THE SEVEN WONDERS OF THE WORLD. THE PYRAMIDS OF EGYPT. Those mighty piles-the Pyramids-have over-lived What though unmoved they bore the deluge weight, What though their founder fill'd with miracles THE eternal Pyramids-the mystery of the pastthe enigma of the present and the enduring for the future ages of this world,-standing at the head of a long reach in the river Nile, directly in front of the traveler, darkening the horizon, solitary, grand, and gloomy, the only objects to be seen in the great desert before him, are the more impressive as being not unfrequently the aim and end of his journey to the land of Egypt. The Pyramids of Jizeh are the most stupendous masses of building in stone that human labor has ever been known to accomplish, and they are still standing there to tell us, that more than two thousand years before the Christian era the Egyptians had learned to transport the heaviest blocks of granite ever moved out of the quarry from Syene to the Delta of the Nile, a land journey of six hundred, or a voyage of near seven hundred miles; to cut and polish them with a precision and nicety we cannot even now surpass, and to use them constructively with a degree of science unequalled from that day to this ;-besides this, we know from the contemporary tombs, that at that age these remarkable people had fixed institutions in civil society, which all tell of a long anterior life, which alone could have led to such maturity. We are indebted to Herodotus, properly styled "The Father of History," for the first written account of these wondrous works of art. Herodotus in his thirtyninth year, B. C. 445, now within three years of twenty-three centuries ago, composed his great and only work that has come down to us :-This work, which is a history of the wars of the Greeks and Persians from the time of Cyrus to the battle of Mycale, in the reign of Xerxes, also gives an account of the most celebrated nations of the world, as well as the results of his travels over Italy, Greece, and Egypt. His style abounds with elegance and ease, and he candidly states what he saw and what he relates on the narration of others. He was informed by the priests of Memphis, that the Great Pyramid was built by Cheops, a King of Egypt; that one hundred thousand men were employed twenty years in building it; and that the body of Cheops was placed in a room beneath the bottom of the pyramid; that the chamber was surrounded by a vault, to which the waters of the Nile were conveyed by a subterranean tunnel. The second pyramid was built by Cephren, the brother and successor of Cheops; and the third was erected by Mycerinus, the son of Cheops. Herodotus goes on to say, "that each face of it measures eight plethra, (eight hundred Greek feet,) it being quadrangular; and the height is the same. It is made of polished stones, fitted together with the greatest nicety, none of the stones being less than thirty feet long. The pyramid was made in the following manner, in the form of steps, which some call crossæ, (battlements,) and others bómides, (little altars.) When they had built it in this fashion, they raised the remaining stones by machines or contrivances of short pieces of wood. They raised them from the ground to the first tier of steps, and when the stone had ascended to this tier, it was placed on the first machine standing on the first row, and from this row it was dragged upon the second row on another machine. As many tiers of stones as there were, so many machines also there were; but according to another account (for I think it right to give both accounts as they were given to me) they transferred the same machine, it being easily moved, from step to step, as they raised each stone. The highest parts were accordingly finished first, then the parts next to the highest, and last of all the parts near the ground, and the very bottom. It is worked in Egyptian characters on the pyramid, how much was spent in furnishing the workmen with purges, leeks, and onions; and as I well recollect what the interpreter said who explained the characters to me, it was one thousand six hundred talents of silver." We are told by Herodotus, that when the Great Pyramid was designed, they began by making a causeway, along which to convey the stone. This causeway, he states, was three thousand Greek feet in length, sixty in breadth, and forty-eight high, at its greatest elevation; it was made of highly-polished stone, covered with sculptures, and in his opinion was as wonderful a work as the pyramid itself. When we consider the length and height of this causeway, it is evident it was an inclined plane, rising from the level below toward that on which the pyramids stood, and forming the most magnificent approach that ever was made to the most wonderful work of human labor. It seems also probable, as the causeway commenced on the west side of the canal, already alluded to, that the heavy blocks (if we adopt the supposition of their being brought from the east side of the Nile) were brought by water to the bottom of this inclined plane, and carried up it to the level above. There are still existing remains of these causeways in several places, particularly one leading to the third pyramid, eight hundred yards in length. Egypt was one of the countries earliest civilized, and brought into a fixed social and political system. The first king mentioned as having reigned over the country is Menes, whose era is supposed with tolerable correctness to have been 2200 years B. C. From this time something like a chronological series has been made out by Wilkinson, in his "General View of Egypt." The immediate successors of Menes are unknown, until we come to Suphis and his brother or brothers, to whom the Great Pyramid is attributed, and who are supposed to be the same as the Cheops and Cephren of Herodotus. Abraham visited Egypt about 1920 B. C., and we have the testimony of Scripture as to the |