But though life was uneventful, it was very pleasant on the ship, and all were sorry when the cruise came to an end.
I remember the last night at dinner in the wardroom the name of a distinguished Admiral occurred in the conversation. He was a man who had a great reputation for capacity and also eccentricity, that came mainly from his habit of concentrated thinking. When he was deep in thought and his eyes caught any bright object, he would go up to it like a magpie and play with it. He would sometimes go up and fiddle with the button of a junior officer on the quarter-deck, looking at it very attentively, to the great discomfort of the junior officer, or even with that of a stranger to whom he had been introduced. The legend grew from this idiosyncrasy, that those may believe who wish to. It was said that one night at a dance he sat out for a long time with a girl in a black dress. His eye caught a white thread on her shoulder, and unconsciously while he talked he began pulling at it. The story goes on to say that when the girl went home she said to her mother: “I know I went out with a vest to-night, and now I wonder what has happened to it.”
I remember at the same dinner Dr. Levick, who had been with Captain Scott in the Antarctic voyage, told a curious story of prophecy. He had been to a fortune-teller after the idea of going with Captain Scott had occurred to him, but before he had taken any steps. The fortune-teller gave a description of the melancholy place where he was to live for two years, of the unknown men who were to be his companions, and particularly one who had strangely flecked hair.
I returned to Cairo and office work with some reluctance. Friends of mine and I took a house, which somehow managed to run itself, in Gezireh. It was covered with Bougainvillea and flowers of every colour, and was a delight to see. Sometimes it lacked servants completely, and at other times there was a black horde. Gardeners sprang up as if by enchantment, and made things grow almost before one’s eyes.
I quote from my diary of March 8, 1915:—
News to-day that King Constantine won’t have Greece come in, and that Venizelos has resigned. At a guess, this means that either Greece or King Constantine is lost. If Constantine goes, Venizelos might shepherd his son through his minority.
March 14, 1915. I left Luxor Tuesday night, after a wonderful time. My guide was a Senoussi—something-or-other Galleel. He had a tip of white turban hanging, which he said was a sign of his people. He was rather like one of the Arabs out of a Hichens book, and I expect about as genuine. A snake-charmer came with us. He gave me the freedom of the snakes as a man is given the freedom of a city, but as one scorpion and two snakes—one of them a so-to-speak soi-disant cobra—stung and bit him during the day, it’s not likely to be of much help to me. He did some very mysterious things, and called snakes from every kind of place—one from a window in the wall, a 5-foot long cobra, and a Coptic cook found its old skin in the next window.
In justice to the snake-charmer it ought to be said that he was only stung and bitten as a consequence of a quarrel with an archæologist.