Inundation of the Nile: colossal statues in the Plain of Thebes, 1861. The stupendous remains of this famous city of antiquity, long the capital of Egypt, extend for seven miles along both banks of the Nile, in Upper Egypt, and present an imposing collection of ancient monuments...[shown here are] two enormous sitting colossi, one of which was the celebrated Memnon...Egypt owes, as is well known, its existence as a productive and habitable region to the Nile, the periodic overflowings of which more than answer the purpose of rain in other countries; and, accordingly, in olden times the beneficent river was worshipped by the inhabitants as their tutelary god. The rich alluvial deposit which the Nile spreads over the lands of Nubia and Egypt is mainly derived, through the Blue River and its affluents, from the high lands of Abyssinia. From "Illustrated London News", 1861.