Again there was a day full of interest—bartering with natives, watching the coolies coaling, cheering Australian transports as they entered the basin, and examining the mixture of shipping in the port.
CHAPTER V
ASHORE AGAIN
Late in the same afternoon the New Zealand ships put to sea, under orders to steam individually at slow speed to meet off Alexandria at dawn. There was not a great deal of settled sleep that night, for all men were busy packing kit-bags and putting in order shore-going clothes. The days of decks, bare feet and semi-nakedness were at an end, and to-morrow would start again the life of boots and puttees, saddles and tents. Men stood in small groups along the deck, shown only by the embers of pipes and the occasional glow of a match. They watched the low line of the Egyptian shore, deep black against a sky which seemed vaster than usual and more brilliant with stars, and were exhilarated by the knowledge that they would disembark to-morrow in that queer old country. The mess room was filled for a while with a cheery, laughing crowd to hear words of warning from an old soldier concerning the joys and sorrows of Cairo and a few general instructions on life in Egypt.
The ships stood in towards the entrance to the port just as the rising sun gilded the houses and minarets of Alexandria. Soon the gangway was dropped for a pilot to come abroad, and shortly with much chattering that gentleman appeared on the bridge. The Captain gazed on the apparition with horror, and the signallers, in security behind the flag locket, were convulsed with mirth. A pale, underfed little Hebrew, not, apparently, the cleanest specimen of its race, clad in something like a dressing-gown and a pair of bath slippers, and topped off by a red tarboosh tilted well back and continuing the contour of its nose, it looked about as capable of piloting a ship as a waste-paper-basket. It chattered away cheerfully to every one on the bridge in a strange lingo, waved its hands alternately here, there and everywhere, and faced in all directions in the attitudes of ancient mural figures. It was serenely unheeding of the business in hand, of the fact that four ships, occupying the narrow fairway ahead, were slowing down, and that three others were coming rapidly up behind, promising trouble.
The skipper recovered from his astonishment.
"Which way?" he said, interrupting a friendly jabber to the third officer.
The figure raised its eyebrows, bared its rabbit teeth and, wildly waving its arms, poured a stream of unintelligible jargon in the skipper's direction.
"Shall I stop her?" yelled the skipper.
A wide, inclusive sweep of the arms was the only reply and the jabbering increased.