DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.6272#0151
148
VOYAGE UP THE NILE.
to be seen in the beautiful East, unless by chance an English
lady traveller strays there, or one from our own bright land.
True the Pachas have toys—the Beys, the Turks, all
have toys; they dress them in silks, in rare tissues ; they feed
them with sweetmeats; and the fatter they are, the more they
prize them. They have, and so have we, dogs whom we treat
thus ; we have canaries whom we cage; and these are your
women in the East.
Cairo, in the eight weeks that I have spent in it, before
going up, and now, is exhausted: and now for the voyage
down the river to Alexandria. This is a simple affair. Twenty-
four hours does it, and you have no bed, which is the bore.
Thackeray, in his squib about the East, « Journey from Corn-
hill to Cairo," fully dilates upon it. The voyage was not four
days, as when I came up from Atfeh, and I have not so much
time to observe the formation of that Delta. I am not a geo-
logist, but I believe that six thousand years ago, Nubia was
as well endowed with soil as Egypt, and that the Creator
did not, as the geologists say he did, (sneeringly,) make that
Delta at the creation ready-made; but that six thousand
years has formed it—Lyell and others to the contrary. I am
supported in my opinion of this by eminent geologists with
regard to the Nile, if not the Mississippi.
After passing Shoobra, and bidding farewell to the Pyra-
mids for ever, we wind through the luxuriant fertility of this
valley, through the palm groves that we gaze on for the last
time. Dr. Lallemand, Membre de VInstitut, is on board, and
his wife and son, and Mr. Danton. I had seen their names in
the tombs of the kings, and we compared notes. Observing thi
Mahmoudieh canal winding like the Nile, I was struck wit!
a remark M. Lallemand quoted from the Turks ; viz., that the
VOYAGE UP THE NILE.
to be seen in the beautiful East, unless by chance an English
lady traveller strays there, or one from our own bright land.
True the Pachas have toys—the Beys, the Turks, all
have toys; they dress them in silks, in rare tissues ; they feed
them with sweetmeats; and the fatter they are, the more they
prize them. They have, and so have we, dogs whom we treat
thus ; we have canaries whom we cage; and these are your
women in the East.
Cairo, in the eight weeks that I have spent in it, before
going up, and now, is exhausted: and now for the voyage
down the river to Alexandria. This is a simple affair. Twenty-
four hours does it, and you have no bed, which is the bore.
Thackeray, in his squib about the East, « Journey from Corn-
hill to Cairo," fully dilates upon it. The voyage was not four
days, as when I came up from Atfeh, and I have not so much
time to observe the formation of that Delta. I am not a geo-
logist, but I believe that six thousand years ago, Nubia was
as well endowed with soil as Egypt, and that the Creator
did not, as the geologists say he did, (sneeringly,) make that
Delta at the creation ready-made; but that six thousand
years has formed it—Lyell and others to the contrary. I am
supported in my opinion of this by eminent geologists with
regard to the Nile, if not the Mississippi.
After passing Shoobra, and bidding farewell to the Pyra-
mids for ever, we wind through the luxuriant fertility of this
valley, through the palm groves that we gaze on for the last
time. Dr. Lallemand, Membre de VInstitut, is on board, and
his wife and son, and Mr. Danton. I had seen their names in
the tombs of the kings, and we compared notes. Observing thi
Mahmoudieh canal winding like the Nile, I was struck wit!
a remark M. Lallemand quoted from the Turks ; viz., that the