296 LETTERS 0-X NATURAL MAGIC. 



statue of granite giving out the very same sounds that 

 were given out at the same time of the day by a granite 

 rock ; and in place of reckoning it a supernatural fact, 

 they could regard it in no other light than as the dupli- 

 cate of a well-known natural phenomenon. It is a mere 

 conjecture, however, that such sounds were common in the 

 Thebaid, and it is therefore probable that a granite rock, 

 possessing the property of emitting sounds at sunrise, had 

 been discovered by the priests, who were at the same time 

 the philosophers of Egypt, and that the block had been 

 employed in the formation of the Memnonian statue for the 

 purpose of impressing upon it a supernatural character, 

 und enabling them to maintain their influence over a 

 credulous people. 



The inquiries of recent travellers have enabled us to 

 corroborate these views, and to add another remarkable 

 example of the influence of subterraneous sounds over 

 superstitious minds. About three leagues to the north 

 of Tor, in Arabia Petraea, is a mountain, within the bosom 

 of which the most singular sounds have been heard. 

 The Arabs of the Desert ascribe these sounds to a convent 

 of monks preserved miraculously under ground, and the 

 sound is supposed to be that of the Nakous, a long narrow 

 metallic ruler, suspended horizontally, which the priest 

 strikes with a hammer for the purpose of assembling the 

 monks to prayer. A Greek was said to have seen the 

 mountain open, and to have descended into the subter- 

 ranean convent, where he found fine gardens and delicious 

 water ; and, in order to give proof of his descent, he pro- 

 duced some fragments of consecrated bread, which ho 

 pretended to have brought from the subterranean convent. 

 The inhabitants of Tor likewise declare that the camels 

 are not only frightened but rendered furious when they 

 hear these subterraneous sounds. 



M. Scetzen, the first European traveller who visited 



