And now we look around for the next hall--and look in vain. The doorway which should lead to it is walled up. The portico was excavated by Mohammed Ali in 1842; not in any spirit of antiquarian zeal, but in order to provide a safe underground magazine for gunpowder. Up to that time, as may be seen by one of the illustrations to Wilkinson’s “Thebes and General View of Egypt,” the interior was choked to within a few feet of the capitals of the columns, and used as a cotton-store. Of the rest of the building nothing is known; nothing is visible. It is as large, probably, as Denderah or Edfû, and in as perfect preservation. So, at least, says local tradition; but not even local tradition can point out to what extent it underlies the foundations of the modern houses that swarm above its roof. An inscription first observed by Champollion states that the sanctuary was built by Thothmes III. Is that antique sanctuary still there? Has the temple grown step by step under the hands of successive kings, as at Luxor? Or has it been re-edified _ab ovo_, as at Denderah? These are “puzzling questions,” only to be resolved by the demolition of a quarter of the town. Meanwhile what treasures of sculptured history, what pictured chambers, what buried bronzes and statues may here await the pick of the excavator! All next day, while the men were baking, the writer sat in a corner of the outer passage and sketched the portico of the temple. The sun rose upon the one horizon and set upon the other before that drawing was finished; yet for scarcely more than one hour did it light up the front of the temple. At about half-past nine A.M. it first caught the stone fillet at the angle. Then, one by one, each massy capital became outlined with a thin streak of gold. As this streak widened the cornice took fire, and presently the whole stood out in light against the sky. Slowly then, but quite perceptibly, the sun traveled across the narrow space overhead; the shadows became vertical; the light changed sides; and by ten o’clock there was shade for the remainder of the day. Toward noon, however, the sun being then at its highest and the air transfused with light, the inner columns, swallowed up till now in darkness, became illuminated with a wonderful reflected light, and glowed from out the gloom like pillars of fire.