160 THEORY OF THE EARTH. 



perform operations of this kind. Between this 

 prince and Moeris, who, according to them, 

 reigned 900 years before the period at which this 

 account was given (1350 years before Christ), 

 they had a succession of three hundred and thirty 

 other kings. 



After these kings came Sesostris, who extend- 

 ed his conquests as far as Colchis * ; and altoge- 

 ther, there were, to the time of Sethos, three 

 hundred and forty-one kings, and three hundred 

 and forty-one chief priests, in three hundred and 

 forty-one generations, during a space of 11,340 

 years. And, in this interval, as if to insure the 

 authenticity of their chronology, these priests as- 

 serted that the sun had risen twice where he sets, 

 without any change having taken place in the 

 climate or productions of the country, and with- 

 out any of the gods having at that time, or be- 

 fore, made their appearance and reigned in 

 Egypt. 



* Herodotus thought he had discovered relations of 

 figure and colour between the Colchians and Egyptians; 

 but it is infinitely more probable that those dark-coloured 

 Colchians of which he speaks, were an Indian colony,, at- 

 tracted by the commerce anciently established between In- 

 dia and Europe, by the Oxus, the Caspian Sea, and the 

 Phasis. See Hitter,, Vestibule of Ancient History before 

 Herodotus, chap. i. 



