A SAILOR TO SUEZ
THE first-class fare on the large liners from Bombay to the Suez Canal
was two hundred and twenty dollars. The cheapest that Richardson and
I could find was one hundred and eighty-five dollars. We had the
money to pay this price but considered that it would make a large and
unnecessary hole in our coin. We agreed not to pay a cent more than
twenty dollars each, even if it meant spending the rest of our lives in
Bombay. We shook hands on this.
Bombay is a large shipping port and it appeared, on first impression,
to be a fertile field from which two semi-stranded roamers could obtain
passage. We made a thorough canvass of the water front in search of a
job. Richardson would strike the skipper of one ship while I tried my
luck with another, or we would board the same boat together, one of
us interview the captain while the other placed the case before the
steward. We hung out at the Seamen's Institute, skippers' clubs, water
front saloons, sailors' rest houses and about the docks. It was uphill
work for we received little encouragement and, often, short and rough
treatment at the hands of the hardened old seamen. We didn't give up
our search until we had visited all the vessels in the harbour--which
took up the greater part of three days. We could find nothing. It was
impossible for us to compete with Oriental, South African and Hindu
labour on these ships, not to mention the practical impossibility of
living on their diet and in their unsanitary quarters. We finally and
reluctantly gave up hope of getting out as toilers and decided to do
the next best thing. We began our campaign over again and visited all
the freighters, asking the captains how much they wanted in money to
take us to the Canal. Many of them were insulted at such a proposal.
Some regretfully said that their owners had rigid rules against taking
any one. Others wanted more than our twenty-dollar limit.
Our luck had been pretty tough and was due to change. We boarded the
steamer _Levanzo_, an old-time Italian freighter, which had ploughed
the sea for centuries, if her looks indicated anything. We marched
straight up to the bridge where the old skipper was standing, smoking a
pipe with an odour strong enough to kill a hog.
"Do you speak English?" I enquired.
"A little," was the reply.
"Which way are you going?" was my second question.
"To Napoli," said the Italian.
"When do you get under way?"
"To-morrow afternoon at one o'clock."
"What do you want to take the two of us through the Canal?"
"I will take you for sixty rupees (twenty dollars) each, I think," he
said after a minute's reflection.
"All right."
The captain explained that we must sign on as members of the crew,
for he was not allowed to take passengers and we should have to be
accounted for both at departure and arrival. We signed up without
delay; Richardson as assistant cook and I as deck hand.
Although the boat was not scheduled to leave until one o'clock the
following afternoon we were instructed to be on hand at ten in the
morning for a quarantine inspection. It is a regulation that the crews
of all ships leaving Indian ports have to be examined before the
authorities will issue clearing papers, thus insuring that no Indian
disease will be transmitted to Europe. Richardson and I lined up at the
appointed hour the next day with the rest of the crew and filed by the
doctors while they gave us a farcical examination.
This proceeding lasted only a few minutes and at its completion we were
driven through the quarantine sheds to the wharf. It was then two hours
before our ship was to leave and Richardson returned to town to bid
farewell to our friends who had entertained us. I took all the luggage
and went to the boat.
At one o'clock, the hour that the _Levanzo_ was to get under way,
Richardson had not returned. The British quarantine doctor issued an
order for the crew to come off the ship and line up so as to file on
one at a time. He beckoned to me and I came down the gangway and fell
in at the rear.
"Where's your friend?" the doctor asked, abruptly, addressing me.
"He's not here," I replied with an attempted evasion of the question,
not wishing to divulge the fact that my partner had broken quarantine.
"He has broken quarantine and can't go on this ship," the officer said,
angrily. "Do you want to go without him?"
I said nothing.
"You must make up your mind at once," added the doctor.
"All right, I will go." I thought that the officer didn't mean every
word and that Richardson would arrive in a few minutes and have no
difficulty in getting aboard.
The motley Italian crew ascended the gangway and, as I was the last one
to go aboard, the plank was removed and several sailors began loosening
the lines. I went up on the stern to look across the wharf to see if
Richardson was in sight. He was not. The ship was pulling away from
the pier. Ideas flew through my mind like water through a sieve. I
had all Richardson's baggage and what was worse I had all his money.
From Bombay to Suez was three thousand miles. It took at least ten
days to make the trip. To leave Richardson stranded on the shores of
India would be nothing short of murder. I was provoked at him for not
appearing but my conscience vibrated with the guilty pangs of deserting
my friend and leaving him probably to starve in a strange land. As
these alternating emotions were flashing in and out of my mind, the bow
of the ship was swinging away from the pier. At last I saw Richardson's
head bobbing in the distance. I shouted, whistled and waved. My frantic
efforts finally instilled in him the necessity for speed. He came
bounding down the wharf like a big calf and attempted to board the
ship. He was abruptly stopped by the captain, who ordered him to stay
off. The marine doctor had left and there was nothing for me to do but
to go on without my companion. The _Levanzo_ was now making her final
swing and I threw Richardson's luggage onto the wharf, hurled him his
money wallet and bade him farewell.
"I will wait for you in Cairo," I shouted as the boat was getting under
way. Richardson stood on the pier with a philosophic smile.
"All right. I will try and make a getaway to-night. So long."
The old Italian "battleship" was soon out in the channel and in a few
hours had her nose pointed towards the west and began her lengthy
journey to the Canal. I wondered how Richardson would fare but had
no doubt that he would get out some way. I therefore dismissed all
conjectures from my mind and decided to wait for the news until we met
some time in the future.
The _Levanzo_ was a hardened, rusty old tramp. Her crew was entirely
composed of Italians who knew little of this world beyond the range of
their ship and the water fronts of the ports to which they had sailed.
I was consigned to the hold where my iron, hay-mattressed bunk was
sandwiched in amongst those of the Italians, who huddled about like
a bunch of gypsies. The dark, foul-smelling atmosphere, the wambling
fumes of the ship's kitchen, the greasy and treacherous appearance
of the crew--none of whom spoke a word of English--promised a trip
whose equal I should never experience. However, I had done sufficient
travelling of this sort to feel at home in such surroundings and I
played the part to a perfection hard to imagine in one who had seen
most of the good things of this life. Attired in a blue flannel shirt
and khaki trousers, I went barefooted, grew a beard--such as it
was--and chewed quantities of the crew's black tobacco.
At four bells the chief steward appeared on deck and called out,
"mangiare." From the empty feeling of my stomach, coupled with the
revolting odours emanating from the galley, I recognised the equivalent
of the word _dinner_. I followed the crew in the hope of getting a
square meal. We formed a line at the kitchen window, where we were
given our eating implements for the voyage. They consisted of a tin
cup, a tin sauce-pan, a knife, fork and spoon. We then marched in a
body to the forecastle where we were given a piece of hard bread each
and a pint of red wine. As we trooped back by the kitchen, the steward
placed some macaroni in our sauce-pans and gave us some milkless and
sugarless coffee. With this assortment of food we retired to the lower
deck, sat on a winch or a coil of rope and proceeded to devour it.
The second day out I lost my knife and, when I made an appeal for
another I was so severely snubbed by the steward that I made no more
requests during the rest of the voyage. I had to resort to my pocket
knife to take the place of the lost article.
Macaroni! Macaroni! I thought my stomach would become paralysed on the
greasy stuff before the journey would end. I vowed that, if I ever
reached shore, I would never allow the word _macaroni_ to be mentioned
in my presence. The bread was actually so hard that each member of the
crew was compelled to soften it in a tub of water--provided for the
purpose--before it was possible to sink his teeth in it. When a man is
hungry enough he will eat anything. Stew that almost turned my stomach
one day and which I refused to eat, I would consider delicious the next.
From Bombay to Suez is something over three thousand miles and at
the rate our ship was travelling it would require sixteen days to
make the trip. How these days did drag--on a macaroni diet! The long,
hot, foodless days and the dark, stuffy nights in vermin-infested and
unsanitary quarters made these sixteen days seem like sixteen years.
Between meals I was supposed to assist the crew. Because I was paying
the captain a small sum for my passage I was let down rather easily on
the work. However, I had to appear busy. Each morning I scrubbed the
stern deck and gave the place a general clean-up. In the afternoon I
washed clothes in a ship-bucket or painted the iron railings and life
boats.
The days dragged slowly on, and three times between sunrise and sunset
the red wine and macaroni diet stared me in the face. We entered the
Red Sea, our journey only half completed; and the thought rose in my
mind that I had eight days more of macaroni. However, all good things
come to an end and, thank God, the bad ones are not exempt in this
respect. On the sixteenth day at midnight the _Levanzo_ pulled into
Suez, the eastern entrance of the Canal.
As soon as the old tub dropped anchor I gave the captain twenty dollars
for my passage and, with the speed of a fly, was on my way to shore in
a small boat propelled by an Arab, leaving the _Levanzo_ to sink in
her tracks for all I cared. I was taken to the Customs House where I
was subjected to the most rigid examination to be found anywhere in
the world, at the hands and mercy of impudent, coarse and treacherous
Arabs. These heavy featured, horse-sized human beings--if such they can
be called--were the worst type of men I had seen in a long time--and I
had seen some tough specimens in the past few months. Fortunately my
belongings made up such a meagre collection that I proved of little
interest to these huge parasites who prey upon innocent travellers who
wend their way through the Canal.
[Illustration: THE SPHINX]
After an ordeal that lasted two hours, in spite of the size of my
luggage, I was liberated. I wandered up the track to the station where
I learned that a train for Cairo was to leave at six o'clock in the
morning. There was an hotel at Suez but I did not care to pay four
dollars of my precious coin for an equal number of hours in bed. I
stood in front of the deserted station for something, or anything, to
happen. Presently a lean-looking Englishman ambled along. This man, who
had a face like a dried prune, entered into conversation with me and I
learned that he was a travelling acrobat who, with his wife and little
daughter, had just come in from the Far East after a theatrical tour of
several months.
"Where are you going to put up?" he asked.
"I don't know. I can't see the hotel for only four hours. I thought
I would crawl in one of those passenger coaches on the siding over
there," I said, pointing to several cars on an adjacent track.
"All right, old chap, I will go with you. Wait until I get my wife and
daughter," said the acrobat as he stepped around the corner of the
station for his family.
In a minute he returned with his wife, a London cockney type, whose
general appearance indicated that she had seen chiefly the rough spots
of this earth. She wore a dress of many colours and a hat which looked
like a vegetable salad. Clinging to her skirt was a frail little girl
who showed the effects of her wandering life. The four of us, with our
luggage, crossed the tracks and tried the doors of several cars but all
were locked. At this moment, a large greedy-looking Arab appeared out
of the darkness and asked what we wanted.
"A place to sleep," I replied.
"Come with me," blurted the man.
We were so tired that if the devil himself had appeared on the scene
and offered us a bed and shelter we would have eagerly accepted. We
followed this burly human being and he led us to a small shed about ten
by twelve feet. He opened the door and ushered us in and immediately
left, stating that he would call us at six o'clock. This shack was
certainly a beautiful bedroom for our homeless little band--nothing but
a barren wooden house with the earth for the floor and cracks in the
walls through which the cold wind rushed in torrents.
The acrobat's wife coiled up in one corner with the little girl on
her lap, the man nestled in another and I stretched myself diagonally
across a third. Sleep was impossible. We all were nearly petrified with
the cold. The Englishman took to his feet and began walking the floor
in silence. I soon followed his example. We paced and repaced that
ten by twelve compartment for an hour, as speechless as two ghosts.
Finally, into the tomb-like silence, the Englishman thrust these
words, "Feed the animals." A few seconds' laughter at this remark and
silence reigned again. At the end of the second hour the woman, whom we
supposed had dozed off to sleep, murmured, "If my mother could see me
now." In this way the night crept on and we ignored our hardships.
The Arab appeared at six o'clock and after paying him an exorbitant
fee, which he exacted, we boarded a third-class coach of an Egyptian
train and, surrounded by a curious lot of natives, started towards
Cairo. I have been told that Egypt was the most expensive country in
the world in which to travel and that it would be impossible for me
to live on less than several dollars a day. Such information had been
given me about so many countries and cities that it was a joke. Egypt
turned out to be one of the cheapest sections of the globe I ever
encountered.
After nearly a day's journey across the desert the train drew into
the huge station at Cairo and in a few minutes I was flowing with the
crowds towards the street. I stood for an instant on the sidewalk and
surveyed the swarms of people who roamed the large plaza in front of
the station. I pulled my hat down securely on my head and dived into
this sea of humanity and in a second was lost in the million or more
inhabitants of that city--of whom I knew not a single soul.
I was on my way to the Hotel Des Princes, a hostelry recommended to me
by my English acrobat friend. By enquiring of every person who gave
any indication that he might speak English, I found the hotel. It was
a two-story structure operated by a middle-class native. I soon made a
deal with him by which I got a room with a double bed for twenty-five
cents a day, with the promise of a rate of forty cents for two when
Richardson arrived. This was surely cheap enough and I thought it was
ridiculously so when I recalled the statements made to me concerning
the high cost of living in Cairo.
This hotel had no dining room and it was necessary to rustle a cheap
but sanitary eating place. Perhaps this was where Cairo deserved its
reputation for being an expensive city. I left the hotel determined
to be the first man to live on a reasonable amount in the Egyptian
capital. I had hardly walked a block when I saw in an alley a sign
which read, "Soldiers' Club." I directed my steps toward it, entered
the place and in a minute was studiously reading the daily menu,
which was posted on a bulletin board in the hallway. Steak, potatoes,
vegetables and tea for three piastres (fifteen cents); tarts and
pudding--one piastre, and other eatables were listed at equally low
prices. As I stood gazing at the bill of fare, almost paralysed with
delight over such a fortunate discovery, an Englishman approached.
"What are you looking for?" he asked.
"For something to eat," I replied. "I am making a sort of tramp trip
around the world and expect to be in Cairo a few days. Money is rather
a scarce article with me and I would like to know what my chances are
of eating here."
"Are you a British soldier?" enquired the Englishman.
"No, sir."
"Are you an ex-soldier?" asked the man, sizing up the hungry-looking
traveller.
"No, sir," was my honest reply.
"All right," said the club man with a smile. "You may eat here."
"Thanks," I added and immediately sat down and ate one of the finest
meals ever served anywhere for fifteen cents. The Soldiers' Club, an
institution of the British soldiers in Cairo, served as a sort of home
for me during my stay in the city. I had just left the club when two
blocks farther up the street I came across a sign with the inscription
"Soldiers' Home" and in this place I found a similar reception and
similar prices. To accuse Cairo of being expensive was slander. I
labelled it one of the most inexpensive places I had visited.
It was now eighteen days since I had left Richardson on the wharf in
Bombay and during this time I had not heard a word from him. Shortly
after my arrival in Cairo I called at the office of the American
Consul, the Y.M.C.A. and Thomas Cook and Son and left in each place my
address with instructions to direct Richardson to me in the event that
he came in and enquired. I also met an occasional train coming in from
Port Said. It was on one of these that I found him.
As soon as my steamer got under way from Bombay, Richardson walked
across the wharf and boarded the British tramp _Farington_. He went
up on the bridge and asked the captain for passage to the Canal. The
pleasant-looking skipper stated that he was sorry that he could not
take him, as his ship had received her papers and was to leave that
night at eight o'clock. Richardson graciously withdrew and descended
from the bridge but, instead of leaving the vessel, he threw his
luggage down an open hatchway and climbed down himself. Here he crawled
off to a crevice in the cargo and remained there until the following
morning when the ship was about two hundred miles out to sea. He
appeared on deck shortly before breakfast and immediately informed the
captain what he had done. The skipper took it very kindly. Instead of
putting Richardson to work he greeted him cordially and said if it had
been proper he would have suggested that he stow away.
Richardson's trip on the _Farington_ was in strong contrast to mine on
the _Levanzo_. He travelled like a civilised person. The captain was a
fine type of Englishman and was very hospitable. The first officer was
a thoroughly good chap and was very friendly.
Richardson had a cabin on the main deck adjoining the officers; he
ate with the second mate and he had the freedom of the entire ship.
He spent many hours on the bridge where the officers answered his
questions. At the end of the journey he was almost a past-master at
navigation. He understood the use of the log; he could locate a ship at
sea by use of the sextant and he was able to handle the wheel and give
signals to the engine room.
The _Farington_ arrived at Suez and steamed through the Canal to
Port Said. As Richardson was not listed on the ship's papers he had
to hide down the hold while the port officials came on board for the
inspection. As soon as she was received he slid over the side of the
ship, jumped into a native boat and was rowed ashore.