before us; we have lost prejudices, and gained knowledge; we have learnt that revolution is not liberty; and that the greatest works of Man are those in which rich and poor feel a mutual interest. ANALYTICAL TABLE OF CONTENTS. PYRAMIDS at Gizeh, of Cheops, Cephren, and Mycerinus. Herodotus' account of the mode of building the Great Py- ramid and of the Causeway by which it was approached, 11-14. Sketch of the early history of Egypt, its scriptural associations, learning, 15. Probable descent of the Egyptians from Ham; manner and time of their settlement; progress in civilization, 16. The Delta; general sketch of the surround- ing country, mountains, cataracts, &c. 17-23. First im- pressions on seeing the Pyramids, as described by modern travellers, 23-30. Illustrations of their dimensions, 31, 32. Interior of Great Pyramid, 33-38; of second, 39. Its ascent by Wilde, 41. Tombs surrounding the Great Pyramid, as inspected by Lepsius, 43. Pyramid of Mycerinus; smaller ones at Sakkára, Dashour, Thebes, in Nubia, 44, 45. Account by Greaves, 46–49. Pyramids in Mexico, India, and Java, 49-53. Tombs of Caius Cestius, Alexander Severus, ibid. Mounds the most ancient form of funeral monument, 54, 55. Lepsius' theory of pyramidal construction, 56; derivation of the word, 58; their rise, 59; chronology, 61, 62. THE TEMPLE, WALLS, AND HANGING GARDENS Hanging gardens; their design and appearance, 81. Pros- INTRODUCTION. High towers, fair temples, goodly theatres, SPENSER. ALTHOUGH THE SEVEN WONDERS OF THE WORLD are among the traditions of our earliest childhood, yet it is a remarkable fact, that ninety-nine persons out of a hundred who might be asked what these wonders were, could not name them. These marvels of the ancients had, even at an early period of ancient literature, become comparatively forgotten, and were thus treated as myths known to more modern ages through traditions collected by the Greeks-traditions so replete with absurdities, that it was difficult to distinguish truth from fiction, historical fact from the wild conceptions of those, who imagined unheard-of scenes of ancient splendour and Oriental magnificence. The chief object of the compiler of this volume is to present such particulars of these marvels of remote centuries of art as could be gathered from the writers living in the ages in which they existed, or, when these failed, from those nearest the time, in a narrative form; -corroborating such statements by the accounts of modern travellers: and to illustrate their political and national relations, by some explanations of the public ceremonies immediately brought into connexion with them; such, for instance, as the Olympic Games dedicated to the worship of Zeus or Jupiter, and the Pythian, to that of Apollo; besides furnishing notices of the more celebrated temples raised to those deities; the multifarious worship of Diana, with her renowned temple, and a sketch of the interesting impostures and the doubtful oracles attached to each. The association of ideas that will necessarily arise in contemplating these wondrous works of past ages, leads to the notice of other fabrics of a similar kind in after-times, and even to those of our own day; as the more remarkable mausoleums or memorials of the great and the brave-the Pyramids of India and Mexico—and those vast mounds of similar form in other parts of the globe; and in connexion with the Pharos that originated a name for such structures, the Pharos of the Emperor Claudius at Ostia; among others of modern date, the superb one at Cordouan; while we may refer with an Englishman's pride to those paragons of engineering triumph over natural obstacles, the lighthouses on the Eddystone, and the Bell Rock. Time has not been able to erase these wonders of the ancients from the page of History. Marvels they have continued; and from being the first of their kind, have remained the examples and prototypes to those which followed. All that modern art and science has done has been to expand, ripen, and make useful, the vast designs which, too often, sunk into ruin, because, erected as tributes to man's selfish admiration of his |