Upon the first day of our journey we passed through the five great locks of the dam which mount to the higher level like some huge Brobdingnagian stairway, and steamed southwards over the wide stretch of the pent-up waters, past groves of palm-trees standing deep in the flood, past the rough points of submerged rocks which once formed the promontories of the mainland, past slopes of golden sand which had formerly descended to the edge of cultivated fields, but now slid straight into the water in the manner of a perilous chute. It was our plan to push through to Abu Simbel, which is some miles south of the area to be affected by the new flood-level, and then to examine the main ancient sites on the way down. At mid-morning we steamed through the magnificent Pass of Kalâbsheh, where towering granite cliffs drop sheer into the water and rugged piles of that splendid stone form islands in the river; and towards sunset we passed the temple of Dakkeh, whose lofty pylons can be seen for many a mile. About eight o’clock in the evening, when darkness had fallen and the sky was massed over with stars, we halted near the temple of Wady Sabu’a, and by the light of a lantern made our way to it over the soft sand. The work in this temple is poor. The edges of the blocks of stone with which the walls are built are roughly trimmed, and the crevices are filled with plaster to hide the reproach of their bad workmanship. One wonders how much the dishonest contractor, or perhaps the Viceroy of Rameses II., in whose reign it was built, obtained out of the transaction; for, knowing modern Egypt and the tortuous ways of the native architect, one has developed a sort of jocular misanthropy that is not bounded by the years. The friend who was with me, and who is a highly cultured barbarian, expressed unmitigated disapproval of the entire place, and begged to be conducted back to the steamer with all dispatch; but to me the ruin, although undoubtedly a monument of slovenly work, has a rugged dignity. In the shifting light of the lantern which caused the shadows, like flibbertigibbets, to perform the most grotesque antics, and the decorated walls to stand out from them in a kind of luminous animation, one felt that there was still something to be learnt from it.