us trench which remained to be crossed before we got into the Mustering all great chamber. my strength, I leaped, and was followed by the American. Smelt stood on the brink, ready to drop with fatigue. He called to "for God's sake to help him over the fosse, or at least to stop, if only for five minutes, to allow him time to recover his strength." It was impossible-to stay was death, and we could not resist the desire to push on and reach the open air. We encouraged him to summon all his force, and he cleared the trench. When we reached the open air it was one o'clock, and the heat in the sun about 160°. Our sailors, who were waiting for us, had luckily a bardak full of water, which they sprinkled upon us, but though a little refreshed, it was not possible to climb the sides of the pit; they unfolded their turbans, and slinging them round our bodies, drew us to the top. Our appearance alone without our guides naturally astonished the Arab who had remained at the entrance of the cavern; and he anxiously inquired for his ha-habebas, or friends. To have confessed they were dead would have excited suspicion, he would have supposed we had murdered them, and have alarmed the inhabitants of Amabdi, to pursue us and revenge the death of their friends. We replied therefore they were coming, and were employed in bringing out the mum inies we had found, which was the cause of their delay. We lost no time in mounting our asses, re-crossed the desert, and passed hastily by the village to regain the ferry of Manfalout. cumstances. That the Arabs of Amabdi would pursue us to revenge the supposed murder of their friends, there was no doubt, and as it would be next to impossible to persuade them we had no hand in their deaths, we all agreed our only safety was in flight. It was resolved we should wait till midnight, and then sail down the Nile for Miniet, the first Turkish garrisoned town we should reach. Owing to the laziness or stupidity of our Reis, it was however five in the morning before we weighed anchor. This at the time gave us great uneasiness, but was in fact a most fortunate circumstance; for, as will appear afterwards, had we sailed earlier we should certainly have fallen into the hands of our enemies. The wind was contrary, blowing strongly from the north, and we had only made two leagues by seven o'clock. We now saw four Turks on horseback galloping towards us, followed by two Arabs on foot, and as we made but little way down the river, they were soon near enough to fire a pistol and order us to bring to. We stopped our boat, and they called to us from the shore, saying they were 2Q2 sent sent by the Cacheff to bring us to Manfalout to answer for the murder of our Arab guides. The two Arabs on foot were violent in their threats, and continued vociferating they would have blood for blood, and that they were resolved on our deaths, though it might cost the lives of twenty more of their countrymen. We entered into a parley with the Turks, and demanded of them if they would answer for our safety on our way to Manfalout, and stipulated also that we should be allowed to carry with us our arms. They promised us we should not be molested on our road to the town, and after some demur permitted us to take our swords, pistols, and double-barrelled guns. On these conditions we went on shore, and walked on foot under the escort of the Turks to Manfalout. When we arrived at the house of the Cacheff, we found him smoking in an outer court, attended by a few Arnout guards, and surrounded by about forty of the inhabitants of Amabdi. The Arabs received us with a shout of revengeful delight. The Cacheff treated us in a stern and haughty manner, and informed us of what we were accused by the people about him. Through our dragoman we related our story, and produced the firman we had received of Machmoud Ali, Pacha of Cairo. Qur passport ran in the usual form, enjoining all the Governors of the different towns through which we should pass to afford us every protection and assistance. A secretary was ordered to read, the firman aloud, which when he had done, the Cacheff reaching out his hand took hold of it, and looking sternly at us, observed sarcastically, I do not see that this firman allows you either to maltreat or kill the Arabs." He then poured out a torrent of abuse upon us in Arabic, to the great satisfaction of our accusers, and retired into an inner court, leaving us, as we conceived, to their mercy. The Arabs were most of them armed with swords and spears, and began now to surround us with menacing gestures. Shortly however we were sent for by the Turk, and conducted by some of his soldiers into his presence. The Arabs expressed grea satisfaction at this, and appeared to think our fate was decided. The Cacheff received us on this occasion in a much more friendly manner than at first; he was unobserved by the Arabs, and laid aside the angry tone which we now perceived he had formerly only affected. "My good friends," said he, laying his hand on the shoulder of our dragoman, "I know I am, by virtue of your firman, bound to protect you, and my head must answer for your safety. I believe your story, but I have a guard only of 50 soldiers, and the village of Amabdi is 700. muskets strong. Should all the inhabitants take a part in this affair and come over, the conse quence will be fatal both to you and myself; you must make your escape secretly, and in the mean time I will amuse and detain the Arabs." We saw the force of this advice, thanked the Cacheff for his friendly conduct, and lost no time in making our retreat through a gate gate at the back of his house. When we had quitted our boat to accompany the Turks to Manfalout, we had given orders that it should follow us, and now found it waiting close to the town. We again set sail, but as the wind continued to blow strongly from the north, with little prospect of eluding the pursuit of our enemies. The Nile here is about two musket shots broad, and we were continually obliged to tack. Though we rowed with all our might we made but little way, and had scarcely lost sight of the town before we observed a party of horsemen at a considerable distance in the Desert, on the right bank of the Nile, whom we took for Bedouin Arabs. Soon after we perceived a number of heads peeping over the sand hillocks on the same side. We were at this moment nearly in the middle of the river, and consequently a little without musket shot. Suddenly several Arabs jumped up and shouted to us to come over, or they would fire upon us. We rowed our boat as quickly as possible to the other bank, and consulted amongst ourselves what measures to take. Our danger was imminent, we were surrounded on all sides by enemies, our friend the Cacheff at Manfalout was unable to protect us, and the distance to Miniet was seventy miles. If the wind had been favourable, by fast sailing and keeping close to the left bank of the river, we might have escaped our pursuers; but in the present circumstances it would have been madness to continue our course. At length it was resolved we should return to Manfalout again, claim the assistance of the Cacheff, or endeavour to convince the Arabs of our innocence. We quickly reached the town, and had no sooner stepped on shore than we were assailed by three women, and five or six children they were all naked and smeared with mud. We were informed that they were the wives and children of the men who had perished, and the state in which they exhibited themselves was according to the custom of mourning amongst them. As we were armed, we reached without much obstruction the house of the Cacheff, whom we now found surrounded by more than four hundred Arabs, and amongst them the Shekh of the village of Amabdi. Making our way through the crowd, we luckily recognized the person of the Arab whom we had left and supposed to have died with his companions in the cavern. His appearance was most wretched; he was unable to stand, and was supported by two of his friends. We afterwards found he had escaped by the light of Mr. Smelt's torch, when he was obliged to remain for a short time to recover his strength at the edge of the trench. Our dragoman related our story again, and called upon the survivor to confirm the truth of it, but in vain; on the contrary he maintained we had taken him and his companions by force, and compelled them to conduct us to the place. In this falsehood he was supported by the Arab who had remained on the outside of the cavern, and whom we now saw for the first time among among the crowd. In our defence we replied it was not possible we could have used any means of compulsion, as we were unarmed. This we boldly asserted, as the brace of pistols I had with me was never produced. Besides, we recalled to his memory that on our way thither one of the guides who had died, had replenished our bardak with water from a well near Amabdi.-This proved that we had gone amicably together. The Cacheff, who continued to treat us haughtily in public, commanded the Arab to explain the means by which the infidels (who he confessed were without arms) had killed his companions. He replied, by magic, for he had seen me burning something on our first entrance into the great chamber. This was the bat I had accidentally scorched. Our cause : now began to wear a better complexion part of the crowd, who treated the idea of magic with contempt, believed us innocent, and the rest probably dreaded the imaginary powers with which we had been invested. Emboldened by this change of sentiment in our favour, our dragoman assumed a lofty tone, and peremptorily insisted on our being sent, together with our two accusers and the Shekh of Amabdi, to Siout, to Ibrahim Bey, the son of the Pacha of Cairo, and the Governor of Upper Egypt. The reputation of this man for cruelty was so great, that his very name excited terror in the assembly. It was. now our turn to threaten, and we talked of the alliance of our king with the Pacha of Cairo, and the consequence of ill-treating any one protected by his firman. This had its effect, and the Cacheff having consulted for some time with the Shekh, suggested an accommodation by money. This proposal we at first affected to reject with disdain, as it would in some manner be an acknowledgement of our guilt, though we were secretly anxious to terminate the affair at any rate. Our dragoman was sent to negociate with the Cacheff, and it was finally agreed we should pay twelve piastres or two Spanish dollars to each of the women, and the same sum we offered as a present to the Shekh of the village. All animosity seemed now to have ceased, and we were permitted quietly to return to our vessel, and continue our voyage. THE SPOTS IN THE SUN. [From a French paper.] The superstitious anxiety excited at present among the vulgar, and even among people who would be offended at being so classed, by the great news of spots in the Sun, must afford ample matter of reflection to all enlightened men. What renders these terrors ridiculous is, that nothing is more usual than the appearance of spots in the Sun's disk: few years pass during which astronomers do not observe them in less or greater numbers, and no injurious influence has ever yet resulted from them. A spot was observed in 1779, which, from its apparent dimensions, must have been about 17,000 leagues in diameter; it was therefore five or six times as large large as the earth. It passed off like the rest, without doing any mischief. We were of course indebted to the telescope for our first knowledge of the existence of such spots. They were seen for the first time in 1611; and nearly about the same time by J. Fabricius, at Wittenberg, by the Jesuit Scheinet, and by Galileo. That great man watched their course with so much attention, and so well developed their phenomena, that very little has been since added to the descriptions which he gave, except more precise measures. The spots of the Sun are at present viewed with astronomical telescopes, in which the great brilliancy of that star is mitigated and not effaced, by the coloured glass placed between the telescope and the eye. There are in the interior of the telescope, at the focus of the object, some very fine threads stretched crosswise, and moveable parallely to each other, by means of which the distance of the spot from the nearest border of the Sun's disk may be ascertained, which determines its position on the disk at the moment of observation. By following in this manner the same spot for several days, it is perceived to change its place. Its size also varies much. The spots sometimes grow thinner, and disperse from one day to another: and hence it is that, though last month rather a large number was visible, within these few days only two aré to be seen. But during the whole time of their presence they pursue a regular course, of which the aspects are common to all. When they first come in sight, they appear on the Sun's border like a slender thread. In proportion as they advance towards the middle of the disk, they appear, from day to day, to enlarge in the direction of their movement. They then decrease periodically; and if they last long enough to traverse the whole disk, they go off by the opposite disk, narrowing to a single thread. These appearances are evidently such as a small body, adhering to a spherical surface, and revolving with or upon that surface, must present. The diminution of the spots, in proportion as they approximate the borders of the disk, results from this-that they then project more obliquely, and are only seen sidewise; but when in the middle of the disk they are seen in their full extent. In fine, upon comparing the direction and rapidity of their course, it soon becomes evident that the supposition of their adhering to the body of the Sun is the only admissible one: that course is so steady, that when the same spot has been watched for several days, all the other positions which it may take may be predicted with certainty. On thus tracing the route of all those which appear, it is ascertained that they move in courses exactly parallel, describing circles which all have their centre on a common axis, passing through the centre of the Sun. The size of these circles varies on different points of the disk, according to the same laws as on a sphere; and the rate of movement is nodified in such way, that all the circles are run through in equal times. This perfect concordance of revolution in spots so change able |