The great speos of Horemheb, the last Pharaoh of the eighteenth dynasty, lies farthest north, and the memorial shrines of the Rameses family lie farthest south of the series. The first is a long gallery, like a cloister supported on four square columns; and is excavated parallel with the river. The walls inside and out are covered with delicately executed sculptures in low relief, some of which yet retain traces of color. The triumph of Horemheb returning from conquest in the land of Kush, and the famous subject on the south wall described by Mariette[178] as one of the few really lovely things in Egyptian art have been too often engraved to need description. The votive shrines of the Rameses family are grouped altogether in a picturesque nook green with bushes to the water’s edge. There are three, the work of Seti I, Rameses II, and Menepthah--lofty alcoves, each like a little proscenium, with painted cornices and side pillars, and groups of kings and gods still bright with color. In most of the votive sculptures of Silsilis there figure two deities but rarely seen elsewhere; namely Sebek, the crocodile god, and Hapi-Mu, the lotus-crowned god of the Nile. This last was the tutelary deity of the spot, and was worshiped at Silsilis with special rites. Hymns, in his honor are found carved here and there upon the rocks.[179] Most curious of all, however, is a goddess named Ta-ur-t,[180] represented in one of the side subjects of the shrine of Rameses II. This charming person, who has the body of a hippopotamus and the face of a woman, wears a tie-wig and a robe of state with five capes, and looks like a cross between a lord chancellor and a coachman. Behind her stand Thoth and Nut; all three receiving the homage of Queen Nefertari, who advances with an offering of two sistrums. As a hippopotamus crowned with the disk and plumes, we had met with this goddess before. She is not uncommon as an amulet; and the writer had already sketched her at Philæ, where she occupies a prominent place in the façade of the Mammisi. But the grotesque elegance of her attire at Silsilis is, I imagine, quite unique. [Illustration: TA-UR-T (SILSILIS).] [Illustration: TA-UR-T (PHILÆ).] The interest of the western bank centers in its sculptures and inscriptions; the interest of the eastern bank in its quarries. We rowed over to a point nearly opposite the shrines of the Ramessides, and, climbing a steep verge of débris, came to the mouth of a narrow cutting between walls of solid rock from forty to fifty feet in height. These walls are smooth, clean-cut, and faultlessly perpendicular. The color of the sand-stone is rich amber. The passage is about ten feet in width and perhaps four hundred in length. Seen at a little after midday, with one side in shadow, the other in sunlight, and a narrow ribbon of blue sky overhead, it is like nothing else in the world; unless, perhaps, the entrance to Petra.