676 TRAVELS TO DISCOVER 
defert, between Gooz and Syene, we faw huge pillars of this 
light fand; their bafe in the earth, and heads in the clouds, 
crofling the wide expanfe in various directions, and, upon 
its becoming calm in the evening, falling to pieces, and bu- 
rying themfelves in the Nile, with whofe flream they mix- 
ed like an impalpable powder, and were hurried down the 
river, to compofe the many fandy iflands we fee in the | 
courfe of it. 
Ir feems to bean eftablifhed fact, that water of every fort, 
frefh and falt, that of rivers, and what is flagnant, has from 
early times fenfibly diminifhed through the whole world; 
if then the land of Egypt has been continually rifing every 
year, while the quantity of water that was to cover it has 
become lefs, or at leaft not increafed, dearth in thefe latter 
years muft have been frequent in Egypt, for want of the 
Nile’s rifing toa proper height; but this is fo far from being 
the cafe, that, in thefe laft 34 years*, there has not been one 
feafon of fcarcity from the lownefs of the Nile, although the 
rife having been too great, and the waters too abundant, have 
thrice in that time occafioned famine by carrying away the 
millet. | 
Ir the land of Egypt increafed (as Herodotus fays) one 
foot in roo years, this addition muit have appeared in the 
moft ancient public monuments: now, the very bafe of all 
the obelifks in Upper Egypt, are bare and vifible, and even 
the paved plane, laid vifibly on purpofe to receive the Gno 
monical fhade, is not covered, nor fcarcely out of its level, 
and 
* Several Arabian MSS. atteft this. 
