Continuing a course against the stream, the traveller passes many interesting scenes, —the great corn tract of Faioum, pits packed with crocodile mummies, rock tombs excavated in the face of the mountains, magnificent ruins and scattered monuments, as at Dendera and Thebes. One hundred miles above he reaches the first cataract (of which there are seven in all), and the town of Assouan on the borders of Nubia.

The course of the Nile through the territory of Nubia presents considerable modifications in the scenery. For the most part the river is shut in by hills of granite and sandstone. The valley between these is arid, barren, sun-baked. It has the dull, leaden aspect of a desert. A few stunted palms are the only traces of vegetation that the eye can discover. Cultivation is nearly impossible, except here and there within a narrow strip of land on either side of the river. In some parts it is painfully carried on by means of irrigation—the water-wheels being worked by oxen, on whose labours those of the husbandman depend for success.