Knowing slavery to be officially illegal in the dominions of the khedive, the M. B.’s applied to a dealer, who offered them an Abyssinian girl for ten pounds. This useful article--warranted a bargain--was to sweep, wash, milk, and churn; but was not equal to cooking. The M. B.’s, it is needless to add, having verified the facts, retired from the transaction. At Derr we pay a farewell visit to the temple; and at Amada, arriving toward close of day, see the great view for the last time in the glory of sunset. And now, though the north wind blows persistently, it gets hotter every day. The crocodiles like it, and come out to bask in the sunshine. Called up one morning in the middle of breakfast we see two--a little one and a big one--on a sand-bank near by. The men rest upon their oars. The boat goes with the stream. No one speaks; no one moves. Breathlessly and in dead silence, we drift on till we are close beside them. The big one is rough and black, like the trunk of a London elm, and measures full eighteen feet in length. The little one is pale and greenish and glistens like glass. All at once the old one starts, doubles itself up for a spring, and disappears with a tremendous splash. But the little one, apparently unconscious of danger, lifts its tortoise-like head and eyes us sidewise. Presently some one whispers; and that whisper breaks the spell. Our little crocodile flings up its tail, plunges clown the bank, and is gone in a moment. The crew could not understand how the idle man, after lying in wait for crocodiles at Abou Simbel, should let this rare chance pass without a shot. But we had heard since then of so much indiscriminate slaughter at the second cataract, that he was resolved to bear no part in the extermination of those old historic reptiles. That a sportsman should wish for a single trophy is not unreasonable; but that scores of crack shots should go up every winter killing and wounding these wretched brutes at an average rate of from twelve to eighteen per gun, is mere butchery and cannot be too strongly reprehended. Year by year, the creatures become shyer and fewer; and the day is probably not far distant when a crocodile will be as rarely seen below Semneh as it is now rarely seen below Assûan. The thermometer stands at 85° in the saloon of the Philæ, when we come one afternoon to Wady Sabooah, where there is a solitary temple drowned in sand. It was approached once by an avenue of sphinxes and standing colossi, now shattered and buried. The roof of the pronaos, if ever it was roofed, is gone. The inner halls and the sanctuary--all excavated in the rock--are choked and impassable. Only the propylon stands clear of sand; and that, massive as it is, looks as if one touch of a battering-ram would bring it to the ground. Every huge stone in it is loose, Every block in the cornice seems tottering in its place. In all this we fancy we recognize the work of our Abou Simbel earthquake.[154]