CHAPTER IV.

Journey up the Nile.-An Arab Burial.-Pilgrims to Mecca.-Trials of Patience.-A Hurricane on the Nile.-A Turkish Bath.

ON the first of January I commenced my journey up the Nile. My boat was small, for greater convenience in rowing and towing. She was, however, about forty feet long, with two fine latteen sails, and manned by eight men, a rais or captain, and a governor or pilot. This was to be my home from Cairo to the Cataracts, or as long as I remained on the river. There was not a place where a traveller could sleep, and I could not expect to eat a meal or pass a night except on board; consequently, I was obliged to provide myself at Cairo with all things necessary for the whole voyage. My outfit was not very extravagant. It consisted, as near as I can recollect, of two tin cups, two pairs of knives and forks, four plates, coffee, tea, sugar, rice, maccaroni, and a few dozen of claret. My bedroom-furniture consisted of a mattress and coverlet, which in the daytime were tucked up so as to make a divan. Over the head of my bed were my gun and pistols, and at the foot was a little swinging shelf, containing my LIBRARY, which consisted of the Modern Traveller on Egypt, Volney's Travels, and an Italian grammar and dictionary. My only companion was my servant; and as he is about to be somewhat intimate with me, I take the liberty of introducing him to the reader. Paollo Nuozzo, or, more familiarly, Paul, was a Maltese. I had met him at Constantinople travelling with two of my countrymen; and though they did not seem to like him much, I was very well pleased with him, and thought myself quite fortunate, on my arrival at Malta, to find him disengaged. He was a man about thirty-five years old; stout, square built, intelligent; a passionate admirer of ruins, particularly the ruins of the Nile; honest and faithful as the sun, and one of the greatest cowards that luminary ever shone upon. He called himself my dragoman, and, I remember, wrote himself such in the convent of Mount Sinai and the temple at Petra, though he promised to make himself generally useful, and was my only servant during my whole tour. He spoke French, Italian, Maltese, Greek, Turkish, and Arabic, but could not read any one of these languages. He had lived several years in Cairo, and had travelled on the Nile before, and understood all the little arrangements necessary for the voyage.

At about twelve o'clock, then, the hour when at home my friends were commencing their Newyear visits, accompanied to the boat by my friend from Alexandria, my first, last, and best friend in Egypt, I embarked; and with a fair wind, and "the star-spangled banner" (made by an Arab tailor) floating above me, I commenced my journey on the Nile. It is necessary here for every stranger to place himself under the flag of his country, else his boat and men are liable to be taken at any moment by the officers of the pacha. It was the first time I had myself ever raised the banner of my country, and I felt a peculiar pride in the consciousness that it could protect me so far from home.

We started, as when I first embarked upon the Nile, with a fair wind, at sunset, and again to the gentle tap of the Arab drum we passed the great pyramids of Ghizeh and the giant monuments of Sachara and Dashoor. Long after sunset their dark outline was distinctly visible over the desert; I sat on the deck of my boat till their vast masses became lost in the darkness. My situation was novel and exciting, and my spirits were elate with curious expectation; but with the morrow came a very essential change. A feeling of gloom came over me when I found the wind against my progress. The current was still running obstinately the same way as before, and to be so soon deserted by the element that I needed gave rather a dreary aspect to the long journey before me. That day, however, we contrived to do something; my boat being small, my men were almost continually ashore, with ropes around their breasts, towing; and, occasionally, rowing across from side to side would give us the advantage of a bend in the river, when we would carry sail and make some progress.

The scenery of the Nile, about fifty miles from Cairo, differed somewhat from the rich valley of the Delta, the dark mountains of Mokattam in the neighbourhood of Cairo bounding the valley on the Arabian side, while on the African the desert approached to the very banks of the river. Though travelling in a country in which, by poetic license, and by way of winding off a period, every foot of ground is said to possess an exciting interest, during my first day's journey on the Nile I was thrown very much upon my own resources.

My gun was the first thing that presented itself. I had bought it in Cairo, doubled-barrelled and new, for fifteen dollars. I did not expect to make much use of it, and it was so very cheap that I was rather doubtful of its safety, and intended to make trial of it with a double charge and a slow match. But Paul had anticipated me; he had already put in two enormous charges, and sent one of the boatmen ashore to try it. I remonstrated with him upon the risk to which he had exposed the man; but he answered in the tone in which he (like all Propean servants) always spoke of the degraded inhabitants of Egypt, "Poh, he is only an Arab;" and I was soon relieved from apprehension by the Arab returning, full of praises of the gun, having killed with both shots. One thing disheartened me even more than the head wind. Ever since I left home I had been in earnest search of a warm climate, and thought I had secured it in Egypt; but, wherever I went, I seemed to carry with me an influence that chilled the atmosphere. In the morning, before I rose, Paul brought in to me a piece of ice as thick as a pane of glass, made during the night; a most extraordinary, and to me unexpected circumstance. The poor Arabs, accustomed to their hot and burning sun, shrank in the cold almost to nothing, and early in the morning and in the evening were utterly unfit for labour. I suffered very much also myself. Obliged to sit with the door of my cabin closed, my coat and greatcoat on, and with a prospect of a long cold voyage, by the evening of the second day I had lost some portion of the enthusiasm with which, under a well-filled sail, I had started the day before from Cairo.

The third day was again exceedingly cold, the wind still ahead, and stronger than yesterday. I was still in bed, looking through the many openings of my cabin, and the men were on shore towing, when I was roused by a loud voice of lamentation, in which the weeping and wailing of women predominated. I stepped out, and saw on the bank of the river the dead body of an Arab, surrounded by men, women, and children, weeping and howling over it previous to burial. The body was covered with a wrapper of coarse linen cloth, drawn tight over the head and tied under the neck, and fastened between two parallel bars, intended as a barrow to carry it to its grave. It lay a little apart before the group of mourners, who sat on the bank above, with their eyes turned towards it, weeping, and apparently talking to it. The women were the most conspicuous among the mourners. The dead man had been more happy in his connexions than I imagine the Arabs generally are, if all the women sitting there were really mourning his death. Whether they were real mourners, or whether they were merely going through the formal part of an Egyptian funeral ceremony, I cannot say; but the big tears rolled down their cheeks, and their cries sounded like the overflowings of distressed hearts. A death and burial-scene is at any time solemn, and I do not know that it loses any of its solemnity even when the scene is on the banks of the Nile, and the subject a poor and oppressed Arab. Human affection probably glows as warmly here as under a gilded roof, and I am disposed to be charitable to the exhibition that I then beheld; but I could not help noticing that the cries became louder as I approached, and I had hardly seated myself at a little distance from the corpse before the women seemed to be completely carried away by their grief, and with loud cries, tearing their hair and beating their breasts, threw out their arms towards the corpse, prayed, and wept, and then turned away with shrieks piteous enough to touch the heart of the dead.

The general territorial division of Egypt, from time immemorial, has been into upper and lower; the latter beginning at the shores of the Mediterranean, and extending very nearly to the ancient Memphis, and the former commencing at Memphis and extending to the Cataracts. Passing by, for the present, the ruins of Memphis, on the fourth day, the wind dead ahead, and the men towing at a very slow rate, I went ashore with my gun, and at about eleven o'clock in the morning walked into the town of Beni Suef. This town stands on the Libyan side of the river, on the borders of a rich valley, the Nile running close under the foot of the Arabian mountains; and contains, as its most prominent objects, a mosque and minaret, and what is here called a palace or seraglio; that is, a large coarse building covered with white cement, and having grated windows for the harem.

Here travellers sometimes leave their boats to make an excursion to Medinet el Faiyum, the ancient Crocodilopolis, or Arsinoe, near the great Lake Moeris. This lake was in ancient days one of the wonders of Egypt. It was sixty mile long (about the size of the Lake of Geneva), and Herodotus says that it was an artificial lake, and that in his time the towering summits of tow pyramids were visible above its surface. The great labyrinth, too, was supposed to be somewhere near this; but no pyramids nor any ruins of the labyrinth are now to be seen. The lake is comparatively dry, and very little is left to reward the traveller.

At sundown we hauled up to the bank, alongside a boat loaded with pilgrims; and, building a fire on shore, the two crews, with their motley passengers, spent the night quietly around it. It was the first time since we had left Cairo that we had come in contact with pilgrims, although we had been seeing them from my first entering Egypt. This was the season for the pilgrimage to Mecca. The great caravan was already gathering at Cairo, while numbers, no wishing to wait, were seen on all parts of the Nile on their way to Qena, from thence to cross the desert to Quseir, and down the Red Sea to the Holy City. They were coming from all parts of the Mussulman dominions, poor and rich, old and young, women and children, almost piled upon each other, by scores, for several months exposing themselves to all manner of hardships, in obedience to one of the principal injunctions of the Koran, once in their lives to perform a pilgrimage to Mecca.

On the fifth the wind was still dead ahead; the men continued to tow, but without making much progress; and the day dragged heavily. On the sixth I saw another burial. Early in morning Paul called me to look out. We were lying, in company with another boat, fast to a little island of sand nearly in the middle of the river. I got up exceedingly cold, and saw a dead man lying on the sand, his limbs drawn up and stiff. He was a boatman on board the other boat, and had died during the night. A group of Arabs were sitting near, while two were preparing to wash the body previous to burial. They brought it down to the margin of the river and laid it carefully upon the sand, then washed it, pressed down the drawn-up legs, and wrapped it in fragments of tattered garments, contributed by his fellow-boatmen, who could ill spare even these scanty rags; and, laying it with great decency a little way from the river, joined the other group, and sat down with great gravity to pipes and coffee. In a few moments two of them rose, and going a little apart, with their bare hands scratched a shallow grave, and the poor Arab was left on a little sandbank in the Nile, to be covered in another season by the mighty river. He was an entire stranger, having come on board the evening before his boat set out from Cairo. In all probability, he was one of an immense mass which swarms in the crowded streets of Cairo, without friends, occupation, or settled means of living.

On the seventh the wind was still ahead and blowing strong, and the air was very cold. Having no books, no society, and no occupation except talking with Paul and my boatmen, and the stragglers on shore, I became dispirited, and sat, hour after hour, wrapped in my greatcoat, deliberating whether I should not turn back. One of the most vexatious things was the satisfaction apparently enjoyed by all around me. If we hauled up alongside another boat, we were sure to find the crew sprawling about in a most perfect state of contentment, and seemingly grateful to the adverse wind that prevented their moving. My own men were very obedient, but they could not control the wind. I had a written contract with my rais, drawn up by a Copt in Cairo, in pretty Arabic characters, and signed by both of us, although neither knew a word of its contents. The captain's manner of signing, I remember, was very primitive; he dipped the end of his finger in the ink, and pressed it on the paper, and in so doing seemed to consider that he had sold himself to me almost body and soul. "I know I am obliged to go if Howega says so," was his invariable answer; but, though perfectly ready to go whenever there was a chance, it was easy enough to see that they were all quite as contented when there was none. Several times I was on the point of turning back, the wind drew down the river so invitingly; but, if I returned, it was too early to go into Syria, and Thebes, "Thebes with her hundred gates," beckoned me on.

On the eighth I had not made much more than fifty miles, and the wind was still ahead, and blowing stronger than ever; indeed, it seemed as if this morning, for the first time, it had really commenced in earnest. I became desperate and went ashore, resolved to wear it out. We were lying along the bank, on the Libyan side, in company with fifteen or twenty boats wind-bound like ourselves. It was near a little mud village, of which I forget the name, and several Bedouin tents were on the bank, in one of which I was sitting smoking a pipe. The wind was blowing down with a fury I have never seen surpassed in a gale at sea, bringing with it the light sands of the desert, and at times covering the river with a thick cloud which prevented my seeing across it. A clearing up for a moment showed a boat of the largest class, heavily laden, and coming down with astonishing velocity; it was like the flight of an enormous bird. She was under bare poles, but small portions of the sail had got loose, and the Arabs were out on the very ends of the long spars getting them in. One of the boatmen, with a rope under his arm, had plunged into the river, and with strong swimming reached the bank, where a hundred men ran to his assistance. Their united strength turned her bows around, up stream, but nothing could stop her; stern foremost, she dragged the whole posse of Arabs to the bank, and broke away from them perfectly ungovernable; whirling around, her bows pitched into our fleet with a loud crash, tore away several of the boats, and carrying one off, fast locked as in a death-grasp, she resumed her headlong course down the river. They had gone but a few rods, when the stranger pitched her bows under and went down in a moment, bearing her helpless companion also to the bottom. It was the most exciting incident I had seen upon the river. The violence of the wind, the swift movement of the boat, the crash, the wild figures of the Arabs on shore and on board, one in a red dress almost on the top of the long spar, his turban loose and streaming in the wind, all formed a strange and most animating scene. I need scarcely say that no lives were lost, for an Arab on the bosom of his beloved river is as safe as in his mud cabin.

On the ninth the wind was as contrary as ever; but between rowing and towing we had managed to crawl up as far as Minyeh. It was the season of the Ramadan, when for thirty days, from the rising to the setting of the sun, the followers of the Prophet are forbidden to eat, drink, or even smoke, or take the bath. My first inquiry was for a bath. It would not be heated or lighted up till eight o'clock; at eight o'clock I went, and was surprised to find it so large and comfortable. I was not long surprised, however, for I found that no sooner was the sacred prohibition removed, than the Turks and Arabs began to pour in in throngs; they came without any respect of persons, the haughty Turk with his pipe-bearing slave and the poor Arab boatman; in short, every one who could raise a few paras.

It was certainly not a very select company, nor over clean, and probably very few Europeans would have stood the thing as I did. My boatmen were all there. They were my servants, said the rais, and were bound to follow me everywhere. As I was a Frank, and, as such, expected to pay ten times as much as any one else, I had the best place in the bath, at the head of the great reservoir of hot water. My white skin made me a marked object among the swarthy figures lying around me; and half a dozen of the operatives, lank, bony fellows, and perfectly naked, came up and claimed me. They settled it among themselves, however, and gave the preference to a dried-up old man, more than sixty, a perfect living skeleton, who had been more than forty years a scrubber in the bath. He took me through the first process of rubbing with the glove and brush; and having thrown over me a copious ablution of warm water, left me to recover at leisure. I lay on the marble that formed the border of the reservoir, only two or three inches above the surface of the water, into which I put my hand and found it excessively hot; but the old man, satisfied with his exertion in rubbing me, sat on the edge of the reservoir, with his feet and legs hanging in the water, with every appearance of satisfaction. Presently he slid off into the water, and, sinking up to his chin, remained so a moment, drew a long breath, and seemed to look around him with a feeling of comfort. I had hardly raised myself on my elbow to look at this phenomenon, before a fine brawny fellow, who had been lying for some time torpid by my side, rose slowly, slid off like a turtle, and continued sinking until he too had immersed himself up to his chin. I expressed to him my astonishment at his ability to endure such heat; but he told me that he was a boatman, had been ten days coming up from Cairo, and was almost frozen, and his only regret was that the water was not much hotter. He had hardly answered me before another and another followed, till all the dark naked figures around me had vanished. By the fitful glimmering of the little lamps, all that I could see was a parcel Of shaved heads on the surface of the water, at rest, or turning slowly and quietly as on pivots. Most of them seemed to be enjoying it with an air of quiet, dreamy satisfaction; but the man with whom I had spoken first seemed to be carried beyond the bounds of Mussulman gravity. It operated upon him like a good dinner; it made him loquacious, and be urged me to come in, nay, he even became frolicsome; and, making a heavy surge, threw a large body of the water over tile marble on which I was lying. I almost screamed, and started up as if melted lead had been poured upon me even while standing up it seemed to blister the soles of my feet, and I was obliged to keep up a dancing movement, changing as fast as I could, to the astonishment of the dozing bathers, and the utter consternation of my would-be friend. Roused too much to relapse into the quiet luxury of perspiration, I went into another apartment, of a cooler temperature, where, after remaining in a bath of moderately warm water, I was wrapped up in hot cloths and towels, and conducted into the great chamber. Here I selected a couch, and, throwing myself upon it, gave myself to the operators, who now took charge of me, and well did they sustain the high reputation of a Turkish bath: my arms were gently laid upon my breast, where the knee of a powerful man pressed upon them; my joints were cracked and pulled; back, arms, the palms of the hands, the soles of the feet, all visited in succession. I had been shampooed at Smyrna, Constantinople, and Cairo; but who would have thought of being carried to the seventh heaven at the little town of Minyeh? The men who had me in hand were perfect amateurs, enthusiasts, worthy of rubbing the hide of the sultan himself; and the pipe and coffee that followed were worthy too of that same mighty seigneur. The large room was dimly lighted, and, turn which way I would, there was a naked body, apparently without a soul, lying torpid, and tumbled at will by a couple of workmen. I had had some fears of the plague; and Paul, though he felt his fears gradually dispelled by the soothing process which he underwent also, to the last continued to keep particularly clear of touching any of them; but I left the bath a different man; all my moral as well as physical strength was roused;

I no longer drooped or looked back; and, though the wind was still blowing a hurricane in my teeth, I was bent upon Thebes and the Cataracts.

CHAPTER V.

Sporting on the -Nile.-A Recluse.-A. Egyptian Hebe--Siout.-A wolf-race among the Tombs.-Adventure with a Governor.

January 13. In the morning, the first thing I did was to shoot at a flock of ducks, the next to shoot at a crocodile. He was the first I had seen, and was lying on a sandbank on an island in the middle of the river. I might as well have thrown a stone at him, for he was out of range twice over, and his hard skin would have laughed at my bird-shot, even if I had bit him; but I did what every traveller on the Nile must do, I shot at a crocodile. I met several travellers, all abundantly provided with materials, and believe we were about equally successful. I never killed any, nor did they. During the day the wind abated considerably, and towards evening it was almost calm. My boat rowed as easily as a barge, and we were approaching Manfaloot. For some time before reaching it there is a change in the appearance of the river.

The general character of the scenery of the Nile is that of a rich valley, from six to eight or ten miles wide, divided by the river, and protected on either side from the Libyan and Arabian Deserts by two continuous and parallel ranges of mountains. These are the strongly-marked and distinguishing features; and from Cairo to the Cataracts, almost the only variety is that occasioned by the greater or less distance of these two ranges. Before approaching Manfaloot they changed their direction, and on the Arabian side the dark mountains of Mokattam advanced to the very border of the river.

Here we began to approach the eternal monuments of Egyptian industry. For a long distance the high range of rocky mountain was lined with tombs, their open doors inviting us to stop and examine therein ; but, most provokingly, now, for the first time since the day we started, the wind was fair. It had been my peculiar bad luck to have a continuance of headwinds on a part of the river where there was nothing to see; and almost the very moment I came to an object of interest, the wind became favourable, and was sweeping us along, beautifu11y. One of the few pieces of advice given me at Cairo, of which my own observation taught me the wisdom, was, with a fair wind never to stop going up; and though every tomb seemed to reproach me for my neglect, we went resolutely on.

In one of the tombs lives an old man, who has been there more than fifty years, and an old wife, his companion for more than half a century, is there with him. His children live in Upper Egypt, and once a year they come to visit their parents. The old man is still hale and strong, at night a light is always burning in his tomb, a basket is constantly let down to receive the offerings of the charitable, and few travellers, even among the poor Arabs, ever pass without leaving their mites for the recluse of the sepulchres.

It was dark when we arrived at Manfaloot, but, being the season of the Ramadan, the Mussulman day had just begun; the bazars were open, and the cook and coffee shops thronged with Turks and Arabs, indemnifying themselves for their long abstinence. My boatmen wanted to stop for the night; but as I would not stop for my own pleasure at the tombs below, I of course would not stop here for theirs and after an hour or two spent in lounging through the bazars and making a few necessary purchases, we were again under way.

At about eight o'clock, with a beautiful wind, I sailed into the harbour of Siout. This is the largest town on the Nile, and the capital of Upper Egypt. Brighter prospects now opened upon me. The wind that had brought us into Siout, and was ready to carry us on farther, was not the cold and cheerless one that for more than two weeks had blown in my teeth, but mild, balmy, and refreshing, raising the drooping head of the invalid, and making the man in health feel like walking, running, climbing, or clearing fences on horseback. Among the bourriquieres who surrounded me the moment I jumped on the bank, was a beautiful bright-eyed little Arab girl, about eight years old, leading a donkey, and flourishing a long stick with a grace that would have shamed the best pupil of a fashionable dancing-master. By some accident, moreover, her face and hands were clean, and she seemed to be a general favourite among her ragged companions, who fell back with a gallantry and politeness that would have done honour to the ballroom of the dancing-master aforesaid. Leaving her without a competitor, they deprived me of the pleasure of showing my preference; and, putting myself under her guidance, I followed her nimble little feet on the road to Siout. I make special mention of this little girl, because it is a rare thing to see an Egyptian child in whom one can take any interest. It was the only time such a thing ever occurred to me; and really she exhibited so much beauty and grace, such a mild, open, and, engaging expression, and such propriety of behaviour as she walked by my side, urging on the donkey, and looking up in my face when I asked her a question, that I felt ashamed of myself for riding while she walked. But, tender and delicate as she looked, she would have walked by the side of her donkey, and tired down the strongest man. She was, of course, the child of poor parents, of whom the donkey was the chief support. The father had been in the habit of going out with it himself, and frequently taking the little girl with him as a companion. As she grew up, she went out occasionally alone and even among the Turks her interesting little figure made her a favourite and when all the other donkeys were idle, hers was sure to be engaged. This and many other things I learned from her own pretty little lips on my way to Siout.

Siout stands about a mile and a half from the river, in one of the richest valleys of the Nile. At the season of inundation, when the river rolls down in all its majesty, the whole intermediate country is overflowed; and boats of the largest size, steering their course over the waste of waters by the projecting tops of the palm-trees, come to anchor under the walls of the city. A high causeway from the river to the city crosses the plain, a comparatively unknown and unnoticed, but stupendous work, which for more than three thousand years has resisted the headlong current of the Nile at its highest, and now stands, like the pyramids, not so striking, but an equally enduring, and perhaps more really wonderful monument of Egyptian labour. A short distance before reaching the city, on the right, are the handsome palace and garden of Ibrahim Pacha. A stream winds through the valley, crossed by a stone bridge, and over this is the entrance-gate of the city. The governor's palace, the most imposing and best structure I had seen since the citadel at Cairo, standing first within the walls, seemed like a warder at the door.

The large courtyard before the door of the palace contained a group of idlers, mostly officers of the household, all well armed, and carrying themselves with the usual air of Turkish conceit and insolence. Sitting on one side, with large turbans and long robes, unarmed, and with the large brass inkhorn by their sides, the badge of their peaceful and inferior, if not degrading profession, was a row of Copts, calling themselves, and believed to be, the descendants of the ancient Egyptians, having, as they say, preserved their blood intact during all the changes of their country. Boasting the blood of the ancient Egyptians, with the ruins of the mighty temples in which they worshiped, and the mighty tombs in which they were buried, staring them in the face, they were sitting on the bare earth at the door of a petty delegate of a foreign master, a race of degraded beggars, lifeless and soulless, content to receive, as a grace from the hands of a tyrant, the wretched privilege of living as slaves in the land where their fathers reigned as masters.

I do not believe that the contents of all the bazars in Siout, one of the largest towns in Egypt, were worth as much as the stock of an ordinary dealer in dry pods in Broadway. But these are not the things for which the traveller stops at Siout. On the lofty mountains overlooking this richest valley of the Nile, and protecting it from the Libyan Desert, is a long range of tombs, the burial-place of the ancient Egyptians; and looking for a moment at the little Mohammedan burying-ground, the traveller turns with wonder from the little city he has left, and asks, Where is the great city which had its graves in the sides of yonder mountains? Where are the people who despised the earth as a burial place, and made for themselves tombs in the eternal granite?

The mountain is about as far from the city as the river, and the approach to it is by another strong causeway over the same beautiful plain. Leaving our donkeys at its foot, and following the nimble footsteps of my little Arab girl, we climbed by a steep ascent to the first range of tombs. They were the first I had seen, and are but little visited by travellers; and though I afterward saw all that were in Egypt, I still consider these well worth a visit. Of the first we entered, the entrance-chamber was perhaps forty feet square, and adjoining it on the same range were five or six others, of which the entrance-chambers had about the same dimensions. The ceilings were covered with paintings, finished with exquisite taste and delicacy, and in some places fresh as if just executed and on the walls were hieroglyphics enough to fill volumes. Behind the principal chamber were five or six others nearly as large, with smaller ones on each side, and running back perhaps a hundred and fifty feet. The back chambers were so dark, and their atmosphere was so unwholesome, that it was unpleasant, and perhaps unsafe, to explore them; if we went in far, there was always a loud rushing noise, and, as Paul suggested, their innermost recesses might now be the abode of wild beasts. Wishing to see what caused the noise, and at the same time to keep out of harm's way, we stationed ourselves near the back door of the entrance-chamber, and I fired my gun within a stream of fire lighted up the darkness of the sepulchral chamber, and the report went grumbling and roaring into the innermost recesses, rousing their occupants to phrensy. There was a noise like the rushing of a strong wind; the light was dashed from Paul's hand; a soft skinny substance struck against my face; and thousands of bats, wild with fright, came whizzing forth from every part of the tomb to the only avenue of escape. We threw ourselves down and allowed the ugly frightened birds to pass over us, and then hurried out ourselves. For a moment I felt guilty; the beastly birds, driven to the light of day, were dazzled by the glorious sun, and, flying and whirling blindly about, were dashing themselves against the rocky side of the mountain and falling dead at its base. Cured of all wish to explore very deeply, but at the same time relieved from all fears, we continued going from tomb to tomb, looking at the pictures on the walls, endeavouring to make out the details, admiring the beauty and freshness of the colours, and speculating upon the mysterious hieroglyphics which mocked our feeble knowledge. We were in one of the last when we were startled by a noise different from any we had yet heard, and from the door leading to the dark recesses within, foaming, roaring, and gnashing his teeth, out ran an enormous wolf: close upon his heels, in hot pursuit, came another, and almost at the door of the tomb they grappled, fought, growled fearfully, rolled over, and again the first broke loose and fled; another chase along the side of the mountain, another grapple, a fierce and desperate struggle, and they rolled over the side, and we lost sight of them. The whole affair had been so sudden, the scene so stirring, and the interest so keen, that Paul and I had stood like statues, our whole souls thrown into our eyes, and following the movements of the furious beasts. Paul was the first to recover himself; and, as soon as the wolves were fairly out of sight, with a characteristic movement, suddenly took the gun out of my hand, and started in pursuit. It is needless to say that he did not go far.

But the interest of the day was not yet over. While walking along the edge of the mountain, in spite of bats and beasts, still taking another and another look, my ears were suddenly struck with a loud voice of lamentation coming up from the valley below; and, looking in the direction of the city, I saw approaching over the elevated causeway a long funeral procession, and the voice came from the mourners following the corpse. They were evidently coming to the Mohammedan burying-around at the foot of the mountain, and I immediately left the tombs of the ancient Egyptians to see the burial of one who but yesterday was a dweller in the land.

Being far beyond the regular path for descending, and wishing to intercept the procession before its arrival at the burying-ground, I had something like the wolf-race I had just beheld to get down in time; unluckily, I had sent Paul back to the place where we had left our cloaks, and donkeys and the little girl, with directions to ride round the foot of the hill and meet me at the burying-ground. How I got down I do not know; but I was quietly sitting under a large palm-tree near the cemetery when the procession came up. It approached with funeral banners and devices which I could not make out, but probably containing some precept of the Koran, having reference to death, and the grave, and a paradise of houries; and the loud wailing which had reached me on the top of the mountain, here was almost deafening. First in the strange procession came the beggars, or santons, men who are supposed to lead peculiarly pure and holy lives, denying themselves all luxuries and pleasures, labouring not, and taking no heed for themselves what they shall eat or what they shall drink, and living upon the willing though necessarily stinted charity of their miserable countrymen. I could read all this at the first glance; I could see that poverty had been their portion through life; that they had drunk the bitter cup to its very dregs. Their beards were long, white, and grizzled; over their shoulders and breasts they wore a scanty covering of rags, fastened together with strings, and all with some regard to propriety. This ragged patchwork covered their breasts and shoulders only, the rest of their bodies being entirely naked, and they led the funeral procession among a throng of spectators, with beads erect and proud step, under what, anywhere else, would be called an indecent and shameless exposure of person, unbecoming their character as saints or holy beggars. Over their shoulders were slung by ropes large jars of water, which, for charity's sweet sake, and for the love of the soul of the deceased, they carried to distribute gratis at his grave. After them came a parcel of boys, then the sheiks and two officers of the town, then the corpse, tightly wrapped from head to foot in a red sash, on a bier carried by four men; then a procession of men, and more than a hundred women in long cotton dresses, covering their heads and drawn over their faces, so as to hide all except their eyes.

These were the last, but by no means the least important part of the procession, as, by general consent, the whole business of mourning devolved upon them; and the poor Arab who was then being trundled to his grave had no reason to complain of their neglect. Smiles and tears are a woman's weapons; and she is the most to be admired, and has profited most by the advantage of education, who knows how to make the best use of them. Education and refinement can no doubt do wonders; but the most skilful lady in civilized life might have taken lessons from these untutored Egyptians. A group of them were standing near me, chattering and laughing until the procession came up, when all at once big tears started from their eyes, and their cries and lamentations rent the air as if their hearts were breaking. I was curious to see the form of a modern burial in Egypt, but I hesitated in following. Some of the Arabs had looked rudely at me in passing, and I did not know whether the bigoted Mussulmans would tolerate the intrusion of a stranger and a Christian. I followed on, however, looking out for Paul, and fortunately met him at the, gate of the burying-ground. The sheik was standing outside, ordering and arranging; and I went up to him with Paul, and asked if there was any objection to my entering; he not only permitted it, but, telling me to follow him, with a good deal of noise and an unceremonious use of the scabbard of his sword, he cleared a way through the crowd, and even roughly breaking through the ranks of the women, so as materially to disturb their business of mourning, and putting back friends and relations, gave me a place at the head of the tomb. It was square, with a round top, built of Nile mud, and whitewashed; two men were engaged in opening it, which was done simply by pulling away a few stones and scooping out the sand with their hands. In front, but a few feet from the door, sat the old mother, so old as to be hardly conscious of what was passing around her, and probably long before this buried in the same grave; near her was the widow of the deceased, dressed in silk, and sitting on the bare earth with an air of total abandonment; her hands, her breast, the top of her head and her face, plastered with thick coats of mud, and her eyes fixed upon the door of the tomb. A few stones remained to be rolled away, and the door, or rather the hole, was opened; the two men crawled in, remained a minute or two, came out, and went for the corpse. The poor widow followed them with her eyes, and when they returned with the body, carefully and slowly dragging it within the tomb, and the feet and the body had disappeared, and the beloved head was about to be shut for ever from her eyes, she sprang up, and passionately throwing her arms towards the tomb, broke forth in a perfect phrensy of grief. "Twenty years we have lived together; we have always lived happily; you loved me, you were kind to me, you gave me bread; what Shall I do now? I will never marry again. Every day. I will come and weep at your tomb, my love, my life, my soul, my heart, my eyes. Remember me to my father, remember me to my brother," &c., &c. I do not remember half she said; but, as Paul translated it to me, it seemed the very soul of pathos; and all this time she was walking distractedly before the door of the tomb, wringing her hands, and again and again plastering her face and breast with mud. The mourning women occasionally joined in chorus, the santons ostentatiously crying out, "Water, for the love of God and the Prophet, and the soul of the deceased;" and a little girl about seven or eight years old was standing on the top of the tomb, naked as she was born, eating a piece of sugar-cane. Paul looked rather suspiciously upon the whole affair, particularly upon that part where she avowed her determination never to marry again. "The old Beelzebub," said he; "she will marry to-morrow if any one asks her."

Leaving the burying-ground, we returned to Siout. On my way I made acquaintance with the governor, not only of that place, but also of all Upper Egypt, a pacha with two or three tails; a great man by virtue of his office, and much greater in his own conceit. I saw coming towards me a large, fine-looking man, splendidly dressed, mounted on a fine horse, with two runners before him, and several officers and slaves at his side. I was rather struck with his appearance, and looked at him attentively as I passed, without, however, saluting him, which I would have done had I known his rank. I thought he returned my gaze with interest; and, in passing, each continued to keep his eyes fixed upon the other to such a degree that we must either have twisted our necks off or turned our bodies. The latter was easier for both; and we kept turning, he on horseback and I on foot, until we found ourselves directly facing each other, and then both stopped. His guards and attendants turned with him, and silent as statues, stood looking at me. I had nothing to say, and so I stood and said nothing. His mightiness opened his lips, and his myrmidons, with their hands on their sword-hilts, looked as if they expected an order to deal with me for my unparalleled assurance. His mightiness spoke, and I have no doubt but the Turks around him thought it was with the plus ultra of dignity, and wondered that such words had not confounded me. But it was not very easy to confound me with words I could not understand, although I could perceive that there was nothing very gracious in is manner. Paul answered, and, after the governor had tuned his back, told me that his first address was, "Do I owe you anything? Which he followed up by slapping his horse on the neck, and saying, in the same tone, "Is this your horse?" Paul says that he answered in a tone of equal dignity, "A cat may look at a King;" though, from his pale cheeks and quivering lips, I am inclined to doubt whether he gave so doughty a reply.

I was exceedingly amused at the particulars of the interview, and immediately resolved to cultivate the acquaintance. During the long days and nights of my voyage up the Nile, in poring over my books and maps, I had frequently found my attention fixed upon the great Oasis in the Libyan Desert. A caravan-road runs through it from Asyut, and I resolved, since I had had the pleasure of on interview with his excellency, to learn from him the particulars of time, danger, &c. I therefore hurried down to the boat for my firman, and strong in this as if I had the pacha at my right hand, I proceeded forthwith to the palace; but my friend observed as much state in giving audience as the pacha himself. Being the season of the Ramadan, he received nobody on business until after the evening meal, and so my purpose was defeated. Several were already assembled at the gate, waiting the appointed hour; but it did not suit my humor to sit down with them and exercise my patience, and perhaps feel the littleness of Turkish tyranny in being kept to the last, so I marched back to my boat

It was still an hour before sunset; my men had laid in their stock of bread, the wind was fair, a boat of the largest size, belonging to a Turkish officer, with a long red satin flag, was just opening her large sails to go up the river, and bidding good-by to my little Arab girl, we cast off our fastening to the bank at Asyut. It was the first day I had spent on shore in the legitimate business of a tourist, and by far the most pleasant since I left Cairo.

Chapter VI

Small Favours Thankfully Received.-Slavery in Egypt.-How to Catch a Crocodile.-An Elaborate Joke.-Imaginary Perils.-Arabs not so Bad as They Might Be

The next day, at about four o'clock, we arrived at Jidda, formerly the capital of Upper Egypt, and the largest town on the Nile. My humour for going to the Oasis had been growing upon me, and finding that there was a track from this place also, I landed, and working my way though the streets and bazars, went to the governor's palace. As I before remarked, the palace where the governor lives is always, by extraordinary courtesy, called a palace.

The governor was not at home; he had gone to Asyut, on a visit to my handsome friend the governor there, but he had left his deputy, who gave us such an account of the journey and its perils as almost put an end to it forever, at least so far as Paul was concerned. He said that the road was dangerous, and could not be travelled except under the protection of a caravan or guard of soldiers; that the Arabs amoung mountains were a fierce and desperate people, and would certainly cut the throats of any unprotected travellers. He added, however, that a caravan was about forming, which would probably be ready in four or five days, and that, perhaps, before that time the governor would return and give me a guard of soldiers. It did not suit my views to wait the uncertain movements of a caravan, nor did it suit my pocket to incur the expense of a guard. So, thanking the gentleman for his civility (he had given us pipes and coffee, as usual), I bad him good-bye, and started for my boat; but I had not gone far before I found him trotting at my heels. In the palace he had sat with his legs crossed, with as much dignity as the governor himself could have displayed; but, as soon as he slid down from the divan, he seemed to have left dignity for his betters, and pounced upon Paul for "bucksheesh." I gave him five piasters (about equal to a quarter of a dollar), for which the deputy of the Governor of Djiddeh, formerly the capital of Upper Egypt, laid his hand upon his heart and invoked upon my head the blessing of Allah and the Prophet.

At Djiddeh, for the first time, I saw carried on one of the great branches of trade on the Nile, a trade which once stained the annals of our own country, and the fatal effects of which we still continue to experience. There were two large boat-loads-perhaps five or six hundred slaves-collected at Dongola and Sennaar, probably bought from their agents for a shawl, a string of beads, or some trifling article of necessity. Born under the burning sun of the tropics, several of them had died of cold even before reaching the latitude of Lower Egypt; many were sick, and others dying. They were arranged on board the boats and on the banks in separate groups, according to their state of health. Among them was every variety of face and complexion, and it was at once startling and painful to note the gradations of man descending to the brute. I could almost see the very line of separation. Though made in God's image, there seemed no ray of the divinity within them. They did not move upon all-fours, it is true, but they sat, as I had seen them in the slave-market at Cairo, perfectly naked, with their long arms wound round their legs, and their chins resting upon their knees, precisely as we see monkeys, baboons, and apes; and as, while looking at these miserable caricatures of our race, I have sometimes been almost electrified by a transient gleam of resemblance to humanity, so here I was struck with the closeness of man's approach to the inferior grade of animal existence. Nor was there much difference between the sick and well; the sick were

more pitiable, for they seemed doomed to die, and death to anything that lives is terrible; but the strong and lusty, men and women, were bathing in the river; and when they came out they smeared themselves with oil, and laid their shining bodies in the sun, and slept like brutes. To such as these, slavery to the Turk is not a bitter draught - philanthropists may refine and speculate, and liberals declaim, but what is liberty to men dying for bread, and what hardship is there in being separated from the parents who have sold them. or doomed to labour where that labour is light compared with what they must endure at home

In the East slavery exists now precisely as it did in the days of the patriarchs. The slave is received into the family of a Turk in a relation more confidential and respectable than that of an ordinary domestic; and, when liberated, which very often happens, stands upon the same footing with a free man. The curse does not rest upon him for ever; he may sit at the same board, dip his hand in the same dish, and, if there are no other impediments, may marry his master's daughter.

In the evening we left Djiddeh, and about ten o'clock hauled up to the bank, and rested quietly till morning. Next day the wind was fair, but light, and I passed it on shore with my gun. This same gun, by-the-way, proved a better companion to me on my journey than I had expected. There were always plenty of pigeons; indeed, advancing in Upper Egypt, one of the most striking features in the villages on the Nile is the number of pigeon-cots, built of mud in the form of a sugar-loaf, and whitewashed. They are much more lofty than any of the houses, and their winged tenants constitute a great portion of the wealth of the villagers. It is not, however, allowable to shoot at these, the laws regulating the right of property in animals ferae naturae being as well established on the banks of the Nile as at Westminster Hall; but there are hundreds of pigeons in the neighbourhood of every village which no one claims. In some places, too, there is fine sport in hunting hares; and, if a man can bring himself to it, he may hunt the gazelle, and almost the whole line of the river, at least above Siout, abounds with ducks and geese. These, however, are very wild, and, moreover, very tough; and, except for the sport, are not worth shooting. No keeping and no cooking could make them tender, and good masticators were thrown away upon them.

But the standing shots on the Nile are crocodiles and pelicans. The former still abound, as in the days when the Egyptian worshiped them; and as you see one basking in the sun, on some little bank of sand, even in the act of firing at him, you cannot help going back to the time when the passing Egyptian would have bowed to him as to a god; and you may imagine the descendant of the ancient river-god, as he feels a ball rattling against his scaly side, invoking the shades of his departed worshippers, telling his little ones of the glory of his ancestors, and cursing the march of improvement, which has degraded him from the deity of a mighty people into a target for strolling tourists. I always liked to see a crocodile upon the Nile, and always took a shot at him, for the sake of the associations. In one place I counted in sight at one time twenty-one, a degree of fruitfulness in the river probably equal to that of the time when each of them would have been deemed worthy of a temple while, living, and embalment and a mighty tomb when dead.

While walking by the river-side I met an Arab with a gun in his hand, who pointed to the dozing crocodiles on a bank before us. and, marking out a space on the ground, turned to the village a little back, and made me understand that he had a large crocodile there. As I was some distance in advance of my boat, I accompanied him, and found one fourteen feet long, stuffed with straw, and hanging under a palm-tree. He had been killed two days before, after a desperate resistance, having been disabled with bullets and pierced with spears in a dozen places. I looked at him with interest and compassion, reflecting on the difference between his treatment and that experienced by his ancestors, but nevertheless opened a negotiation for a purchase; and though our languages were as far apart as our countries, bargain sharpens the intellect to such a degree that the Arab and I soon came to an understanding, and I bought him as he hung, for forty piasters and a charge of gunpowder. I had conceived a joke for my own amusement. A friend had requested me to buy for him some mosaics, cameos, &c., in Italy, which circumstances had prevented me from doing, and I had written to him, regretting my inability, and telling him that I was going to Egypt, and would send him a mummy or a pyramid; and when I saw the scaly monster hanging by the tail, with his large jaws

distended by a stick, it struck me that he would make a still better substitute for cameos and mosaics, and that I

would box him up, and, without any advice, send him to my friend.

The reader may judge how desperately I was pushed for amusement, when I tell him that I chuckled greatly over this happy conceit; and having sent my Nubian to hail the boat as she was coming by, I followed with my little memorial. The whole village turned out to escort us, more than a hundred Arabs, men, women, and children, and we dragged him down with a pomp and circumstance worthy

of his better days. Paul looked a little astonished when he saw me with a rope over my shoulder, leading the van of this ragged escort, and rather turned up his nose when I told him my joke. I had great difficulty in getting my prize on board, and, when I got him there, he deranged everything else; but the first day I was so tickled that I could have thrown all my other cargo overboard rather than him. The second day the joke was not so good, and the third I grew tired of it, and tumbled my crocodile into the river. I followed him with my eye as his body floated down the stream; it was moonlight, and the creaking of the water-wheel on the banks sounded like the moaning spirit of an ancient Egyptian, indignant at the murder and profanation of his god. It was, perhaps, hardly worth while to mention this little circumstance, but it amused me for a day or two, brought me into mental contact with my friends at home, and gave me the credit of having myself shot a crocodile, any one of which was worth all the trouble it cost me. If the reader will excuse a bad pun, in consideration of its being my first and last, it was not a dry joke; for in , in getting the crocodile on board, I tumbled over, and, very unintentionally on ny part, had a January bath in the Nile.

During nearly the whole of that day I was walking on the bank of the river; there was more tillable land than usual on the Arabian side, and I continually saw the Arabs, naked or with a wreath of grass around their loins, drawing water to irrigate the ground, in a basket fastened to a pole, like one of our oldfashioned well-poles.

On the seventeenth, we approached Dendera. I usually dined at one o'clock, because it was then too hot to go on shore, and also, to tell the truth, because it served to break the very long and tedious day. I was now about four hours from Dendera by land, of which two and a half were desert, the Libyan sands here coming down to the river. It was a fine afternoon, there was no wind, and I hoped, by walking, to have a view of the great temple before night. It was warm enough then; but as it regularly became very cold towards evening, I told my Nubian to follow me with my cloak. To my surprise he objected. It was the first time he had done so! He was always glad to go ashore with me, as indeed were they all, and it was considered that I was showing partiality in always selecting him. I asked one of the others, and found that he, and, in fact, all of them, made objections, on the ground that it was a dangerous road.

This is one of the things that vex a traveller in Egypt, and in the East generally. He will often find the road which he wishes to travel a dangerous one, and, though no misadventure may have happened on it for years, he will find it impossible to get his Arabs to accompany him. My rais took the matter in hand, began kicking them ashore, and swore they should all go. This I would not allow. I knew that the whole course of the Nile was safe as the streets of London; that no accident had happened to a traveller since the pacha had been on the throne; and that women and children might travel with perfect safety from Alexandria to the Cataracts; and, vexed with their idle fears, after whipping Paul over their shoulders, who I saw was quite as much infected as any of them, I went ashore alone. Paul seemed quietly making up his mind for some desperate movement; without a word, he was arranging the things about the boat, shutting up the doors of the cabin, buttoning his coat, and with my cloak under his arm and a sword in his hand, he jumped ashore and followed me. He had not gone far, however, before his courage began to fail. The Arabs, whom we found at their daily labour drawing water, seemed particularly black, naked, and hairy. They gave dubious and suspicious answers, and when we came to the edge of the desert he began to grumble outright; he did not want to be shot down like a dog; if we were, strong enough to make a stout resistance it would be another thing, &c., &c. In truth, the scene before us was dreary enough, the desert commencing on the very margin of the river, and running back to the eternal sands of Africa. Paul's courage seemed to be going with the green soil we were leaving behind us; and as we advanced where the grass seemed struggling to resist the encroachments of the desert, he was on the point of yielding to the terror of his own imagination, until I suggested to him that we could see before is the whole extent of desert we were to cross; that there was not a shrub or bush to interrupt the view, and not a living thing moving that could do us harm. He then began to revive; it was not for himself, but for me he feared. We walked on for about an hour, when, feeling that it was safe to trust me alone, and being tired, he sat down on the bank, and I proceeded. Fear is infectious. In about half an hour more I met three men, who had to me a peculiarly cut-throat appearance; they spoke, but I, of course, could not understand them. At length, finding night approaching, I turned back to meet the boat, and saw that the three Arabs had turned too, and were again advancing to meet me, which I thought a very suspicious movement. Paul's ridiculous fears had completely infected me, and I would have dodged them if I could; but there was no bush to hide behind. I almost blushed at myself for thinking of dodging three Arabs, when I had a double-barrelled gun in my hand and a pair of pistols in my sash; but I must say I was not at all sorry, before I met them again, to hear Paul shouting to me, and a moment after to see my boat coming up under full sail.

One who has never met an Arab in the desert can have no conception of his terrible appearance. The worst pictures of the Italian bandits or Greek mountain robbers I ever saw are tame in comparison. I have seen the celebrated Gasperini, who ten years ago kept in terror the whole country between Rome and Naples, and who was so strong as to negotiate and make a treaty with the pope. I saw him surrounded by nearly twenty of his comrades and when he told me he could not remember how many murders he had committed, he looked civil and harmless compared with a Bedouin of the desert. The swarthy complexion of the latter, his long beard, his piercing coal-black eyes, half-naked figure, an enormous sword slung over his back, and a rusty matchlock in his hand, make the best figure for a painter I ever saw; but, happily, he is not so bad as he looks to be.