At six, we were all locked up for the night, and we selected places to lie down upon, on the lime floor. But sleep was out of the question, and the Arabs kept up such a harsh and constant screaming, that we could do nothing but lie awake, turn from one side to the other in the hope of finding an easy position, and think of horrible things. The fleas and mosquitoes continued in full activity throughout the night; and, with the first blush of morning, the flies, who still remain one of the plagues of Egypt, came in swarms, and flew at once to settle in our eyes, according to their custom, bearing with them from the natives who thus cherish them, and are actually taught to do so from infancy, the virus of ophthalmia.
The next day we contrived to hire some mattresses to put on the floor; and these, with a light crate, or coop, made of palm-sticks, for a tack, completed our furniture. We also got some dinner ordered, but as it had to come some distance, everything was quite cold when it arrived. This, however, was of little consequence. We made our toilets at a general stone tank in the yard, and then came back to grumble, until it was time to be locked up in our cells; for, as I have said, there was no shade all day long, in the yard, and the very air appeared to be chiefly composed of hot lime dust.
Transit steamer to Cairo
To add to our annoyance also, we lost the transit steamer to Cairo, and I was afterwards compelled to hire a private boat or Kanjia for the voyage, which occupied six days, from want of wind, and the strength of the Nile stream at the period of inundation. The boat, moreover, swarmed with rats as big as kittens; spiders that led one at once to place credence to the full in the bird-catching powers of some of their race, and darted in and out of gaps in the wood, whenever the shutters were let up or down; cockroaches, fleas, and their more important associates, with millions of mosquitoes, to whose stings clothes offered no protection. I began to think that the American traveler, who covered his head with his hunting kettle, and clinched the stings of these horrible insects with his hammer, as they came through the copper, was unjustly laughed at for his narrative.
Add to these the continuous croaking’s of millions of frogs, the howling of the dogs in the villages, and the jackals in desert places, with the squabbles of the dragoman, with the eight all but naked Arabs who formed my crew; and then, with a tolerably clear conception, the reader will not be able to form the slightest notion of what I endured. I am given to understand, however communist bulgaria tour, that all these accompaniments are considered as so many interesting novelties by travelers on the Nile, and that therefore I should have been gratified by them, or, at least, have written with more or less enthusiasm, to that effect.
More dreary than the first
But I am getting a-head of my subject;—to return to the lazaretto. The second day was, if anything, more dreary than the first. The confinement made me so nervous, that I could not settle to anything. I tried to write an article for a magazine, with a hat- box for a desk, but this proved an utter failure. Then I attempted to read, but I could not fix my mind upon the book; and yet it was one of Sir Francis Head’s. I have said it was too hot to go out, or I could have walked up and down behind my bars, like a wild beast in a show, and so, perhaps, worn out a little of my irritability. In fact, I could only be miserable.
And yet, under other circumstances—as a visitor for an hour or two—there was much to amuse. It would have been comical to have seen the Count, when he expected a visit from his pretty cousins who lived in Alexandria, and for one of whom, I found out, he had a great affection—to have seen this real earnest Count washing out his small finery at the tank,—his collar, ruffles, and pocket-handkerchief, —to appear smart when the dark-eyed Ionian girls came. There was a funny Turk, too—the only comic Moslem I ever met—who did curious things with a bottle, after the manner of M. Auriol, and was cunning in passing piastres through hats, and making articles appear where they were not supposed to be,—all of which greatly scandalized the leigh-turbaned Hadis bound for Mecca. And the thin priest himself, who still was convinced of the impossibility of our being put in quarantine, was amusing in his way. But I only enjoyed these bits of character in the retrospect, when I got out.
Bisera Radkova 