CHAPTER XXIV.

THE GAWAZEE— EXPLORING TEMPLES AND TOMBS— PHIL/E AND ITS
RUINS-NUBIA.
HE Thebiad was one of the principal divisions of ancient Egypt, and was originally divided into ten nomes. There were ten halls in the Labyrinth that were specially allotted to the princes of Upper Egypt. It was divided by the river running through its entire length, and situated in a narrow valley that was, and is to-da}^, bounded by the Arabian hills on the west side, and the Libyan hills and desert on the other. It extended north as far as Eshmiinen the Hermopolis Magna of the Greeks, and on the south as far as Asjnit or Syene. We talked of the ancient glory of this wonderful city of Thebes and realized that it was the same old river that ran murmuring by, as when Seti and his son, the Great Rameses, beautified and adorned its banks with such wondrous works of art.
The sun shone bright and warm that day, and Memnon still sat looking to the east, but his voice was now hushed and his stony lips were as silent as the voices of the dead that surrounded him. The risinsf sun
o
turned the Libyan hills into red and gold, and the marvellous play of colors were indescribable. The sky was just as blue, her fields were still marked with bright greens, yellow and brown, and the bean flower still shed its fragrance upon the morning air as in the days of old. The nights were supremely beautiful, the stars glittered in the azure vault above, and the splendid moon shone as beautiful and bright as when this majestic hundred-gated Thebes was in the height of her glory, and yet, nought but the ruins of this mighty city remain with us to tell of the wondrous knowledge that pertained to these warrior kings, and their vanished splendor.
We arose that morning and found a light air astir and Abdallah pre- paring to weigh the anchor, but it was not until nearly ten o'clock that the wind came out good and strong, our anchor was soon apeak, our big
560 EGYPT, THE CRADLE OF ANCIENT MASONRY.
sails loosed and we bid adieu to Thebes. We passed swiftly by the grand pylon of Karnak and inside of an hour we drew up towards Erment, and very soon moored on the west bank, close to a sugar factory, four hundred and sixty-two miles from Cairo, and eight miles from Thebes. It was told us that there were some very interesting ruins at that place, but on our arrival we lea:rned that they had been entirely destroyed for the purpose of building the sugar factor}' there, consequently as there was a light wind astir, we went on board again and started off for Eshne, but within about eight miles from that place the wind died out, the heat became intense and nearly unbearable, and hung like a heavy pall over all. Our great sails flapped idly to and fro with the motion of the boat as our sailors started out upon the tow path, and struck up their everlasting songs once more. We had dinner just as the sun went down, and we sat on deck until we saw the lights of Eshne, when we retired, and early the next morning we found that our boat was anchored off that place, which is located on the west bank of the Nile, four hundred and ninety miles from Cairo. This is the site of the old city of Latopolis, and derived its name from the Lato fish or Latus, that was worshipped here in the sanctuary of this temple. The people of this place claim that Moses was born here. It has a population of about ten thousand inhabitants and it is the headquarters of the Alme or Gawazee (dancing girls) of whom I have already spoken in a previous chapter.
Warburton, in " Crescent and the Cross," gives an account of the Alme, page 208, f/ seg., which I believe will be of interest to you, my dear Brothers and readers, it is as follows : " The term Alme, or, in the pliiral Awalim^ means literall}', a learned female. This epithet is only strictly applicable to singing women, whose music is sometimes of a very high order and their accomplishments in other respects so numerous, that they frequently obtain fifty guineas from a party for their exhibi- tions on one evening. The dancing girls belong to a very inferior order, and are termed Gawazee in the language of the country. These women used to have a settlement near Cairo, and attended all the marriages and other festivities of the beau monde there. The Moollahs, or Moslem divines, however, objected to them, not on account of their impropriety, but on the plea that the profane eyes of the ' Infidel ' ought not to gaze upon the women of the true faith. There was such an agitation raised
THE GAWAZEE, OR DANCING GIRLS.
EGYPT, THE CRADLE OF ANCIENT MASONRY. 561
on this subject, that the priests prevailed, and all the Ahne were sent off to Eshne, five hundred miles up the river, by way of banishment, where they are allowed a small stipend, by the government, to keep them from starvation. The effects of this reformation produced frightful results, which I cannot allude to here, and Almeism still flourishes everywhere
outside of the Cairene districts The dress of the Alme is very
picturesque, and graceful, consisting of a short embroidered jacket fitting close, but open in the front, long loose trousers of almost transparent silk, a cashmere shawl wrapped round the loins, rather than the waist and light elegant turbans of muslin embroidered with gold. Their hair flows in dark curls down their shoulders, and glitters with small gold coins ; their eyes are deeply but delicately painted with Kohl, which gives them a very languishing expression, and a profusion of showy ornaments glitters on their unveiled bosoms.
" When about to commence the Oriental ballet, the Alme exchanges this for a yet lighter dress, throws off her slippers and advances to the center of the room with a slow step and undulating form, that keep accu- rate time to the music of the reed-pipe and the castanets, on which she is accompanied by her attendants. She then, after a glance round upon her audience, throws herself at once and entirely into the part she intends to act ; be it pensive, gay or tragic she seems to know no feeling, but that of the passion she represents. In some cases a whole romance is acted ; an Arab girl, for instance, she listens at the door of her tent for the sound of her lover's horse, she chides his dela}' ; he comes, she expresses her delight ; he sinks to sleep, she watches over and dances around him ; he departs, she is overwhelmed with grief Generall}' the representation is more simple ; the ' Wasp dance ' is a favorite ballet of the latter class : the actress is standing musing in a pensive posture, when a wasp is sup- posed to fly into her bosom — her girdle — all about her ; the music becomes rapid, she flies about in terror, darting her hand all over her person in pursuit of the insect, till she finds it was all a mistake ; then smiling she expresses her pleasure and her relief in dance."
We started out to visit the temple of Eshne and found only a portico
which was surrounded by houses, and the temple proper was covered
with houses, it being very difficult to tell anything at all about it. The
portico has been cleared of the rubbish and debris, and we recognized it as 36
562 EGYPT, THE CRADLE OF ANCIENT MASONRY.
belonging to the Roman period, for the cartouches belong to the various Roman Emperors. We did not care to stop at Eshne over night, but force of circumstances compelled us to remain. There was not a breath of wind astir, and Hassan had gone to visit a friend, so we spent that afternoon in rambling around the town visiting the bazaars, where we purchased a few articles, then went down to our dahabiyeh. After dinner we wrote a few letters, arranged our notes, and at night we went up to one of the prin- cipal coffee houses, and witnessed some of the dances of the Gawazee girls.
The very first dance was the " Wasp " dance that Warburton described, but like all the rest it soon began to express unbridled passion, when we turned away in disgust, throwing a few piasters as our offering. We strolled off down to our boat, smoked a cigar, and after a chat about what we had seen we retired for the night.
The next morning Salame aroused me from a sound slumber to hand me my morning coffee, and as I sat sipping it I looked out through the cabin window, and saw that we were under way, and would soon arrive at El-Kab, if the wind did not fail us ; but by the time our breakfast was ready the wind had left us, and we had a lot of towing to do before reach- ing that place.
As we sat on deck that day we amused ourselves by shooting, and we bagged quite a lot of birds, some of which were beautiful specimens, and we preserved the skins for future use. We went crawling along slowly but surely with our big sails hanging from the yards, swaying backward and forward with every motion of the boat. We dropped off into a doze from which we were suddenly aroused by the shouts of our sailors, who came laughing and swimming on board, when the '''' shogooV was eased off our big sails swelled out full and round as the wind struck us on our port quarter, just before we got to El-Kab, the Eilcitliycs of the ancients, or the " City of Liicinay This was a very interesting place to visit, where there were some very fine rock tombs especially interesting. They would well repay any one for the time expended in examining them, but as I had visited these tombs and temples some years ago, and as the wind was blowing strongly in our favor and both Abdallah and Hassan urged us to go on, we took advantage of the wind and concluded to con- tinue on to Edfu.
EGYPT, THE CRADLE OF ANCIENT MASONRY. 563
The decorations of the tombs and temples at El-Kab were in a very fair state of preservation when I saw them last. In the tomb of Paheri we were enabled to see farm scenes such as ploughing, sowing, reaping, in fact all kinds of field and farm work, river scenes, such as fishing, hunting, etc. There is one scene here that will be of great interest to the Masonic student, and that is the funeral procession and th.^ Judgment of the Dead. One threshing scene in this tomb, where the oxen were tread- ing out the golden grain, has the song of the driver inscribed above, which is translated as follows :
Thresh for yourselves Oxen ! Thresh for yourselves I Measure for yourselves ! Measure for your Masters.
Mr. Gliddon renders it :
Hie along oxen ! tread the corn faster ; The straw for yourselves, The corn for your master.
Some of the scenes here will be very interesting to the Scottish Rite Mason. We soon left this place {El-Kab) behind us with its yellow mountains, date palms, etc. As the wind was blowing fresh and strong' we had earnestly desired to be enabled to anchor off Edfu.
After we passed El-Kab we ran by some very fertile islands, and noticed that the whole of the way from Eshne, the arable land upon the east bank of the river was very narrow, except in a very few places, but before we reached Edfu it began to widen out again. Our gong sounded the dinner hour and we went down to partake of it, and as we sat chatting over our nuts and wine the loud voices of our sailors rang out in song, we hurried up on deck and discovered the propylon of -Edfu. We went gliding along, and as the shadows lengthened and twilight fell around us our sails were furled, and we were soon moored for the night under the glittering stars at Edfu, the Appollinopolis Magna of the Greeks.
Edfu has a post and telegraph ofl&ce, and the steamers stop here every Tuesday and Frida}' for a couple of hours. We went on shore, and . strolled up to the post office, and had quite a long chat with some gentle- men who were remaining over, so as to be enabled to visit the celebrated temple at that place ; so we made arrangements to visit it together the
564 EGYPT, THE CRADLE OF ANCIENT MASONRY.
next morning. We went back to the dahabiyeii, and retired early, tell- ing Hassan to have an early breakfast. The next morning Salame aroused me from a sound slumber, and finishing our morning meal, we started off with our new acquaintances to visit the celebrated temple, located about iifteen minutes ride from the river.
The temple lies directly West of the town, and it is entirely sur- rounded by the mud hovels of the natives ; in fact, the whole of this most beautiful temple was covered, roof and all, with the mud dwellings of the people who lived here previous to 1864, when it was cleared of them by