The free press., 1892-11-17
THE PYRAMIDS.
Something About Egypt's Huge
Piles of Stone.
Climbing Up and Entering One
of the Great Edifices.

Thousands of years before there
were any dwellings on the sites since
occupied by Jerusalem, Rome and
Athens, at the very dawn Of human
history, when all the rest of the world
was still wrapped in the thick gloom
of prehistoric barbarism, a vast town
of huge buildings rose not far from
the present city, on the other side of
the Nile, which was dotted with the
boats of the ancient inhabitants. A
forest of venerable date-trees casts its
shadows upon the black soil, beneath
which lie buried the builders of this
city of world gone by, Of which
nothing remains but the vast ceme-
teries, their position marked by an
avenue of monuments. The famous
pyramids of Gizeh, opposite Cairo, on
the borders of the desert, form the
last of these necropoli.
Every one is familiar with the ap-
pearance Of these strange pyramids,
these huge paradoxes Of strictly geo.
metrical form, SO vast and SO lofty
that it was not until after fifty-eight
centuries Of development that the hui
man race succeeded in erecting a
building of greater height, whilst the
loftiest pinnacle of the most aspiring
Gothic belfry, however light and airy
it be, did not soar higher than the
point Of the pyramid Of Cheops be-
fore it was blunted by time. Nothing
could be more confusing 10 the eye
than the general appearance OF these
heaps Of stones, in which no artistic
conception plays the slightest part.
The effects of perspective in these
lines of mathematical regularity are
most bizarre-huge bare triangles, the
outlines shortened or heightened,
marked out like diagram by the sun
into flat bands of light and shade, the
reflections in the sand of the four
mighty angles varying according to
the time of day. Tho sloping sides,
which at distance appear absolutely
plain, are, when approached more
nearly, disc ,vered to be broken
up into series of project
ing stones, like huge stair
case worn with age. 1t is somewhat
difficult to Judge at first sight the size
of the pyramid, and the best way to
measure the height is by climbing it !!
1t is at u cornor where the stages.
which seem to have been made for a
race of giants, are divided into smaller
steps, either for the sake of mortals of
lesser stature or by the action of time,
that the ascent of the great pyramid
of Cheops is made. We start, pushed
from behind by one Arab guide, and
dragged from above by another, with
our eyes fully occupied with the
dangers of the climb. Completely
exhausted, altogether out of breath
and with knees too stiff to move, we
pause at last, feeling us if we had
scaled all three monuments at once.
But looking round, we find we are
scarcely one-third of the distance up,
and see our fellow climbers looking
like scattered ants upon the huge tri-
angular mass. 1t is not until the
platform at the top is reached, and the
lungs are filled with the pure air of
the heights. that any real idea is OBJ
tanned of the monument of CheOps.
And what does this huge edifice
contain? We must go down again to
find out.
The entrance, which was vailed up,
is at considerable height from the
ground, in one of the faces of the
pyramid, and looks like the porch of
u cave cut in the living rock. A dark,
door opens on to a
low narrow passage, with floor. walls
and ceiling all lined with granite,
polished till it is like ice. An Arab
guide, with candle in his hand,
hoists you on to his shoulders and
plunges with you into the slippery
corridor, which descends rapidly to
hole in the rock on a level with the
soil, going up again at the same
angle. This opening gives access to
bare room, in which is square hole,
once the resting place of the mummy
of one of the Pharaohs. Tho rest of
the interior consists of two or three
narrow passages, resembling cavities
Il 1. a j..