ON THE NILE.
At daylight on Monday morning, March sixteenth, the Amasis steamed away
from Luxor and by nine o'clock had arrived at the landing for Dendera.
The donkey boys of Dendera, having been notified of our coming, were
waiting with their donkeys. In a few minutes the tourists were mounted
for a half hour's ride on narrow paths through green barley fields to
the ruined temple. I rode on a donkey named Whiskey and Soda, with my
donkey boy Hassan running behind prodding the animal occasionally with a
sharp-pointed stick, and yelling "Haow! Haow!" to urge Whiskey and Soda
to a more rapid gait. Along the paths through the fields many children
ran to greet us with outstretched palms. Their costumes were those of
the Garden of Eden before the fall; but having been informed of our
approach, the bronze colored youngsters had decorated themselves for the
occasion with wreaths of green barley around their waists and crowns of
the same material on their heads. The little Arabs, bright-eyed,
smooth-limbed, and handsome featured, attractive and picturesque in
appearance, shouted with glee when a few small coins were thrown among
them.
"Look at that!" exclaimed one of the party. "I have heard of the
shepherds carrying the lambs on their shoulders, but here is a man
coming with the foal of a donkey in his arms."
"What a dear little pet," said the ladies as the Arab passed us with the
young donkey nestling contentedly on his breast.
"The famous Temple of Dendera was not so magnificent nor so large as the
temples of Karnak and Thebes," said the guide, as we stood before the
gates, "but it was more richly decorated with carvings and paintings.
Every inch of column, wall, and ceiling was carved with hieroglyphic and
pictorial decorations. These were painted in bright colors which are yet
faintly visible. This structure is a modern one compared with Karnak;
for Karnak was an ancient temple more than one thousand years old when
King Ptolemy began the erection of this building just before the
Christian Era. An inscription on the walls states that the time required
for its construction was one hundred and eight years, six months, and
fourteen days. When Egypt became a Roman province after the death of
Cleopatra, the Roman emperors continued the construction of the
unfinished temple. Augustus, Tiberius, Caligula, Claudius, and Nero are
represented in reliefs on the walls. The temple was dedicated to the
worship of the Goddess Hathor, the Egyptian Venus, or goddess of love
and beauty."
"Why was the temple built here two miles away from the river, instead of
near the banks of the Nile?" inquired a tourist.
"It was because this terrace is higher than the valley," answered
Mahmoud. "Remember that these green fields through which we rode are
made fertile by the overflow of the Nile; then I think that the reason
for building on this plateau will be plain to you."
[Illustration: DONKEY BOYS WERE WAITING FOR US.]
"But why was it built in a depression?"
"It was not originally in a hole," explained the guide, "but was built
on level ground. Some sixteen hundred years ago the Christian Roman
Emperor Theodosius forbade the worship of idols. After that time, the
worship of the goddess Hathor being discontinued, the temple was
neglected and a village of mud huts sprang up around it. These huts,
built of sun-dried bricks, crumbled to dust in the passage of years and
were trampled under foot. Again and again new huts supplanted the old
until in the course of centuries the debris accumulated many feet in
depth. When the government, fifty years ago, undertook to restore the
temple, the workmen had to begin by shoveling mud huts off the roof."
We descended a long flight of steps to reach the level of the floor of
the excavated temple, and passing the blue-uniformed guards entered the
grand hall of columns. The hall, as the guide had told us, was richly
decorated. Master sculptors had carved every available space on the
walls and columns with hieroglyphic inscriptions and beautiful reliefs;
master artists in color had heightened the effect with tint and shade.
Looking up we saw, pictured on the ceiling, the Egyptian deity, Nut, the
goddess of the sky, controlling the movements of sun and stars; the rays
of the sun shining in blessing on the head of Hathor; the moon issuing
from Nut's mouth; the signs of the Zodiac; the flying Hours of day and
night; and the sailing boats of the planets.
[Illustration: RICHLY DECORATED WITH CARVINGS AND PAINTINGS.]
The guide raised a stone trap door less than two feet square in the
stone floor and through this small entrance we squeezed, candle in hand,
and descended a stone stairway to explore the dark crypt underneath.
Although the ladies screamed when the bats, disturbed and blinded by the
light, flew wildly overhead, they bravely followed the guide. The long
passage was but three feet in width and we wondered why the dragoman had
brought us down into its close and gloomy recesses; but when magnesium
wires were lit, our wonder turned into admiration, for the sputtering
white light revealed on the smooth sidewalls most beautiful reliefs in
well preserved coloring.
[Illustration: OFFERED INCENSE TO THE GODS.]
"Did you see anything remarkable in that dark cellar?" inquired a voice
from above as we ascended through the trap.
"Why didn't you come along?" was the laughing response.
"I've not trained down to the proper size yet," rejoined the fat man who
could be jolly on all occasions. "Do you think that a man of my size
could squeeze through a hole like that?"
[Illustration: ENTERED THE GRAND HALL OF COLUMNS.]
By a long stone stairway of easy steps we ascended leisurely to the
roof, stopping frequently to admire the ceremonial procession of priests
pictured on the walls of the staircase. From the flat stone roof we saw
on one side the green cultivated fields extending to the river's edge
and on the other side the yellow desert stretching to the distant
cliffs.
"This is a picture of Cleopatra and her son Caesarion," said Mahmoud, as
we inspected the reliefs on the outer walls, "and this is King Ptolemy
offering incense to the gods Osiris and Isis, and hawk-headed Horus
their son. Here also is Hathor's picture repeated many times."
The trip down the river Nile on the fine steamer Amasis, which had been
chartered for us, was thoroughly enjoyed by the forty-two people who
made up the party. The staterooms were bright and clean and the meals
served were equal to those of a first class hotel. The captain and his
officials did all they could to make the trip pleasant for us. Life on
board was a life of ease; the air though warm was balmy and restful, and
cares were forgotten. The centre of the upper deck was roofed over but
open at the sides with rugs on the floor, easy chairs, small tables, and
a piano. In this open piazza-parlor we sipped the coffee that was served
to us there after luncheon and after dinner. There, too, we partook of
the tea and cakes that were handed around at four o'clock, and when we
returned from excursions on shore, tired and warm, we found refreshing
lemonade ready to quench our thirst.
[Illustration: RELIEFS ON THE OUTER WALL.]
Our dragoman, Mahmoud Achmed, the Egyptian conductor of all our
sight-seeing excursions on land, was an interesting character and became
a great favorite. He was a native of Luxor and while we were at that
place his bright-eyed little girl, neatly dressed, came to meet us.
Mahmoud had a fund of information regarding the history of the country,
the legends of the gods, and the fabulous deeds of the ancient kings. He
had a most interesting way of interspersing history with mythical tales
and humorous incidents, and so kept the party in high spirits. Mahmoud
was noted, too, for his ability to answer intelligently all reasonable
inquiries and for his great patience in replying to many questions, that
must have appeared to him very silly. Each day on the boat while we were
all seated at dinner, Mahmoud came into the dining saloon and announced
the program for the following days, always beginning: "Ladies and
gentlemen, if you please," and closing with, "Monument tickets are very
much wanted. Galloping donkeys is not allowed."
For some one to mislay or forget a permit was a daily occurrence and the
caution had to be repeated often. As to the donkeys, the riders paid no
attention to the restriction, but walked, trotted, or galloped the
donkeys as they felt inclined.
During the daytime Mahmoud wore a plain gown suitable for traveling on
shore in heat and dust, but in the evenings he was resplendent in robes
of silk. One night, at the request of one of the ladies, he brought to
the mid-deck five handsome silk gowns to be inspected by the tourists.
He also brought his book of references written by people whom he had
conducted. In this we read the dignified prose of preacher and college
president, the practical remarks of business men, and the nonsensical
lines of the rhymster. One of his feminine admirers, seemingly impressed
by the dragoman's silk robes, polite attention, and general good humor,
had left the following jingle on the record:
Who guided us all about the show,
Whether we wanted to go or no,
And always pleased and made us go?
Mahmoud.
Who whipped the donkey when he fell
And then the donkey boy as well,
And dressed himself a howling swell?
Mahmoud.
Who sat so sweetly at my feet
With red tarbouche and slippers neat
And stirred my heart with many a beat?
Mahmoud.
And now, when all the trip is done
Rides to temples, and tombs, and fun,
We may forget them all save one,
Mahmoud.
[Illustration: THIS IS A PICTURE OF CLEOPATRA AND HER SON.]
Mahmoud took great pride in showing his many references in prose and
rhyme, and the members of our party were glad to contribute in prose to
his collection. But at the end of the week we presented him with another
testimonial of a more practical kind.
"The Nile is a most wonderful river," remarked the professor one evening
as we sat on the open deck watching the moonlight glisten on the green
water. "Several other rivers rival it in length; the Congo is noted for
its size; the Amazon, swelled by great tributaries, discharges a volume
of water immensely greater; and the Missouri, including the Mississippi
to the Gulf, may be longer; but the Nile is unique in that for twelve
hundred miles it flows without a tributary through a rainless region.
Not a drop of rain nor a single brook adds to its volume in all that
distance, and a hot sun, canals, ditches, sakiyehs, shadoofs, and water
carriers are continually taking away from it throughout every mile of
its winding course. The river is wider here but it has less volume than
one thousand miles farther up the stream. It is unique also in the
regularity of the annual inundations, which begin on almost the same
day, continue the same length of time, and rise to an almost similar
height each year, and have done so annually for untold centuries. In our
land a flood is a disaster causing loss and sorrow; in this country it
is a blessing producing wealth and joy. When the slowly rising waters
each year reach the figures on the stone column of the Nilometer which
show that the Nile has spread abroad his fertile bounty by covering the
cultivable lands, and has filled the dams and ditches for future needs,
the news is spread abroad and the people rejoice with festivities and
processions."
[Illustration: 'TWAS SCENES LIKE THESE WE LOOKED UPON.]
Before taking the trip on the Nile we had thought that the days on the
river might become monotonous and tiresome; but we found, on the
contrary, that every hour was full of interest. Each day some excursion
on shore was taken. One day the patient donkeys carried the tourists on
a long trip to the ruins of the great temple of Seti at Abydos to view
its sculptured columns and famous list of kings. On another day
carriages conveyed us to the rock tombs on the limestone hills above
Assiout and we visited the bazaars and the noted potteries of that busy
town. On the last day of our sail the donkeys of Bedrashen were called
into service for a ride through the palm forest and green fields, past
the fallen columns of Ramses, to Sakkara, the tombs of the sacred bulls,
and the pictured tombs of Ptahhotep and Ti.
[Illustration: TROD ROUND AND ROUND THE WHEEL.]
[Illustration: THE COLUMNS AT ABYDOS ARE OF GREAT SIZE.]
"This is the height of enjoyment," said a member of our party one day
while we were lounging in easy chairs taking afternoon tea on the deck,
and lazily watching the panoramic scenes as the Amasis steamed down the
river.
[Illustration: DOTTED WITH PILES OF YELLOW WATER-JARS.]
It was scenes like these we looked upon. Along the banks of the river at
short intervals, the shadoof man, or drawer of water, with his shadoof
resembling an old-fashioned spring-pole or well sweep, drew up his
dripping bucket and lowered it again, his only garment an apron at the
waist.
All through the day the red-brown man
Stands on his perch in the red-brown bank;
Waters never more gratefully ran,
Cucumbers never more greedily drank.
--Canon Rawnsley.
Where the bank was very high, a series of two, three, or four natives,
each with his spring-pole, raised the water one to the other until it
reached the top and was poured into the little channels that carried it
over the rich, but very thirsty soil of a rainless land. On the
river-bank, also, interspersed with the shadoofs of the poorer class of
agriculturists, the more prosperous farmers, who were the happy
possessors of buffaloes or camels, lifted the irrigating water from the
stream by means of sakiyehs, or wooden power wheels, which creaked
unceasingly as the patient camels or buffaloes, with eyes covered by
blinders of mud, trod round and round the wheel.
Rough clout upon his patient head,
The stately camel round doth go,
With gentle hesitating tread;
And yoked, and blind with frontlets, made
Of black Nile mud, the buffalo
Plies with him his unequal trade.
--Canon Rawnsley.
A large Dahabeah with rugs, easy chairs, and piano on deck, and the
stars and stripes hanging listlessly overhead, floated by, propelled by
fourteen Arab rowers--there being no wind to fill the sails. A drove of
gray buffaloes, forty in number, were taking their bath, splashing the
water like a party of schoolboys in a swimming pool. A group of women
filled earthen jars at the water's edge, and with the dripping jars on
their heads mounted the steep river bank. Here and there were irregular
groups of mud huts, intersected by crooked alleys and surrounded by date
palms, little villages where doves were flying overhead and from which
came the sound of barking dogs to mingle with the puffs of the steamer.
Flat-bottomed boats freighted with sugar cane lay with drooping sails in
a noonday calm, or, later in the day, sped before the evening breeze.
Near the pottery towns the river banks were dotted with yellow water
jars in scattered piles ready for shipment to the city market. Immense
stacks of the sugar-cane just harvested had been brought to the shore
for conveyance to the sugar factories. And fields of cotton covered with
white bloom extended into the distance.
We could see, too, the fertile Nile valley, not more than ten miles in
breadth at its widest part, bounded on both sides by ranges of yellow,
barren cliffs. On the western side the cliffs were farthest away; on the
eastern side the valley was narrow, and the cliffs were sometimes
distant, sometimes so near that they completely crowded out the
cultivable soil and approached to the water's edge.
"There is something peculiar in the air of this dry land," observed one
of the tourists after sitting quiet awhile. "The atmosphere lends a
softness to the outlines of distant objects and adds delicate tints in
the afternoon light. See how the barren cliffs are glorified with a
flush of pink, the wheat fields are a brilliant green, and the barley
fields, almost ready for the harvest, are golden. Even the mud huts and
the white-washed mosque of that village on the western shore have lost
their crude outlines and have become picturesque. At sunset the western
sky will change to crimson and the eastern cliffs will change to gold.
The sunsets, though, are not so gorgeous in coloring, nor do they show
such striking contrasts as I have seen occasionally in my western home,
but they are beautiful."
[Illustration: ALL EYES WERE FIXED ON THE MAGICIAN'S MOVEMENTS.]
During the latter part of our sail down the Nile, where the river
broadened and was shallow, we had some interesting experiences with
sandbars.
"This is the Amasis' last trip of the season," said one of the officers
as we stood on the upper deck at the bow of the steamer watching two
sailors poling below. "The Nile always falls rapidly in the spring, the
channels change, new sandbars form, and navigation becomes difficult.
The water is now very low, and we have to be careful and alert wherever
the river broadens as it does here before us."
On account of the indications of shallowness ahead the Amasis was
steaming very slowly, occasionally merely drifting with the current. The
two Arab boatmen stationed in the bow continually tested the depth of
the water with poles and shouted in Arabic the results of their
measurements to the anxious commander on the deck above. Notwithstanding
these precautions, our steamer occasionally scraped on the sandbars,
sometimes sticking on them for a short time.
"Surely this is an unlucky day," exclaimed the captain later, looking
at his watch as we came within sight of a railroad bridge with a draw in
it that was then being closed for an approaching train. "It is now four
o'clock, and, according to the official rules, that drawbridge is
closed for the day and will not be opened for steamers to pass through
until nine o'clock to-morrow morning. We shall have to anchor here until
that time. That last stop of half an hour on the sandbar robs us of half
a day's time."
[Illustration: SHOVING FROM ITS DECK WITH LONG POLES.]
The delay at the bridge was provoking, but a greater test of the temper
of the officers and patience of the passengers was to come. On Friday
morning while at breakfast we felt a jar that caused the vessel suddenly
to stop. We heard an unusual puffing of the engine and felt vibrations
that caused the steamer to tremble and the dishes to rattle.
"What's the matter? What's the trouble?" cried several.
"Struck another sandbar," laconically remarked the doctor at the end of
the table. "Eat your breakfast. We'll be off in a few minutes."
But succeeding events proved that the doctor was a false prophet. For
during the next twenty hours the Amasis lay helpless in the midst of the
stream, notwithstanding all the attempts of the officials and crew to
free her from the bar, and it was not until Saturday morning that their
efforts were crowned with success and the steamer floated free.
However, we took the doctor's advice the first morning and finished our
omelet and coffee. Then we hurried to the deck to investigate and ask
numberless questions of the worried officials. Our baggage had been
packed in anticipation of landing before noon at Cairo, which was but
sixty miles distant, and we feared that a delay might interfere with our
plans for a busy afternoon of sight-seeing in the city.
"'Misery loves company,' says an old proverb. If that is true we should
be happy," remarked one of the tourists as we gathered on the deck
gazing at an animated scene. "Look! There are thirty boats in the same
predicament as our own."
[Illustration: PALMS GROW ON THE SITE OF ANCIENT MEMPHIS.]
Within sight in different directions on the wide river lay thirty
loaded feluccas stranded on the bars, and in addition to these were
sixty-five others not aground. Alongside of one laden with live cattle a
dozen sailors were in the shallow water, shouting and splashing,
endeavoring to push their sloop off the bar. On many of the stranded
sloops the sailors were transferring parts of their cargoes to other
boats which were not aground. At some places the dark-hued laborers were
shoveling grain from a stranded felucca into a lighter one; at others
they were carrying unwieldy bundles of sugar-cane from one deck to
another. Here they were handling, with much difficulty, large blocks of
stone; there throwing yellow water-jars one at a time, passing
red-bricks slowly, or shifting stacks of green clover from deck to deck.
They accompanied the work of disburdening the vessels with strange cries
and chants in which the name of Allah noticeably recurred, occasionally
stopping to test the result of their labor by plunging into the water
and pushing the felucca, or by shoving from its deck with long poles.
One of the officers of the Amasis with some sailors in a row-boat
carried an anchor to its cable's length from the steamer and dropped it
in the water, then a donkey-engine on deck to which the cable was
attached was started and the steamer shook with the throbs of the engine
endeavoring to pull it off the bar toward the anchor. Unsuccessful in
tugging the steamer in that direction, they raised the anchor into the
row-boat and took it to other locations one after another; but the
engine panted and throbbed in vain. In the meantime the captain had gone
to a village on the shore, had hired sixty natives, and brought them
out in boats. The Arabs, dropping off their long blue gowns, and arrayed
only in loin cloths, jumped into the water, which was not over three
feet in depth. Then, placing their shoulders against the steamer, the
gang of naked Arabs, chanting in unison a prayer to Allah for help and
protection, pushed, or pretended to push, in order to assist the puffing
engine in its task. With intermissions for rest, the pushing, the
throbbing, and the chanting of the Arabic song, "Allah il Allah, Allah
il Allah," continued during the remainder of the day.
[Illustration: THE PROSTRATE BROKEN STATUE OF RAMSES II IS ENORMOUS.]
There was so much of interest happening around them that the passengers
could scarcely take time to eat their meals, and their disappointment in
not reaching Cairo was almost forgotten.
"This has been to me one of the most interesting days of the trip. I
will mark it with a red letter," said one of our party in the evening.
"I do not regret the delay. I would not have missed those amusing and
novel sights for anything."
When efforts were resumed at dawn on Saturday, the Amasis floated free,
and before noon we arrived at Cairo. Our joyous trip on the Nile, with
its pleasant associations of fellow voyagers, dragomen, donkey boys,
temples, tombs, and gallops over the sand, was at an end.