Rashid then, or Rosetto, is a large, clean, neat town, or village, upon the eastern side of the Nile. It is about three miles long, much frequented by studious and religious Mahometans; among these too are a considerable number of merchants, it being the entrepot between Cairo and Alexandria, and _vice versa_; here too the merchants have their factors, who superintend and watch over the merchandise which passes the Bogaz to and from Cairo.
There are many gardens, and much verdure, about Rosetto; the ground is low, and retains long the moisture it imbibes from the overflowing of the Nile. Here also are many curious plants and flowers, brought from different countries, by _Fakirs_, and merchants. Without this, Egypt, subject to such long inundation, however it may abound in necessaries, could not boast of many beautiful productions of its own gardens, though flowers, trees, and plants, were very much in vogue in this neighbourhood, two hundred years ago, as we find by the observations of Prosper Alpinus.
The study and search after every thing useful or beautiful, which for some time had been declining gradually, fell at last into total contempt and oblivion, under the brutal reign of these last slaves[73], the most infamous reproach to the name of Sovereign.
Rosetto is a favourite halting-place of the Christian travellers entering Egypt, and merchants established there. There they draw their breaths, in an imaginary increase of freedom, between the two great sinks of tyranny, oppression, and injustice, Alexandria and Cairo.
Rosetto has this good reputation, that the people are milder, more tractable, and less avaricious, than those of the two last-mentioned capitals; but I must say, that, in my time, I could not discern much difference.
The merchants, who trade at all hours of the day with Christians, are indeed more civilized, and less insolent, than the soldiery and the rest of the common people, which is the case every where, as it is for their own interest; but their priests, and moullahs, their soldiers, and people living in the country, are, in point of manners, just as bad as the others.
Rosetto is in lat. 31° 24´ 15´´ N.; it is the place where we embark for Cairo, which we accordingly did on June the 30th.