THE SOURCE OF THE NILE. 129 



Radioes. He has on him a loofe fhirt, like what they wear at 

 this day in Nubia (only it is not blue) with loofe fleeves, 

 and arms and neck bare. It feemed to be thiCfc muflin, or 

 cotton cloth, and long-ways through it is a crimfon flripe 

 about one-eighth of an inch broad ; a proof, if this is Egyp* 

 tian manufacture, that they underftood at that time how to 

 dye cotton, crimfon, an art found out in Britain only a very 

 few years ago. If this is the fabric of India, Hill it proves 

 the antiquity of the commerce between the two countries, 

 and the introduction of Indian manufactures into Egypt. 



It reached down to his ancle ; his feet are without fan* 

 tlals ; he feems to be a corpulent man, of about fixty years of 

 age, and of a complexion rather dark for an Egyptian. To 

 guefs by the detail of the figure, the painter feems to have 

 had the fame degree of merit with a good fign-painter in 

 Europe, at this day.— If we allow this harper's ftature to be 

 five feet ten inches, then we may compute the harp, in its 

 -extreme length, to be fome thing lefs than fix feet and a 

 half. 



This inflrument is of a much more advantageous form 

 •than the triangular Grecian harp. It has thirteen firings, 

 but wants the forepiece of the frame oppofite to the longefl 

 firing. The back part is the founding-board, compofed of 

 four thin pieces of wood, joined together in form of a cone, 

 that is, growing wider towards the bottom ; fo that, as the 

 length of the firing increafes, the fquare of the correfpond- 

 ing fpace in the founding-board, in which the found was to 

 undulate, always increafes in proportion. The whole prin- 

 ciples, on which this harp is conftructed, are rational and 



Vol. I, R ingenious. 



