ME.  HOENEE  ON  THE  ALLUVIAL  LAND  OE  EGYPT. 
8.S 
river  descends,  and  in  a distance  of  580  miles  the  difference  at  the  extremes  of  Cairo 
and  Elephantina  must  be  very  great.  Under  such  circumstances,  that  the  rise  of  the 
bed  of  the  river  and  the  rise  of  the  inundation  water  at  the  two  places  should  relatively 
have  so  near  an  agreement,  appears  to  me  to  be  highly  improbable. 
It  is  further  assumed  that  the  Ehoda  Nilometer  has  undergone  no  alteration  since 
A.D.  847 ; but  M.  Marcel,  a colleague  of  M.  Girard  in  Egypt,  in  an  elaborate  disserta- 
tion on  this  Nilometer*,  states,  that  it  was  erected  in  a.d.  715,  that  it  had  been  injured 
by  neglect,  was  restored  in  814,  repaired  in  846,  and  again  repaired  in  861,  1092,  and 
1518.  Sir  Gardiner  Wilkinson  tells  us  “ that  it  is  certain  no  accurate  calculations  can 
be  obtained  from  a column  which  has  been  broken  and  repaired  in  such  a manner  that 
one  of  the  cubits  remains  incomplete  f.”  How  little  reliance,  for  such  an  object,  is  to 
be  placed  on  this  Nilometer,  is  still  more  apparent  from  the  following  extracts  from  a 
memoir  upon  it  sent  to  me  by  Hekekyan  Bey,  dated  Cairo,  15  November,  1857. 
“ The  chamber  or  deep  basin  in  which  the  graduated  column  is  erected,  is  an  oblong 
space  21  feet  8 by  16  feet  9,  having  a flight  of  steps  within  it.  The  present  column  is 
formed  out  of  the  remnants  of  an  older  column  of  records,  erected  formerly  on  the 
same  spot.  According  to  some  historians  it  was  commenced  and  terminated  in  a.d.  715. 
The  building  has  frequently  required  repafr,  effected  at  various  intervals  by  Caliphs, 
Sultans,  Beys,  Pachas,  and  by  the  French  General  Menou.  It  rests  upon  an  isolated 
disk  of  sandstone  31-|  inches  thick,  and  by  soundings  it  has  been  ascertained  that  the  disk 
rests  upon  an  arenaceous  Nile  alluvium,  containing  particles  of  limestone  and  pottery. 
“ In  estimating  the  heights  of  the  inundations  by  the  column,  the  difficulty  to  surmount 
has  been,  the  conception  of  some  clear  idea  of  the  nature  of  the  scale  and  the  nomen- 
clature used  in  the  daily  measurements  and  records  of  the  water-levels.  At  the  bottom 
of  the  flight  of  steps  there  is  a landing-place,  called  the  Mastaba,  the  surface  of  which 
is  on  a level  with  the  9th  cubic  mark  on  the  column.  The  surface  of  the  water  at  the 
commencement  of  the  annual  increase  is  measured  down  from  the  Mastaba,  and  when 
it  has  risen  to  that  level,  it  is  measured  up  from  the  Mastaba  until  it  culminates.  It 
is  again  measured  down  from  its  point  of  culmination  to  the  Mastaba,  and  from  that 
level  down  to  its  ebb,  and  again  down  from  the  Mastaba  at  the  rise  of  the  following  year, 
circularly,  without  intermission ; a process  which  has  been  going  on  from  generation  to 
generation  every  day  at  sunrise,  and  with  extreme  care  at  the  precise  times  of  the  two 
solstices  and  equinoxes.  These  measurements  are  carried  up  and  down  the  interior 
scarps  of  the  walls  of  the  chamber  on  the  west  and  south  sides.  The  measuring  instru- 
ment is  the  Black  Cubit,  so  called  because  it  is  made  of  ebony. 
“ The  column  has  nothing  to  do  with  these  measurements.  Mehemed  Ali  Pacha, 
observing  the  wide  discrepancies  between  the  numerical  values  assigned  evidently  to  the 
same  water-levels  from  year  to  year,  ordered  the  Sheikhs  of  the  Nilometer  to  send  up 
the  daily  accounts  of  their  observations,  and  to  register  them  in  government  books. 
* Description  de  I’Egypte,  tome  i.  p.  29,  and  tome  ii.  Etat  Moderne,  p.  119. 
t Topography  of  Thebes,  p.  31.3. 
