panta

Arabs, well-dressed merchants, Turkish officers, and veiled beauties, there were numbers of Maltese masqueraders loons, clowns, ballet girls, drunken sailors— acted as well as real. In one khan a body of zealous Mussulmen were performing the dervish dances; in the next, a group of pleasure-loving Arabs were encoring a dance by the Almi dancing girls. A few yards further on a barrel organ was giving forth Jeannette and Jeannot, and on the opposite side a pretty girl, with a melodious voice, was reciting the touching loves of Bour ad Esseen and the daughter of the Great Wezeer, from the Arabian Nights.

Solos, male and female, varied the scene here and there; and, as a contrast, an old merchant might be observed reading the Koran to a select circle of smoking friends.

As I passed along, the streets were

brilliantly illuminated; but suddenly I found myself on the shore of the deep blue sea, and nothing was heard but the waves breaking on the beach, and dashing over the bar, reminding me of the exclamation of Napoleon: "Alexandrie doit être la capitale du monde." All was dark, save where the moonbeam falling on the rough water, cast a trembling light on the dancing boats half drawn up on the shore. Not a human being was visible, except in one direction, where a young Arab girl was silently weeping over a child that had just expired.

The contrast was exceedingly striking: from the brilliance of art to the calm beauty of nature, and from the busy hum of life to the solemn sorrow of death.

CHAPTER XIX.

Sale by auction-Dinner and ball-Ride from Alex

andria Rain-water lakes Effects of distance

Ancient house-A wonderful Englishwoman— A midnight serenade-A parting scene-Farewell to Egypt.

WHILE visiting the Minister of Commerce, there took place a sale by auction of wheat and other grains. About one hundred gentlemen, chiefly Greeks, made their appearance and sat round on the divan;

VOL. II.

U

a little man of rather curious appearance then entered and, in Italian, announced a lot of one thousand ardebs of wheat, proposing forty piastres as a just price. This he shouted out for about ten minutes, when the gentleman who sat next me cried "Quaranta un quarto" and after a good deal of shouting the lot was finally knocked down to him, no one making any bid either for that lot or any other.

These sales are to dispose of the produce of the land belonging to Government, and that which comes into its possession in the way of taxes. The news from England happened to be unsatisfactory, or the bidding would have been more exciting.

In the evening we joined an English dinner-party; and after our six months' experience of boats, deserts and mud houses, as may be readily imagined, we thoroughly

enjoyed ourselves over an excellent English dinner, served in a capital English diningroom, followed by capital tea, and then "Kathleen Mavourneen," sung by English ladies in one of the most elegant drawingrooms I had ever entered.

We heard that there was also a ball-not exactly the entertainment so familar to us in England. In Alexandria the company commence dancing at nine o'clock in the evening, the gentleman of the house locking every one out at twelve. This was a very grand affairfive hundred persons being present, among whom were Said Pacha and Achmet Bey, the two next heirs to the vice-regal throne. The supper, which was excellent, was furnished by the hotel, a door having been broken through the wall of the next house, to assist in effecting the necessary arrange

ments.