so fearful, that no one could presume on his success. The artillery horses were wearied, and the guns could not have proceeded. The column of infantry was not within three miles at the time of the surrender, and never could have come up if the convoy had persevered. The desert ensured, therefore, a safe retreat (particularly if the infantry had been mounted on the camels), from whence they might at any time have reached the cultivated country, or even continued on as far as the pyramids, before they attempted to enter; they had some provisions, and could not want water; the wells at the lake of Natron, where there are Coptic monasteries, would have yielded a sufficiency; but then the situation of men is to be considered, who, in the midst of a burning desert, were offered a rescue from a wretched country, which they so long had suffered in, and a return to their native land and families. "Human nature was scarcely proof against such temptations, and such weaknesses must be considered with humanity; nor could colonel Cavalier alone resist the general inclination. "The French troops, after the battle of the 21st, were not very well affected, or in a state of necessary subordination: colonel Cavalier was even heard to request the patience of his people until the terms could be arranged with honour to them; and all the officers afterwards avowed, that when France' was mentioned by major Wilson, that word electrified the soldiers, and the sentiments connected with it were not to be repressed. "General Regnier, as usual inaccurate, represents this convoy as composed of four hundred and fifty men, and attacked by three thousand, still preserving so bold a front as to stipulate for the preservation of its arms to France." We shall conclude with the description of Grand Cairo and its defences, which gives a more correct idea of that celebrated city than any other we have seen. "The inspection of Grand Cairo was no less big with disappointment. The French had anticipated on their arrival the sight of magnificent buildings, grand squares, sumptuous decorations, a general appearance of wealth and riches, of commerce, the enjoyment of every luxury in all the profusion of eastern splendour, in short, a capital where their recre ations would amply compensate them for the misery they had suffered on their route thither. This city they fondly fancied to have been the emporium, which was the object of the expedition, and the reward of France to them for their services in Egypt. Great therefore was their disappointment, when they saw none of these expectations realized, but, on the contrary, the desperate certainty that they were involved in a wretchedness, from which they could not escape. "The English, instructed by their error, expected little, yet did not reduce their ideas low enough. "The town of Boulac, which is the great suburb of Cairo, was one heap of ruins, having been destroyed by the French during the siege in the insurrection in the year 1799. A few wretched hovels, and two or three barracks, were the only remaining buildings of this once large and populous fauxbourg. "The city of Cairo itselfis also very much shattered at the different entrances; the streets are about two yards yards wide; the houses very high, and built of brick like those of Rosetta. "The palaces of the beys are large; two or three of them are very fine buildings; particularly Cassan Bey's, where the Institute was held, and the house in Place Bequier, in which Kleber lived, and in the garden of which he was murdered*. "Place Bequier is a large open square, where most of the beys resided; but many of their houses have been destroyed by the French; indeed, one whole side is in ruins. This place has, however, been otherwise improved by them, trees being planted on each side of the roads which cross the square at right angles, and fosses having been dug to retain the water, with the view of checking the dreadful quantity of dust which flies from the sand and ruins always in the evening. "To conceive the true nature of this insufferable nuisance, the whirlwind of other countries must be imagined as occurring every evening, and filling the whole atmosphere of Egypt with burning dust, and the light particles of rubbish. "Thus the only part of the day which is tolerable from the diminution of heat cannot be taken advantage of as the opportunity for excerciser. "The French had intended to have opened the streets of Cairo, and formed through Place Bequier a magnificent road from the citadel to Giza; but the distraction of the times did not allow of these im provements being attended to, and thus the city bears irretrievable monuments of their ravages, with very few indeed of their benefits. The bairas, or exchanges, which the merchants occupy, are large square buildings, divided into little shops, in which the treasures of the caravans were deposited. Since the arrival of the French none had come from Arabia, and even an unwashed shawl was not to be bought. "The citadel, in which the pacha was always kept as a kind of state prisoner, is a miserable paltry castle, and the avenue of houses leading to it is horrible. In the citadel is the celebrated well called Joseph's, being dug in the time of a vizier bearing that name. It is excavated in the rock, is two hundred and eighty feet deep, and forty two in circumference. Winding stairs lead gradually to the bottom, and some way down; oxen are employed in turning the wheels to raise the water, which is very brackish. "In the quarter of the Franks are two monasteries, which are kept in very good order. The monks were extremely hospitable, but the French almost reduced them to absolute want, and robbed their churches as well as their apartments of every thing which could be converted into money. By their necessities, or avaricious pillage, the French had always in Egypt such avaricious people, that neither Turks, Copts, Arabs, or even Franks, were friendly to them. The latter had peculiarly suffered from fines and * He was stabbed whilst walking on a terrace, and several drops of his blood still mark the railing against which he staggered. + Independent of this general state of the atmosphere, large pillars of dust and wind are always visible. Sometimes in the circle of the horizon twenty are to be seen, and scarcely ever fewer than four or five; their force is very great, and the tents were instantly blown into the air by them. 3 K 3 imprison imprisonments; indeed so much, that they preferred the government of the Mamelukes, for each merchant had then his patron bey, whom he served, and charged against him again in goods those losses power had extorted from him; thus a reciprocal interest and understanding were established between them, by which the person of the merchant was protected*, whilst the beys, never thinking beyond their own immediate wants, considered them as a kind of banker, whom they might command at any time, and repay with the exactions levied on others; an exchange the Franks knew how to convert into their own favour: on the contrary, during the French government, enormous impositions were laid on them; they were repeatedly sent as hostages to the citadel, and instead of obtaining the consequence they expected, were reduced to poverty, and treated with insult. "The circumference of the city of Cairo, including the suburb of Boulac, is six miles; and yet this place, till lately, was considered in the East, and partially through Europe, as the largest capital in the world. "The people were excessively dirty, mostly affected in their eyes; and swarms of beggars, distorted or unnatural formed wretches, crowded the streets. The manners and customs of the inhabitants are so well delineated in the Arabian Nights Eotertainments ‡, that every one has becn agreeably made acquainted with them. "The military position of Cario is not good; its citadel is commanded by the heights of Mokattam, which are perpendicularly elevated about a stone's throw from the works, and completely look into every battery, so that musquetry could play on any part. But to plant cannon on these heights would have been extremely difficult. The detour was very con * Travellers have described with much indignation the treatment which the Franks experienced, and particularly mentioned the indignity of their being obliged in Cairo to ride on jack-asses; but the fact is, that the Mamelukes wishing to keep the good horses to themselves, made this regulation; nor is it at all severe, since this animal, so much despised in Europe, is in Egypt beautiful, with very good paces. Their mules are also excellent; indeed both so good, that to ride about a town every one would prefer them. The wives of the beys even ride on them. To pass the desert, dromedaries are used; and to travel to Rosetta, the Nile is the most agreeable passage. It was, however, rather a ludicious scene to see the British infantry officers riding on jack-asses, and every one kept his dapple, since an order was issued by the commander in chief against the purchase of horses, except for the cavalry and the general service. + There were two very remarkable cases :--one was of a man who apparently had no body: and the other of one who had a belly hanging down from his navel to his ancies; a blue skin contained his bowels, but which seemed so thin as to be liable every moment to burst. The weight was enormous, and its size appeared much larger than an ox's paunch. The unfortunate wretch was otherwise in good health, and crawled about gaining his bread by begging. It may afford some pleasure to many readers, and particularly the female part, for it is presumed they will honour this work by a perusal, to know that Mr. Hammer, in Cairo, procured a complete edition of the Arabian Nights Entertainmen's in Arabic menuscript, containing many more stories than have as yet been published, and which be means to translate. Since the first edition, I have ascertained that Mr. Clark had the fortune to discover this work, the only perfect and complete one extant in the world, and which Mr. Clark has given to Jesus College, Cambridge. It is in four large volumes quarto, and contains 172 tales, which are divided into one thousand and one nights. siderable siderable to reach them, yet necessary, in order to avoid the forts, whilst the immense chasms and ravines in this part of the desert, to go round which there was scarcely a camel's track, rendered any attempt to bring heavy artillery almost impossible; and as the number of troops to maintain the post must have been proportioned to the strength of the garrison, the great want of water would have rendered its occupation nearly impracticable; yet if these obstacles could have been surmounted, the citadel was so weak, that a very slight battery would have crumbled the whole into dust. "The French, for the further defence of the town, constructed on the high hills of rubbish, which laid on the north and east fronts of it, small square stone towers, at such distances as to flank each other, and the line of each front was commanded by a principal fort; that to the north was called Fort Camin, that on the east Fort Dupuis. "All of these towers were bomb proof, a deep ditch surrounded them, and a gun from the upper story was worked out of a covered embrasure *. Each was provided with a cistern; the door was in the centre, and a moveable ladder the means of ascent: so fortified, they defied as sault, and would have required the battering of heavy artillery, when they might have still resisted four or five days; but, nevertheless, as they could be passed in an assault by night, they were to be considered rather as a strong chain of works to an intrenched camp, than the defences of a fortified city. "Behind these was a line of intrenchments, in front of which was dug a very deep ditch, and the walls of Cairo formed the last line of defence. "The southern front was protected by an aqueduct (with the cavity of the arches built up), extending from the citadel to a large building on the banks of the Nile, and in which were the works to throw up the water into the aqueduct. This building was converted into a fort by the French. In front were several small detached forts, and the remains of Old Cairo †, which place was not fortified except by a few batteries on the bank of the Nile, open in the gorge, consequently not to be defended against an army which had crossed the river higher. "Fort Ibrahim Bey and Fort L'Institute formed the second line. This was the weakest side in regard to fortification, but strong from position, as the Nile was to be passed, ✦ Each tower was intended to be manned with fifteen men: it was such a tower as those which at Corsica resisted for three days several men of war, one of which was set on fire, and another dismasted; nor was it taken until a landing was made by some troops. + In Old Cairo, except the granaries of the patriarch Joseph, which are only large pieces of ground enclosed by walls, and divided into compartments, there is nothing remarkable. The greater part of the place is in ruins. Here the Greek patriarch resided, and who was a very fine venerable old man. Babylon, founded by Cambyses, stood on the scite of this city; a quarter of the town, called Babou, marks now its position.. A large canal, supposed by some to have been constructed in the time of Adrian, and by others in the reign of one of the Pharaohs, commences a little above Old Cario, and crosses the middle of the new town from the west to the north-east, but forms no defence, as it is only filled with water during the months of August, September, and October. A splendid ceremony takes place when the water of the Nile is let into this canal. and the front was very contracted. "The west rn side is defended by the Nile and the island of Rhoda, on which were several heavy batteries, particularly at the northern point. At the dry season of the year, the interior channel, which runs by the farm of Ibrahim Bey, is fordable in several places, so that the Nile must be considered then as the only river to be forded. “The island of Rhoda is the prettiest spot in Egypt: very fine sycamore trees crew along its banks, attording the most gratifying shade, yet do not provide a sufficient barrier to the whirlwinds and clouds of dust, which, although having to pass the Nile, are still here intolerable. On this island is celebrated he mekias, by which the height of the Nile is ascertained: a redoubt, with six pieces of cannon, served as the tête du pont to the bridge which connects Giza. Giza is a dirty village, which the French have improved by building half a dozen houses, and establishing in it their manufactories of arms, shot, &c. The chiefornament of the place is a palace of Morad Bey's, much in ruins; and an excellent coffee-house, kept by a Frenchman, who remained behind, was acknowledged to be its most agreeable embellishment. "The works of Giza are very contemptible; a wall surrounds the whole, except on the northern front, where Morad Bey's house forms the defence. This wall is very thin, and not high enough to render an escalade difficult; but to delay the immediate approach, a chain of redoubts was thrown forwards about sixty yards; yet the whole resistance would have proved insignificant, if the strength of the garrison had not prevented an assault. Such were Cairo and its outworks. In this state, defended by ten thousand men, and with three hundred and sixty-three serviceable pieces of cannon, including the fifty removed by the French, did the whole surrender without the firing of a short." We have gone to unusual length in this article, because it must be more interesting to the English reader than any other subject, so long as national glory and British valour, which shine so conspicuously in every page of the work, shall have the power of inspiring him with the principles of patriotism and honour, Travels through Sweden, Finland, and Lapland, to the North Cape, in the Years 1798 and 1799. By Joseph Acerti. HE author of this highly inter TH esting work being a native of Italy, we do not consider him accountable for a very few inaccuracies of style which may occur in the course of two vols. in 4to. whilst we feel ourselves bound to bestow great praise upon him as a laborious, enlightened, and judicious travel, ler. His observations are those of a discriminating mind, and bear every mark of truth; but from a certain vein of satire by which they are accompanied, we are inclined to think that this work, like Dr. Johnson's Tour to the Hebrides, will find more admirers in other countries than in that which it describes. Mr. A. landed at Helsingburg, from Denmark; from thence he proceeded to Gottenburg. He remarks, with great truth, that the mode of travelling in Sweden, every circumstance considered, is little cheaper than |