We were all crowding to the handrail looking overboard. The Egyptian sunset had just vanished and the deep blue of an Eastern night held the docks in a haze of gloom.
The pipe band of the Inniskillings was playing “The Wearin' o' the Green” in that mournful, gurgling chant which we came to know so well.
One of the little Egyptian beggar-girls was dancing to it on the floating quay down below us by the flicker of the arc-lamp. She was a tiny mite, with a shock of black hair and brown face and arms. She wore a pink dress with some brass buttons hung round her neck. She danced with all the supple gracefulness of the out-door tribes of the desert, never out of step, always true and rhythmic in every motion of arms and body.
When the pipes on board trailed away with a hiss of wind and a choking, gurgling noise into silence the little dancing girl began to sing in a deep, musical voice—the voice of one who has lived out-of-doors in tents—
“Itta long way—Tipple-airy!
—Long way to go!
—Long way—Tipple-airy!
Sweetie girl I know!...”
She sang in broken English, and danced to the tune, which she knew perfectly.
The khaki crowd aboard whistled and cheered and laughed. Some one threw a penny. The whole gang of beggars scrambled after it, and there ensued a scrimmage with much shouting and swearing in Arabic.
We could see the city lit up beyond the dull gray docks.
Next morning we went for a route march through Alexandria. We marched through the dockyards. Gangs of native workmen in native costume-coloured robes and bare feet, turbans and red fezes—were working on the transports, unloading box after box of bully-beef and biscuit and piling them in huge “dumps” on the quays. Rusty chains clanked, steam cranes rattled and puffed out whiffs of white steam.
But they did not hustle or hurry. They worked under the direction of English sergeants and officers, loading and unloading.