A pilgrimage to the temples and tombs of Egypt, Nubia, and ...

TEMPLE OF EDFOU. 267
ceeded one another within the precincts of the
temple have accumulated to a height which has
more than half buried the columns of the court
and pronaos, and has left nothing visible of the
great door that leads from the latter into the
adytum, but its cornice. A wall of circumvalla-
tion originally surrounded the temple, and is still
nearly perfect, and covered on both sides with
sacred sculptures. On the roof of this sanctuary
there is a populous village; lambs bleating, dogs
barking, cocks crowing, children squalling, and
all the not delightful sights and sounds that char-
acterize rural life on the banks of the Nile. I
rode my donkey into the midst of it, and looking
down from thence into the great court, beautiful
still in its degraded state, figured to myself how
it must have appeared, when the priests of Apollo
in all their sacerdotal splendour, received the
princes of the land within that sacred enclosure,
and the votaries of the god flocked from far
and near to witness the pagan rites enacted
there.
Again have I found that my admiration, based
upon ignorance, has led me all astray in my
judgment of Edfou, which I frankly own to you
excited in me sentiments of the most unqualified
approbation and delight. The old story of dating