It is now six weeks since I said that, but as yet he has made no reply.
XI
THE NILE
In travelling abroad there are some things which you wish to do more than others. There are certain treasures you particularly desire to see, certain scenes your mind has pictured, until the dream has almost become a reality. The ascent of the Nile was one of my Meccas, and now that it is over the reality has almost become a dream.
In Egypt the weather is so nearly perfect during the season that it was no surprise to find the day of our departure a cloudless one. I seldom worry myself to arrange beforehand for the creature comforts of a journey, trusting to the beneficent star which seems to hover over the unworthy to shine upon my pathway. But this time I had so dreamed of and brooded over and longed for the Nile that I went so far as to investigate the different lines of boats, and we chose the moonlight time of the month, and we hurried through Russia and Turkey and Greece with but one aim in view, and that was to have our feet on the deck of the Mayflower on the 19th of February. And we succeeded.
Ah, it was a dream well worth realizing! Twenty-one days of rest. Three glorious weeks of smooth sailing over calm waters. Three weeks of warmth and sunshine by day, and of poetry and starlight by night. Three weeks of drifting in the romance which surrounds the name of that great sorceress, that wonderful siren, that consummate coquette, that most fascinating woman the world has ever known. Three weeks of steeping one’s soul in the oldest, most complete and satisfactory ruins on the face of the earth. Here, in delving into the past, we would have no use for the comparative word “hundreds.” We could boldly use the superlative word “thousands.” What memories! what dreams! what fragments of half-forgotten history and romance came floating through the brain! I have, generally, little use for guide-books except, afterwards, to verify what I have seen. But I admit that I had an especial longing to reach the temple of Denderah, which was said to contain the most famous relief of Cleopatra extant. I was anxious to see if her beauty or her charm or anything which accounted for her sorceries were reproduced. “If Cleopatra’s nose had been shorter, the whole history of the world would have been changed.” How far away she seemed! How near she would become!
On the terrace at Shepheard’s the morning of our departure you could see by people’s faces how they were going to make this journey. Some had Stanley helmets on, and were laden with cushions and steamer-chairs and fruits as if for an ocean voyage. Others were clutching their Baedeker, and their Amelia Edwards, and their “Kismet,” and their note-books, and wore a do-or-die expression of countenance. One or two others floated around aimlessly, with dreamy eyes, as if they were already lost in the past which now pressed so closely at hand. Then the coach from the Gehzireh Palace rolled by in a cloud of dust, and people hurried down the steps of Shepheard’s and took their places in our coach, and the dragomans in their gorgeous costumes followed with wraps, and the porters bustled about stowing away hand-luggage, and Arabs crowded near, thrusting their violets and roses and amber necklaces and beaded fly-brushes into your very face, and the old man who sells turquoises made his last effort to sell you a set for shirt-studs, and the Egyptians and East-Indians from the bazaars opposite came to the door and looked on with the perennial interest and friendliness of the Orient, and a swarm of beggars pleaded, with the excitement of a last chance, for backsheesh, and there was a babel of tongues—French, English, Italian, German, and Arabic, all hurtling about your ears like so many verbal bullets in a battle, when suddenly the door slammed, the driver cracked his whip, the coach lurched forward, the children scattered—and we were off.
Everybody knows when a boat starts up the Nile, and everybody is interested and nods and waves to everybody else. There was a short drive to the river amid polite calls of “good-bye” and “bon voyage,” and there lay the Mayflower, like a great white bird with comfortably folded wings. Nobody seemed to hurry much, for a Nile boat does not start until her passengers are all on board. An hour or so makes no difference.
You go down the bank of the Nile to go on board a boat upon steps cut in the earth, and if your hands are full and you cannot hold up your dress, you sweep some three inches of fine yellow dust after you. But you don’t care. The man ahead scuffed his dust in your face, and the woman behind you is sneezing in yours, and everything and everybody are a little yellowish from it, but nobody stops to brush it off. It is too exciting to hurry up on deck and place your steamer-chair and fling your things into your stateroom and rush out again for fear that you will miss something. There were Italians, French, English, Poles, Swedes, and Americans on board. Some of them had titles. Some had only bad manners, with nothing to excuse them. But, after all, everybody was nice, I got through the whole three weeks without hating anybody and with only wanting to drown one passenger. What better record of amiability could you ask?
But one thing marred the start. This Anglo-American line of boats is the only line in Egypt which flies the American flag. That was the final inducement they offered which decided my choice of the Mayflower. But while we knew that she was obliged to fly the British flag also, we were indignant beyond words to see a huge Union Jack floating at the top of the forward flagstaff and beneath it a toy American flag about the size of a cigar-box. Beneath the English flag! I nearly wept with rage. The owner of the line was at hand, and I did not wait to draw up a petition or to consult my fellow-Americans. I just said: “Have the goodness to haul down that infant American flag, will you? I have no objection to sailing under both, but I do object to such an insulting disparity in size. Besides that, you seem to have forgotten that the American flag never flies below any other flag on God’s green earth!”
He made some apologies, and gave the order at once. The baby was hauled down amid the smiles of the English passengers. But at Assiout we were avenged when an enormous American flag arrived by rail and was hoisted to the main flagstaff, twenty feet higher than the British. When I came out on deck that Sunday morning, and saw that blessed flag waving above me, everything blurred before my eyes, and I do assure you that it was the most beautiful sight I saw in all of that European continent. You may talk about your temples and your ruins and your old masters! Have you ever seen “Old Glory” flying straight out from a flagstaff in a foreign country seven thousand miles away from home?