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The traders arriving at Semneh generally waited until a sufficient number were gathered together to form a strong caravan for mutual protection against the natives inhabiting the desert, who held themselves independent alike of Egypt and of Meroe, and attacked and plundered parties crossing the desert, unless these were so strong and well armed as to be able to set them at defiance.
Sometimes Egypt under a powerful king carried her arms much further to the south, at other times a warlike monarch of Meroe would push back the Egyptian frontier almost to Syene; but as a rule the Nile as far south as Semneh was regarded as belonging to Egypt.
It had been arranged that the men belonging to the boats each day brought up should that night take sentinel duty; and this evening Jethro, his companions and boatmen were among those on guard. Many of the boats had left Semneh before them, and they had been among the last to arrive at the foot of the cataracts, and consequently came up in the last batch.
When, however, they journeyed beyond Semneh they left them there until their return, the danger and hardships of the desert journey being too great for them to encounter, and it was therefore thought advisable that the girls should remain in seclusion.
When the spot to be fortified was situate upon a height, the Egyptian engineers knew perfectly well how to adapt their lines of defence to the nature of the site. At Kûmmeh and Semneh, in Nubia, where the Nile rushes over the rocks of the second cataract, the engineering arrangements are very ingenious, and display much real skill.
The priests of the other parts of the country sent gifts out of their poverty in aid of this pious work; and among the figures on the walls we see those of forty cities, from Semneh, at the second cataract, to Memphis and Saïs, in the Delta, each presenting an offering to the god of the temple.
The mouths of the defiles which led into the desert needed to be closed against the Bedawîn; while the great feudal nobles fortified their houses, their towns, and the villages upon their domains which commanded either the mountain passes or the narrow parts of the river, against their king or their neighbours. The oldest fortresses are those of Abydos, El Kab, and Semneh.
"There are a party of Arab traders from the other side who wish to pass up to carry their goods either to Semneh or Meroe, but I have detained them until news should reach me from above, for if any wrong should happen to them their countrymen might probably enough hold us responsible for their deaths, and this might lead to quarrels and loss of trade; but since you have passed through with so small a party there can be no fear, and they can arrange with the people who brought you down as to the amount to be paid to the chiefs for free passage."
Consequently much time was lost in dragging the boats and their stores up or around the difficult rapids above Semneh . Meanwhile a large quantity of stores had been collected at Dongola and Debbeh; numbers of boats were also there, so that a swift advance of a vanguard thence by the calmer reaches farther up the Nile seemed to offer many chances of success.
As they thought it best to allow six months from the date of their departure from Thebes to elapse before they entered any large Egyptian town, they remained for nearly two months at Semneh, and then finding that a flotilla of boats was ready to ascend the river, they made an arrangement with some boatmen for the hire of their craft to the point where they were to leave the river and again set out on their journey.
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