In courage and military genius their superiority is very striking; for the Egyptians are essentially an unwarlike people.

The one point of advantage to which Egypt may fairly lay claim is the grandeur and durability of her architecture.

The Assyrian palaces, magnificent, as they undoubtedly were, must yield the palm to the vast structures of Egyptian Thebes.

No nation, not even Rome, has equalled Egypt in the size and solemn grandeur of its buildings.

But, except in this one respect, the great African kingdom must be regarded as inferior to her Asiatic rival--which was indeed "a cedar in Lebanon, exalted above all the trees of the field--fair in greatness and in the length of his branches--so that all the trees that were in the garden of God envied him, and not one was like unto him in his beauty.".