The Nile without a Dragoman

Chapter I. Intkodtjctoet

In the spring of 1869, I received my doctor's orders to go to Bad Gastein. Chilled by the cold, and wearied by the length of the preceding winter, my wife and I resolved to shirk the following one, or, at least, to pass it in some southern climate. Tired of the Riviera, and knowing how very cold Italy can be, our thoughts turned longingly to the Nile. That we were forced to cross the half of Europe seemed an excellent reason for traversing the other moiety; and besides, for a sick man, there were two tempting water-routes from the Tyrol to Egypt. The one, down the Danube, via Constantinople; the other, by Venice and Brindisi. Before setting out on such a journey, however, it was necessary to count the cost, and to have more information respecting the advantages and drawbacks offered by the Nile to small people than we could gather from Dr. Russell's letters to the Times.

So we bought and studied " Murray's Handbook to Egypt," and made inquiries among our friends. The result was sufficiently disheartening. Murray, admirable in his B WLTHOUT A DRAGOMAN. 2 knowledge of Egypt 4000 years ago, told us all an antiquary could reasonably wish to know of the ancient kings, the order of their succession, the things that they did, and the temples that they built; but was despairingly vague as to present prices, and the state of affairs existing. Such estimates as he gave were deter ringly high ; and as we had been told that the chief food of Upper Egypt was turkeys, the 81 piastres (8s.) he named as the price of an average one was not reassur ing. Our private information, too, pointed in the same direction. The dahabeah necessary for a voyage up the Nile would cost from £100 to £200 a month, and a dragoman might be found to feed us at £2 per head per diem — that is to say, in ordinary years; but in this, 1869, the pasha's world-wide invitation to see the opening of the Suez canal would so fill Egypt that prices would be far higher than usual.

We fortunately, however, applied to an acquaintance who had passed many years in Alexandria, and had but lately quitted it. With the greatest good nature, he answered all our inquiries, and offered us the dahabeah he had left behind him. We hired her at the price his agent had had instructions, previous to our application, to ask ; and, thanks to the constant kindness of these two gentlemen, we were able to pass from the steamer which brought us to Alexandria directly into our boat. There must be many invalids to whom a winter in the DRAGOMANS. almost perfect climate of Upper Egypt would be of much benefit. There must be still more to whom to change the cold and damp, the constant variation and fatiguing length, of an English winter, for the warmth, light, and open-air life of the same season in Egypt, would be an almost unmixed gain — to whom the change of habits, the novelty of the scene, and the absence of papers, letters, and business, would be the best of tonics, mental and physical.

All of these may not care to travel en ■prince, none may have the advantage we happily possessed of a friend behind the scenes, and it is to aid, if perchance we may be able so to do, some one or more who may wish to pass a winter on the Nile that these pages, written at the time for our amusement, are now published. Our object is to give, by the narration of our own experiences, that information it is so difficult to obtain upon even the most ordinary thing that one desires or is compelled to do in a manner at all unusual. Nothing is easier than for a rich man to go to Cairo and to engage a dragoman. By signing a single written coutract, all trouble as to what he shall eat, drink, see, or pay, where he shall sleep or go, will then be taken off his hands. The same useful personage will, as a rule, with more or less accuracy, answer his every question on every subject.

The class are, as far as I have heard, very intelligent and honest — tried by the standard of the East. They are always obliging, with due regard, of course, to their own interest, and liberal in fulfilment of their contracts. b But, as may be expected, their charges are ridiculously high, and with many everything yields to the desire to make the best of their bargain. Still, as I have said, they are most useful. Couriers of the East, they smooth all difficulties, and stand between the traveller and nearly all annoyances. If their information is not always correct, nothing that I know of in Egypt is ; and if they are a little greedy themselves, they do a great deal to protect their master from the rapacity of others. But it is not given to all men to enjoy such luxuries as couriers and dragomans, and we hope to show in these pages how they in Egypt may be dispensed with.

With that view we shall add to the account of our inland voyage lists of such provisions and other articles of outfit as we found useful, if not necessary. We shall endeavour to give such information as we sought for in London before starting, and as many details as we think may be of service to those who venture on "the Nile without a dragoman."

Chapter II. Alexandria

Timing our start from Venice so as to avoid the crowd rushing to the opening of the Suez Canal, we took our passage by the steamer, via, Brindisi, which was due at Alexandria just too late for the commencement of the Viceroy's fetes. Our vessel, II Principe Carignano, knife like in shape, was inolto agile, as one of her officers told us, in behaviour. The weather was bad, and she did not belie her character. All miseries, however, come to an end, and we reached our port on the 19th November. As soon as I came on deck, and before there was time to take in and wonder at the sight, at first so striking, of a motley Eastern throng, a note was put into my hand. The bearer was an intelligent-looking little man, with crepe hair and a smooth face. He was dressed in a fez, bright blue embroidered cloth jacket, white embroidered Greek waiscoat, and trousers of calico, spotlessly white, most voluminous in folds, and tight at the ankles.

He was the. Egyptian servant of M. B., the French gentleman who acted as agent for our daha beah, and who, having undertaken to help us on our way, well fulfilled his offer. M. B. arriving imme diately afterwards, we landed at the custom-house, and made acquaintance with Egyptian officials. There is a terrible sameness in the world. Every thing passed as it might have done at any European port, except perhaps that our detention was less long than usual, and that our five-franc pieces, openly expected, were given without disguise. On passing European custom-houses, it may sometimes be expedient, but it is not necessary to give; but he who enters Egypt without money in his hand will see his effects pass a bad quarter of an hour : the officials have the right of search, and they exercise it. We had nothing but our clothes with us, nothing of any kind contraband, and so our ten francs were graciously received, and ourselves and goods most obligingly passed.

After a row with a gang of porters, in all kinds of costume, carried on in a dozen dialects, during which, by the care taken of us, we were able to appear only as an amused audience, we pushed into a couple of carriages, and set out for the Mamoodeeh Canal. Our way took us through Alexandria, a cosmopolitan city of French houses, Italian villas, Turkish lattice-windowed buildings, and native mud hovels, where every tongue is commonly spoken, and every coin is in current circulation. A city of extremes and contrasts. Deluged in winter by rain and at times even pinched by cold, it is annually scorched for five months by a fierce sun, dusted by desert sand, and parched by drought. Excellent European shops of all descriptions stand amongst Eastern coffee-houses and bazaars. Inhabited by men of all nations, a fancy ball could scarce produce a more incongruous crowd than SKETCH OF THE CITY. 7 that which fills its streets.

English and Greek sailors jostle their way through a throng of Italian and French merchants, German mechanics, Maltese servants, Turkish and Egyptian women, donkeys with their boy-masters, and camels with their Arab drivers. More beautiful women may be seen in it in a day than anywhere out of London, and others, poor things 1 more ugly and squalid than any even London can produce. There passes a carriage full of Greeks who contradict ones insular prejudices in favour of English beauty, and there an artificial product of the Boulevards is knocked by a donkey off her high heels into a puddle. And what puddles ! In this, the old part of the town, there is no road properly speak ing, and no pathway. Man, woman, or beast, each takes the way which offers, and makes the best of the open space. The road was once, like everything in Egypt, well, even prodigally, made, and then left to take take care of itself.

After the manner of roads, it gave unevenly, and the weak parts had become quagmires, the strong, rocks. The ruts were not ruts, but rather chains of ponds filled with mud which was water, and with water which was mud. Between the ponds the rem nants of the old road served as embankments, and at each moment our carriage hauled painfully up one of these, poised itself dripping at the top before making another plunge into the sea below. Bad, however, as was the road, the scene was so novel and amusing that we were almost sorry to rumble through the gate of the fortifications out into our first palm plantation. Passing a very pretty garden and the cemetery, a little more jolting brought us to the canal, and there lay our boat and home for the next five months. The first glance at her was an anxious one, and the result a little dispiriting.

She looked very small, she was in some disorder, and her crew were huddled together on the bank under a tent extemporised to shelter them from the pitiless storms, between two of which we had landed. The background of the picture was even less promising. There are probably few bits of the earth uglier than the one on which we stood. The canal there makes a bend so tbat only so much is seen as will make a pond, the whole ugliness of whose flat mud-banks, muddy water, and surrounding mud huts is forced upon one by the necessity of looking at it. Its dirt, damp, and cold, its squalor and poverty were all there, and one could not look over or beyond, for there was nothing else to see. We went into our cabin ; M. B., whose time pressed, left us. The rain began again, and we sat down among our unpacked goods and unknown servants.

But hunger soon roused us to action, and we called for the cook, who had just been pointed out to us. Girghis (anglice, George) had not been well-treated by nature, nor did he possess the art or taste to make the least of his disadvantages. His bullet-shaped head, and lank, lustreless brown hair, was covered by a tarboosh, not too new, round which was twisted a white and red cotton OUR SERVANTS. 9 handkerchief, not too clean. Large black eyes that shone in the dark, if ever eyes so shone, and a shapeless coarse mouth, gave him a cruel animal appearance that much misrepresented the man. A dirty brown cloth jacket, the worse for wear, and none the better for his recent donkey ride to Alexandria; a waistcoat whose embroidery was worn and buttons defective, trousers of the butcher-boy blue colour and texture, with Blucher boots innocent from their birth of blacking, completed, with the help of a red sash and a few inches of Girghis between trousers and Bluchers, his not too inviting appearance.

But we were hungry, and asked what we could have for breakfast, putting our question in English, of which we had been told he understood enough to receive in it his orders. His answer was, "Yes, ma'am," given with the purest London accent. Again and again we tried to make our wants known, but it was an unusual hour for eating, Girghis was not happy at guessing, and I had to reinforce my English by pantomime. This was easy, but not so to get his reply as to the state of the larder ; so we called Ibrahim, our soffraghee or table servant. His European language was Italian, and as he knew at least a dozen words, and always pretended that he understood whatever was said to him, Girghis was soon sent to the galley. Ibrahim was a tall ill-made native of Sioot. Hair and lips of the negro type, weak eyes, a sunken chest, enormous knees that no bagginess of trowsers could conceal, splay feet that no slippers could confine, with a general ungainliness of figure and motion, harmonised ill with the swagger and assumption of his manner.

But enough of Ibrahim for the present; unfortunately we shall have more to say of him later on. Breakfast over, our first care was to examine the boat. A dahabeah has generally fine lines and a very handsome shape ; she is built of wood as a rule, but not rarely of iron. Her sides are low, her beam is great, and her draught light. In one respect her form is peculiar, for the bow is much deeper in the water than the stern. The older boats have a considerable sheer, the stern especially cocking up high out of water, but the newer ones are flatter. She is furnished with four means of progression, viz., sails, punting-poles,* tow-rope, and oars. The first three are used almost exclusively on the voyage up, and the oars on the voyage down. Her sails, two in number, are lateen. The trinkeet, or forward sail, is of great size, the yard on which it is laced being as long, and sometimes longer, than the hull of the boat itself.

The ballakoon, or after sail, is small, bearing to the foresail much the same proportion as the dandy of a yawl has to its mainsail. Into the after part of the dahabeah is built a wooden house, which sometimes fills nearly half the boat ; and the size of a distant dahabeah may be easily told by the number, six or eight, nine or ten, of the Venetian-blinded windows with which the sides of the house are pierced. Inside are the cabins ; outside, on the roof, the deck where the OUR DAHABEAH— THE 'LOTUS.' 11 Nile travellers' time is almost entirely spent. Two or three steps from the cabin's floor, which is in fact the floor of the boat itself, lead up on to the maindeck, and from this a staircase, or in large boats two, one on each side, gives access to the deck above. Three fourths of the maindeck are made of movable bars or planks that are taken up when the oars are used ; and it is under this part of the deck that packages and cases are stored.

The oars on the return voyage, when not in use, are lashed along the sides, each to its pin ; but on going up they generally serve as a rail round the upper deck, being fastened rail-wise to iron uprights fixed for the support of the awning. Round the mast are ranged the punting-poles, that play no second-rate part in a Nile voyage ; and im mediately in front of it is the cook's galley. Every part of the boat from stem to stern is fitted with awnings. Canvas is the only roof ever given to the kitchen ; it closes in, when required, the sides of the main deck and of the cabins. It roofs them in also, and affords every possible protection from the sun. In the tents so made the crew sleep : the men on the main deck, the reis, or captain, and one or two others on the upper deck ; and in them on every day of rest the men hold feast and holiday.

So swathed in her awnings is a dahabeah on such an occasion, that as little can be seen of her as of a racehorse in his clothes. The Lotus, a very small boat, was about 53 feet long by 10 feet broad. She had three cabins and a closet, opening one into the other. The main cabin, most amidships, was 8 feet 3 inches broad, 6 feet 6 inches long, and 6 feet 6 inches high ; the other two were of the same length and height, but narrowing with the curve of the vessel. Large dahabeahs, indeed all that we saw excepting ours, have a passage down the middle leading aft from the main cabin. On either side are the sleeping cabins, often necessarily very narrow. Our boat, having no passage, afforded us better sleeping accommodation than we should have had in a vessel twice as large ; but the main cabin was small.

Divans on either side of each cabin, and an infinity of lockers, drawers, and shelves, turned the space, however, to the best account, and for two people the little boat was very comfortable. Going out of the cabin on to the main deck, on one side was the staircase to the upper deck, on the other the pantry ; and in front, by the mast, stood the filter — a large goolah jar, set in a green wooden case. These jars are of earth, very porous, and consequently cooling. On the upper deck stand chairs, and divans, and per haps a table. It can, as I have said, be completely sur rounded and covered in by awnings, and a handsome Persian carpet is often spread upon it. The forewarder part is in fact a day-room, used by the owners more than is the main cabin. From the afterpart the boat is steered, and it is more or less abandoned to the reis, steersman, and the poultry.

Our boat, however, had a ginnayn, or garden, as the five or six feet of extreme stern, some times not occupied by the cabins is called, from the HINTS FROM A RESIDENT. 13 habit that prevails in the native boats of placing here one or more pots of flowers, generally cactuses. We found our garden most useful. From it the ballakoon was worked, and in it our chicken coops were ranged. Such is the best description I can give of the travelling Nile-boat; and a more graceful boat, or one better suited for its purpose, it would be hard to find. The fine lines and immense sails give it the power requisite to stem the rapid current of the Nile. The lateen cut of these sails spreads the canvas high above the shelter of the oftentimes deep banks. The great beam gives stability and accommodation. The light draught makes her easy to tow, and, for so large a boat, easy also to row.

Thereby, too, she has a better chance of escaping the numerous sandbanks; and as she strikes them with her deepest part, the bow, she is more easily got afloat again. The low freeboard, only about two feet from the waterline, adds to her lightness in fact and ap pearance ; whilst her long pennants, gaily painted sides, and white canvas, bordered often by one or two cloths of blue, give the boat a most picturesque and holiday-like look. Near or at a distance, a dahabeah is fair to see. Near, she is a picture of comfort and convenience, of adaptability of means to an end. In all things a perfect boat-home. At a distance she resembles a bird on the wing rather than a boat on the water. Our first day on board, however, was by no means an agreeable one : bad weather kept us in the cabins, and WLTHOUT A DRAGOMAN. the horrors of unpacking had to be endured in a very small space.

It was novel to see the servants, and even one of the crew whom we sent with a message, start for Alexandria on donkeys (nobody in this country will go half a mile on foot if he can help it) ; and it was suffi ciently amusing to see their return and the donkey-carried provisions. But it was by no means fun trying to settle accounts afterwards with men who did not understand us, and whom we did not understand ; more especially as Ibrahim, who understood us best, was determined for his own purposes to do so but little. It was evident that one was a rascal, if not both ; and if they would cheat us at Alexandria, where we were among friends, what would they do when we got up the country. The next morning we saw M. B., and asked if it was not possible to get better servants, or at least one who would have some language in common with us.

He most kindly went through the account of the day before, and pointed out the items which were excessive, and those which were only high. The chickens for instance were too dear, and a franc was worth eight piastres, not seven; but it was clearly exorbitant to reckon the penny egg-cups at a franc apiece. Somebody was not quite honest, nevertheless it was better to keep the men we had got : to change would occasion delay ; servants were this year most difficult to find, owing to the great influx of foreigners. In a short time they would understand us better. Could we learn some Arabic ? No, that was GOOD ADVICE. 15 scarcely possible, but Ibrahim had some Italian, and would find it if we proved ourselves his masters; and if we changed, we might not do so for the better. On peut Men changer un borgne pour un boiteux.

After giving this advice, M. B. made us a list of the prices current both in Upper and Lower Egypt, of a number of things in. common use — such as eggs, chickens, mutton, and turkeys; and he counselled us to make the most of this information, and where it failed, to follow Ibrahim's example, and to act as if it was all-sufficient. The advice was good, and we took it thankfully.

Chapter III. The Pit Out

The next two days were spent in fitting out and victual ling the ship. The donkeys came and went without cessation. Girghis spent the morning in buying a beefsteak for luncheon, and the afternoon in finding a chicken and some fish for dinner. C. rode in on a donkey, followed by Ibrahim on another, and came back in a carriage full of odds and ends, with Ibrahim on the box. I passed the time on board with the one or two of the crew who were not at the coffee-shops, and took from them my first lessons in Arabic. It is no easy thing to fit out for a voyage into a strange land for those whose housekeeping experiences have been hitherto made with butchers, bakers, and grocers in the next street. Murray gives, in his " Handbook to Egypt," a good deal of information, but he does not give much that one also wants to know.

For the vast majority of English travellers, who have a dragoman, such details are of no importance. It is the dragoman's business to find a sufficiency of all supplies, and to know what will and what will not be required. We had to do our own work, and it was not a very simple task. All difficulty could, it was true, be got over by taking everything in large quantities ; but this was not an economic solution of the LIST OF PROVISIONS. 17 problem. We had, therefore, made some time before a list of the things we should, as we thought, certainly require, calculated the quantities probably necessary, and had ordered them to be sent from England per Peninsular and Oriental steamer. This list we now supplemented by purchases at Alexandria; and we give the outfit in detail, for the benefit of any reader who may start, as we did, on the Nile without a dragoman.

Arrowroot 2 lbs. Barley, pearl 8 lbs. Biscuits — 2 tins Albert's \ 2 tins digestive do 4 tins captain U-lb. tins. 4 tins cabin 2 tins brown college 2 tins spice nuts J Bacon in tins 18 lbs. Bath chops 2. Butter 4 5-lb. jars. Paraffin candles 30 lbs. Composite do., for lanterns 20 lbs. Capers 1 pint. Chutnee 2£ pints. Currie powder 1 pint bottle. Cheese lOlbs. Extractum Carnis (Liebig) 8 |-lb. jars. Hams 2 small. Jams and jellies — 12 assorted jams 1-lb. jars. Red currant jelly 2 1-lb. jars. Dundee marmalade 12 1-lb. tins. Preserved Meats — Beef, mutton, and jugged hare 18 1 & 2-lb.tins. Mustard 1-lb. tin. French do 1 small jar. C Scotch oatmeal 3 4-lb. tins. Olives, French 2 pint bottles. Oil.salad 2 pint bottles. Pepper 1-lb. bottle. Peas, split 1 7-lb. tin. Soups 30 1-lb. tins. Preserved Vegetables — Green peas 18 1-lb. tins.

Macedoines (mixed vegetables) 18 1-lb. tins. Harvey sauce 2 J-pint bottles. Soap 12 tablets. Starch, Glenfield 1 4-lb. tin. Tongues 4. Tea 6 lbs. Vinegar, raspberry 6 J-pint bottles. The provisions enumerated above were amply sufficient for ourselves and two servants, for a voyage that lasted nearly five montlis. There was more than enough, indeed, of some of the items, as, for instance, the biscuits; whilst others were nearly useless, e.g., the preserved meats. Still the biscuits were a most welcome small " backshish " to our crew (An Arab is a perfect child, and loves something to eat, especially something that is new.), and the tinned beef and mutton made us independent of markets, and so enabled us to upset a dozen little plots of our people to stop for provisions at this or that village when they wished for a halt.

The great proportion of our stores were sent, as I have said, from London ; and for those who can despatch them sufficiently beforehand, such a plan is the best. One is certain that the provisions will be good. The freight is ridiculously cheap. But it is not necessary to be so provident, for at the shops in Alexandria would be found everything asked for; and WINE.— COFFEE. 19 some things will, of course, be bought better there than in England, as flour, coffee, rice, macaroni, sugar, and common soap. The two last indeed may be bought everywhere. Wine may also, be bought of every description at Alexandria. But I was not lucky enough to get any Bordeaux either there or at Cairo. The wines sent us came not from the Medoc but from the Grave and Rhone districts. In laying in a supply, it should be remembered that the climate of Egypt requires light wines.

I did not use half as much there as in Eng land; the wine I drank was invariably mixed with sodawater, and I thirsted for a light Rhine wine, for the Austrian Mailberger or Gumpoldskirchner, or, better still, the light white Tisch wine one finds at Pesth, and drinks on the Lower Danube. We bought at Alexandria a sodawater-making machine, and it was a very great comfort ; but the drink of drinks on the Nile is the native stimulant, coffee. Both at Cairo and Alexandria most excellent coffee may be obtained ; the green berry of Cairo has the highest repute, but we preferred the Alexandrian. The coffee of the East is a very different beverage from the decoction as a rule put up with in England. The berry is of much finer quality ; and pounded, not ground; the coffee is made in two or three minutes, and served, grounds and all.

The first day or two we were disposed to find fault with the thick potion ; but the fine flavour and happy absence of the oily bitter c taste that is produced by slow making, and is so frequently found in European coffee, soon reconciled us to the unac customed grits; and before ten days were over, we surprised each other eating these very grits with a spoon, in true Arab fashion. So excellent is the coffee, and so sympa thetic with the climate, that we drank too much of it, and found it necessary for health's sake to abandon our European cups for native ones of egg-shell size, and even to limit these in number. To be in a well-provisioned ship adds, no doubt, greatly to one's comfort, but one is by no means dependent upon the stores taken on board. At all the large towns on ,the river bank weekly markets are held, and we constantly stopped for them, as much for the amusement as for the supplies they afforded.

Beef, can only be obtained at Alexandria and Cairo. Preserved soups and a good supply of Liebig's extract of meat for stock are therefore necessary. Veal can be only occasionally met with ; but mutton of fair quality, good chickens and geese, pigeons and turkeys beyond praise, can be always obtained below Assouan. During the fast of Ramadan only had we any difficulty in getting fresh provisions. At that season the meat is always killed after sunset ; and that which is killed is consumed by the hungry true believers. Vegetables are scarce and not good. Cabbage may now and then be obtained ; a very small, but not very good, broad bean; a lettuce resembling dandelion, and cucumbers after Christmas. VEGETABLES.— MILK. 21 We tried several other kinds that are eaten by the natives, but we never asked for them a second time.