CAIRO.

19

stopping at sunset opposite the island of Rhoda, and
looking back at a view that few things of the kind
can surpass. The vast city, studded with graceful
domes and still more beautiful minarets, rises up
loftily from the fiat, monotonous surrounding Desert,
partly placed on and partly backed by the bold white
Mokuttum cliffs, while, at a little higher elevation, the
Mosque and Tomb of Muhammed 'Ali, with its white
alabaster walls, dark blue roofs, and delicately slight
minarets, stands, like a watchman guarding the city;
in the foreground, the river-bank is lined with large
palaces, some white and some red, adorned with graceful
arcades and handsome balconies, each with its own
garden and orange-grove, meeting the gardens of Old
Cairo and Rhoda. The forest of boats, of every size
and form, with brightly painted masts, red and blue
awnings, flags, and streamers, form a gay fringe to the
wide grey river. On the other side, far away over the
fields of green crops, and the wide expanse of desert
sand, the Pyramids raise their grave, calm, solemn
triangles, cutting against the cloudless sky, clothed in
strangely beautiful sunset colours of violet and gold,
all too gorgeous for any paint-box to depict.

We were joined the next morning by Mr. Hood's
dahabieh and another; on the following day we over-
took a third; while a fourth joined us two days after.
The five boats made quite a pretty little fleet; and
during the ten days that ensued of slow tracking, we
found plenty of amusement in efforts and stratagems to
outstrip each other; this, however, is against all ideas
of propriety among the crew, and our Reis invariably
apologised to the other Reises at sunset if we had gained
any advantage over their boats during the day ; rather
exasperating to our feelings when we were chuckling

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