like clumps of enormous thimbles; and now and then we saw several small processions of men going along the banks on donkeys, horses, and camels; and here and there was a solitary palm: but, with the exception of these, the scenery still maintained its Essex-marsh character.

The Arabs continued very silent. One of them was the cook to the party, and he was never away from the fireplace, boiling up lentils with coarse bread. This was their only food, and they drank the Nile water. I found to-day that the meat we had brought from Alexandria was touched by the heat; so I gave it to the crew, who soon disposed of it. They threw lumps of it on the live embers, and so broiled it.

The mosquitoes had gone, but the flies were almost as bad. They took possession of the cabin, and would not be driven away, worrying me almost into a fever. At last I cut out one of the paper net "fly-catchers," and hung it from the roof. As night came, they all settled on it; and then I gently moved it away, and sent it floating down the Nile, with its freight of intruders. This was all the excitement of the day; but at night there was a terrible skirmish amongst the rats, who, attracted by the fowls, appeared to be boarding the boat on all quarters.

Thursday, 11th. The morning broke with a dead calm. Now and then the wind came in little puffs, and then died away again. The monotony of the voyage was broken by a fight between Giovanni and one of the Arabs, or, rather, my servant had it all on his own side. The man objected to get into the water to tow, upon which the dragoman gave him a good thrashing with a rope, and then he got overboard and worked away well.

About noon the wind came, and all the afternoon we amused ourselves with shooting hawks and ibises, of which there were great numbers. I also shot a sicsac, one of the birds reported to get into the crocodile's mouth and pick its teeth

of parasitical water-animals. It had sharp points on the top of its wings, which the Arabs said were to keep the crocodile from closing its jaws. When the birds fell, the Arabs dashed overboard just like spaniels, and brought them back in their mouths.

Whatever we

It was curious to see how they watched us. were about eating, washing, or reading—they never took

Their actions

their eyes from us, but followed every movement. were singularly like those of a monkey: they picked up small things, and examined them carefully, usually trying them first with a bite; and an old envelope I had thrown on one side was a matter of great scrutiny: they could not make it out at all; but after passing it round, and apparently offering many opinions on it, they put it carefully by under a board. Giovanni told me they were all thieves, but stole singularly minute things -odd bits of string, useless lucifers, knobs of sealing-wax, and such-like rubbish. At night a good rattling breeze came on; and whilst we were surging through the water, I amused them with some commonplace conjuring tricks, from which time I was regarded as a great magician.

We anchored alongside a village at night, and I got rid of the flies as before. About one o'clock I was lying awake, and, hearing a throbbing noise up the river, I looked out and saw a light advancing. It came on, and in a few minutes I found it was the Overland mail steamer, homeward bound. This little incident was very impressive. The boat came near enough for me to shout out "Good night!" which was returned by one or two persons on deck, surprised, I have no doubt, at the familiar salutation from a moored kandjia. I watched this out of sight; and then, after a look at my crew, who had completely wrapped themselves up in canvass until they looked like mere bundles, and were lying about the deck in the bright moonlight, I turned in to sleep.

M

Friday, 12th. The people in the village commenced making such an unearthly riot at daybreak, that, as there was no wind, I made the Arabs tow us up some miles higher, to another clump of houses. A large traffic-boat from Cairo had stopped here, crammed with peasants; many of them were blind, the majority had but one eye, and all the children were suffering from ophthalmia. The passengers landed and bought bread, like pancake, of other women who came down to sell it. The Arabs kept on towing, but very slowly. I do not think we made above a mile an hour; and at noon, with a suffocating hot wind dead against us, they pulled up at a village and said they could not go on, because there was a shallow just above us right across the river, and that we must wait for a wind to take us over to the other bank. I was very angry, but to no effect; so we lay broiling under the sun until three, when they punted across, and we started again. They had only dawdled about from sheer idleness. In the afternoon a cripple, with limbs shockingly distorted and hands webbed like fins, swam off from a hovel on shore to beg money. The wind now came on dead against us; the towing paths were all under water, and the men really could not track the boat, as they did not know where they were going, and every now and then disappeared into deep holes; so we were obliged to come to a stand-still again, and made fast for the night under a bank of osiers. We amused ourselves and the Arabs by making little rafts of palm-wood, putting bits of lighted candle on them, and then launching them off, one after another, down the stream. As there was no wind, they burnt very steadily, and, when several were started, looked very pretty. The Arabs said that the peasants would think they were devils. This night was the worst I ever passed in my life. The foliage brought the mosquitoes again in overwhelming force; the rats came along the ropes from the land, and scuffled about our very feet; the spiders and cockroaches were in full activity;

and a man, or successive men, beat a drum on shore, in some religious ceremony, all night long. A verdict of "Temporary Insanity" would have justified anything that a man might have done under these inflictions.

Saturday, 13th. I routed all the men up at six, and, as there was the usual lack of wind, set them to work. They grumbled at going into the water whilst it was so cold; but I soon settled this, and at seven we were fairly off. I was so heartily sick of the boat, with its delays and inconveniences, that we stopped at a village and tried to get some camels or donkeys to ride on to Cairo, "across country." The people, however, were so miserably poor, they had nothing; and I was getting altogether out of heart, when a brisk wind sprang up and blew us along bravely, under a press of sail that almost lifted the kandjia out of the water. About noon Giovanni showed us the Pyramids on the horizon, and soon after we rounded the apex of the Delta. Provisions were running short, but it was not worth while to buy any more; so I had a "scratch" dinner of maccaroni, potatoes, onions, and ricepudding, all chopped up together and fried, which was really capital. The wind kept up, and by and bye we came to the great works erected for the barrage of the Nile, which is to cost a great deal and not ultimately answer. Then villages came quickly after one another, and the people thickened on the banks. Anon palaces, kioskos, and beautiful gardens, diversified the prospect; the crowd of boats increased; the Pyramids rose higher above the scenery. Then I saw minarets and towers, off and away on our left; and at last, just in time to save ourselves from being locked out for the night, the kandjia stopped at one of the landing-places of Boolak, the port of Cairo.

Giovanni soon procured donkeys, and, leaving the boat in charge of the Arabs, we rode off. We first passed through Boolah, with swarms of dogs yelping after us as many as I

had seen at Constantinople; then along neat Oriental streets, with picturesque wooden-latticed windows and garden-walls, over which we saw dates and prickly pears growing; and at last, traversing a cool, English-looking road, bordered with acacias, I entered Cairo at the Esbekeyah, and pulled up at the British Hotel, delighted beyond all measure to have done, for at least some time, with the Nile and the kandjia.