| Southport : Original Sources in Exploration | | |
Voyage in Lower and Upper Egypt, during the Campaigns of General Bonaparte. Vivant Denon | | | | |
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Vol. 1, Chapters 3-5
Chapter 3. Arrival before Alexandria.
Our mission, after having warned the
Franks to be on their guard, was to come and find the army which was to
cross, and wait six leagues from Cape Brûlé. At noon we were thirty
leagues from Alexandria; at four o'clock the topmen shouted ground; six
of us saw it from the bridge: we had the breeze all night; At daybreak
I saw the coast to the west, which stretched like a white ribbon on the
bluish horizon of the sea. Not a tree, not a habitation; it was not
only nature saddened, but the destruction of nature, but silence and
death. The cheerfulness of our soldiers was not altered; one of them
said to his comrade, showing him (p.21) across the desert: Hey, look,
here are the six acres that we decreed. The general laughter that this
joke caused can serve as proof that courage is disinterested, or at
least that it has its source in nobler sentiments. These places are
perilous in times of storm and in the mists of winter, because then the
low coast disappears, and we only see it when there is no longer time
to avoid it. But the happiness that accompanied us left us free to
maneuver on Cape Durazzo, which we were looking for by heading east and
south.
Plate 1:
Map of Nile delta and coastline from Alexandria to Rosette (detail from
Plate 1 of Vivant Denon 1802, vol.3: "General map of Lower Egypt, drawn
up according to the astronomical observations of the engineers employed
in the Army of the Orient").
Ten leagues from the cape, five from Alexandria, we saw a
ruin called the Tower of the Arabs (Tour des Arabes); At noon I made a drawing. This ruin
seemed to me a bastioned square; some distance away there is a tower. I
would have liked to be able to distinguish the details better, to judge
if it is an Arab building, or if its construction is ancient, and to
what antiquity it belongs; whether it is the Taposiris of the ancients,
which Procopius gives us as the tomb of Osiris, or the Chersonesus of
Strabo, or Plinthine, whose gulf is named after him. The garrison of
Alexandria has since reconnoitred to this post; but the purely military
reports of these reconnaissances could not shed any light on the origin
of these ruins, and only increased the curiosity inspired by their mass
and their extent. In general, all this western coast, containing the
small and large Sirte of Cyrenaica, formerly very inhabited, which had
republics, particular governments, is now one of the most forgotten
countries in the universe, and is no longer remembered in our memory
except by the superb medals which remain to us.
From right and
left our promised land seemed even more arid to us than that of the
Jews. It is true that until then it had not cost us that much; that, if
we had not liked ready-roasted quails, our manna (p.22) manna had not
been corrupted, that we had not had fiery colic, and that we had still
preserved everything that had fallen to. Israelites; but for the rest
the Bedouin Arabs, who wander on these coasts, could have been
equivalent to these scourges, and become as fatal to us. However, it is
assured that for twenty years they have made an agreement with the
Alexandria factory, by which, after more or less insults, they return
the castaways for twenty piastres per head, instead of killing them, as
they did more formerly. The lieutenant, who was sent ashore, left at
one o'clock in the afternoon; He didn't even have his foot in the boat
when we were waiting for his return and counting the moments.
I
made, from three leagues distance, a view of Alexandria. Through the
telescope we saw the tricolor flag on our consul's house: I imagined
the surprise he was going to experience, and that which we were
planning for the seberif of Alexandria for the next day.
When the
evening shadows outlined the contours of the city, I could distinguish
these two ports, these great walls flanked by numerous towers, which
only enclose sand hills, and a few gardens where the pale green of the
palm trees tempers the barely the ardent whiteness of the ground, this
Turkish castle, these mosques, their minarets, this famous Pompey's
column, my imagination returned to the past; I saw art triumph over
nature, the genius of Alexander employ the active hand of commerce to
plant on an arid coast the foundations of a superb city, and choose it
to deposit the trophies of the conquests of the world; the Ptolomies
call the sciences and the arts there, and bring together this library
in the destruction of which barbarism has spent years: it is there, I
said to myself, thinking of Cleopatra, of Caesar, of Antony, that the
empire of glory gave way to the empire of voluptuousness: I then saw
(p.23) fierce ignorance establishing itself on the ruins of the
masterpieces of the arts, finishing to consume them, and not having
however, could still disfigure the beautiful developments which were
based on the great principles of their first plans.
I was roused
from this preoccupation, from this happiness of dreaming in front of
great objects, by a cannon fired from our side, to call to order a
vessel which had put everything to the wind to enter Alexandria in
spite of us, and carry there without doubted the notice of our march:
the night soon hid him from our searches. Our anxiety on the boat
increased every moment, and changed into terror. At midnight we heard
calling with frightened voices; and soon we saw our consul and his
dragoman enter, escaping the avenging saber and the fear spread
throughout the country. They told us that a fleet of fourteen English
warships had only left the Alexandria anchorage the previous evening;
that the English had declared that they were looking for us to fight
us: they had been taken for French; and the whole country, already
informed of our projects, and informed of the capture of Malta,
immediately rose up; we had fortified the castles, added militias to
the regular troops, and gathered an army of Bedouins (these are the
wandering Arabs, whom the inhabitants pursue, but with whom they ally
themselves when they have to fight a common enemy).
The presence
of the English had darkened our horizon. When I remembered that three
days before we regretted that the calm had kept us, and that without it
we would have fallen into the enemy fleet, to which we would have
discovered ours, I devoted myself from then on to fatalism, and
recommended myself to the Bonaparte's star. The sheriff had only
consented to the departure of the consul by having him accompanied by
mariners from Alexandria, who were supposed to bring him back there:
they arrived in the Frankish language. and heard Italian; I spoke with
them: they (p.24) added to what the consul had said, that the English
had traveled to Test to pick us up in Chipre, where they believed we
had remained.
We marched to meet our fleet: the first break of
day made us discover the first division of the convoy; At seven o'clock
we arrived on board the Orient. I had been charged with accompanying
the consul of Alexandria; we had to tell the general what could most
interest him in such a critical circumstance: we had seen the English,
they could arrive at any moment; the wind was very strong, the convoy
mixed with the fleet, and in a confusion which would have ensured the
most disastrous defeat if the enemy had appeared. I could not notice
any change in the general's countenance. He made me repeat the report
that had just been made to him; and after a few minutes of silence he
ordered the disembarkation.
Chapter 4. Landing at Fort Marabou.—Capture of Alexandria.
The
arrangements were to approach the convoy from land as far as the danger
of coasting at a time when the wind was so strong could allow; the
warships formed a defensive circle outside; all the sails were brought
in, and the anchors cast. Hardly had we carried out this operation when
we were ordered to cruise in front of the town as close as the wind
would allow us, and to make false attacks to create a diversion.
The
wind had increased again; the sea was so heavy that we worked in vain
all the rest of the day to weigh anchor. The night was too stormy to
carry out this operation without risking to overwhelm us, and sink
(p.25) the boats and transports, which carried out the landing with
incredible difficulty and dangers: the boats took one by one and by the
robbed those who got off the ships; when they were encumbered, the
waves threatened at every moment to engulf them, or else, pushed by the
wind, they met or approached others; and, after having escaped all
these dangers, upon arriving near the coast they did not know how to
touch it without breaking against the breakers. In the middle of the
night a boat which could no longer steer passed our stern, and asked us
for help: the danger in which I felt those with whom it was loaded
caused me an emotion all the more vivid as I thought I recognized the
voice of each one. of those who screamed. We threw a cable to these
unfortunate people; but they had barely reached it when it had to be
cut; the waves hitting the boat against our vessel threatened to open
it. The cries they uttered at the moment when they felt abandoned
resonated to the depths of our souls; the silence which followed
brought still more dire thoughts. The terror was redoubled by the
darkness, and the operations were as slow as they were disastrous.
However,
on July 2 [1798], at six o'clock in the morning, there were enough
troops on land to attack and take a small fort called Marabou. There
the first tricolor flag in Africa was planted. On the 3rd, the sea was
better: we set sail while the beach was covered with our soldiers. At
noon, they were already under the walls of Alexandria; the center at
Pompey's column, behind small hills formed from the remains of the
ancient city. These old walls only offered the valor of our soldiers a
series of breaches: one column moved, all the others deployed, marched,
and attacked at the same time; approaching bad ditches, they discovered
more walls than we had seen at first: a fire of extraordinary vivacity
from the besieged (p.25) stunned our troops for a moment, but did not
slow down in any way. their impetuosity: they sought under enemy fire
the most practicable approach; it was found at the western corner,
where the ancient port of Kibotos was; we mounted the assault: Kléber,
Menou, Lescale, were overthrown by gunfire, and by the fall of sections
of the walls. Koraim, sheriff of Alexandria, who fought everywhere,
took the overthrown Menou for the general in chief wounded to death,
which for a moment longer supported the courage of the besieged. No one
was fleeing; it was necessary to kill everyone in the breach, and two
hundred of ours remained there.
Our frigate was ordered to
protect the convoy's entry into the old port; and I took this
opportunity to go ashore. An ancient prejudice had established that as
soon as a Frankish vessel entered the old port, the empire of
Alexandria would be lost to the Muslims; for the moment our boat
verified the prophecy. It would be impossible for me to describe what I
felt when I arrived at Alexandria: there was no one to receive us or
prevent us from going down; We could barely get a few beggars,
crouching on their heels, to show us the headquarters; the houses were
closed; all who had not dared to fight had fled, and all who had not
been killed hid for fear of being killed, according to oriental custom.
Everything
was new to our sensations, the ground, the shape of the buildings, the
figures, the costume, and the language of the inhabitants. The first
scene that presented itself to our eyes was a vast cemetery, covered
with innumerable tombs of white marble on a white ground: a few thin
women, and covered in long torn clothes, looked like larvae wandering
among these monuments; the silence was only interrupted by the
whistling of the kites hovering over this sanctuary of death. From
there we passed through narrow and deserted streets. While crossing
Alexandria, I (p.27) remembered and thought I read Volney's description
of it; shape, color, sensation, everything is painted to such a degree
of truth that, a few months later, rereading these beautiful pages of
his book, I thought I was returning again in Alexandria. If Volney
had described all of Egypt in this way, no one would ever have thought
that it was necessary to paint other pictures of it, to make drawings
of it.
Throughout the crossing of this long, melancholy city,
Europe and its cheerfulness was only reminded of me by the noise and
activity of the sparrows. I no longer recognized the dog, this friend
of man, this faithful and generous companion, this cheerful and loyal
courtier; here, a dark egoist, stranger to the host whose roof he
inhabits, isolated without ceasing to be a slave, he misunderstands the
one whose asylum he still defends, and without horror he devours his
remains. The following anecdote will complete the development of his
character. The day I went ashore, having not brought any linen to
change, I wanted to go on the frigate Junon, which I believed was
placed at the entrance to the port; I take a small Turkish boat, and we
sail towards this point. Arriving at the frigate, we saw that it was
not the Junon; we were shown another one in the harbor half a league
away. The sun was setting; two thirds of the way were done; I could
sleep on board: here we are again on the road. It was not yet the
Junon: she was cruising offshore. We therefore had to return; but the
wind had freshened; the waves had become so high that we could only see
by stealth the land we had to return to. My man put me at the helm to
only take care of the sail.
I could barely see the direction I
had to keep; and I then began to feel that it was a real abandonment of
oneself to find oneself at that hour delivered to the winds, in the
middle of a rough sea, alone with a man who, like all his fellow
citizens, could do well, without (p.28) injustice, hating the French,
and wanting revenge. I affected confidence, even cheerfulness, I put on
a good countenance; and finally we reached the shore, the object of all
my wishes. But it was eleven o'clock, I was still half a league from
the neighborhood; I had to cross a town taken by storm in the morning,
and of which I did not know a street. No offer of reward could persuade
my man to leave his boat to accompany me.
I undertook the
journey alone, and, braving the spirits of the dead, I crossed the
cemetery; it was the path that I knew best: arriving at the first
habitations of the living, I was assailed by packs of fierce dogs,
which attacked me from doors, streets, and roofs; their cries echoed
from house to house, from family to family; However, I was able to
perceive that the war which was declared against me was a coalition,
because as soon as I had passed the property of those by whom I was
assailed, they were repelled by those who had come to receive me at the
border. Ignoring the abjection in which they lived, I did not dare to
hit them, for fear of making them scream, and also of arousing the
masters against me. The darkness was only diminished by the glow of the
stars, and the transparency that the night always preserves in these
climates. In order not to lose this advantage, to escape the clamor of
the dogs, and to follow a route which could not lead me astray, I left
the streets and resolved to walk along the shore; but walls and
construction sites which reached as far as the sea blocked my passage;
finally passing into the sea to avoid the dogs, climbing the walls to
avoid the sea when it became too deep, wet, covered with sweat,
overwhelmed with fatigue and terror, I reached one of our sentinels at
midnight, well convinced that dogs were the sixth and most terrible of
the plagues of Egypt.
Arriving in the morning at headquarters, I
found Bonaparte surrounded by the city's grandees and members of the
old government; he (p.29) received the oath of loyalty: he said to
Sherif Koraïm: I took your arms in your hand, I could treat you as a
prisoner; but you showed courage; and, as I believe it to be
inseparable from honor, I return your arms to you, and think that you
will be as faithful to the republic as you have been to a bad
government. I noticed in the physiognomy of this witty man a
dissimulation shaken and not overcome by the generous loyalty of the
general in chief: he did not yet know our means, and did not know
enough if everything that had happened was not a mistake; but when he
saw 30 thousand men and artillery trains on the ground as he set about
capturing Bonaparte, he never left the headquarters. Bonaparte was in
bed while still in his antechamber; a very remarkable thing in a Muslim.
The
first drawing I made was the new port, from the little Farilîon up to
the Frankish quarter, which was, in the time of Cleopatra, the
delightful quarter where her palace was built, and where the theater
was located.
On the 5th, in the morning, I accompanied the
general in a reconnaissance: he visited all the forts, that is to say
ruins, bad constructions, where bad cannons were lying on some stones
which served as a lookout for them. The general's orders were to tear
down everything that was useless, to only mend what could serve to
prevent the approach of the Bedouins; he focused all his attention on
the batteries which were to defend the ports.
We
passed near Pompey's column. It is with this monument as with almost
all reputations, which always lose as soon as one approaches what is
its object. It was named the column of (p.30) Pompey in the fifteenth
century, when knowledge began to awaken from its slumber: scholars,
rather than observers, hastened at that time to assign a name to all
the monuments ; and these names passed without contradiction from
century to century; tradition consecrated them.
Plate 3, Nos. 1 and 2: Measurements of Pompey's Column and Cleopatra's Obelisk (from Plate 3, vol 3).
No. 1
(left).—"Pompey's Column. This column was measured in all its details
by citizen Norry, who gave the public the results of his operations;
the dissertation he attached leaves nothing to be desired for curiosity
about this monument. The simple line that I give here to show the main
dimensions of this column is borrowed from the operations of citizen
Norry."
No. 2
(right).—"This is also a simple view of the obelisk of Cleopatra,
according to the measurements taken subsequent to the excavation made
at its base since our stay in Egypt." (Comments by Vivant Denon in vol.2, Explanations of Plates.)
A monument to
Pompey had been erected in Alexandria; he was no longer there, they
thought they found him in this column. It has since been made a trophy
for Septimius Severus; However, it is built on the rubble of the
ancient city, and at the time of Septimius Severus the city of the
Ptolomies was not yet in ruins. To provide this column with a solid
foundation, an obelisk was erected, on the base of which an ugly
pedestal was placed, which carries a beautiful shaft, topped with a
heavily carved Corinthian capital.
If the shaft of this column,
separating it from the pedestal and the capital, was part of an ancient
building, it attests to the magnificence and purity of the execution;
it must therefore be said that it is a beautiful column, and not a
beautiful monument; that a column is not a monument; that the column of
Ste-Marie-Majeure, although it is one of the most beautiful in
existence, does not have the character of a monument, that it is only a
fragment; and that if the Trajan and Antonine columns leave this
category, it is because they become colossal cylinders, on which the
history of the glorious expeditions of these two emperors is
sumptuously unfolded, and which, reduced to their simple features and
their size alone, they would be nothing more than heavy and sad
monuments. The foundations of Pompey's column having become loose, we
thought we could add to their solidity by adapting to the first
foundation two fragments of an obelisk in white marble, the only
monument of this material that I have seen in Egypt.
Excavations
carried out around the column would undoubtedly shed (p.31) light on
its origin; the movement of the ground and the shapes that it still
allows to be seen attest in advance that the research would not be in
vain: they would perhaps discover the substruction and the atrium of
the portico to which this column belonged, which was the object of
dissertations written by scholars who have only seen drawings of it, or
only had descriptions from travelers; and these travelers did not tell
them that fragments of columns of the same material and the same
diameter were found near there; that the movement of the ground
indicates the ruin and burial of large buildings, whose shapes are
distinguishable on the surface, such as a square of great proportion,
and a large circus, which could be covered, although it is covered sand
and debris, again measure the main dimensions.
After observing
that the so-called Pompey's column is of a very pure style and
execution, that the pedestal and the capital are not of the same
granite as the shaft, that the work is heavy and only seems to be a
sketch, that the foundation, made of debris, announces a modern
construction; we can conclude that this monument is not ancient, and
that its erection can also belong to the time of the Greek emperors, or
to that of the caliphs, since, if the pedestal and the capital are well
enough worked to belong to the first of these eras, they do not have
enough perfection so that art in the second could not have reached that
far.
Excavations in this place could also determine the
enclosure of the city at the time of the Ptolomies, when its commerce
and its splendor changed its first plan and made it immense: that of
the caliphs, which still exists was a reduction of it, although it
enclosed today countryside and deserts: this circumvallation was built
of debris, because their buildings always recall the destruction and
ravage; the jambs and bases of the doors that they made for their
enclosures and their (p.32) fortresses are only columns of granite,
which they did not even take the trouble to shape for the use they
intended. 'they gave them; they appear to have remained there only to
attest to the magnificence and grandeur of the buildings of which they
are the remains; other times they included this immensity of columns in
the construction of their walls, to straighten and level the base; and
as they have stood the test of time, they now look like batteries.
Moreover, these Arab and Turkish constructions, works for the needs of
war, offer a confusion of eras and different industries of which we
perhaps see nowhere else more striking and closer examples. The Turks
especially, adding ineptitude to profanation, mixed with granite not
only brick and limestone, but planks, and even planks, and all these
elements, so little analogous and so strangely amalgamated, presented
the monstrous assemblage of the splendor of human industry, and its
degradation.
Returning from the column towards the modern city,
we crossed that of the Arabs, or that which was enclosed by their
walls; for it is now only a desert dotted with a few enclosures, which
are gardens in the months of the flood, and which in other times
preserve more or less trees and vegetables in proportion to the size of
the area. cistern that they contain: this cistern is the principle of
their existence; if it dries up, the gardens return to rubble and sand.
At the gate of each of these gardens, there are monuments of touching
piety; These are water reservoirs that the pump fills every time it is
set in motion, and which offer the passing traveler enough to satisfy
the first need in this burning climate, thirst. At every step we
encounter views of these cisterns which communicate with each other,
and whose vents are crowned with the base or capital of an ancient
hollowed column, serving as a coping. .(p.33)
It is enough, for
the manufacture of a new cistern, to dig and line tanks on several
stages, to then make a bleed, and to extend it until it meets another
excavation; from then on it receives the common benefit of overflow,
which fills, through the effect of the level that the waters seek, all
the void presented to it. The great swimming pool, or water reservoir
of Alexandria, is one of the great antiquities of the Middle Ages of
Egypt, and one of the most beautiful monuments of this kind, either by
its grandeur or by the intelligence of its construction: although one
part is degraded and the other needs repair, it still contains enough
water to suffice for the consumption of men and animals for two years.
We arrived the month before it was to be renewed, and we found it very
fresh and very good.
We were attracted by a reddish ruin, which
the Catholics call the house of Ste. Catherine the learned, the one who
married little Jesus, four hundred years after his death: the
construction is Roman; the canals coated with stalactites indicate that
these must have been thermal baths. We then came to the so-called
Cleopatra obelisk; another, overturned next to it, indicates that they
both decorated one of the entrances to the palace of the Ptolomies, the
ruins of which can still be seen a few steps away. Inspection of the
current state of these obelisks, and the breaks, which existed even
when they were erected in this place, prove that they were already
fragments at that time, and brought from Memphis or Upper Egypt. They
could easily be embarked, and become in France a trophy of the
conquest, a very characteristic trophy, because they are a monument in
themselves, and the hieroglyphs with which they are covered must make
them preferable to Pompey's column, which is only a column a little
larger than those found everywhere. We have since excavated the base of
this obelisk, and we found that it was placed on a stone: the (p.34)
pedestals, which have always been added in Europe to this type of
monument, are an ornament which changes the character. The description
I have given shows the state of this obelisk since the excavation.
I
made a picturesque drawing of these two obelisks (plate 2, No.2), as well as the
landscapes and monuments which surround them: by observing the Saracen
monument which is nearby, I found that the base belonged to a Greek or
Roman building; we can still see the capitals of engaged columns, of
the Doric order, whose shafts will be lost below sea level. Strabo said
that the bases of Ptolemy's palace were beaten by the waves: this
debris could all both attest to the truth of Strabo's report and give
the location of this palace.
Returning to the bottom of the port
by the seaside, we find debris from structures from all times, equally
mistreated by the wave and by the centuries. There are remains of
baths, of which there are still several rooms, built later in older
walls. These constructions seemed Arab to me; and to preserve them, we
made a kind of columnar piles, which now resemble level batteries;
their immense number proves how magnificent were the palaces which they
decorated. When we have passed the bottom of the port, we find large
Saracen buildings, which have some details of magnificence and a
mixture of taste which embarrass the observer: friezes, decorated with
Doric triglyphs, topped with ribbed vaults, must make us believe that
these structures were built from ancient fragments that the Saracens
mixed with the taste of their architecture. The doors of these
buildings can give the measure of the indestructibility of the sicamore
wood, which remained in its entirety, while the iron with which they
were covered gave way to time and disappeared entirely. Behind this
type of fortress are Arab baths, decorated with all kinds of (p.35)
license details: our soldiers, who had found them very hot, had
established themselves there to do laundry, and had suspended their
use. I therefore refer to another moment the description of baths of
this type, and to that which Savary made of them, the idea of
voluptuousness that one should take from them.
Near these baths
is one of the principal mosques, formerly a primitive church under the
name of St. Athanasius. This building, as dilapidated as it is
magnificent, can give an idea of the Turks' neglect of the objects of
which they are most jealous. Before our arrival they would not allow a
Christian to approach it, and preferred to have a guard there rather
than repair the doors: in the state in which we found them, they could
neither close nor roll on their hinges.
Plate 3, Nos. 3-6: San Athanasius (3), and portico (4) with ancient sarcophagus (5,6) (from Plate 3, vol.3).
No. 3.—"View
of a principal mosque in Alexandria, known under the name of S.
Athanasius: four rows of ancient marble columns of all kinds bear
arches which support a floor, and form a covered portico, the three
walls and the pavement are covered with marble mosaic, with a frieze
where sentences from the Koran in large characters are executed in
enamel mosaic. This open portico overlooks a square courtyard, paved in
marble, surrounded by a gallery supported by columns of the same nature
as those of the portico (See plan No, 4
same plate). The most miserable structures are added by the Turks to the
Sarracen magnificences that I have just described. In the courtyard,
the plants, then the trees, came to light and lifted the marble
pavement; the landslides replaced the vaults at the place where they
were punctured, and a few sicomore boards which do not join repair the
defects in the continuity of the fence: the small octagonal building
which we see in the middle of this view, contains the ancient
sarcophagus feature (No. 6) with No.5 showing the plan. (See its Description in the Journal, Volume I, p. 35.)" (Comments by Vivant Denon in vol.2, Explanations of Plates.)
(p.35) In the middle of the
courtyard of this mosque, a small octagonal temple contains an Egyptian
breccia basin of incomparable beauty, either by its nature, or by the
innumerable hieroglyphic figures with which it is covered inside and
out; this monument, which is undoubtedly a sarcophagus from ancient
Egypt, will perhaps be illustrated by volumes of dissertations. It
would have taken a month to draw the details; I only had time to take
the general form; and I must add that it can be considered as one of
the most precious pieces of antiquity, and one of the first remains of
Egypt, with which it would be desirable that we could enrich one of our
museums. My enthusiasm was shared by Dolomieux when we discovered this
precious monument together.
It was from the galleries of the
minarets of this mosque that I made a drawing where we see from a
bird's eye view the entire development of the new port. Very close to
the mosque are three standing columns (plate 4, No.1), of which no traveler has spoken,
it would be interesting to excavate at their base: upon completion of
the work on these columns we can judge that they were part of some
ancient monuments; but their exaggerated spacing should suggest that
they were not placed (p.36) at their original destination: whatever it
may be, they are the remains of a large and magnificent building.
Plate 2, No. 1: (from Plate 2 by Vivant Denon, in vol.3)
"The view of three columns which one encounters near the mosque of S.
Athanasius: they are of granite, and of fine workmanship. .... their
diameter at half their height is four feet six inches; the factory
behind it is an Arab casino in a garden: in the background, we can see
the top of Pompeius' column. " (Comments by Vivant Denon in vol.2, Explanations of Plates.)
We
went from there to the Rosetta Gate, which is fortified, and where the
Turks had defended themselves when we arrived. A group of houses there
forms a sort of village, which leaves an empty space of half a league
between this part of the town and that which borders the ports. All the
horrors of war still existed in this district. I had an encounter there
which offered me the most striking of all contrasts: a young woman,
white and pink, in the middle of the dead and the debris, was seated on
a catalect still covered in blood; it was the image of the angel of the
resurrection: when attracted by a feeling of compassion I expressed to
her my surprise at finding her so isolated, she replied with sweet
ingenuity that she was waiting for her husband to go to sleep in the
desert; it was still only a word for her, she was going to sleep there
as in another lodging. From this we can judge the fate that awaited the
women to whom love had given the courage to follow their husbands on
this expedition.
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