"It spells S-a-h-i-d out here when you mean the port at the entrance of the Suez Canal," replied the captain quietly and with a smile.
"Oh, you have become an Arabian scholar!" exclaimed Felix with a hearty laugh.
"Honestly, Flix, I did not understand what you meant. I have studied up the navigation in this region," continued Captain Scott, as he took from a drawer in the case on which the binnacle stood a small plan of the port in question. "Look at that, Flix, and tell me what the diæresis over the i in Saïd is for."
"It means that the two vowels in the word are to be pronounced separately, and I stand corrected," answered Felix promptly.
"I did not mean to correct you; for I make too many blunders myself to pick up another fellow for doing so. I only wanted to explain why I did not understand you. I had got used to pronouncing it Sah-eed, and Sed does not sound much like it, and I did not take in what you meant, and thought you were talking about some port in the island of Cyprus, where we are bound."
"I accept your apology, Captain, and shift all the guilt to my own shoulders. Now may I ask how far it is from here to Port Sah-eed?" replied Felix very good-naturedly.
"It is 101.76 miles, by which, of course, I mean knots. I figured it up from a point north of Rosetta," added the navigator.
"Won't you throw off the fraction?"
"No; if you run one hundred and one miles only, you will fetch up three-quarters of a knot to the westward of the red light at the end of the breakwater."
"That is putting a fine point on it; but I will go on the hurricane deck and see what the Fatty is about," replied Felix.