The Wheeling daily register. [volume] (Wheeling, W. Va.) 1864-1878, 1878-04-17
THE DEAD CITIES OF TIE OLD
WORLD.
A Talk About Them From One Who
Knows Them Well.

The ruined cities Of the Old World
have q charm in their appearance ana
in their history that is indescrlbaoie'
Persons of sill ages, conditions or kinds
are interested in them, snd are delighted
TO hear of them from the lips Of those VINO
have visited them and can tell what they
saw in q simple and Intelligent manner.
This feeling, together with the reputa-
ton of the speaker, drew large audience
to listen 10 the lecture on the "Burled
Cities Of the Old World" by Rev. +. ;.
DeHass a. the Fourth Street Nj. l..
Church last night. The gentleman wss a.
one time United States consul to Jerusa-
lem, and rs he has quick Intellect and
good memory, he cas- give sn unusua!
Zesl 20 the subject. Mr.. Densss deliy-
cry is pleasing his enur cistlon good, and
his materials are presented in Il crisp,
spicy manner.
After describing the manner in which
Pompeii was destroyed by the eruption OF
Vesuvius, he spoke of the work winch
had been done in the way Of unesrthlng
the buried city and bringing It's treasures
TO the knowledge of the world. Not
only are the houses which have been COW
cred by from twenty to thirty
feet OF earth and rubbish, been
uncovered, but relics Of the in
hsbitants are found by the thou
sands. The inhabitants themselves are
discovered in the streets or IN the
houses. A woman was found upon her
knees, as If asking the Gods to spare her
life. A miser lay across the door OF his
house, Lis lean hand clutching purse OF
gold. A mother with three children
cIssped closely 10 her bosom lay where
she had fallen in the street, her mater
nal love ruling until the last. A young
girl and man with arms thrown around
each other tell US the touching story o:
the lovers of that past age. In the lit
tie guard box at one of the gates wss
found the famous martyr OF duty, q Ro-
man soldier, with one hand oyer his
mouth, as if to shut out the deadly gases,
and the other graspng his javelin. In
one OF the jsils siJty-two prisoners
were found with their tee. confined
with manaces. You can take q stroll
through the dead old city, and then so to
the crater of Vesuvius from whence
poured forth the food of lava that an
initiated the town. You can 60 down
into the crater a considerable distance,
but as you walk on the thin crust which
ia formed over the seethlng mass below,
YOU think of the remark of an old Dutch-
man who once was here. He cried to
to his son, "Hsns! Hans! let US get out of
dis Hell is not far away off"
From the sunny skies of Italy we pass
to the sombre and mysterious land Of
| Egypt. We land at Alexandrls, q
famous old city, founded by Alexander
the Great, three hundred and thirty
two years before Christ and where
that great warrior is buried. The
city once had college of philosophy
with fourteen thousand students in at
tendance. Here in this ruined town, the
Bible was frst translated from Hebrew
| into Greek. The latter translation is the
one from which our own is taken. OF
the grand old city itself nothing remains
but "Pompeys Pillar" superb monolilh
! 100 feet high and ten feet in diameter
and CIeopstra's needles, two great
columns of stone y feet high and 7 feet
| thick at the base One Of these obelIsks
was recently taken to England, and the
other has been presented to our own
| Government The old city is covered
! by the new one. The sand of the desert
and the deposits Of mud from the Nile
have covered it entirely. One OF the
sights which makes the heart home-sIcl
! in this Tar Oft city, is the long caravan of
csmels with a barrel of petroleum on
on either side, hanging bys rope. These
! familiar blue barrels, coming from our
| own immediate neighbOrhuoi al home,
have q strange effect upon you. The oil
is used for lighting the towns through
out the entire country.
After speaking OF the strange customs
and habits of the people, the lecturer
passed on TO dsapproye Of the antiquity
assigned to some OF the remains OF this
once mighty race, by scientists. He said
that the linen found on the oldest mum
mics was scarcely rotten; the garden
seeds, bread, and even eggs discovered in
! the sepulChres are sufficient proof that
this race IS not older than the Bible says
it's.
There are at least 10000 cities iu this
| land whose histories are lost IN the mys-
! tic gIeom OF past centuries. Since the
finding of the Rosetta stone and its
deciphering by Champolhon, new
light has been shed into this long buried
period. Recently while digging canal
in Goshen, some affairs were unearthed,
upon which in sil probability, was shed
the blood OF the Paschal lamb as the
IsreslItes were about TO leave the land Of
their bondage. Heilieopolis, the oldest
city in Egypt il the place where the an
clients believed the phRniX existed, tor
500 years, and after being burned, rose
again in new beauty from its ashes. It
was their method Of expressing the I'm.
mortality OF the soul. Only one obelIsk
remains of all the citys former
splendor, Memphis, the capital of
Lower Egypt for more than thousand
years, is also entirely buried by the de-
posts Of the Nile, and palm trees wave
their graceful heads above the renowned
affairs Of Osiris. A great statue of Ra-
meses Mel Amour lthe Sesostris Of
Herodotus), has been uncovered here,
ana Deslle was one OF young woman,
supposed to be the daughter of Pharaoh,
who discovered Moses among the rusbes
Beyond Memphis is the great desert, and
at It's border is the greatest cemetery in
the world. 1t is estimated that twenty
five millions OF mummies are in the caves
and chambers. / am told that a publish.
ing firm in this country intend to pub
lsh work about Egypt on paper made
from linen found on these mummIes.
So much has been written and said
about the pyramids that | will not at
tempt to say anything Of their construc-
ton, ct2, but will only try to give you
an idea OF their size. The largest pyra-
mid-thst Of Cheops-is 764 feet square
at the base, covers thirteen acres, and is
500 feet high. There is material enough
in It to build an entire city Of the size Of
Chicago.
The Sphinx, OF which we have all
read, hiss mans fsce aud not that Of q
woman, as Is often said. There Is but
one womsn's face in sIl the great sculp-
tury of Eyypt. The Sphinx il 143 feet