THE ENTRANCE TO THE CITADEL OF CAIRO. 
The principal entrance to the citadel is from the great square, Er-Rumeyleh, in 
which is situated the noblest sacred structure in Cairo, the Mosque of the Sultan 
Hassan. This square, in which a market is held, is the great place of resort of 
the idlers of Cairo, and crowds are always to be found there grouped round tale¬ 
tellers, mountebanks, musicians, jugglers, and other attractions to a crowd. Here 
the great gate of the citadel, with its massive round towers, leads to a steep and 
narrow road within — so steep, that in many places it has been necessary to cut 
steps in the rock to facilitate the ascent and descent of horses and camels; visitors 
usually go on asses, and ladies in sedans. This road leads to the plain of the citadel, 
which lies on the south-eastern extremity of Cairo. It has an elevation of about 
two hundred and fifty feet above the city, that lies stretched out immediately below 
it in the plain, and affords one of the most striking views in the East. 
This citadel was founded by the Sultan Sal;di-ed-Deen — the great Saladin of 
our crusades—in the year of the Hegira 572 (a.d. 1176); but it was not finished 
till thirty-two years afterwards. Since that time it has been the residence of the 
Sultans, Pashas, and other Govei'nors of Egypt. 
The principal gate, leading from the Rumeyleh, is called the Bab-el-Azab, and 
the narrow and steep road within was the site of the massacre of the Memlooks 
by Mehemet Ali on the 1st of March, 1811 ; an act of base treachery in our estimation, 
but of consummate, deep, and successful daring in Eastern politics. It was an act 
of self-defence, for they had plotted, and were still plotting, to destroy him; and 
if the act is to be estimated by the amount of good that follovred the evil, few 
revolutions have so essentially served the cause of humanity as the destruction of 
a set of wretches Avho were recruited in infamy, and whose abominable lives and 
characters had fortunately no parallel in the history of a government. Simply as 
a power which controlled or destroyed every chance of a good administration, they 
were not worse than the Janissaries, happily also destroyed, and consigned with 
Memlooks and Praetorian bands to the infamy they so well deserved in history. 
The bold and decisive step, and its successful execution, led to a change in 
the policy as well as government of Egypt; and the extraordinary man who effected 
this lived to be esteemed one of the regenerators of his race, whose prejudices stood 
not in the way of important improvements in establishment of civil intercourse with 
other creeds and people; and though those he governed suffered from his despotism, 
his policy has opened the means of introducing a more liberal system, which cannot 
fail, from the increased intercourse of Egypt with civilised Europe, in rendering 
the condition of the Egyptians within a short period far better than could have been 
hoped for from any pre-existent government in the Valley of the Nile. 
