I received your kind letter in the midst of the drumming and piping and
chanting and firing of guns and pistols and scampering of horses which
constitute a religious festival in Egypt. The last day of the _moolid_
of Abu-l-Hajjaj fell on the 1st January so you came to wish me 'May all
the year be good to thee' as the people here were civil enough to do when
I told them it was the first day of the _Frankish_ year. (The
_Christian_ year here begins in September.)
I was very sorry to hear of poor Lady Theresa's (Lady Theresa Lewis)
death. I feel as if I had no right to survive people whom I left well
and strong when I came away so ill. As usual the air of Upper Egypt has
revived me again, but I am still weak and thin, and hear many
lamentations at my altered looks. However, '_Inshallah_, thou wilt soon
be better.'
Why don't you make Alexander edit your letters from Spain? I am sure
they would be far more amusing than mine can possibly be--for you _can_
write letters and I never could. I wish I had Miss Berry's though I
never did think her such a genius as most people, but her letters must be
amusing from the time when they were written. Alexander will tell you
how heavy the hand of Pharaoh is upon this poor people. 'My father
scourged you with whips but I will scourge you with scorpions,' did not
Rehoboam say so? or I forget which King of Judah. The distress here is
frightful in all classes, and no man's life is safe.
Ali Bey Rheda told me the other day that Prince Arthur is coming here and
that he was coming up with him after taking a Prince of Hohenzollern back
to Cairo. There will be all the _fantasia_ possible for him here. Every
man that has a horse will gallop him to pieces in honour of the son of
the Queen of the English, and not a charge of powder will be spared. If
you see Layard tell him that Mustapha A'gha had the whole Koran read for
his benefit at the tomb of Abu-l-Hajjaj besides innumerable _fathahs_
which he said for him himself. He consulted me as to the propriety of
sending Layard a backsheesh, but I declared that Layard was an Emeer of
the Arabs and a giver, not a taker of backsheesh.