“In the month of September last (1867), when visiting the Great Exhibition in Paris, I was particularly struck with the fine appearance of the obelisk of Luxor in the Place de la Concorde, and I thought that, as the French had taken the trouble and gone to the expense of moving this highly interesting monolith, it was a reflection on our nation and on the engineering skill of Britain, that the prostrate obelisk at Alexandria (one of Cleopatra’s Needles, as it is commonly termed), was not occupying a place of honour in England or Scotland. “This obelisk was presented to George IV. many years ago by Mahommed Ali Pacha, who also generously offered to move it on rollers to the sea, from which it is 30 yards distant, and, embarking it on rafts and lighters, convey it to a vessel for transport to England. “The state of public affairs at the time, perhaps, prevented the accomplishment of this enterprise; now the time may be more favourable for it. “Sir Gardner Wilkinson and other writers on Egypt and its antiquities, are of opinion that Cleopatra’s Needles (one of which is upright) were brought by one of the Ptolemies from Heliopolis, near Cairo, to decorate a palace at Alexandria. On the obelisks appear the names of Thothmes III. (B.C. 1463), of Rameses the Great, and of Osirei I. (B.C. 1232), long before Cleopatra’s time. Sandys, who travelled in 1610, calls the prostrate obelisk ‘Pharaoh’s Needle,’ and says ‘it is half buried in rubbish.’ It is of red granite; and, looking down a hole, its top is seen with crowned hawks sculptured on it. Lord Nugent, writing in 1845, says the hieroglyphics on three sides are well preserved. Colonel Ayton, of H.M. Bombay Engineers, informed me, that whilst in Egypt in 1862, and whilst there was an idea of a memorial for Prince Albert first started, Mr. Clark, of the telegraph department, uncovered the prostrate obelisk, removed the sand and rubbish from it, found the hieroglyphics on three sides in good preservation, and, as the obelisk was not then wanted, he covered it up again. “This obelisk, with others, is well ascertained to have been quarried at Syené, at the extreme boundary of Upper Egypt. It is not easy to find out how the hieroglyphics were graven on such a hard surface, and what was the process of hardening the bronze tools used for this purpose. The Messrs. Macdonald of Aberdeen, and other workers in granite in this country, might be able to explain this: possibly the assistance of emery-powder was brought in.