The janissary spoke very tolerable English, and after sunset, when we seated ourselves outside the cabin-door, he came forward and entered into conversation. He told us that a quarrel having taken place between the boatmen of a small vessel and the people of a village, the former came on board in great numbers in the night, and murdered six of the boatmen; and that on the affair being represented to the Pasha, he sent three hundred soldiers to the village, and razed it to the ground. He said that he had been in the service of several English gentlemen, and had once an opportunity of going to England with a captain in the navy, but that his mother was alive at that time, and when he mentioned his wishes to her, she cried, and therefore he could not go. The captain had told him that he would always repent not having taken his offer; but though he wished to see England, he was glad he had not grieved his mother. He had been at Malta, but had taken a dislike to the Maltese, in consequence of a wrong he had received, as a stranger, upon his landing.
Amongst the noblemen and gentlemen whom he had served, he mentioned the Marquess of Waterford. We asked him what sort of a person he was, and he immediately replied, "A young devil." Mohammed, who had been in various services with English travellers, expressed a great desire to go to England; he said, that if he could once get there, he would "never return to this dirty country." Both he and the janissary apparently had formed magnificent ideas of the wealth of Great Britain, from the lavish manner in which the English are accustomed to part with their money while travelling.
We inquired of Mohammed concerning the magician, whose exploits Mr. Lane and other authors have recorded. At first, he did not understand what we meant; but, upon further explanation, told us that he thought the whole an imposture. He said, that when a boy, about the age of the Arab captain's son, who was on board, he was in the service of a lady who wished to witness the exhibition, and who selected him as the medium of communication, because she said that she knew he would tell her the truth. The ceremonies, therefore, commenced; but though anxiously looking into the magic mirror, he declared that he saw nothing: afterwards, he continued, "A boy was called out of the bazaar, who saw all that the man told him." But while Mohammed expressed his entire disbelief in the power of this celebrated person, he was not devoid of the superstition of his creed and country, for he told us that he knew of another who really did wonderful things. He then asked us what we had called the Mughreebee whom we had described to him: we replied, a magician; and he and the janissary repeated the word over many times, in order to make themselves thoroughly acquainted with it. In all cases, they were delighted with the acquisition of a new word, and were very thankful to me when I corrected their pronunciation. Thus, when the janissary showed me what he called kundergo, growing in the fields, and explained that it made a blue dye, and I told him that we called it indigo, he never rested until he had learned the word, which he repeated to Mohammed and Mohammed to him. I never met with two more intelligent men in their rank of life, or persons who would do greater credit to their teachers; and brief as has been my intercourse with the Egyptians, I feel persuaded, that a good method of imparting knowledge is all that is wanting to raise them in the scale of nations.
During our progress up the river, I had been schooling myself, and endeavouring to keep down my expectations, lest I should be disappointed at the sight of the Pyramids. We were told that we should see them at the distance of five-and-thirty miles; and when informed that they were in view, my heart beat audibly as I threw open the cabin door, and beheld them gleaming in the sun, pure and bright as the silvery clouds above them. Far from being disappointed, the vastness of their dimensions struck me at once, as they rose in lonely majesty on the bare plain, with nothing to detract from their grandeur, or to afford, by its littleness, a point of comparison. We were never tired of gazing upon these noble monuments of an age shrouded in impenetrable mystery. They were afterwards seen at less advantage, in consequence of the intervention of some rising ground; but from all points they created the strongest degree of interest.
We had a magnificent thunder-storm just as it was growing dark, and the red lightning lit up the pyramids, which came out, as it were, from the black masses of clouds behind them, while the broad waters of the Nile assumed a dark and troubled aspect. The scene was sublime, but of short duration; for the tempest speedily rolled off down the river; when, accompanied by a squall and heavy rain, it caught several boats, which were obliged to put into the shore. We did not experience the slightest inconvenience; and though the latter part of the voyage had been protracted from want of wind, arrived at the port of Boulak at half-past nine on the second evening of our embarkation.
CHAPTER V.
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CAIRO.
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Arrival at Boulak—Description of the place—Moolid, or Religious Fair—Surprise of the People—The Hotel at Cairo—Description of the City—The Citadel—View from thence—The City—The Shops—The Streets—The interior of the Pasha's Palace—Pictures—Furniture—Military Band—Affray between a Man and Woman—Indifference of the Police to Street Broils—Natives beaten by Englishmen—Visit to an English Antiquary—By-ways of the City—Interior of the Houses—Nubian Slave-market—Gypsies—Preparations for Departure to Suez—Mode of driving in the Streets of Cairo—Leave the City—The Changes in travelling in Egypt—Attractions of Cairo.