“So I believe, Amuba. Our merchants penetrate vast distances to the south exchanging our products for gold and ivory, and everywhere they find the country inhabited by black people living in wretched villages, without, as it seems, any government, or law, or order, waging war with each other and making slaves, whom they also sell to our merchants. They differ so wholly from us that it is certain that we cannot come from the same stock. But they are strong and active and make excellent slaves. Lying between Meroe and the sea, the country called Abyssinia is also inhabited by a race of Arab blood, but differing more from us than those of Meroe. “They have great towns, but I do not think that their religion is the same as ours; our traders say that their language can be understood by them, although more rough and unpolished. I have heard my father say that he considered that all the country lying east of the Nile, and of its eastern branch that rises in Abyssinia and is called the Tacazze, belongs to Asia rather than to Africa.” The party found that the death by violence of two successive high priests of Osiris was one of the principal topics of conversation in Syene, but none appeared to think that there was the remotest probability of any concerned in those occurrences making for the south. However, Jethro thought it prudent that the whole party should not land together, and therefore Amuba and Chebron usually went one way and he with the girls another. They paid visits to the sacred island of Ebo opposite the town, and to the quarries of Phile, four miles away. Here they saw the gangs of slaves cutting colossal statues, obelisks, and shrines from the solid rock. First the outline was traced on the rock, then the surrounding stone was removed with chisels and wedges, and at last the statue or obelisk was itself severed from the rock. Then it was hewn and sculptured by the masons, placed on rollers and dragged by hundreds of men down to the landing-place below the rapids, and these placed on rafts to be floated down the river to its destination. They saw many of these masses of stone in all stages of manufacture. The number of slaves employed was enormous, and these inhabited great buildings erected near the quarries, where also were barracks for the troops who kept guard over them. Watching the slaves at their painful labor, Jethro and Amuba were both filled with gratitude at the good fortune that had placed them with Ameres instead of sending them to pass their lives in such unceasing and monotonous toil. Among the slaves were several whom, by their complexion and appearance, they judged to be Rebu. As at first all those brought to Egypt had been distributed among the priests and great officers, they supposed that either from obstinacy, misconduct, or from attempts to escape they had incurred the displeasure of their masters, and had been handed over by them for the service of the state.