226 Royal Society :^ ' " 



pf the more extensive researches iu the district of Memphis. That 

 account, together with the author's general conclusions, form the 

 subject of this second part. 



The practical part of the whole inquiry has been conducted under 

 the immediate direction of Hekekyan Bey, an Armenian engineer 

 officer in the service of the Viceroy of Egypt ; and a brief biogra- 

 phical account of liim is given, showing his eminent scientific quali- 

 fications for such researches. The author had the advantage of ob- 

 taining the zealous cooperation of our Cousul-General in Egypt, the 

 Honourable Charles Augustus Murraj', and his successor, the Honour- 

 able Frederick Bruce, on whose representations the late Viceroy 

 Abbas Pacha, and the present, not only gave a ready assent to the 

 undertaking, but, with a rare and most exemplary liberality, ordered 

 that the expense should be defrayed by the Egyptian Government. 



As at Heliopolis the Obelisk is all that remains above ground of 

 that city, so, at Memphis, there is one solitary monument of its 

 former greatness, a fallen colossal statue of the great king Ra- 

 messes II., the Sesostris of the Greeks. All testimony appears to 

 concur in assigning the foundation of Memphis to Menes, the first 

 king of the first dynasty, who, according to Lepsius, began his reign 

 3892 years B.C. The same authority assigns the dates of 1394 to 

 1328 B.C. for the reign of Ramesses II. The site of Memphis pre- 

 sented therefore a peculiarly fit situation for prosecuting the inquiry, 

 by sinking pits to the greatest practicable depth near this colossal 

 statue, and around it. 



The surface of the ground, for some distance arouud the statue, 

 being uneven, it became necessary, in order to ascertain the variable 

 depth of water during an inundation, at the mouths of the pits, 

 intended to be sunk in various parts of the area, that the level of the 

 highest rise of the water over the ground at a given time should be 

 determined. This was done for the inundation of 1851, and it proved 

 to be somewhat above the 24 th cubit mark of the Rhoda Nilometer, 

 a height of water which covers the entire surface of the valley, leaving 

 above it artificial elevations. The inequalities of the ground are 

 such, that in any section, under the 24th cubit level, the surface 

 varies from where it coincides with that level to nearly 20 feet in the 

 deepest part ; so that, while in one part of the district there might 

 be a depth of nearly 20 feet of turbid water, in another it might be 

 less than an inch ; and consequently, the same period of time would 

 be represented by very different degrees of thickness of the sediment. 



Two pits were sunk close to the fallen colossal statue, sections of 

 both of which are given. In the deepest, the shaft was continued to 

 the depth of 24 feet 5 inches, when further progress was stopped by 

 filtration water. This interruption to excavations occurred iu every 

 other pit that was sunk. From the bottom of the shaft, a boring 

 tool was applied, and cores of soil were brought up from successive 

 depths, the lowest being 41 feet 4^^ inches from the surface of the 

 ground. The sections given of the two pits in this locality show, that 

 the soil consists of varieties of loam and sand in irregularly alternating 

 layers ; and the Nile sediment from the lowest part of the boring was 

 fomid, by a careful analysis, to be nearly identical in composition 



