Passing along the raised causeway, down which so many great monuments have been rolled slowly to the river, I came through a long stretch of burning desert to a spur on the northern extremity of the granite hills. Here, unexpectedly, I found myself overlooking the lake formed by the filling of the Reservoir. Graceful lines of palm-trees showed where the banks of the river had once been. Philæ was but an insignificant speck on the blue waters, overpowered by the fantastic piles of granite boulders that hem in the valley. In the far distance rose some lofty hills, crowned by dazzling sand that might easily have been mistaken for snow. The Dam builders have been accused of vandalism, but they have created a standing pool in the wilderness of surpassing beauty. The view of the lake was not the only attraction of the spot; at my feet lay a colossal statue of Osiris, destined for some temple, but never moved from the spot where it was hewn. Ancient Egypt may well look on with scornful wonder at our pride in our achievements. The Great Pyramid at Gizeh contains three times as much solid masonry as the Dam, cut from these same quarries. Every one of those huge blocks had to be dragged to the river, and carried down 600 miles, before it was hoisted into its place. As an achievement of mechanical power the Great Dam cannot compare with the Great Pyramid; but when at last I climbed a little hill hard by the river, below the Reservoir itself, and saw the whole length of the great stone rampart, stretching right across the valley, the contrast between the world of Pharaoh and our own came strong upon me. Pharaoh, to whom time and life were nothing, out of the misery of the forced labour of his subjects, raised a perfectly useless monument of his own folly; yet he achieved his object, and made his tomb one of the wonders of the world. We, with the free labour of voluntary workers—paid, fed, and cared for, instead of being driven by the whip—have dared to harness Nile himself. It is a work vital to the interests of millions of dwellers by the river. Yet who can say that the fame of the Pyramid will not endure the longer? Hundreds of years after the time of Cheops a mighty Dam was built in Southern Arabia for a like purpose of irrigation; it lasted for eight centuries or more, and its bursting in 100 A.D. is mentioned in the Koran. Its ruins remain to this day, and show that it was larger than the Nile Dam. Eight hundred years is a long life for a reservoir, but if this one lasts a quarter of that period it will have repaid its cost many hundred times over.