TO ROSETTA. 317 
them, as we should say, by the gallon ; heaping- 
them into a measure containing a certain quan- 
tity, for which they ask the low price of a para ; 
rather more than a farthing of our money. Four 
soldiers were at this time stationed at Berinbal 
to protect the inhabitants from being pillaged 
by our allies, the Turks, 
Near to this village we noticed the superb ^'^'"'^'^ ^* 
tomb of some Santon, or Sheik, standing upon ^'^ii'recki. 
the banks of the Nile. The form of the dome, 
so prevalent in these buildings, seems to have 
been originally borrowed from the shape either 
of a pumpkin or of a melon ; the external fluted 
surface, and almost the entire form of the fruit, 
being modelled by the architect. The custom 
also of surrounding a principal tomb with hum- 
bler sepulchres, as it existed in ages when the 
Pyramids were erected, seems, by the appear- 
ance of this coemetery, to have been common in 
the country. The place is called Massora Shi- 
brecki. Other travellers have observed, not only 
in Egypt, but also in Syria, and particularly in 
the neighbourhood of Damascus, a form of sepul- 
chre precisely corresponding, though upon a 
smaller scale, with the graduated structure of 
the Pyramids; being all of them pyramidal, with 
decreasing ranges, o^ four or more steps, like 
