Chapter II (2)

The present Khedive (or Viceroy) is thirty-eight years of age. Well proportioned, with fine dark eyes, he may be called a handsome man; but his face is made heavy by its expression of settled melancholy. It is said in Cairo that he has never been known to laugh. But this must apply to his public life only, for he is much attached to his family--to his wife and his four children; in this respect he lives strictly in the European manner, never having had but this one wife. He is a devoted father. Determined that the education of his sons should not be neglected as his own education was neglected by Ismail, he had for them, at an early age, an accomplished English tutor. Later he sent them to Geneva, Switzerland; they are now in Vienna. Tufik's chief interest, if one may judge by his acts, is in education. In this direction his strongest efforts have been made; he has improved the public schools of Egypt, and established new ones; he has given all the support possible to that greatest of modern innovations in a Mohammedan country, the education of women. With all this, he is a devout Mohammedan; he is not a fanatic; but he may be called, I think, a Mohammedan Puritan. He receives his many European and American visitors with courtesy. But they do not talk about him as they talked about Ismail; he excites no curiosity. This is partly owing to his position, his opinions and actions having naturally small importance while an English army is taking charge of his realm; but it is also owing, in a measure, to the character of the man himself. One often sees him driving. On Sunday afternoons his carriage in semi-state leads the procession along the Gezireh Avenue. First appear the outriders, six mounted soldiers; four brilliantly dressed saises follow, rushing along with their wands high in the air; then comes the open carriage, with the dark-eyed, melancholy Khedive on the back seat, returning mechanically the many salutations offered by strangers and by his own people. Behind his carriage are four more of the flying runners; then the remainder of the mounted escort, two and two. At a little distance follows the brougham of the Vice-reine; according to Oriental etiquette, she never appears in public beside her husband. Her brougham is preceded and followed by saises, but there is no mounted escort. The Vice-reine is pretty, intelligent, and accomplished; in addition, she is brave. Several years ago, when the cholera was raging in Cairo, and the Khedive, almost alone among the upper classes, remained there in order to do what he could for the suffering people, his wife also refused to flee. She stayed in the plague-stricken town until the pestilence had disappeared, exerting her influence to persuade the frightened women of the lower classes to follow her example regarding sanitary precautions. Tufik is accused of being always undecided; he was not undecided upon this occasion at least. It is probable that some of his moments of indecision have been caused by real hesitations. And this brings us to Arabi.

Arabi (he is probably indifferent to the musical sound of his name) was the leader of the military revolt which broke out in Egypt in 1881--a revolt with which all the world is familiar, because it was followed by the bombardment of Alexandria by the English fleet. Arabi had studied at El Azhar; he knew the Koran by heart. To the native population he seemed a wonderful orator; he excited their enthusiasm; he roused their courage; he almost made them patriotic. The story of Arabi is interesting; there were many intrigues mixed with the revolt, and a dramatic element throughout. But these slight impressions--the idle notes merely of one winter--are not the place for serious history. Nor is the page completed so that it can be described as a whole. Egypt at this moment is the scene of history in the actual process of making, if the term may be so used--making day by day and hour by hour. Arabi has been called the modern Masaniello. The watchword of his revolt was, "Egypt for the Egyptians"; and there is always something touching in this cry when the invaded country is weak and the incoming power is strong. But it may be answered that the Egyptians at present are incapable of governing themselves; that the country, if left to its own devices, would revert to anarchy in a month, and to famine, desolation, and barbarism in five years. Americans are not concerned with these questions of the Eastern world. But if a similar cry had been successfully raised about two hundred years ago on another coast--"America for the Americans"--would the Western continent have profited thereby? Doubtless the original Americans--those of the red skins--raised it as loudly as they could. But there was not much listening. The comparison is stretched, for the poor Egyptian fellah is at least not a savage; but there is a grain of resemblance large enough to call for reflection, when the question of occupation and improvement of a half-civilized land elsewhere is under discussion. The English put down the revolt, and sent Arabi to Ceylon, a small Napoleon at St. Helena. The rebel colonel and his fellow-exiles are at present enjoying those spicy breezes which are associated in our minds with foreign missions and a whole congregation singing (and dragging them fearfully) the celebrated verses. Arabi has complained of the climate in spite of the perfumes, and it is said that he is to be transferred to some other point in the ocean; there are, indeed, many of them well adapted for the purpose. The English newspapers of to-day are dotted with the word "shadowed," which signifies, apparently, that certain persons in Ireland are followed so closely by a policeman that the official might be the shadow. Possibly the melancholy Khedive is shadowed by the memory of the exile of Ceylon. For Tufik did not cast his lot with Arabi. He turned towards the English. To use the word again, though with another signification, though ruler still, he has but a shadowy power.

THE ARAB MUSEUM

Near the city gate named the Help of God, on the northeastern border of Cairo, is the old mosque El Hakim. Save its outer walls, which enclose, like the mosques of Touloun and Amer, a large open square, there is not much left of it; but within this square, housed in a temporary building, one finds the collection of Saracenic antiquities which is called the Arab Museum.

This museum is interesting, and it ought to be beautiful. But somehow it is not. The barrack-like walls, sparsely ornamented with relics from the mosques, the straight aisles and glass show-cases, are not inspiring; the fragments of Arabian wood-carving seem to be lamenting their fate; and the only room which is not desolate is the one where old tiles lie in disorder upon the floor, much as they lie on broken marble pavements of the ancient houses which, half ruined and buried in rubbish, still exist in the old quarters. Why one should be so inconsistent as to find no fault with Gizeh, where rows of antiquities torn from their proper places confront us, where show-cases abound, and yet at the same time make an outcry over this poor little morsel at El Hakim, remains a mystery. Possibly it is because the massive statues and the solid little gods of ancient Egypt do not require an appropriate background, as do the delicate fancies of Saracenic taste. However this may be, to some of us the Arab Museum looks as if a New England farmer's wife had tried her best to make things orderly within its borders, poor soul, in spite of the strangeness of the articles with which she was obliged to deal. It must, however, be added that the museum will not make this impression upon persons who are indifferent to the general aspect of an aisle, or of a series of walls--persons who care only for the articles which adorn them--the lovers of detail, in short. And it is well for all of us to join this class as soon as our feet have crossed the threshold. For we shall be repaid for it. The details are exquisite.

The Arab Museum has been established recently. Every one is grateful to the zeal which has rescued from further injury so many specimens of a vanishing art. One covets a little chest for the Koran which is made of sandal-wood. It is incrusted with arabesques carved in ivory, and has broad hasps and locks of embossed silver. There are many koursis, or small, stool-like tables; one of these has panels of silver filigree, and fretted medallions bearing the name of the Sultan Mohammed ebn Kalaoon, thus showing that it once belonged to the mosque at the Citadel which was built by that Memlook ruler--the mosque whose minarets are ornamented with picturesque bands of emerald-hued porcelain. The illuminated Korans are not here; they are kept in the Public Library in the Street of the Sycamores. Perhaps the most beautiful of the museum's treasures are the old lamps of Arabian glass. In shape they are vases, as they were simply filled with perfumed oil which carried a floating wick; the colors are usually a pearly background, faintly tinged sometimes by the hue we call ashes of roses; upon this background are ornaments of blue, gold, and red; occasionally these ornaments are Arabic letters forming a name or text. These lamps were made in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries; the glass, which has as marked characteristics of its own as Palissy ware, so that once seen it can never be confounded with any other, has a delicate beauty which is unrivalled.

HELIOPOLIS

Like the pyramids, Heliopolis belongs to Cairo. On the way thither, one first traverses the pleasant suburb of Abbasieh. How one traverses it depends upon his taste. The most enthusiastic pedestrian soon gives up walking in the city of the Khedive save in the broad streets of the new quarter. The English ride, one meets every day their gallant mounted bands; but these are generally residents and their visitors, and the horses are their own; for the traveller there are only the street carriages and the donkeys. The carriages are dubiously loose-jointed, and the horses (whose misery has already been described) have but two gaits--the walk of a dying creature and the gallop of despair; unless, therefore, one wishes to mount a dromedary, he must take a donkey. But the "must" is not a disparagement; the white and gray donkeys of Cairo--the best of them--are good-natured, gay-hearted, strong, and even handsome. They have a coquettish way of arching their necks and holding their chins (if a donkey can be said to have a chin), which always reminded me of George Eliot's description of Gwendolen's manner of poising her head in _Daniel Deronda_. George Eliot goes on to warn other young ladies that it is useless to try to imitate this proud little air, unless one has a throat like Gwendolen's. And, in the same spirit, one must warn other donkeys that they must be born in Cairo to be beautiful. Upon several occasions I recognized vanity in my donkey. He knew perfectly when he was adorned with his holiday necklaces--one of imitation sequins, the other of turquoise-hued beads. I am sure that he would have felt much depressed if deprived of his charm against magic--the morsel of parchment inscribed with Arabic characters which decorated his breast. His tail and his short mane were dyed fashionably with henna, but his legs had not been shaved in the pattern which represents filigree garters, and whenever a comrade who had this additional glory passed him, he became distinctly melancholy, and brooded about it for several minutes. There is nothing in the world so deprecating as the profile of one of these Cairo donkeys when he finds himself obliged, by the pressure of the crowd, to push against a European; his long nose and his polite eye as he passes are full of friendly apologies. The donkey-boy, in his skull-cap and single garment, runs behind his beast. These lads are very quick-witted. They have ready for their donkeys five or six names, and they seldom make a mistake in applying them according to the supposed nationality of their patrons of the moment, so that the Englishman learns that he has Annie Laurie; the Frenchman, Napoleon; the German, Bismarck; the Italian, Garibaldi; and the Americans, indiscriminately, Hail Columbia, Yankee Doodle, and General Grant.

In passing through the Abbasieh quarter, we always came, sooner or later, upon a wedding. The different stages of a native marriage require, indeed, so many days for their accomplishment that nuptial festivities are a permanent institution in Cairo, like the policemen and the water-carts, rather than an occasional event, as in other places. One day, upon turning into a narrow street, we discovered that a long portion of it had been roofed over with red cloth; from the centre of this awning four large chandeliers were suspended by cords, and at each end of the improvised tent were hoops adorned with the little red Egyptian banners which look like fringed napkins. In the roadway, placed against the walls of the houses on each side, were rows of wooden settees; one of these seats was occupied by the band, which kept up a constant piping and droning, and upon the others were squatted the invited guests. Every now and then a man came from a gayly adorned door on the left, which was that of the bridegroom, bringing with him a tray covered with the tiny cups of coffee set in their filigree stands; he offered coffee to all. In the meanwhile, in the centre of the roadway between the settees, an Egyptian, in his long blue gown, was dancing. The expression of responsibility on his face amounted to anxiety as he took his steps with great care, now lifting one bare foot as high as he could, and turning it sidewise, as if to show us the sole; now putting it down and hopping upon it, while he displayed to us in the same way the sole of the other. This formal dancing is done by the guests when no public performers are employed. Some one must dance to express the revelry of the occasion; those who are invited, therefore, undertake the duty one by one. When at last we went on our way we were obliged to ride directly through the reception, our donkeys brushing the band on one side and the guests on the other; the dancer on duty paused for a moment, wiping his face with the tail of his gown.

The road leading to Heliopolis has a charm which it shares with no other in the neighborhood of Cairo: at a certain point the desert--the real desert--comes rolling up to its very edge; one can look across the sand for miles. The desert is not a plain, the sand lies in ridges and hillocks; and this sand in many places is not so much like the sand of the sea-shore as it is like the dust of one of our country roads in August. The contrast between the bright green of the cultivated fields (the land which is reached by the inundation) and those silvery, arrested waves is striking, the line of their meeting being as sharply defined as that between sea and shore. I have called the color silvery, but that is only one of the tints which the sand assumes. An artist has jotted down the names of the colors used in an effort to copy the hues on an expanse of desert before him; beginning with the foreground, these were brown, dark red, violet, blue, gold, rose, crimson, pale green, orange, indigo blue, and sky blue. Colors supply the place of shadows, for there is no shade anywhere; all is wide open and light; and yet the expanse does not strike one in the least as bare. For myself, I can say that of all the marvels which one sees in Egypt, the desert produced the most profound impression; and I fancy that, as regards this feeling, I am but one of many. The cause of the attraction is a mystery. It cannot be found in the roving tendencies of our ancestor, since he was arboreal, and there are no trees in the strange-tinted waste. The old legend says that Adam's first wife, Lilith, fled to Egypt, where she was permitted to live in the desert, and where she still exists:

"It was Lilith, the wife of Adam;
Not a drop of her blood was human."

Perhaps it is Lilith's magic that we feel.

Heliopolis, the City of the Sun, the On of the forty-first chapter of Genesis, is five miles from Cairo. Nothing of it is now left above ground save an obelisk and a few ruined walls. The obelisk, which is the oldest yet discovered, bears the name of the king in whose reign it was erected; this gives us the date--5000 years ago; that is, more than a millennium before the days of Moses. At Heliopolis was the Temple of the Sun, and the schools which Herodotus visited "because the teachers are considered the most accomplished men in Egypt." When Strabo came hither, four hundred years later, he saw the house which Plato had occupied; Moses here learned "all the wisdom of the Egyptians." Papyri describe Heliopolis as "full of obelisks." Two of these columns were carried to Alexandria 1937 years ago, and set up before the Temple of Caesar. According to one authority, this temple was built by Cleopatra; in any case, the two obelisks acquired the name of Cleopatra's Needles, and though the temple itself in time disappeared, they remained where they had been placed--one erect, one prostrate--until, in recent years, one was given to London and the other to New York. One recites all this in a breath in order to bring up, if possible, the associations which rush confusedly through the mind as one stands beside this red granite column rising alone in the green fields at Heliopolis. No myth itself, it was erected in days which are to us mythical--days which are the jumping-off place of our human history; yet they were not savages who polished this granite, who sculptured this inscription; ages of civilization of a certain sort must have preceded them. Beginning with the Central Park, we force our minds backward in an endeavor to make these dates real. "Homer was a modern compared with the designers of this pillar," we say to ourselves. "The Mycenae relics were _articles de Paris_ of centuries and centuries later." But repeating the words (and even rolling the _r's_) are useless efforts; the imagination will not rise; it is crushed into stupidity by such a vista of years. As reaction, perhaps as revenge, we flee to geology and Darwin; here, at least, one can take breath.

Near Heliopolis there is an ostrich yard. The giant birds are very amusing; they walk about with long steps, and stretch their necks. If allowed, they would tap us all on the head, I think, after the fashion of the ostriches in that vivid book, _The Story of an African Farm_.

FRENCH AND ENGLISH

Gerard de Nerval begins his volume on Egypt by announcing that the women of Cairo are so thickly veiled that the European (_i.e._, the Frenchman?) becomes discouraged after a very few days, and, in consequence, goes up the Nile. This, at least, is one effort to explain why strangers spend so short a time in Cairo. The French, as a nation, are not travellers; they have small interest in any country beyond their own borders. A few of their writers have cherished a liking for the East; but it has been what we may call a home-liking. They give us the impression of having sincerely believed that they could, owing to their extreme intelligence, imagine for themselves (and reproduce for others) the entire Orient from one fez, one Turkish pipe, and a picture of the desert. Gautier, for instance, has described many Eastern landscapes which his eyes have never beheld. Pictures are, indeed, much to Frenchmen. The acme of this feeling is reached by one of the Goncourt brothers, who writes, in their recently published journal, that the true way to enjoy a summer in the country is to fill one's town-house during the summer months with beautiful paintings of green fields, wild forests, and purling brooks, and then stay at home, and look at the lovely pictured scenes in comfort. French volumes of travels in the East are written as much with exclamation-points as with the letters of the alphabet. Lamartine and his disciples frequently paused "to drop a tear." Later Gallic voyagers divided all scenery into two classes; the cities "laugh," the plains are "amiable," or they "smile"; if they do not do this, immediately they are set down as "sad." One must be bold indeed to call Edmond About, the distinguished author of _Tolla_, ridiculous. The present writer, not being bold, is careful to abstain from it. But the last scene of his volume on Egypt (_Le Fellah_, published in 1883), describing the hero, with all his clothes rolled into a gigantic turban round his head, swimming after the yacht which bears away the heroine--a certain impossible Miss Grace--from the harbor of Port Said, must have caused, I think, some amused reflection in the minds of English and American readers. It is but just to add that among the younger French writers are several who have abandoned these methods. Gabriel Charmes's volume on Cairo contains an excellent account of the place. Pierre Loti and Maupassant have this year (1890) given to the world pages about northwestern Africa which are marvels of actuality as well as of unsurpassed description.

The French at present are greatly angered by the continuance of the English occupation of Egypt. Since Napoleon's day they have looked upon the Nile country as sure to be theirs some time. They built the Suez Canal when the English were opposed to the scheme. They remember when their influence was dominant. The French tradesmen, the French milliners and dressmakers in Cairo, still oppose a stubborn resistance to the English way of counting. They give the prices of their goods and render their accounts in Egyptian piasters, or in napoleons and francs; they refuse to comprehend shillings and pounds. And here, by-the-way, Americans would gladly join their side of the controversy. England alone, among the important countries of the world, has a currency which is not based upon the decimal system. The collected number of sixpences lost each year in England, by American travellers who mistake the half-crown piece for two shillings, would make a large sum. The bewilderment over English prices given in a coin which has no existence is like that felt by serious-minded persons who read _Alice in Wonderland_ from a sense of duty. Talk of the English as having no imagination when the guinea exists!

France lost her opportunity in Egypt when her fleet sailed away from Alexandria Harbor in July, 1882. Her ships were asked to remain and take part in the bombardment; they refused, and departed. The English, thus being left alone, quieted the country later by means of an army of occupation. An English army of occupation has been there ever since.

At present it is not a large army. The number of British soldiers in 1890 is given as three thousand; the remaining troops are Egyptians, with English regimental officers. During the winter months the short-waisted red coat of Tommy Atkins enlivens with its cheerful blaze the streets of Cairo at every turn. The East and the West may be said to be personified by the slender, supple Arabs in their flowing draperies, and by these lusty youths of light complexion, with straight backs and stiff shoulders, who walk, armed with a rattan, in the centre of the pavement, wearing over one ear the cloth-covered saucer which passes for a head-covering. Tommy Atkins patronizes the donkeys with all his heart. One of the most frequently seen groups is a party of laughing scarlet-backed youths mounted on the smallest beasts they can find, and careering down the avenues at the donkey's swiftest speed, followed by the donkey-boys, delighted and panting. As the spring comes on, Atkins changes his scarlet for lighter garments, and dons the summer helmet. This species of hat is not confined to the sons of Mars; it is worn in warm weather by Europeans of all nationalities who are living or travelling in the East. It may be cool. Without doubt, aesthetically considered, it is the most unbecoming head-covering known to the civilized world. It has a peculiar power of causing its wearer to appear both ignoble and pulmonic; for, viewed in front, the most distinguished features, under its tin-pan-like visor, become plebeian; and, viewed behind, the strongest masculine throat looks wizened and consumptive.

The English have benefited Egypt. They have put an end to the open knavery in high places which flourished unchecked; they have taught honesty; they have so greatly improved the methods of irrigation that a bad Nile (_i.e._, a deficient inundation) no longer means starvation; finally, they have taken hold of the mismanaged finances, disentangled them, set them in order, and given them at least a start in the right direction. The natives fret over some of their restrictions. And they say that the English have, first of all, taken care of their own interests. In addition, they greatly dislike seeing so many Englishmen holding office over them. But this last objection is simply the other side of the story. If the English are to help the country, they must be on the spot in order to do it; and it appears to be a fixed rule in all British colonies that the representatives of the government, whether high or low, shall be made, as regards material things, extremely comfortable. Egypt is not yet a British colony; she is a viceroyalty under the suzerainty of the Porte. But practically she is to-day governed by the English; and, to the American traveller at least (whatever the French may think), it appears probable that English authority will soon be as absolute in the Khedive's country as it is now in India.

In Cairo, in 1890, the English colony played lawn-tennis; it attended the races; when Stanley returned to civilization it welcomed him with enthusiasm; and when, later, Prince Eddie came, it attended a gala performance of _Aida_ at the opera-house--a resurrection from the time of Ismail ordered by Ismail's son for the entertainment of the heir-presumptive (one wonders whether Tufik himself found entertainment in it).

In the little English church, which stands amid its roses and vines in the new quarter, is a wall tablet of red and white marble--the memorial of a great Englishman. It bears the following inscription: "In memory of Major-General Charles George Gordon, C.B. Born at Woolwich, Jan. 28, 1833. Killed at the defence of Khartoum, Jan. 26, 1885." Above is a sentence from Gordon's last letter: "I have done my best for the honor of our country."

St. George of Khartoum, as he has been called. If objection is made to the bestowal of this title, it might be answered that the saints of old lived before the age of the telegraph, the printer, the newspaper, and the reporter; possibly they too would not have seemed to us faultless if every one of their small decisions and all their trivial utterances had been subjected to the electric-light publicity of to-day. Perhaps Gordon was a fanatic, and his discernment was not accurate. But he was single-hearted, devoted to what he considered to be his duty, and brave to a striking degree. When we remember how he faced death through those weary days we cannot criticise him. The story of that rescuing army which came so near him and yet failed, and of his long hoping in vain, only to be shot down at the last, must always remain one of the most pathetic tales of history.

SOUVENIRS

As the warm spring closes, every one selects something to carry homeward. Leaving aside those fortunate persons who can purchase the ancient carved woodwork of an entire house, or Turkish carpets by the dozen, the rest of us keep watch of the selections of our friends while we make our own. Among these we find the jackets embroidered in silver and gold; the inevitable fez; two or three blue tiles of the thirteenth century; a water-jug, or kulleh; a fly-brush with ivory handle; attar of roses and essence of sandal-wood; Assiout ware in vases and stoups; a narghileh; the gauze scarfs embroidered with Persian benedictions; a koursi inlaid with mother-of-pearl; Arabian inkstands--long cases of silver or brass, to be worn like a dagger in the belt; a keffiyeh, or delicate silken head-shawl with white knotted fringe; the Arabian finger-bowls; the little coffee-cups; images of Osiris from the tombs; a native bracelet and anklet; and, finally, a scarab or two, whose authenticity is always exciting, like an unsolved riddle. A picture of these mementos of Cairo would not be complete for some of us without two of those constant companions of so many long mornings--the dusty, shuffling, dragging, slipping, venerable, abominable mosque shoes.

HOMEWARD-BOUND

"We who pursue
Our business with unslackening stride,
Traverse in troops, with care-fill'd breast,
The soft Mediterranean side,
The Nile, the East,
And see all sights from pole to pole,
And glance and nod and bustle by,
And never once possess our soul
Before we die."

So chanted Matthew Arnold of the English of to-day. And if we are to believe what is preached to us and hurled at us, it is a reproach even more applicable to Americans than to the English themselves. One American traveller, however, wishes to record modestly a disbelief in the universal truth of this idea. Many of us are, indeed, haunted by our business; many of us do glance and nod and bustle by; it is a class, and a large class. But these hurried people are not all; an equal number of us, who, being less in haste, may be less conspicuous perhaps, are the most admiring travellers in the world. American are the bands who journey to Stratford-upon-Avon, and go down upon their knees--almost--when they reach the sacred spot; American are the pilgrims who pay reverent visits to all the English cathedrals, one after the other, from Carlisle to Exeter, from Durham to Canterbury. In the East, likewise, it is the transatlantic travellers who are so deeply impressed by the strangeness and beauty of the scenes about them that they forget to talk about their personal comforts (or, rather, the lack of them).

There is another matter upon which a word may be said, and this is the habit of judging the East from the stand-point of one's home customs, whether the home be American or English. It is, of course, easy to find faults in the social systems of the Oriental nations; they have laws and usages which are repugnant to all our feelings, which seem to us horrible. But it is well to remember that it is impossible to comprehend any nation not our own unless one has lived a long time among its people, and made one's self familiar with their traditions, their temperament, their history, and, above all, with the language which they speak. Anything less than this is observation from the outside alone, which is sure to be founded upon misapprehension. The French and the English are separated by merely the few miles of the Channel, and they have, to a certain extent, a common language; for though the French do not often understand English, the English very generally understand something of French. Yet it is said that these two nations have never thoroughly comprehended each other either as nations or individuals; and it is even added that, owing to their differing temperaments, they will never reach a clear appreciation of each other's merits; demerits, of course, are easier. Our own country has a language which is, on the whole, nearer the English tongue perhaps than is the speech of France; yet have we not felt now and then that English travellers have misunderstood us? If this is the case among people who are all Occidentals together, how much more difficult must be a thorough comprehension by us of those ancient nations who were old before we were born?

The East is the land of mystery. If one cares for it at all, one loves it; there is no half-way. If one does not love it, one really (though perhaps not avowedly) hates it--hates it and all its ways. But for those who love it the charm is so strong that no surprise is felt in reading or hearing of Europeans who have left all to take up a wandering existence there for long years or for life--the spirit of Browning's "What's become of Waring?"

All of us cannot be Warings, however, and the time comes at last when we must take leave. The streets of Cairo have been for some time adorned with placards whose announcements begin, in large type, "Travellers returning to Europe." We are indeed far away when returning to Europe is a step towards home. We wait for the last festival--the Shem-en-Neseem, or Smelling of the Zephyr--the annual picnic day, when the people go into the country to gather flowers and breathe the soft air before the opening of the regular season for the Khamsin. Then comes the journey by railway to Alexandria. We wave a handkerchief (now fringed on all four sides by the colored threads of the laundresses) to the few friends still left behind. They respond; and so do all the Mustaphas, Achmets, and Ibrahims who have carried our parcels and trotted after our donkeys. Then we take a seat by the window, to watch for the last time the flying Egyptian landscape--the green plain, the tawny Nile, the camels on the bank, the villages, and the palm-trees, and behind them the solemn line of the desert.

At sunset the steamer passes down the harbor, and, pushing out to sea, turns westward. A faint crescent moon becomes visible over the Ras-et-Teen palace. It is the moon of Ramadan. Presently a cannon on the shore ushers in, with its distant sound, the great Mohammedan fast.

CORFU AND THE IONIAN SEA

Sad eyes! the blue sea laughs, as heretofore.
Ah, singing birds, your happy music pour;
Ah, poets, leave the sordid earth awhile;
Flit to these ancient gods we still adore:
"It may be we shall touch the happy isle!"

--_Translated by Andrew Lang._

Not long before Christmas, last year, I found myself travelling from Ancona down the Adriatic coast of Italy by the fast train called the Indian Mail. There was excitement in the very name, and more in the conversation of the people who sat beside me at the table of a queer little eating-house on the shore, before whose portal the Indian Mail stopped late in the evening. We all descended and went in. A dusky apartment was our discovery, and a table illuminated by guttering candles that flared in the strong currents of air. Roast chickens were stacked on this table in a high pile, and loaves of dark-colored bread were placed here and there, with portly straw-covered flasks of the wine of the country. No one came to serve us; we were expected to serve ourselves. A landlord who looked like an obese Don Juan was established behind a bench in a distant corner, where he made coffee with amiability and enthusiasm for those who desired it. It was supposed that we were to go to him, before we returned to the train, and pay for what we had consumed; and I hope that his trust in us was not misplaced, for with his objection to exercise, and his dim little lamp which illuminated only his smiles, there was nothing for him but trust. The Indian Mail carries passengers who are outward-bound for Constantinople, Egypt, and India; his confidence rested perhaps in the belief that persons about to embark on such dangerous seas would hardly begin the enterprise by crime. To other minds, however, it might have seemed the very moment to perpetrate enormities. As we attacked the chickens, I perceived in the flickering glare that all my companions were English. Everybody talked, and the thrill of the one American increased as the names of the steamers waiting at Brindisi were mentioned--the _Hydaspes_, the _Coromandel_, the _Cathay_, the _Mirzapore_: towards what lands of sandal-wood, what pleasure-domes of Kubla-Khan, might not one sail on ships bearing those titles! The present voyagers, however, were all old travellers; they took a purely practical view of the Orient. Nevertheless, their careless "Cairo," "Port Said," "Bombay," "Ceylon," "Java," were as fascinating as the shining balls of a juggler when a dozen are in the air at the same moment. My right-hand neighbor, upon learning that my destination was Corfu, good-naturedly offered the information that the voyage was an easy one. "Corfu, however, is _not_ what it has been!"

"But, Polly, it is looking up a little, now that the Empress of Austria is building a villa there," suggested a sister correctively.

After this outburst of talk, we all climbed back into the waiting train, and went flying on towards the south, following the lonely, wild-looking coast, with the wind from the Adriatic crying over our heads like a banshee. It was midnight when we reached Brindisi. At present this, the ancient Brundusium, is the jumping-off place for the traveller on his way to the East; here he must leave the land and trust himself to an enigmatical deep. But if he wishes to have the sensation in full force, he must not delay his journey; for, presently, the Indian Mail will rush through Greece and meet the steamers at Cape Colonna; and then, before long, there will be another spurt, and Pullman trains will go through to Calcutta, with a ferry over the Bosporus.

At Brindisi I became the prey of five barelegged boatmen, who, owing to the noise of the wind and the water, communicated with each other by yells. The Austrian-Lloyd steamer from Trieste, outward-bound for Constantinople, which carried the friends I was expecting to meet, was said to be lying out in the stream, and I enjoyed the adventure of setting forth alone on the dark sea in search of her, in a small boat rowed by my Otranto crew. During the transit there was not much time to think of Brundusium, with its memories of Horace and Virgil. But there was another opportunity to reflect upon the question, perplexing to the unskilled mind--namely, Why it is that an American abroad is constantly called upon to praise the wharves, piers, and landing-stages, and with the same breath to condemn as disgraces to civilization the like nautical platforms of his own country, when he is so often obliged, on foreign shores, to embark and disembark by means of a tossing small boat or a crowded tender, whereas at home, with the aid of those same makeshift constructions for whose short-comings he is supposed to blush, he walks on board of his steamship with no trouble whatever?

Early the next morning, awakening on a shelf in a red velvet cupboard, I was explaining to myself vaguely that the cupboard was a dream, when there appeared through the port-hole a picture of such fairy-tale beauty that the dream became lyrical--it began to sing:

"Far and few, far and few,
Are the lands where the Jumblies live!"

At last those famous lines were actualities, for surely this was the sea of the Jumblies, and those heights without doubt were "the hills of Chankly Bore." (There are people, I believe, who do not care for the Jumblies. There are persons who do not care for Alice in Wonderland, nor for Brer Rabbit, when he played on his triangle down by the brook.)

The sea which I saw was of a miraculously blue tint; in the distance the cliffs of a mountainous island rose boldly from the water, their color that of a violet pansy; a fishing-boat with red sails was crossing the foreground; over all glittered an atmosphere so golden that it was like that of sunset in other lands, though the sky, at the same time, had unmistakably the purity of early morning. Later, on the deck, during the broadly practical time of after breakfast, this view, instead of diminishing in attraction, grew constantly more fair. The French novelist of to-day, Paul Bourget, describes Corfu as "so lovely that one wants to take it in one's arms!" Another Frenchman, who was not given to the making of phrases, no less a personage than Napoleon Bonaparte, has left upon record his belief that Corfu has "the most beautiful situation in the world." What, then, is this beauty? What is this situation?

First, there is the long and charming approach, with the snow-capped mountains of Albania, in European Turkey, looming up against the sky at the end; then comes the landlocked harbor; then the picturesque old town, its high stone houses, all of creamy hue, crowded together on the hill-side above the sea-wall, with here and there a bell-tower shooting into the blue. Below is the busy, many-colored port. Above towers the dark double fortress on its rock. And, finally, the dense, grove-like vegetation of the island encircles all, and its own mountain-peaks rise behind, one of them attaining a height of three thousand feet. There are other islands of which all this, or almost all, can be said--Capri, for instance. But at Corfu there are two attributes peculiar to the region; these are: first, the color; second, the transparency. Although the voyage from Brindisi hardly occupies twelve hours, the atmosphere is utterly unlike that of Italy; there is no haze; all is clear. Some of us love the Italian haze (which is not in the least a mist), that soft veil which makes the mountains look as if they were covered with velvet. But a love of this softness need not, I hope, make us hate everything that is different. Greece (and Corfu is a Greek island) seemed to me all light--the lightest country in the world. In other lands, if we climb a high mountain and stand on its bald summit at noon, we feel as if we were taking a bath in light; in Greece we have this feeling everywhere, even in the valleys. Euripides described his countrymen as "forever delicately tripping through the pellucid air," and so their modern descendants trip to this day. This dry atmosphere has an exciting effect upon the nervous energy, and the faces of the people show it. It has also, I believe, the defect of this good quality--namely, an over-stimulation, which sometimes produces neuralgia. In some respects Americans recognize this clearness of the atmosphere, and its influence, good and bad; the air of northern New England in the summer, and of California at the same season, is not unlike it. But in America the transparency is more white, more blank; we have little of the coloring that exists in Greece, tints whose intensity must be seen to be believed. The mountains, the hills, the fields, are sometimes bathed in lilac. Then comes violet for the plains, while the mountains are rose that deepens into crimson. At other times salmon, pink, and purple tinges are seen, and ochre, saffron, and cinnamon brown. This description applies to the whole of Greece, but among the Ionian Islands the effect of the color is doubled by the wonderful tint of the surrounding sea. I promise not to mention this hue again; hereafter it can be taken for granted, for it is always present; but for this once I must say that you may imagine the bluest blue you know--the sky, lapis lazuli, sapphires, the eyes of some children, the Bay of Naples--and the Ionian Sea is bluer than any of these. And nowhere else have I seen such dear, queer little foam sprays. They are so small and so very white on the blue, and they curl over the surface of the water even when the sea is perfectly calm, which makes me call them queer. You meet them miles from land. And all the shores are whitened with their never-ceasing play. It is a pygmy surf.

It was eleven o'clock in the morning when our steamer reached her anchorage before the island town. Immediately she was surrounded by small boats, whose crews were perfectly lawless, demanding from strangers whatever they thought they could get, and obtaining their demands, because there was no way to escape them except by building a raft. Upon reaching land one forgets the extortion, for the windows of the hotel overlook the esplanade, and this open space amiably offers to persons who are interested in first impressions a panoramic history of two thousand five hundred years in a series of striking mementos. Let me premise that as regards any solid knowledge of these islands, only a contemptible smattering can be obtained in a stay so short as mine. Corfu and her sisters have borne a conspicuous part in what we used to call ancient history. Through the Roman days they appear and reappear. In the times of the Crusaders their position made them extremely important. Years of study could not exhaust their records, nor months of research their antiquities. To comprehend them rightfully one must indeed be an historian, an archaeologist, and a painter at one and the same time, and one must also be good-natured. Few of us can hope to unite all these. The next best thing, therefore, is to go and see them with whatever eyes and mind we happen to possess. Good-nature will perhaps return after the opening encounter with the boatmen is over.

From our windows, then, we could note, first, the Citadel, high on its rock, three hundred feet above the town. The oldest part of the present fortress was erected in 1550; but the site has always been the stronghold. Corinthians, Athenians, Spartans, Macedonians, and Romans have in turn held the island, and this rock is the obvious keep. Later came four hundred years of Venetian control, and I am ashamed to add that the tokens of this last-named period were to me more delightful than any of the other memorials. I say "ashamed," for why should one be haunted by Venice in Greece? With the Parthenon to look forward to, why should the lion of St. Mark, sculptured on Corfu facades, be a thing to greet with joy? Many of us are familiar with the disconsolate figures of some of our fellow-countrymen and countrywomen in the galleries of Europe, tired and dejected tourists wandering from picture to picture, but finding nothing half so interesting as the memory of No. 4699 Columbus Avenue at home. I am afraid it is equally narrow to be scanning Corfu, Athens, Cairo, and the sands of the desert itself for something that reminds one of another place, even though that place be the enchanting pageant of a town at the head of the Adriatic. History, however, as related by the esplanade, pays no attention to these aberrations of the looker-on; its story goes steadily forward. The lions of St. Mark on the facades, and another memento of the Doges--namely, the statue of Count von der Schulenburg, who commanded the Venetian forces in the great defence of Corfu in 1716--these memorials have as companions various tokens of the English occupation, which, following that of Venice, continued through forty-nine years--that is, from 1815 to 1863. Before this there had been a short period of French dominion; but the esplanade, so far as I could discover, contains no memorial of it, unless Napoleon's phrase can stand for one--and I think it can. The souvenirs of the British rule are conspicuous. The first is the palace built for the English Governor, a functionary who bore the sonorous official name of Lord High Commissioner, a title which was soon shortened to the odd abbreviation "the Lord High." This palace is an uninteresting construction stretching stiffly across the water-side of the esplanade, and cutting off the view of the harbor. It is now the property of the King of Greece, but at present it is seldom occupied. While we were at Corfu its ghostliness was enlivened for a while; Prince Henry of Prussia was there with his wife. They had left their yacht (if so large a vessel as the _Irene_ can be called a yacht), and were spending a week at the palace. An hour after their departure entrance was again permitted, and an old man, still trembling from the excitement of the royal sojourn, conducted us from room to room. All was ugly. Fading flowers in the vases showed that an attempt had been made to brighten the place; but the visitors must have been endowed with a strong natural cheerfulness to withstand with success such a mixture of the commonplace and the dreary as the palace presents. They had the magnificent view to look at, and there was always the graceful silhouette of the _Irene_ out on the water. She could come up at any time and take them away; it was this, probably, that kept them alive.

If the palace is ordinary, what shall be said of another memento which adorns the esplanade? This is a high, narrow building, so uncouth that it causes a smile. It looks raw, bare, and so primitive that if it had a pulley at the top it might be taken for a warehouse erected on the bank of a canal in one of our Western towns; one sees in imagination canal-boats lying beneath, and bulging sacks going up or down. Yet this is nothing less than that University of the Ionian Islands which was founded by the Earl of Guildford early in this century, the epoch of English enthusiasm for Greece, the days of the Philhellenes. Lord Guildford, who was one of the distinguished North family, gave largely of his fortune and of his time to establish this university. Contemporary records speak of him as "an amiable nobleman." But after seeing his touchingly ugly academy and his bust (which is not ugly) in the hall of the extinct Ionian Senate at the palace, one feels sure that he was more than amiable--he must have been original also. The English are called cold; but as individuals they are capable sometimes of extraordinary enthusiasms for distant causes and distant people. Adventurous travellers as they are, does the charm lie in the word "distant"? The defunct academy now shelters a school where vigorous young Greeks sit on benches, opposite each other, in narrow, doorless compartments which resemble the interior of a large omnibus; this, at least, was the arrangement of the ground-floor on the day of our visit. Although it was December, the boys looked heated. The teachers, who walked up and down, had a relentless aspect. Even the porter, white-haired and bent, had a will untouched by the least decay; he would not show us the remains of the university library, nor the Roman antiquities which are said to be stored somewhere in a lumber-room, among them "fifty-nine frames of mosaic representing a bustard in various attitudes." He had not the power, apparently, to exhibit these treasures while the school exercises were going on, and as soon as they were ended--instantly, that very minute--he intended to eat his dinner, and nothing could alter this determination; his face grew ferocious at the mere suggestion. So we were obliged to depart without seeing the souvenirs of Lord Guildford's enthusiasm; and owing to the glamour which always hangs over the place one has failed to see, I have been sure ever since that we should have found them the most fascinating objects in Corfu.