From my companion, the prince-hierarch, I learned it was begun by an ancient Pharaoh of the same name, one of the kings of the oldest dynasty, who conceived the idea of chiselling into these grand proportions a mass of rock, which, projecting from the Libyan hills, nearly obstructed the view of the principal pyramid. We were here forbidden to advance in our chariot, and the footmen, who had never left the side of the horses, however swiftly our charioteer might drive, caught them by the head, and we alighted. I had leisure now to contemplate the scene before me. The personation of majesty, the sphinx, fills the breadth of the approach between the massive pillars of the colonnade. Between his fore-paws, which extend fifty feet, while the body is nearly three times this measure, stands a beautiful temple faced with oriental alabaster. His head is crowned with a helmet slightly convex, upon which, like a crest, is affixed the sacred uræus or serpent, shining with gold. The cape or neck-band of the helmet is of scales, colored blue, red, green, and orange, intermingled with gilding. A great and full beard descends over his breast, immediately under which, and between his feet, is the summit of the temple where sacrifices are daily offered to the god. Above his towering brow soars the mighty pyramid before which this colossus keeps guard. "The majesty of this image, O prince," said the high-priest, as, leaning at every step upon his slender acacia rod, he walked by my side, "impresses you." "It is the most majestic of all the gods of Egypt," I answered. "Yes. Its age is nearly coeval with the pyramid." "On the pyramidion base of the left obelisk in front of the temple of Osiris, have I not seen reposing four small sphinxes copied from this?" "Thou hast seen them. That obelisk is many ages old; yet long before it, was this sphinx-god, as silent, majestic, and immovable in eternal repose as you behold him now." At the termination of the avenue of direct approach, we descended an inclined plane to a platform of marble, on which is an image of Osiris in stone, and were brought nearly opposite the lower part of its face. Then another flight of steps, cased with polished porphyry, brought us on a level with the top of the temple. In the centre of this level platform stands a statue of Horus, cast in bronze. Thence descending another flight of thirty broad steps, we stood in the space between the enormous feet of the sphinx, and directly before the beautiful temple. Our gradual approach in this descent, during which the sphinx was kept constantly in view, rising above us as we descended, heightened the impressions first made upon me by its colossal size; and I beheld, with new emotions of sublimity, its posture of repose and calm majesty of aspect.