a wall four feet high and two feet thick, and something more than two thousand miles long, with the stones in this pyramid, or you could build a wall twelve feet high and four feet thick all the way from Cincinnati to St. Louis--a distance of three hundred and forty miles. And if you piled it up around Manhattan Island, where New York stands, you would encircle that metropolis with a wall twenty feet thick and forty feet high. And remember that all this stone was hewn from the quarries, and moved and piled up before the days of steam!

How were the pyramids built? That is a conundrum which many people have puzzled over, and nobody has been able to answer. The Egyptians have left nothing to indicate how they performed their work, and nobody has been able to devise a satisfactory explanation. Many men have theorized about the matter, and every time anybody builds up a theory the rest of them show that it was impossible to build the pyramids in that way. One of these days, something may be discovered to throw light upon the matter, but at present all is darkness.

All this time I have had you climbing up the northeast corner of the great pyramid, halting occasionally to take breath and a swallow of water, and a glance at the country around and below us. It is tough work for the muscles, to climb these high steps, but if you are patient and careful you will get along without much trouble.

In about fifteen minutes we are at the top, and the Arabs indulge in a hurrah as we get there. They pestered me on the way up to give them a personal fee, in addition to what I gave the sheik, and I promised it to them on condition that they should not allude to it again until they reached the base. The men I had were strong, healthy fellows, rather dignified in their bearing, and they spoke English, French, and Italian sufficiently well to be understood. They handled me without difficulty, and by making them understand what I wanted at the outset, and being firm with them, I had no trouble.

The Judge had so much bother with the Arabs, that he was {520}rather disgusted with his visit. About a dozen of the fellows accompanied him, and gave him all sorts of assistance. Two pulled him up, and two pushed; one unwound his turban, and two others put it around the Judge’s waist in order to lift him.

Another carried his overcoat, another his cane, and another a bottle of water, and two or three others gave directions as to the proper places for his feet.

When he reached the top, they wanted some “backsheesh,” and he was injudicious enough to give it. This opened the ball, and they kept at him; and he gave away, there and at the base of the pyramid, something over twenty-five francs. Each man who pulled and each who pushed wanted something; the fellows who lifted at the turban wanted something, and the owner of the turban wanted something for the use of it; the man who carried his overcoat wanted something, and so did the cane-bearer and the water-bearer; then the other fellows wanted something, and after they had received something all around separately, they asked for a general fee in addition. You could no more satisfy these brigands with any ordinary lot of money, than you could bail out Lake Erie with a teaspoon.

Originally, the summit of the great pyramid was a point or very {521}nearly so; it has been removed so that it is now about thirty feet square, some of the blocks resting higher than others. You can sit around them there very comfortably, but there isn’t much to see when you are there--that is, nothing very different from what you can see at the base. On the west is the desert, north is the rich delta of the Nile, east is Cairo, beyond the river and backed by the Mokattaw and other hills that fill the horizon, and south there is the valley of the Nile, opening between the double lines of desert on either side. There are no mountains to attract the eye with their varieties of color and jaggedness of outline; there are no lakes shining in the sunlight, and there is no glimpse of the ocean with its ever-beating waves.

The prettiest artificial features of the landscape are the walls and domes and minarets of Cairo, and the most salient natural features are the sharp contrast of valley and desert. There is no intermediate ground; at one place it is rich alluvium, and six inches away lies the arid sand. The one is a deep, rich green; the other is a greyish white, dazzling where it reflects the sun, and tinted with the faintest shade of purple where it does not. The one is the perfection of fertility, the most fecund spot of land on the globe; the other is bleak and utter sterility, with not the tiniest blade of grass or shred of lichen to relieve its desolation. Nature draws nowhere a picture of sharper contrasts.

Out from the deserts in the southern horizon comes the Nile, freighted with the mud which makes the wealth of Egypt. It is more than that--it _is_ Egypt, and were it not for this river, the land of the Pharaohs, the Caliphs, and the Khedive would not exist. You can trace the river as it winds away through the Delta and separates into the branches and canals which enable it to distribute its blessings over a wide area There is no point where you can better realize how much the Nile is Egypt than when you look from the summit of the great pyramid.

While we were at the summit, an Arab proposed to run from where we stood to the top of the second pyramid in ten minutes, a feat which at first glance seemed impossible. We finally agreed to give him five francs if he would do it, and away he started. He jumped from block to block with the agility of a monkey, at {522}about the rate that an able-bodied boy descends an ordinary staircase, when he is in a hurry to get something at the bottom. He ran across the space between the pyramids and up the other, but I observed that he made the ascent with less appearance of hurry than when descending the first. He made the journey in a little more than ten minutes, and I have heard of an Arab doing it inside of eight minutes.

This is one of the stock amusements of the trip to the pyramids, and I have a book, written thirty years ago, in which the same feat is mentioned.

We offered to give the whole crowd of Arabs five francs each if they would stand at the edge of the platform and then turn a somersault downwards and outwards; they were inclined to consider the matter at first, but one of them, after a moment’s thought, exclaimed, “It would kill us; we no do it.”

We explained that this was exactly what we wanted. The fellow laughed, and replied, “It do you no good; plenty more Arabs left. They come here and take our place, and they not good Arabs like us.”

We had nothing more to say.

In descending the pyramid, my two Arabs stepped ahead and took my hands as I jumped from step to step. I found it much easier than the ascent, as I had my weight, which is not that of a feather, to assist me.

There is a difference of opinion about the descent, some affirming that it is much worse than going up, while others are equally vehement in saying that it is much easier. It depends upon a

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{525}variety of personal circumstances, such as weight, age, condition of muscles and lungs, and upon the manipulations of the Arabs that have you in charge. The same conditions in every respect will not be found in any two persons.

In any event, unless much accustomed to climbing, you will have a realizing sense of weariness for the rest of the day, and when you attempt to rise next morning, and move your stiffened limbs, you can easily imagine yourself to be your own grandfather.

The great pyramid was built by Cheops, one of the kings of Memphis, who ruled about twenty-seven hundred years before Christ--some say nearly four thousand years--and was intended for his monument. Three hundred thousand men are said to have been employed twenty years upon its construction, and some authorities say it was not completed till after his death. When his mummy was ready, it was put inside the granite sarcophagus intended for it, and the entrance was carefully walled up and concealed. It remained thus closed for many centuries. In the year 820 of our era, one of the Caliphs of Cairo ordered a search for the opening, and it was finally discovered at quite a distance up from the ground on one side. Nothing of consequence was found there, and the Caliph was greatly disappointed, as he had expected a vast treasure which tradition said was concealed there.

It is quite as wearisome work to go inside as to climb to the top, and many persons think it is worse.

From the opening, you descend about sixty feet, at an angle of 26°, through a passage way three ft. five in. high, and three ft. eleven in. wide. Then, after a slight detour, you have an ascent at the same angle for nearly three hundred feet, some parts of it being quite low, and others expanding into a high gallery. At the end of this passage is the sepulchral vault known as the King’s Chamber, and containing nothing but an empty sarcophagus of red granite. The sides and roof of the chamber are of polished granite; the room measures thirty-four ft. by seventeen, and the height is a little over nineteen feet.

Below it, and reached by a horizontal gallery from the main entrance, is another apartment called the Queen’s Chamber, {526}somewhat smaller than the upper one, and there are three or four other insignificant apartments whose use has not been clearly determined.

The passage by which we enter the pyramid continues three hundred and twenty feet downwards, at the same angle as at the commencement, and so straight is it that when you are at the lower end you can see the sky as if looking through the tube of a huge telescope. At the end of it there is a small chamber, and in this a well has been dug thirty-six feet, without finding any signs of water. The statement of Herodotus, that this chamber was filled by the inflow from the Nile, is probably on a par with other statements of this reliable gentleman.

Most travellers are satisfied with a very brief examination of the interior of the pyramid, and are glad to scramble out without delay. The heat is pretty high, the air is close, and the dust almost stifling. Then there are the smoke of the candles and the glare of the magnesium wire, used for lighting up the interior of the chambers, and the noise made by the Arabs, which is ten times worse than the same amount of din in the open air.

Formerly, they had a trick of frightening timid persons into the payment of heavy “backsheesh,” to secure a safe return to the outside, and not unfrequently they attempt the same thing now. Some persons have been very roughly handled by them, and on a few occasions they have verified the American proverb about waking up the wrong passenger.

Early this season, an Englishman and an American went together to visit the pyramid, and, while they were inside, the Arabs began to threaten them. One Arab was knocked senseless, and the others were told that they would have the same fate, if they did not instantly and safely take the strangers outside.

They obeyed, and when the outer air was reached were told that they would not receive anything for their services.

They became importunate, and two more of them were knocked down. A squad of soldiers from a surveying party happened to be near; the officer in charge of them was appealed to successfully, and the offenders were severely thrashed. Since then, there has been less rudeness to persons visiting the interior of the pyramid. {527}About a quarter of a mile southeast of the great pyramid is the famous work of antiquity known as the Sphinx. It is much mutilated about the face, and is buried up to the breast in the sand. Its origin and meaning are unknown; volumes have been written about it, and for more than two thousand years it has been the subject of much learned controversy, of which I have not space to give even the outline. It has the body of an animal in a crouching position, and the head of a man. The body, a hundred and forty feet long, is formed of the natural rock, with pieces of masonry here and there to fill up the cavities. The head is cut out of the solid rock, and was originally about thirty feet from the top of the forehead to the bottom of the chin, and about fourteen feet broad.

Originally, it had a cap, wig, and beard; the cap is gone, but the wig is still there, and the beard, which has fallen, lies on the ground below. As it now stands, only the head, shoulders, and back of the Sphinx are visible, the sand being everywhere drifted and piled around the rest. There was, originally, a temple and altar between its paws, and there was a flight of steps that descended from a platform in front of the temple to the plain below.

The nose and most of the lips are gone, as though the Sphinx has been the party of the second part, in a prize-fight for the championship, but, with all its disfiguration, the statue retains much of the comeliness and grandeur for which it has long been famous.

What must have been its beauty before time and man placed their spoiling hands upon it, and before the encroaching desert heaped the sand around it, burying the platform, the steps, and the temples, and converting the whole scene into one of desolation! Could any pageant of modern times surpass the spectacle of the processions of Memphis, arranged after the manner of the most brilliant period of Egyptian history, and coming to offer adoration at the temple guarded between the paws of that figure hewn from the living rock and overshadowed by that mysterious and immobile face? Shall we ever know who was its architect, and what was the purport of this remarkable statue? Who will explain the riddle of the Sphinx? {528}Proceeding southerly from the Sphinx, we reach a temple which was discovered and excavated a few years ago. It is lined with red granite, porphyry, and alabaster, and the stones of which it is composed are very nicely joined together.

Its history is unknown, but, from certain inscriptions and statues found there, it is supposed to owe its erection to Cephrenes, or Shafra, the builder of the second pyramid.

The Arabs broke off pieces of the stone to sell to us, but we declined to buy. Part of a statue lies buried in the sand; a statue of Cephrenes was discovered here, and is now in the museum at Cairo. There are many tombs and small temples all around the pyramids, but they have no great, interest after one has seen the great pyramid and the Sphinx. All the tombs, as far as known, have been opened and examined, and their contents, if of any value, carried away. Doubtless there are some yet undiscovered, but at present there are no explorations in progress.

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