THE SOURCE OF THE NILE. i* 



j 



imagined it was an old obelifk, hewn to that round form. 

 It is nine feet diameter ; and were it but 80 feet high, it 

 would require a prodigious obelifk indeed, that could ad- 

 mit to be hewn to this circumference for fuch a length, fo 

 as perfectly to efface the hieroglyphics that muft have been 

 very deeply cut in the four faces of it. 



The tomb of Alexander has been talked of as one of the 

 antiquities of this city. Marmol * fays he faw it in the year 

 1546. It was, according to him, a fmall houfe, in form of 

 a chapel, in the middle of the city, near the church of St 

 Mark, and was called Efcander. 



The thing itfelf is not probable, for all thofe that made' 

 themielves mailers of Alexandria, in the earlieft times, had! 

 too much refpecft for Alexander, to have reduced his tomb 

 to fo obfeure a Hate. It would have been fpared even by 

 the Saracens ; for Mahomet fpeaks of Alexander with great 

 refpect, both as a king and a prophet. The body was pre- 

 fcrved in a glafs coffin, in f Strabo's time, having been rob- 

 bed of the golden one in which it was firffc depofited. 



The Greeks, for the moft part, are better initruelied in the 

 hiftory of tfcefe places than the Cophts, Turks, or Chrifti- 

 ans ; and, after the Greeks, the Jews. 



As I was perfectly difguifed, having for many years worn> 

 the drefs of the Arabs, I was under no conftraint, but walked. 

 dirough the town in all directions, accompanied by any of 



thofe 



* Marmol, lib. xi. cap. 14. p. 276. torn. 3. f Strabo, lib. xvii. p. 922. 



