he never forgets what he has been told to do, and he is clean in his work, though hopelessly dirty as to his clothes. He cannot get used to them, and takes a roll in the dirt, or leans against a dirty mud wall, quite forgetting his clean washed blue shirt. Achmet is quicker, and more careless ; but they are both good boys, and very fond of Omar. "Uncle Omar" is the form of address, though he scolds them pretty severely if they misbehave; and I observe that the high jinks take place chiefly when only I am in the way, and Omar gone to market or to the mosque. The little rogues have found out that their laughing does not "affect my nerves," and I am often treated to a share in the joke. How I wish R- could see the children; they would amuse her. Yussuf's girl, "Meer en Nezzil," is a charming child and very clever: her emphatic way of explaining any thing to me, and her gestures, would delight you. Her cousin and future husband, aged five (she is six), broke her doll which I had given her, and her description of it was most dramatic-ending with a wheedling glance at the cupboard, and "of course there are no more dolls there." She is a fine little creature, far more Arab than Fellaha, quite a shaitan, her father says. She came in, full of making cakes for Bairam, and offered her services. "Oh, my aunt, if thou wantest anything, I can work," said she, tucking up her sleeves.

It is warm and fine enough now, and I am a good deal better; Mustafa has found me a milk-camel at last ;-no easy matter, as all our camels are now taken to work. You cannot think what the war in Crete is to the people here; they who take no sort of pleasure in killing Christians, and only hate leaving their families, and the cold and misery!

The last regulations have stopped all money-lending; and the prisons are full of "Sheykhs el Beled," whose villages cannot pay their taxes. Most respectable men have offered me to go partners with them now in their wheat, which will be cut in six weeks, if only I would pay their taxes now: I to

take half the crop, and half the taxes, with interest, out of their half,-some such trifle as thirty per cent, per month. A Greek at Koos is doing this business; but, as he knows the people here, he accepts none but such as are vouched for by good "cadees," and he will not lose a feddan. Our prison is full of men, and we send them their dinners in turns. The other day a woman went with the big wooden bowl on her head full of what she had cooked for them, accompanied by her husband. A certain Effendi, a new Vakeel here, was there; and said, "What dost thou ask here, thou -?" calling her by an opprobrious name. Her husband said, "She is my wife, O Effendi!" Whereupon he was beaten till he fainted, and then there was a lamentation. They carried him down past my house with a crowd of women all shrieking like mad creatures, especially his wife, who yelled, and beat her head, and threw dust over it, more majorum as you may see on the tombs. Such are the humours of tax-gathering in this country. The distress in England is terrible, but at least it is not the result of extortion like it is here, where everything from Nature is so abundant and glorious, and yet mankind so miserable. It is not a little hunger, it is the cruel oppression which maddens the people now. They never complained before, but now whole villages are deserted, and thousands have run away into the desert between this and Assouan.

6th March.

The warm weather has set in, and I am already as much the better for it as usual. But I have been very ill. Dear Sheykh Yussuf was with me the evening I was attacked, and sat up all night. At the prayer of dawn, an hour and a half before sunrise, I watched him wash and pray, and heard his supplications for my life and health, and for you and all my family, and I thought of what I had lately readhow the Greeks massacred their own patriots because the Turks had shown

them mercy-a display of temper which I hope will enlighten Western Christendom as to what the Muslims have to expect if the Western Christians help the Eastern Christians to get the upper hand.

Yussuf was asking about a traveller the other day who had turned Catholic. "Poor thing," he said, "the priests have drawn the brains through the ears, no doubt; but never fear, the heart is good, and the convert's charity is great, and God will deal lightly with those who serve Him with their hearts, though it is sad they should bow down before images. But look at thy slave Mabrook. Can he understand onehundredth part of the thoughts of thy mind? Nevertheless he loves thee, and obeys thee with pleasure and alacrity: and wilt thou punish him because he knows not all thy ways? And shall God, who is so much above us as thou art above thy slave, be less just than thou?" I pinned the Mufti at once, and insisted on knowing the orthodox belief; but he quoted the Koran and the decisions of the learned, to show that he stretched no point as far as Jews and Christians are concerned, and even the idolators are not to be con

demned by man. Yussuf wants me to write a short notice of the Faith from his dictation. I wonder if any one would publish it. It annoys him terribly to hear the Muslims constantly accused of intolerance. Is he right, or is it not true? They show their conviction that their faith is the best in the world with the same sort of naïveté that I have seen in very innocent and ignorant Englishwomen: in fact, they display a sort of religious conceit: but it is not often bitter or haineux, however much they are in earnest.

Achmet, who was always hankering after the flesh-pots of Alexandria, got some people to take him; so he came home, and picked a quarrel, and departed. Poor little fellow, the "Sheykh el Beled" put a stop to his fun by informing him that he would be wanted for the Pasha's works, and must stay in his own place. Since his departure

Mabrook has come out wonderfully, and does his own work and Achmet's too with the greatest satisfaction. He tells me he likes it best so; he likes to be quiet.

The old lady of the Maohn proposed to come to me, but I would not let her leave her home, which would be quite an adventure to her. I knew she would be explanatory, and lament over me, and say every moment, "Oh my liver, oh my eyes! the name of God be upon thee, and never mind! to-morrow, please God, thou wilt be quite well," and so forth. People send me such odd dishes; some very good. Zeyneb, Yussuf's wife, packed the meat of two calves tight in a little black earthen pan, with a seasoning of herbs, and baked it in the bread oven, and the result was excellent.

The slaves are now coming down the river by hundreds every week, and are very cheap twelve or twenty pounds for a fine boy, and nine pounds and upwards for a girl. I heard that the last gellab (or slave-dealer) who called, offered a woman and baby for anything one would give for them, on account of the trouble of the baby. By the bye, Mabrook displays the negro talent for babies; now that Achmet is gone, who scolded them and drove them out, Mohammed's children, quite babies, are for ever trotting about "Maboo," as they pronounce his name, and he talks incessantly to them; he is of the sons of Anak, and already as big and as strong as a man, with the most prodigious chest and limbs. . .

...

I am a special favourite with all the young lads; they must not talk much before grown men, so they come and sit on the floor round my feet, and ask questions and advice, and enjoy themselves amazingly. "Hobbe-de-hoyhood" is very different here from what it is with us; they care earlier for the affairs of the grown-up world, and are more curious and more polished, but they lack the fine animal gaiety of our boys; the girls here are much more gamin than the boys, and more romping and joyous.

It is very warm now. I who worship

"Amun Ra," love to feel the Shem el Kebir (the big sun) in his glory. It is long since I have had letters; Ilong to hear how you all are.

I am to inherit another little blackie from some people in Keneh :-the funniest little fellow. I hope he will be as good and innocent as Mabrook. I can't think why I go on expecting so-called savages to be different from other people. Mabrook's simple talk about his village, and the animals, and the victuals; and how the men of a neighbouring village stole him in order to sell him for a gun (the price of a gun is a boy), but were prevented by a razzia of Turks, &c. who killed the first aggressors, and took all the children;-all this he tells just as an English boy might tell of bird-nesting; he has the same general notions of right and wrong and yet his tribe have neither bread nor any sort of clothes, nor cheese nor butter; nor have they even milk to drink, nor even the African beer (mereessah); and it always rains there, and is always deadly cold at night, so that without a fire they would die. They have two products of civilization, guns and tobacco, for which they pay in boys or girls whom they steal. The country is called "Sowaghli,” and the next people are Mueseh," on the sea-coast, and it is not so hot as Egypt. It must be the Suaheli country, on the mainland, opposite Zanzibar. The new "négrillon" is from Darfoor; won't Maurice be amused by his attendants? the Darfoor boy will trot after him, as he can shoot and clean guns,-tiny as he is. I wish he may stay the winter here; I really think he would enjoy it.

19th April.

Since the hot weather has come I am mending. I expect my boat up in two or three weeks, and next month I will start down the river; it will be time to make plans for next winter when I am in Cairo. . . . Mustafa will go down with me, and in return will send my horse and sais in a boat with his two horses. I shall be very glad of his company, and it will be very convenient. Perhaps Yussuf will come too.

I have been much amused lately by a new acquaintance who, in romances of the last century, would be called an "Arabian sage." Sheykh Abdurrachman lives in a village half a day's journey off, and came over to visit me, and to doctor me according to the science of Galen and Avicenna. Fancy a tall, thin, graceful man, with a grey beard and liquid eyes, absorbed in studies of the obsolete kind, a doctor of theology, law, medicine, and astronomy! We spent three days in arguing and questioning. I consented to swallow a potion or two which he made up before me, of very innocent materials. My friend is neither a quack nor superstitious, and two hundred years ago would have been a better physician than most in Europe. Indeed I would rather swallow his physic now than that of an Italian M.D. I found him, like all the learned theologians I have known, extremely liberal and tolerant. You can conceive nothing more interesting and curious than the conversation of a man learned and intelligent, and yet utterly ignorant of all modern Western science. If I was pleased with him, he was enchanted with me, and swore by God that I was a mufti indeed, and that a man could nowhere spend time so delightfully as in conversation with me. He said he had been acquainted with two or three Englishmen who had pleased him much, but that if all Englishwomen were like me the power must necessarily be in our hands, for that my "akl" was far above that of the men he had known. He objected to our medicine, that it seemed to consist in palliatives, which he rather scorned, and aimed always at a radical cure. I told him that if he had studied anatomy he would know that radical cures were difficult of performance, and he ended by lamenting his ignorance of English or some European language, and that he had not learned our "Elm" (science) also. Then we plunged into sympathies, mystic numbers, and the occult virtues of stones, &c.; and I swallowed my mixture (consisting of liquorice, cummin, and soda) just as the sun entered a particular house and the

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moon was in some favourable aspect. He praised to me his friend, a learned Jew of Cairo. I could have fancied myself listening to Abu Suleyman of Cordova, in the days when we were barbarians and the Arabs were the learned race. There is something very winning in the gentle dignified manners of all the men of learning I have seen here, and their homely dress and habits make it still more striking. I longed to photograph my sheykh as he sat on my divan pulling manuscripts out of his bosom to read to me the words of "El Hakeem Lokman," or to overwhelm me with the authority of some physician whose very name I had never heard.

The hand of the Government is awfully heavy upon us. All this week the people have been working night and day cutting their unripe corn, because 310 men are to go to-morrow to work on the railway below Sioot. This green corn is of course valueless to sell and unwholesome to eat. So the magnificent harvest of this year is turned to bitterness at the last moment. From a neighbouring village all the men are gone, and some more are wanted to make up the corvée The population of Luxor is 1,000 males of all ages, so you can guess how many strong men are left after 310 are taken.

The poor Copts are working away today at their 450 "rekahs" (prostrations) which take place on Good Friday: how tired and faint they will be to start to-morrow for the works, after fifty-five days' hard fasting, too!

The new black boy who is coming to me is, I am told, a Coptic Christian, which is odd, as he is from Darfoor, which is a Mahommedan country. Mabrook suits me better and better; he has a very good, kind disposition; I have grown very fond of him.

I am

sure you will be pleased with his pleasant, honest face. I don't like to think too much about seeing you and M- next winter for fear I should be disappointed. If I am too sick and wretched I can hardly wish you to

come, because I know what a nuisance it is to be with one always coughing and panting, and unable to do like other people. But if I pick up tolerably this summer, I shall be very glad to see you and him once more.

This house is falling sadly into decay, which produces snakes and scorpions. I sent for the "Hawee" or charmer, who caught a snake, but who can't conjure the scorpions out of their holes. One of my fat turkeys has just fallen a victim, and I am in constant fear for my little dog, Bob, only he is always in Omar's arms. I think I described to you the festival of Sheykh Gibrieel: the dinner, and the poets who improvised; this year I had a fine piece of declamation in my honour. A real calamity is the loss of our good Maohn. The Mudir hailed him from his steamer to go to Keneh directly, with no further notice. We hoped some good luck for him, and so it would have been to a Turk. He is made "Nazer el Gisr" over the poor people the railroad works. He only gets 21. 58. per month additional, and has to keep a horse and a donkey, and to buy them, and keep a sais, and he does not know how to squeeze the fellaheen. It is true, "however close you skin an onion, a clever man can always peel it again ;" which means that even the poorest devils at the works can be beaten into giving a little more; but our dear Maohn, God bless him, will be ruined and made miserable by his promotion. I had a very woeful letter from him yesterday.

THEBES, 15th May.

at

All the Christendom of Upper Egypt is in a state of excitement owing to the arrival of the Patriarch of Cairo, who is now in Luxor. My neighbour Mikaeel entertains him, and Omar has been busily decorating his house, and arranging the illumination of his garden; and to-day is gone to cook the confectionery, he being looked on as the person best acquainted with the customs of the great. Last night the Patriarch sent for me, and I went to

was a very droll caricature of the thunder of the Vatican. Poor Mikaeel had planned that I was to dine with the Patriarch, and had borrowed my silver spoons, &c. &c. &c. in that belief. But the representative of St. Mark is furious. against the American missionaries, who have converted some twenty Copts at Koos, and he could not bring himself to be decently civil to a Protestant. I found a coarse-looking man seated on a raised divan, smoking his chibouk: on his right were some priests on a low divan. I went up and kissed his hand, was about to sit by the priests, but he roughly ordered a cavass to put a wooden chair off the carpet to his left, at a distance from him, and told me to sit there. I looked round to see whether any of my neighbours were present, and I saw consternation in their faces; so, not wishing to annoy them, I did as if I did not perceive the affront, and sat down and talked for half an hour to the priests, and then took leave. Mikaeel's servant brought a pipe, but the Patriarch bawled at him to take it away, and then poor Mikaeel asked his leave to give me a cup of coffee, which was granted. I was informed that "the Catholics were Maas messakeen (inoffensive people), and that the Muslims at least were of an old religion, but that the Protestants ate meat all the year round, like dogs," -"or Muslims," put in Omar, who stood behind my chair, and did not relish the mention of dogs and of the "English religion" in one sentence. As I went, the Patriarch called for dinner; it seems he had told Mikaeel he would not eat with me. It is evidently "a judgment" of a most signal

nature that I should be snubbed for the offences of missionaries, but it has caused some ill-blood, the Cadee and Sheykh Yussuf, and the rest, who all intended to do the civil to the Patriarch, now won't go near him, on account of his rudeness to me. He has come up in a steamer at the Pasha's expense, with a guard of cavasses, and of course is loud in praise of the government, though he failed in getting the Mudir

the public works or the army.1

Yesterday I heard a little whispered murmuring about the money demanded by the "Father". one of my Copt neighbours was forced to sell me his whole provision of cooking-butter to pay his quota. This a little damps the exultation caused by seeing him so honoured by the Pasha. Keneh gave him 200 purses (6007.). I do not know what Luxor has given yet, but it falls heavy on the top of all the other taxes. One man, who had heard that he called the American missionaries "beggars," grumbled to me- "Ah, yes, beggars, beggars; they did not ask me for any money." I really do think that there must be something, in this dread of the Protestant movement. Evidently the Pasha is backing up the Patriarch, who keeps his Church well apart from all other Christians, and well under the thumb of the Turks.

It was pretty to hear the priests talk so politely of Islam, and curse the Protestants so bitterly. We were very near having a row about

a

woman who formerly turned Muslimeh to get rid of an old blind Copt husband, who had been forced upon her, and was permitted to recant, I suppose, in order to get rid of the Muslim husband in his turn. However, he said, "I don't care, she is the mother of my two children; and whether she is Muslim or Christian, she is my wife, and I won't divorce her, but I'll send her to church as much as she likes." Therefore the priests, of course, dropped the wrangle, much to the relief of Yussuf, in whose house she had taken up her quarters after leaving the church, and who was afraid of being drawn into a dispute.

My new little Darfoor boy is very

1 Since the above was written three Protestant converts were seized at Koos by the directions of the Patriarch, and sent up the river to the White Nile. It is believed that instructions had been given to throw them overboard as soon as they were at a safe distance. Through the vigorous interposition, however, of the English and American consulsgeneral, the Government was compelled to send after them, and they have been restored to their homes.-EDITOR.