CHAPTER XVII.

Tombs at Benihassan Boat aground-CairoThe Esbekya-Abbas Pacha and the PorteThe Census Cairene ladies Their evening parties-Palaces of the Pacha-The Overland Route-An American-Mehemet Ali's Palace.

AT sun-rise we made a start, and so did a stiff breeze from the north, which presently brought us on a bank, where there were already two or three rafts from Keneh, laden with pottery. These are constructed of

palm branches resting upon hundreds of large jars fastened together, on these are placed a similar layer of jars—above which a kind of canopy is raised to shelter the men. The voyage takes ninety days from Keneh to Cairo.

We had passed Manfaloot with its numerous fields of sugar cane during the night, and at three o'clock a large factory, where sugar is refined. For miles round, sugar canes grow in extraordinary profusion, the land being beautifully irrigated by a waterpump worked by steam, twenty miles up the

stream.

At half-past seven we arrived at Benihassan. The sepulchre is situated at the base of a mountain, formed of regular steps or strata. There are, I believe, thirty tombs ; but we satisfied ourselves with an inspection

of the three most important ones. They are

very similar, consisting of a portico of two fluted columns, and a large square room in the interior, with four or six columns of an extremely simple and elegant character, supporting an arched roof, painted red and white, chess-board fashion. The walls are coloured and covered with wonderful paintings, having such subjects as a galley sailing on the Nile, in the transparent water of which fishes are swimming, and a hippopotamus disporting a series of wrestlers, in fifty different postures-then came flax-dressers and cloth manufacturers, glass-blowers and ironmongers-a barber operating on a young man, apparently for the first time, for the indications of beard are very faint—a doctor bleeding an unfortunate wretch who appears to have drank too much nectar over night--men and women being bastinadoed-dwarfs in the trains of noble Egyptians: an example

of that patronage of littleness which became fashionable in Europe two thousand years later -sportsmen catching ibex with a noose, and gazelles just caught by grey-hounds-herds tended by cripples, having but one leg or one arm, or exhibiting a withered and useless limb, reminding one of the verse of Genesis that describes every shepherd as an abomination to the Egyptians.

Our brilliant torch illumined these scenes splendidly; indeed, we beheld them to much greater advantage than we could have done by day the door then giving the only light by which they can be seen. As we returned into the bright moonlight, the sand looked so much like snow, that the night air could scarcely dispel the illusion.

We passed Minieh in the night, and then a breeze sprung up, that shortly turned to a gale, which so alarmed our Reis

that he wanted to stop at Colosaneh, which we were closely approaching. This village being famous for lentils, we were suspicious that he thought more of soup than of wind, and were for proceeding, when the gusts came on sharper, and therefore we agreed to anchor. Unfortunately we were not quite quick enough, a gust drove us on a bank in the very middle of the stream, and the boat swung round to the wind. The crew soon got us off, and we were presently moored to the bank where we were glad enough to find ourselves in safety: not the less satisfied were we when we beheld a boat fill in the same place, a few minutes later, and in less than half an hour another capsize.

Some hours subsequently, we again made sail; but the wind just allowed us to get into the middle of the stream, when we