±ou DESCRIPTIONS OF EGYPT. 
locks of moving sand, lies in N. L. 26° ff 51% 
and E. long. 34° 4' 15". The houses of the town 
are built of clay, and the inhabitants, in their man- 
ners and features, have a greater resemblance to 
the Arabians of the eastern shore of the Red Sea, 
than to the native Egyptians. The port is formed 
by a rock, which projects about four hundred yards 
into the sea. There is no cultivated land in the 
vicinity of the town, and the water is so brackish, 
that the inhabitants are forced to procure it from 
Terfowey, which is a day's journey distant. Cos- 
seir exhibits no vestiges of antiquity, and is as lit- 
tle distinguished by modern grandeur as by ancient 
fame. Though more accessible than Suez, the on- 
ly other Egyptian port on the Red Sea, it derives 
more advantage from lying in the route of the pil- 
grims of Mecca, than from its trade. The Maadan 
Uzzumurud, or Emerald Mine, visited by Bruce, 
to the south of Cosseir, is probably the Smaragdus 
Mons of Ptolemy. Bruce observed five pits sunk 
at the foot of a mountain, a few miles from the 
shore, but did not explore the mineralogy of the 
district. Tracing the same bold, naked, and almost 
inaccessible coast, after doubling Ras-el- Ans, a large 
promontory, which corresponds to the ancient Lep^ 
te, we reach the Sinus Immundus of the ancients, 
an extensive bay marked with shoals and breakers, 
which, in our modern charts, still retains the ap- 
pellation of Foul Bay. In the bottom of this bay 
