THE GATEWAY OF THE EAST
The anchor is up and we are in a stately ship moving on slowly into the
Suez Canal. When we arrived at Port Said--how many weeks ago was it? It
seems to me like a year--we were on the _Orontes_, of the Orient Line,
and we steamed into the harbour past a long breakwater like a thin arm;
standing upon it is a statue of Ferdinand de Lesseps, the man who made
the Suez Canal. That meant nothing to you then, for the canal was merely
a name and not of any special interest, but now that we are actually
passing into it it is different.
Just here, you remember, we are at the place where three continents
meet, Europe being represented by the Mediterranean Sea. The other two,
Asia and Africa, are joined by a strip of land called the Isthmus of
Suez, about a hundred miles across. For ages men had it in their minds
to cut through this strip so that their ships could sail straight from
the Mediterranean into the Red Sea on the other side of the Isthmus.
But it wasn't quite so easy to do as it sounds, for the land was mostly
desert sand, and if you have ever tried to dig out a trench on the
seashore and then let water into it, you will know very well what
happens. The sides slip down, and in a few minutes your trench is level
up to the top and is a trench no more!
The ancient Egyptians frequently marched across the Isthmus with their
armies and advanced into Palestine and made war on the wild tribes
there. They built also a strong wall across the Isthmus to prevent the
inhabitants of Palestine from retaliating, just as the Romans built a
wall across Northumbria to hold back the Picts and Scots.
It was not until comparatively recent days, that is to say, in the time
of your grandfather, that the attempt to cut a canal across the Isthmus
was successful, and the man who did it was Ferdinand de Lesseps, whose
statue stands on the breakwater. He was a Frenchman, but he wished to
get other nations to help in the great work, as France could not raise
all the money alone; unfortunately Great Britain would have nothing to
do with the idea, though luckily afterwards, when the canal had been
built, the Government managed to buy a large number of the shares in it
from the Egyptian Government. It took ten years to make the canal, but
it was done at last after the expenditure of quantities of money and the
loss of many lives, and even up to the opening day there were many who
scoffed and said it could never be made useful; yet now that bronze
statue stands solemnly watching, day by day, the great ships of many
nations crawling slowly into the narrow opening at the northern end.
Not only had the canal to be made but it has to be kept in working
order, for the sand silts back into the channel, and so numbers of
dredgers are constantly at work scraping out the bottom so as to keep
it deep enough for ships of large size.
At first the depth of the main channel was twenty-six feet, but now it
has been deepened to twenty-nine feet; but even that seems less than we
should expect.
At one time the storms of January and February used to drive quantities
of sand from the Mediterranean into the mouth of the canal, and even
now, though the breakwater has been lengthened to prevent it, there is
always difficulty. Steamers are only allowed to go through slowly,
otherwise the suction or pull of the water they disturb would tear down
the banks and soon make the canal useless. You have no idea what a wave
a big ship can raise in going through that narrow trough; even at a
moderate pace it would be sufficient to tear another ship from her
moorings by the bank, and then there might be a collision and disastrous
results. Ships have to pay a heavy toll for the privilege of using the
short cut, but the toll is needed to meet the working expenses and to
pay the interest on the money spent in the construction.
The ship we are in is considerably larger than the _Orontes_; she is the
_Medina_, belonging to the P. & O. Company, and was chosen to take the
King and Queen to India in 1911. She is not very cheerful looking
outside, being painted buff, with black funnels, but she is a
comfortable boat, and we are lucky in having a large cabin on the upper
deck, so that we can have our port-hole open whatever the weather may
be.
The sun is setting in a flame of salmon and scarlet as we pass the canal
offices and turn into the narrow channel. There are sidings dug out
about every five or six miles, for as only one big ship can go through
at a time, if she meets another, one of them must stop and tie up. There
are telegraph stations at every siding, and every ship entering the
canal is controlled all the way by an elaborate system of signals which
tells the pilot exactly what he is to do, whether he must "shunt into a
siding," to use railway language, or if he may go right ahead.
Directly we are in the canal we see over the banks on both sides; on the
west is a wide sheet of water lit up to smoky-red by the reflection of
the sinking sun. Flocks of storks and pelicans and other birds cover it
at certain times of the year to fish in the shallow salt waters, for
this is a salt lake, a sort of overflow from the sea. One day it will be
drained and then crops can grow upon it. The canal is cut through it and
hemmed in by an embankment; farther on it runs through the desert and
then goes through another lake. For the greater part of the way a
railway line runs beside it, passing through Ismailia, the junction for
Cairo, and going on to Suez, and from some parts of this line you can
see a strange spectacle, for, as no water is visible, the ships appear
to be gliding along the top of a sandbank; there is apparently just a
huge modern steamer lost among the sandhills and making the best of her
way back to the sea!
The pilot who is on board now takes us to Ismailia, half-way down, and
then another replaces him as far as Suez, where the canal ends. Every
ship over one hundred tons is compelled to carry a pilot, who is
responsible for her while she is in the difficult channel. And, indeed,
a pilot is necessary, for the canal is not by any means a straight, deep
trench; there are curves where it is a delicate job to manoeuvre a
ship of any length, and in places in the deeper lakes the course is only
marked by buoys. It needs a man who spends his whole time at the work
and gives all his attention to it. The danger at the curves is lest the
propeller at the stern should come in contact with the banks, so the
ship has to be manoeuvred most slowly and carefully round them. Only
at one place in the whole length of the canal was no digging out
necessary. This is in the great Bitter Lake, where for eight miles the
water is deep enough for the ships to pass safely.
There is not much to see at first; the banks are lined by scrubby
bushes, and on them, in a sandy open patch, we see a man falling and
bowing at his evening devotions; a few camels pass along the raised
bank, looking like gigantic spiders against the illuminated sky, and
there comes faintly to us the distant bark of a jackal.
When we come on deck again after dinner we find the air quite mild; we
are only going at the rate of six miles an hour, which is the
speed-limit.
Somewhere across the desert where we are passing to-night have passed
also the feet of many mighty ones of history. Abraham crossed it with
Sarah, his beautiful wife, Joseph was carried down a captive over the
caravan track of that day. Later on his brothers twice journeyed, driven
by famine, and lastly came old Jacob also. Many times, as we know, did
the armies of the Pharaohs start out in all the panoply of war and
return victorious bringing captives in chains. Across the wilderness
somewhere Moses led forth the children of Israel, and, most wonderful
remembrance of all, Joseph, the carpenter of Nazareth, brought down to
Egypt his wife and her infant son to escape the wrath and jealousy of
Herod. Hardly any strip of land we could name has so many associations
interesting to all the world.
Why do you start and catch hold of my arm to draw my attention? That is
only a Lascar, one of the sailors, a picturesque fellow, isn't he?
Didn't you notice them when we came on board? The P. & O. ships carry a
crew of Lascars to work under the white quartermasters; they are dark
brown men with shining eyes and gleaming teeth, who dress in bright blue
with red belts and caps; they love a bit of finery and stick it on
wherever they can. They come from the coasts of India and usually sign
on for three years under one of their own headmen called a _serang_; you
can always pick him out by the silver chain of office which he wears
round his neck, Lord-Mayor fashion. I saw him just now, a little man
rather like a monkey. He is a very important personage, for all the
orders are given through him, and he receives the pay for his men and is
responsible for their good behaviour. Woe be to the man who is
insubordinate! Not only will he be punished now, but his whole village
will hear about it, and he will be disgraced and find it difficult to
get work thereafter.
[Illustration: A LASCAR.]
The moon is covered with clouds to-night, which is a pity, but the
brilliant reflectors the ship carries in her bows throw the light well
ahead on to both banks.
Hullo! We're coming to something; there is another ship tied up waiting
for us to pass. No, it is true I can't make her out, but I can see her
searchlights, so I guess she is behind them. Very slowly we crawl on,
making hardly a ripple; we are going dead slow now, scarcely moving, in
fact. That light from the other ship is blinding; just where it strikes
the water there are any number of little fish wriggling and squirming in
an ecstasy of painful delight. The water is alive with them, churning
and threshing over one another like a pot full of eels. Bright lights
attract fish and it is a very old dodge, known all over the world, to
hold a flare over the water and then spear or net the fish who are
attracted by it. Fish must have something akin to moths in their nature,
as many of them simply cannot resist a light.
Now we are alongside; the other ship's light is out of our eyes and our
own falls full upon her. What a spectacle! She looks like a phantom ship
carrying a cargo of ghosts! She is transformed by our lights into blue
fire! Every plank and rope stands out brilliantly in the ghastly light.
Her decks are crowded by a mass of turbaned and fez-covered men, mostly
in light garments, and they, their faces and their clothing, are all
blue-white. They stand silently, packed side by side like sardines; it
doesn't look as if they would have room to lie, or even to sit down. As
we glide slowly past a strange odour floats over from them enveloping
us--an odour made up of spices and camels and tired unwashed humanity;
there is a hint of coffee in it and a touch of wood-smoke--it suggests
Eastern bazaars and the desert.
Then our light slips off them and we see the ship as she really is under
the faintly diffused light of the clouded moon. She is a dirty
commonplace hulk, packed with men in soiled clothes, no longer the
radiant white ship of our vision.
"Taking pilgrims back from Mecca," says one of the passengers who is
leaning over the rail near us smoking. "They pack them like cattle
usually. On some of these vessels their fare doesn't include any
accommodation or food; they have to bargain with the captain for a bit
of deck to lie down on, and the highest bidder secures the best place!"
Mecca, which lies many miles inland from the port of Jiddah, half-way
down the Red Sea, is the birthplace of Mohammed, and the sacred city of
the Mohammedans; when they kneel at their devotions it is with their
faces turned towards Mecca. Those who have managed to pilgrimage there
even once in their lives are looked upon as superior beings.
The siding we have just passed is one of the largest in the canal, and
three ships can lie up there together if necessary. It is here that the
Syrian caravans cross over into Africa.
Next morning we are up on deck in good time, as we want to see all we
can of the canal. We are by this time out in the wide water of the
Bitter Lake, where we can go at a good speed, then the canal itself
begins again and we pass one of the little station-houses where the
signalmen live; it looks as if it was built out of a child's bricks, and
stands on the arid banks with only a few scanty palms near. It must be a
dreary sort of life for ever signalling to ships which are going onward
to all countries of the world, while you yourself remain pinned down in
the same few square yards of land.
This narrow waterway that passes down between Asia on the one side and
Africa on the other is stimulating to the imagination.
We catch a glimpse of Suez afar off and run by a tree-shadowed road that
leads to a peninsula, where are the P. & O. offices and a row of houses
inhabited by the men whose work in life it is to look after the canal.
Notice that buoy on the port side of the ship, it is about as far from
the bank as a man could throw a cricket-ball, yet through that strip of
water, which marks the deepest channel, every ship has to pass either on
entering or leaving the canal. Think of it! Between five thousand and
six thousand ships steam through in a year, they are of all sizes, of
many nations, carrying many kinds of cargo. There are the mail ships and
passenger ships of the European countries, there are pilgrim ships from
Russia and Turkey, there are transports carrying our own khaki-clad
soldiers; you can always recognise one of these transports, for she is
painted white and carries a large white number on a black square at the
stem and stern. Then there are merchant ships innumerable; it is true
that the heavily laden Australian ships go home round the Cape, as the
distance (from Sydney) is much the same, but those stored with teak wood
from Burma, with tea, cotton, spices, and silk from China, Ceylon, and
India come through here. If a boy were to sit on the verandah of one of
those houses and hear the names, destinations, and freight of all the
vessels he saw, he could learn the geography and commerce of half the
world with hardly an effort!
[Illustration: IN THE SUEZ CANAL, THE NARROW WATERWAY BETWEEN ASIA AND
AFRICA.]
That range of mountains across there, which look strangely like ruined
forts and castles, forms part of the great peninsula of Sinai where the
Law was given to Moses, and though it is in Asia it now belongs to
Egypt. It looks as if you could hit it with a stone, so wonderfully do
distant objects stand out in this clear atmosphere, but it is seven or
eight miles away. That dark clump midway between it and the sea marks
the place called Moses' Well.
We are in the Gulf of Suez now, and it must have been somewhere about
here that the Israelites crossed over with the host of Pharaoh pursuing
them.
We are getting up better speed, and it is not long before we have
reached the end of the gulf and pass out into the wide waters of the Red
Sea.
There were two delusions I cherished for many a year about this sea. I
always imagined it a long, narrow strip, like a river, in which you
could see from bank to bank as you sailed along; and secondly, I thought
there must be some red colouring on the banks or in the water to account
for the strange name. As a matter of fact, the sea is over one thousand
miles long and varies from twenty to one hundred and eighty miles in
breadth. Being on it in a ship is like being out in the open ocean, for
one can see no shore. The name "Red" Sea has never been satisfactorily
explained, but some people suggest that it may have arisen from the
spawn or eggs of fish which float on the surface in quantities at
certain times of the year and are of a reddish tinge, others say it is
from the coral which grows so well here, and others think it may have
something to do with the rocks of red porphyry on the Egyptian side of
the Arabian Gulf.
For the first time since we left England we begin now, as we go
southward, to feel uncomfortably hot. It was never too hot in Egypt, for
there was always a fresh wind. Here at first we have a following wind
which makes it seem dead calm; there is a kind of clammy dampness in the
air which makes it impossible to do anything requiring energy. The deck
games of "bull" and quoits and even cricket, which have been carried on
in such a lively way lately, fall off; no one cares to do anything.
Even the children cease from troubling. There are quite a number of them
on board, for this is an Australian ship; if she were going to India
there would be no small children. Here I counted fifteen at the table
downstairs where they have their meals. You, of course, are treated as a
grown-up person, and quite right too, as you are on the eve of a public
school. I wonder how you will settle down at Harrow next winter after
all this change! There is only one other boy of about the same age. I
saw you talking to him this morning; what do you make of him?
A "rotter"? Yes, I thought so too. He seems to consider that the
greatest fun on board is to rumple up the stewards' hair or to knock off
their caps, and as they can't retaliate it is poor sport. He never plays
games either, which is odd considering he is an Australian.
Oh, I hoped that child had sunk into a sweet slumber! He is a nuisance;
he can't be more than four, but he never seems to rest day or night, and
he spends the laziest hour of the afternoon dragging a squeaking cart up
and down the wooden deck, to the annoyance of everyone except the fond
mother, who encourages it as a sign of genius! Odd one never can travel
without at least one child of that sort on board. There's a nice alcove
aft behind the smoking-room where we may find refuge.
Yes, I grant the little girls are just as bad as the boys; there is that
pert spoilt little miss who rushes after the steward when he carries
round the _hors d'oeuvre_ before dinner and clamours for them.
"They're not for children," he told her.
"But mother doesn't forbid me to have them," she retorted, standing on
one leg with her finger in her mouth.
If she refrained from doing only what her mother _did_ forbid her she
would have a fairly easy time I think.
It is too stifling to sleep in the cabin, so we will try the deck
to-night. It is rather pleasant stepping out on to the warm dry boards
when the lights are out. The awning shuts us in overhead, but at the
side we can see the smooth water lying white in the moonlight. Here is
our place, with our mattresses laid out neatly side by side and the
number of our cabin scrawled in white chalk on the wooden boards beside
them. There is a story of a certain ape who got loose on board ship and
paid a visit to the deck when all the men were asleep! A funny sight it
must have been as he landed on the top of one after the other!
In spite of the calmness of the night it is always more or less noisy on
a ship: there is the flap of an awning, the crack of a rope, the
creaking of the plates, and the frilling away of the water past the
ship's side. I lie awake a long time, turning uneasily and feeling the
taste of the salt on my lips. At last, low down between the rails, away
on the horizon, I see the well-known constellation, the Southern Cross.
You have often heard of it I expect. It is one of the most famous groups
of stars in the southern hemisphere and as much beloved by southerners
as the Great Bear is by us. As the Great Bear sinks night by night lower
in the north so the Southern Cross rises into sight. It is not a very
brilliant or even cross, but rather straggly, and the stars are not very
large, but it means much--hot skies, blue-black and brilliantly
star-spangled, lines of white surf breaking on silvery sand beneath palm
trees, fire-flies and scented air--I am growing drowsy at last--sleep is
coming.... I must show you the cross another night.
Hullo! it's morning! A Lascar is standing by grinning, with a bucket of
water and a deck-swab; they want to begin holystoning down the decks.
How sleepy I am! And as for you, the night steward, who is still on
duty, lifts you in his arms and carries you into your bunk, where you'll
find yourself when you do wake. It's only five--time for some more hours
yet. Sleeping on deck is rather an overrated amusement I think!
Before getting out of the Red Sea into the Indian Ocean we have to pass
through the Straits of Babel-Mandeb, which means the Gate of Affliction
or Tears, because of the numerous wrecks there have been here. Then we
stop at Aden, where the passengers going on to India change to another
P. & O. steamer, the _Salsette_, which is waiting for them. The _Medina_
goes across to Ceylon and then south to Australia, but the ship
following her next week goes straight to India.
It is lucky for Britain that she owns Aden, for it is the doorway at the
south end of the Red Sea, as the canal is the doorway at the north end.
Of course it is more important to us that the route to the East should
be kept clear than it is to any nation, because in case of difficulties
in India we should have to send troops there at once. It is more by good
luck than good management that just these little corners of the world,
that mean so much, should happen to fall into our possession--Gibraltar,
for instance, the gateway of the Mediterranean. And though the British
Government refused to have any hand in the making of the Suez Canal, yet
afterwards, because the Khedive of Egypt was hard up and willing to sell
his shares, we bought at a reasonable rate and have much influence in
the management of the canal.
Standing beside us, watching the passengers for India climb down the
gangway, is a fresh-looking, pink-faced young man of about
one-and-twenty. He has a simple look, and you would think he was too
young and innocent to go round the world by himself.
"I'm right down glad I'm not going to 'do' India," he remarks. "I'm sick
of travelling; I'm just longing to get back."
"To Australia?"
"Yes; I'm a sheep-farmer there. I've worked four years without a break,
so I took a holiday in Europe."
Anything less like one's idea of a sheep-farmer it would be hard to
find! I always pictured them stern bearded men, with brick-red faces and
sinewy limbs. This lad doesn't look as if he had ever been in a strong
sun, and his slender loose-jointed legs and arms do not give the
impression of an open-air life spent mostly in the saddle.
"You have a sheep-farm? Hard life, isn't it?"
"Best life in the world," he answers with enthusiasm. "Always on
horseback, miles of open country, not shut in by beastly houses."
"But there's a lack of water, isn't there?"
"You can always sink a well, that's what they do now. It costs a good
deal, but you can get water almost anywhere within reason."
"Are you far out?"
"No, only about three hundred and forty miles from the town where my
mother lives. I go down to see her at week-ends; we're lucky in being
close to a station, only a fifteen-mile ride."
Three hundred and forty miles! About the distance from London to
Berwick! Good place for week-ends, especially with a fifteen-mile ride
at one end! I suppose our ideas get small from living in a little
country. Pity we can't visit Australia, but we can't manage it this
time. That great island-continent and its sister, New Zealand, are well
worth seeing. Except for the Canadians there are no people nearer akin
to us than the Australasians. The world-famous harbour of Sydney, the
great hills clothed in eucalyptus, hiding in their depths vast caverns
of stalactites, the wide open ranges stretching for leagues inland, all
these things are attractive. In New Zealand, too, we should find
tree-ferns of gigantic size, lovely scenery, and spouting geysers; it is
an England set in a very different climate from ours! Then we might pass
on to those strange South Seas, gemmed by coral islands, and to the
latitudes where the mighty albatross swings overhead like an aeroplane,
only, unlike an aeroplane, he glides in a never-ending plane without
apparent effort or even one flap of his huge twelve-foot wings.
Alas, we can't see everything this trip!
[Illustration: A FLYING FISH.]