Now, also, the southern cross and a second group of stars, which we conclude must form part of the Centaur, are visible between two and four every morning. They have been creeping up, a star at a time, for the last fortnight; but are still so low upon the eastern horizon that we can only see them when there comes a break in the mountain-chain on that side of the river. At the same time, our old familiar friends of the northern hemisphere, looking strangely distorted and decidedly out of their proper place, are fast disappearing on the opposite side of the heavens. Orion seems to be lying on his back, and the Great Bear to be standing on his tail; while Cassiopeia and a number of others have deserted _en masse_. The zenith, meanwhile, is but thinly furnished; so that we seem to have traveled away from the one hemisphere and not yet to have reached the other. As for the Southern Cross, we reserve our opinion till we get farther south. It would be treason to hint that we are disappointed in so famous a constellation. After Gerf Hossayn, the next place of importance for which our maps bid us look out, is Dakkeh. As we draw near, expecting hourly to see something of the temple, the Nile increases in breadth and beauty. It is a peaceful, glassy morning. The men have been tracking since dawn, and stop to breakfast at the foot of a sandy bank, wooded with tamarisks and gum-trees. A glistening network of gossamer floats from bough to bough. The sky overhead is of a tender, luminous blue, such as we never see in Europe. The air is wonderfully still. The river, which here takes a sudden bend toward the east, looks like a lake and seems to be barred ahead by the desert. Presently a funeral passes along the opposite bank; the chief mourner flourishing a long staff, like a drum-major; the women snatching up handfuls of dust and scattering it upon their heads. We hear their wild wail long after the procession is out of sight.