In the mean time our orientally-decked tent had been put in order, and a dinner prepared within, in which Prussians only took part, with the exception of our two English companions. That our first toast here was “His Majesty and the Royal family” need not be told; and no great eloquence was necessary to render all hearts enthusiastic in drinking it. The rest of the day passed in gay, festal, and hearty reminiscences and conversations, till the time of our departure arrived. We had yet to wait a quarter of an hour after sunset, to give our attendants, donkey-drivers, and the rest of our Arab suite, time to eat their frugal dinner, which they had not yet taken, despite all the heat and labour of the day, in consequence of the Ramadan. Then the bright full moon guided us in the cool still night over the sand and water ocean, through villages and plantations of date-trees, back to the city. We did not arrive there until about midnight. LETTER IV. AT THE FOOT OF THE GREAT PYRAMID. _January 2, 1843._ Still here! in full activity since the 9th of November, and perhaps to continue so for some weeks of the new year! How could I have anticipated from the accounts of previous travellers, what a harvest we were to reap here,--here, on the oldest stage of the chronologically definable history of mankind. It is remarkable how little this most-frequented place of all Egypt has been examined hitherto. But I will not quarrel with our predecessors, since we inherit the fruits of their inactivity. I have been obliged the rather to restrain our curiosity to see more of this wonder-land, as we may half solve the problem at this place. On the best charts of former times, two graves have peculiar designations, beside the pyramids. Rosellini has only examined one grave more, and Champollion says in his letters, “_Il y a peu à faire ici, et lorsqu’on aura copié des scenes de la vie domestique, sculptées dans un tombeau, je regagnerai nos embarcations!_” [There is little to be done here, and when they have copied the scenes of domestic life sculptured in one tomb, I shall regain our vessels.] We have given in our exact topographical plan of the whole Necropolis forty-five graves, with whose inmates I have become acquainted by their inscriptions, and I have enumerated eighty-two in all, which seemed worthy of notice on account of their inscriptions, or some other peculiarities.[8] Of these but few belong to the later time; nearly all of them were erected during or shortly after the building of the great pyramid, and therefore present us with an inestimable series of dates for the knowledge of the oldest definable civilisation of the races of man. The architecture of that age, concerning which I could formerly offer only a few speculations,[9] now lies before me in the fullest circumstantiality. Nearly all the branches of architecture are to be found developed; sculptures of complete figures of all dimensions, in haut-relief and bas-relief,