_To Sir Alexander Duff Gordon_.
OFF BOULAK,
_September_ 21, 1886.
I am better again now and go on very comfortably with my two little boys.
Omar is from dawn till night at work at my boat, so I have only Mahbrook
and Achmet, and you would wonder to see how well I am served. Achmet
cooks a very good dinner, serves it and orders Mahbrook about. Sometimes
I whistle and hear _hader_ (ready) from the water and in tumbles Achmet,
with the water running 'down his innocent nose' and looking just like a
little bronze triton of a Renaissance fountain, with a blue shirt and
white skull-cap added. Mahbrook is a big lubberly lad of the
laugh-and-grow-fat breed, clumsy, but not stupid, and very good and
docile. You would delight in his guffaws, and the merry games and hearty
laughter of my _menage_ is very pleasant to me. Another boy swims over
from Goodah's boat (his Achmet), and then there are games at piracy, and
much stealing of red pots from the potter's boats. The joke is to snatch
one under the owner's very nose, and swim off brandishing it, whereupon
the boatman uses eloquent language, and the boys out-hector him, and
everybody is much amused. I only hope Palgrave won't come back from
Sookum Kaleh to fetch Mahbrook just as he has got clever--not at stealing
jars, but in his work. He already washes my clothes very nicely indeed;
his stout black arms are made for a washer-boy. Achmet looked forward
with great eagerness to your coming. He is mad to go to England, and in
his heart planned to ingratiate himself with you, and go as a 'general
servant.' He is very little, if at all, bigger than a child of seven,
but an Arab boy '_ne doute de rien_' and does serve admirably. What
would an English respectable cook say to seeing 'two dishes and a sweet'
cooked over a little old wood on a few bricks, by a baby in a blue shirt?
and very well cooked too, and followed by incomparable coffee.
You will be pleased to hear that your capital story of the London cabman
has its exact counterpart here. 'Oh gracious God, what aileth thee, oh
Achmet my brother, and why is thy bosom contracted that thou hast not
once said to me d------n thy father, or son of a dog or pig, as thou art
used to do.'
Can't you save up your holidays and come for four months next winter with
my Maurice? However perhaps you would be bored on the Nile. I don't
know. People either enjoy it rapturously or are bored, I believe. I am
glad to hear from Janet that you are well. I am much better. The
carpenter will finish in the boat to-day, then the painter begins and in
a week, Inshallah, I shall get back into her.