of a barbarian horde of spoilers.  On one occasion one of the Ulemahs could not help smiling at the zeal which he manifested for tracing home the murder of an obscure peasant to the perpetrator.  The Mussulman asked if the dead man were anywise related to the blood of the Sultan Kebir?  “No,” answered Napoleon, sternly—­“but he was more than that—­he was one of a people whose government it has pleased Providence to place in my hands.”  The measures which he took for the protection of travellers to Mecca were especially acceptable to the heads of the Moslem establishment, and produced from them a proclamation, (in direct contradiction to the Koran,) signifying that it was right and lawful to pay tribute to the French.  The virtuosi and artists in his train, meanwhile, pursued with indefatigable energy their scientific researches; they ransacked the monuments of Egypt, and laid the foundation, at least, of all the wonderful discoveries, which have since been made concerning the knowledge, arts, polity (and even language) of the ancient nation.  Nor were their objects merely those of curiosity.  They, under the General’s direction, examined into the long-smothered traces of many an ancient device for improving the agriculture of the country.  Canals that had been shut up for centuries were re-opened:  the waters of the Nile flowed once more where they had been guided by the skill of the Pharaohs or the Ptolemies.  Cultivation was extended; property secured; and it cannot be doubted that the signal improvements since introduced in Egypt, are attributable mainly to the wise example of the French administration.  At Cairo itself there occurred one stormy insurrection, provoked, as may be supposed, by some wantonness on the part of the garrison; but, after this was quelled by the same merciless vigour which Napoleon had displayed on similar occasions in Italy, the country appears to have remained in more quiet, and probably enjoyed, in spite of the presence of an invading army, more prosperity, than it had ever done during any period of the same length, since the Saracen government was overthrown by the Ottomans.

In such labours Napoleon passed the autumn of 1798.  “At this period,” writes his secretary, “it was his custom to retire early to bed, and it was my business to read to him as long as he remained awake.  If I read poetry, he soon fell asleep, but if, as sometimes happened, he called for The Life of Cromwell, I made up mind to want repose for that night.”

General Dessaix, meanwhile, had pursued Mourad Bey into Upper Egypt, where the Mamelukes hardly made a single stand against him, but contrived, by the excellence of their horses, and their familiarity with the deserts, to avoid any total disruption of their forces.  Mourad returned to the neighbourhood of Cairo on hearing of the insurrection already mentioned; but departed when he learned its suppression.  Those gallant horsemen were gradually losing numbers in their constant desert marches—­they were losing heart rapidly:  and everything seemed to promise, that the Upper Egypt, like the Lower, would soon settle into a peaceful province of the new French colony.