AND LOWER EGYPT. 2O9 



tiality common enough, and in which mere animal 

 passion is every thing, while the heart is totally 

 unaffected. Offended pride lays strong hold of a 

 breast once inflamed, and which knows nothing 

 of love but its transports. Dissembling as well 

 as cruel, they instil a slow but mortal poison into 

 the blood of a faithless husband. Examples of a-_ 

 revenge, which even the delirium of an amorous 

 passion cannot excuse, are daily to be seen. 

 Their blows are meditated in silence, and they 

 indulge coolly, and in large draughts, the dreadful 

 pleasure of depriving an unhappy being of his life. 

 I have not actually witnessed what I am just now 

 going to relate, but they are facts which have 

 been unanimously attested to me, and which are 

 considered in the country as certain and un- 

 doubted. 



These women, desperately wicked, are not 

 willing to inflict a quick and sudden death ; with 

 this their remorseless jealousy would not be grati- 

 fied; but they bring on a gradual decay more in- 

 tolerable than death itself. In themselves they 

 find the poison which promotes their views. The 

 periodical discharge, which Nature employs to 

 preserve their existence and health, becomes, in 

 their hands, a mean of destroying others. Mixed 

 with some food, a portion of this discharge is a 

 poison which immediately throws him who swal- 



voL, III. p low* 



