To put it in
very practical language, "Pharaoh's Bed" was "all of a piece." The form
was married to the color. The color seemed to melt into the form. It was
indeed a bed in which the soul that worships beauty could rest happily
entranced. Nothing jarred. Antiquaries say that apparently this building
was left unfinished. That may be so. But for all that it was one of the
most finished things in Egypt, essentially a thing to inspire within one
the "perfect calm that is Greek." The blighting touch of the Nile, which
has changed the beautiful pale yellow of the stone of the lower part
of the building to a hideous and dreary grey--which made me think of
a steel knife on which liquid has been spilt and allowed to run--has
destroyed the uniformity, the balance, the faultless melody lifted up by
form and color. And so it is with the temple. It is, as it were, cut in
two by the intrusion into it of this hideous, mottled complexion left by
the receded water. Everywhere one sees disease on the walls and columns,
almost blotting out bas-reliefs, giving to their active figures a
morbid, a sickly look. The effect is specially distressing in the open
court that precedes the temple dedicated to the Lady of Philae. In this
court, which is at the southern end of the island, the Nile at certain
seasons is now forced to rise very nearly as high as the capitals of
many of the columns. The consequence of this is that here the disease
seems making rapid strides.
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