her skin, and thus encompassed but by lofty mounds of debris and a waste of scattered cemeteries. A turn of the road, and it opens into view from afar-a fairy city, lapped in a warm rosy light, crouching at the rocky foot of one of the desert hills! Although this point is by no means an advantageous one for a first introduction, few are disappointed. The utter change from everything European itself keeps up a kindly illusion. Across a reach of green you behold a fair clustering group of many minarets and domes, slender and graceful, uprising from the mass, and glittering through the faint haze in which the distant city seems enveloped. And towering above, on a kind of craggy promontory or spur of the rock-the frontier rock of the Mokattum range—the vice-regal citadel hangs precipitous; a complex work of bastions and ramparts, so deftly cut and wrought into the living cliff as to appear an excrescence from the mountain. It is a grim-looking fortress truly, frowning and severe; but—and in this fantastic land all such contrasts come as of courseyou see planted with its enceinte, as a wild flower on a ruin, a fair and comely mosque of costly alabaster, with a dazzling coronet of cupolas and pinnacles. Such is Grand Cairo to you from the rail, as seen through the palm vistas and above the sea of gardens that intervene. You scan it wistfully, and A WARM RECEPTION. 21 muse of half-forgotten days. Never quite again shall come to you the freshness of that first look. I was beset-all travellers are-by a legion of donkey-boys on my arrival. A certain detachment are admitted within the station boundary-limits, where confusion is even worse confounded than at Alexandria. The rest, with a medley of donkeys, dragomans, camels, hotel touts, lumbering bullockcars, cochers, and mangy curs, cluster outside, and lurk in wait, or make faces at you through the open palings—a wooden grille, supporting a trellis where tropic creepers grow and intertwist, wantoning in a luxuriance of crimson and green, which astonishes you, fresh from the sedater flora of the north. My effects, being thrown out of the waggon, were immediately pounced upon by as many urchins as there were items of property-more, in fact, for two at once laid claim to my portmanteau, quarrelling and fighting over it, until a third, taking a mean advantage of a fall, snatched it up and bore it away in triumph. I followed at the heels of this gentleman-followed briskly; but, once fairly launched in the Babel outside, all further power of tracking my friend was lost. "Try good donkey, sare! him got plenty go in him!" "Vare fine jackass for you, milord!" "Dis splendid beast, captain!" such, together with a volley of guttural epithets, in sound like a mingled sneeze and choke, and blows urging the beasts to butt at me, were discharged point-blank at my devoted person the instant I issued from the gate. I was enveloped in donkeys, taken off my legs by them; while a troop of swarthy-skinned, bright-featured youngsters, bare-breasted and barelegged, fought for me and over me as the Philistines within had done by my portmanteau before. Oh, for a helping hand! It came. One fellow more powerful than the rest gave me a leg over his beast's back-it was cleverly done-wrenched himself from his fellows, and, like a shaft from a bow, we shot out of the scramble and were free-dilapidated, rather, about the necktie and hat, and panting, but still free. Yes; but the baggage! Whither had it sped? 66 Baggage all right, sare, yonder." And Mohammed-he told me his name in confidence while settling my disordered dress-pointed to where, under the trees, four of his picturesque brethren were coolly sitting on my effects, nursing their knees and smoking little rolls of tobacco. A fresh donkey was hired, endless coils of cord came up to hand from somewhere, and I looked on while four pairs of fists busied themselves in slinging portmanteaus, bag, and boxes across some meek Neddy's back. Very insecurely they did it, too; but made up in noise and fuss for want of skill. I did ENTRANCE INTO GRAND CAIRO. 23 23 not interfere. It was enough to feel free; besides, the proceeding altogether was so ludicrous, one could not find heart to be angry. And so, all being ready-for none of my dusky friends would leave me-we departed in the deepening glow of afternoon for the city, bending our course among the turbaned loungers in the shady lebbek avenue which outlies the Frank quarter, and through the brilliant bustle of the dusty way leading to the Uzbekeeyeh. Baggage to the front-cavalry following-infantry in the rear; quick march! Such was my entrance into Grand Cairo. CHAPTER IV. THE DRAGOMAN. "The garden-bowers and grots Slumber'd; the solemn palms were ranged A sudden splendour from behind Flush'd all the leaves with rich gold green, And, flowing rapidly between Their interspaces, counterchanged The level lake with diamond plots Of dark and bright, a lovely time." THREE people were lying at ease one bright sunny morning under the chequered shadow of a lotustree, in the pleasant gardens of the Uzbekeeyah. They had strolled out after breakfast, to hold council as to the future. A boat was to be hired, sailors and servants taken into pay, and other preparations made for a twelve weeks' river journey. The members of this council of three so convened had each a different end in view when, in a northern city, they agreed to travel in company to the cataracts of the Nile. But slightly acquainted, they nevertheless hoped by mutual forbearance and courtesy, not only to avoid |