The chief merit of Mr. Taylor’s descriptions lay in their apparent frankness and their charming details. He appeared to think that every reader was acquainted with the works of those great archæologists, Lepsius and Champollion, and did not attempt to supply to his readers the information they had already given. He seems to have imagined that all the reading public wished to follow him, and he gave such information as the tourist would need. He told about the clothes he purchased in Alexandria, about the fit of his Arab attire, about the cost of a dinner, the conversation between dragomen and boatmen, the personal appearance of his companions, the faithlessness of his guide, the dirty appearance of his boat, and the gorgeous sunset. He described his own sensations and actions with the boldness of one unconscious of any motive to conceal or deceive. He reveals the sorrow of his heart by occasional remarks such as these: “For many months past I had known no mood of mind so peaceful and grateful.”—“I am away from reminders of sorrow.”—“It is not the beauty of the desert that gratifies me so much, in these days, after all, as the absence of civilization.” The party, which consisted of Mr. Taylor, the German companion, and an Italian, engaged one of the Nile boats, at Alexandria, for the trip up the Nile, and after testing the comforts, or misery, of the Egyptian hotels, seeing Cleopatra’s Needle (now in London) and Pompey’s Pillar, which were then as in later years about all that there was to be seen of interest in Alexandria, they started on their lazy voyage up the wonderful Nile. He wrote with great enthusiasm of the sweet rest he found in a pipe of tobacco, after the manner of all habitual smokers. He seems to have had plenty of time to muse and smoke as he slowly ascended the stream. It has often been a subject of wonder that he could afterwards remember so many incidents and the impressions they had made on him, when perhaps weeks of time and some more exciting transactions had intervened. But Mr. Taylor did not wait long before recording his ideas and comments, and was in the habit of keeping a memoranda-book always at hand, and while travelling, noted with a pencil any peculiar thought or incident which awakened attention. At Atfeh, which has been for hundreds of years an intermediate stopping-place on the highway and river between Alexandria and Cairo, he clambered up into the town and witnessed a marriage procession. He appears to have been inclined to get a near view of the bride; but the relatives hurried her off, and with cries and threatening gestures drove him back to cover. But he decided that if he could not see the bride, he would do the next best thing, and accordingly visited her father. The disconsolate parent was being comforted by a hoarse chant and appeared to be as cheerful as could be expected considering the din.