CHAPTER XLVIII--CAMEL RIDING.--ADVENTURES AMONG THE NUBIANS.

_How they made the Royal Coffins--Splitting Blocks of Stones with Wooden Wedges--An Ingenious Device--A Ride on a Camel--A Beast indulging in Familiarities--Lunching on Trowsers--Mounting in the Saddle--Curious Sensation--An Interesting Brute--A Camel Solo--Sitting in a Dish--Camel Riding in a Gymnastic Point of View--Secondary Effects--Nubian Ferry-Boats--P. T. and his Paint-Pot--Labors of an Enthusiastic American--Mr. Tucker on his Travels--“A Human Donkey”--Visiting the Cataract--Paying Toll to a Sheik--The Professor and his Camel--Crocodiles of the Nile--Starting back to Cairo._

WE arranged to go around the cataract and visit the Island of Philæ the day after our arrival at Assouan. On our way we took in the granite quarries, where for thousands of years blocks of stone were taken out for various building purposes and for making those enormous sarcophagi used in so many Egyptian tombs. The stone is of the red character known as syenite and admits of a high polish. In one of the quarries there is an obelisk not quite detached, which would have been ninety-five feet high and eleven feet broad at the base. Why it was abandoned and under what king it was begun are not known.

The quarries are interesting from the fact that they show the ancient method of removing stone. Holes were cut to receive wooden wedges, which were driven firmly in and then wet with water until their swelling broke away the stone by the equal and powerful pressure it exerted. The same plan is still in use in, some parts of India; the quarries at Jerusalem whence was, {613}taken the stone for building Solomon’s temple show similar marks of the wedge.

We were offered the choice of camels or donkeys for the ride to Philæ and back, and for the novelty of the thing I selected a camel.

I went out early in the morning before any other passenger was stirring, and examined the beasts with the eye of a connoisseur. They were all lying down and chewing the cud of content or some other kind of grass, and I endeavored to get on friendly terms with them. I patted one on the head and he resented the familiarity by endeavoring to bite a section from the seat of my trowsers.

This kind of performance was not calculated to secure my friendship and I moved on to another which the boy in charge insisted was _tayb kateer_ (very good). He did not try to bite and as he was of goodly size I chose him. Then I proceeded to mount and took my seat in the saddle which had a strong resemblance to a wood-sawyer’s “horse” with a blanket over it. Now was the critical moment.

I grasped firmly the pommel of the saddle and also the cantle; as I did so, the boy pulled the camel’s halter and uttered something like “_Hey da! Hey da!_”

The camel lifted his shoulders and came up to his knees; then he brought up his hind quarters to the full height of the legs there, and finally he arose from his knees to his fore feet. The motion, so far as I was concerned, was a surge backward, then a surge forward, and finally a backward surge that subsided into a level. {614}Here is the formula: Half the fore-legs, then all the hindlegs, then half the fore-legs. From a level you are pitched backward so that you could easily fall on your shoulders; an instant after, you find yourself inclined forward, and the next instant you are on the backward lean again, and subside into a level. I held on firmly, or I should have come to grief. I fancy the camel boys who stood around had several laughs at my precautions to prevent falling.

The camel kneels in the reverse of the motions of rising, _i. e._, half the fore-legs, all the hind-legs, and then half the fore-legs. When he is lying down his back is easily accessible for loading or mounting, but when he is up in the air he is a long way off.

I selected one of the largest beasts on purpose to know the sensation of being elevated. I expected to have a sense of insecurity and possibly of giddiness, but on the contrary experienced nothing of the kind.

On the score of beauty the camel has no reason to be proud. His neck and head are ill-shaped and suggest an overgrown turkey; his feet move awkwardly and with an appearance of gout, rheumatism, and spring-halt; his skin looks like an old boot that has been exposed to wind and rain for half a year; and his shape generally is as beautiful as that of a gnarly apple. My camel had a grotesquely colored skin; he had hair in spots and spots without hair, and what he had was of the shade of a very old buffalo robe. He had a sort of wool on his neck, but it was rather bunchy and looked as if his brother camels had browsed upon it; and his under-lip hung down like that of a boy who is about to whimper in expectation of a flogging.

When I mounted him, he arched his neck around like a snake and brought his head quite near mine, and at the same time began a noise that was a combination of screaming, bellowing, and groaning. He kept this up about half the time I was on his back, and altogether he made the journey a musical one.

The regular saddle for riding a camel is a sort of dish, in which you sit with your legs crossed over the animal’s neck or hanging down at will. You can have stirrups if you like, as a rest for the feet, and for a long journey the best plan is to sling a pair of well-filled saddle-bags or a couple of boxes over a common pack {615}saddle, and arrange them in such a way that they form a level surface about six feet from side to side. Cover this with blankets, shawls, and a mattress, and roll up the sheets and pillow of your bed, and strap them to the back of the saddle so as to form a comfortable rest. Fasten a pair of stirrups to the saddlebow and have everything well strapped and corded so as to prevent slipping.

With this arrangement you can lean, lie down, sit sideways or cross-legged, or with your feet in the stirrups; and if you want to be luxurious, you can fasten a huge umbrella so as to shade you from the sun. A suggestion of my own is that you add a soda fountain, a billiard table, and a fish-pond, and also a light carriage for driving around your platform. Other comforts would doubtless occur to the imaginative reader.

There is a peculiar rocking motion to the camel, and the experienced rider moves his body backwards and forwards, bending at the hips, at each step of the beast.

The night after my camel ride, I dreamed that I had a backbone of glass, and could not move without breaking in two; and when I got up in the morning it seemed as if I was all backbone and that an iron rod had been passed through it for purposes of rigidity. I went around rather pompously for all that day, and I couldn’t have made a bow if I had been in front of the king of the Cannibal Islands and threatened with instant death for any appearance of incivility. I dropped my cane while walking on shore and had to hire an Arab to pick it up, and as for putting on my boots it was as great an effort as to turn a somersault in a peck measure. {616}My camel was an ordinary baggage beast, and the saddle was such as they use for transporting freight around the cataract. The two round sticks that run from pommel to cantle were painfully perceptible beneath the blanket that hid them, and the rubbing, rocking motion over them made a couple of abrasions of the skin as large as a soda cracker.

The result of my camel riding was to teach a great deal of dignity, and to cause me to sit as little as possible in the presence of my elders or of any body else. What with stiffness and soreness I was not agile in my movements, and it took as long for me to sit down or rise from a seat, and was about as laborious, as to lay the corner-stone of an eight-story building.

From Assouan to the quarries the scenery was wild and striking, especially so at the point where we caught sight of the river and had Philae in the midst of the Nile as the centre of the picture. We had at one view the desert, black rocks and white sand, green trees, a flowing river, and the beautiful island with its coronet of temples. Under the tall trees on the river bank, there was a crowd of Arabs and Nubians, waiting for us to dismount, and beyond them lay the boats which were to ferry us over. The scene was unlike that of any other part of the Nile that we had yet encountered, and we readily realized that we had passed the frontier of Egypt and had entered Nubia.

Leaving my camel in the hands of his driver--a scantily-dressed boy of Nubian origin,--I entered the boat and waited till the rest of the party were on board. Half a dozen merchants of ostrich feathers and ornaments of silver were trying to strike up bargains, but did not create much business. In the river some Nubian urchins were sitting astride of logs and paddling about, and they showed great dexterity in balancing themselves. These logs are generally a foot in diameter and six or eight feet long, and you can see them lying around on the banks; they appear to be common property for use as ferry boats, but whether they are supplied by government I am unable to say. A native comes to the Nile and wishes to cross; he removes his clothing and makes it into a bundle that he places on the top of his head, and thus prepared he takes a log, strides it, plunges into the river and paddles over. On the other side he draws the log well on {617}the land, and as soon as his body is dry he dons his clothing and moves on. Sometimes and generally he does not happen to have any clothing, and in this event he is saved a great deal of trouble.

Philæ has always excited the admiration of travellers, many of whom have characterized it as the most lovely spot they ever beheld.

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To the ancient Egyptian it was the most sacred place on earth. It was the resting-place of his god of gods, the all-powerful Osiris, who was identified with the annual overflow of the Nile, and the consequent fertility of the land.

Hence arose the fable that his body was deposited in the cataract, whence he arose each year to enrich the earth.

Isis was the sister and wife of Osiris. On the monuments she is variously styled the “Mistress of Heaven,” the “Regent of the Gods,” the “Eye of the Sun.” A veil always hung before her shrine, which, said the well known inscription, “None among mortals have ever lifted up.” Sometimes she represented the land of Egypt, just as Osiris did its fertilizing river, the Nile.

Such were the deities to whose mysterious worship, Philæ, the Sacred Island, was solemnly dedicated.

The temple was beautifully situated, as it covered a considerable part of the Island, and must have appeared in the days of its glory very much as though it rose out of the water. It is comparatively modern, as the dates upon it do not go back beyond the XXXth Dynasty--about four hundred years B. C. The building was very irregular, and the indications are that it was the work of several architects at different periods. The propylon towers are massive, and rise to a height of nearly sixty feet above their base, affording a fine view of the island and its surroundings. {618}The colors on the walls and towers are wonderfully preserved,--better than in most of the Egyptian temples,--and they present a beautiful effect.

The sky was clear and the air soft and balmy; a slight breeze shook the leaves of the trees and roughened the water of the river. To the north were the black rocks that marked the locality of the cataract, while to the south the Nile made a short bend among the Nubian hills and was speedily lost to view.

There is a sentimental poem on the “Long Ago” by an American author, which contains the following stanza:

“There’s a musical isle up the river Time,

Where the softest of airs are playing;

There’s a cloudless sky and a tropical clime,

And a song as sweet as the vesper chime,

And the tunes with the roses are straying.”

It may have been, and at all events it is pretty and poetical enough for the uses of anybody who ever ventured upon verse-making. If I wanted to cure anybody of the poetic mania Philæ would be the last place to which I should send him.

There are inscribed on the temple, chiefly on the pylon towers, the names of many persons who have visited the place within the past two hundred years. On the side of one of the doorways is an inscription in French, announcing that the army of Desaix reached the island of Philæ, at the time of the occupation of Egypt by the French under Bonaparte. The inscription remained untouched until 1848, when some English visitors effaced the words _Buonaparte_ and _Armée Française_. An enthusiastic Frenchman, who had been up the river

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{621}to the second cataract, happened to visit the island on his return and found that the mutilation had occurred during his absence. He procured a pot of paint, restored the names and wrote beneath the inscription: “_Une page d’histoire ne s efface pas!_”

One of the most enterprising of modern travellers--so far as recording the fact of his visit is concerned--is a somebody from New York. He came here in 1870 and travelled, literally, not figuratively, with a paint pot and brush in his hand. On the pyramids, on the tombs at Sakkarah, on the walls of the temple at Karnak, at Edfou, Esneh, in fact everywhere along the Nile I saw his initials, “P. T., N. Y., 1870” I was told that his full name is Tucker; I hope it is at any rate, as it is not proper that such a genius should rest in obscurity. He smeared those initials where they were sure to be seen, and was not at all particular if he defaced a fine mural painting or sculpture by so doing. In the temple at Karnak, for example, he painted them in such a way as to deface a mural sculpture, and he did likewise at other places. If he could come here again, and under another name accompany a party like ours up the Nile, he would no doubt listen with pleasure to the compliments passed upon him.

Nearly everybody called him a first-class ass, an idiot, a fool; and some prefixed an adjective of a participial character to the word; and I heard several persons wish to wring his neck. I endeavored to reprove them, but it was of no use; and lest he should go down to the obscurity that he evidently dreaded, I embrace this opportunity to make known his name and valorous deeds.

An Englishman said to me one day while looking at the above inscription, “We have a good many human donkeys in England, but I think your countryman who did that is the grandest ass in the world.” My heart was so full just then that I could not rush to my compatriot’s defence, and I fear that my British friend believed I shared his opinion.

From the island we went to see the cataract, which is nothing more than a succession of rapids. In the time of the highest flood boats can ascend the cataract with the aid of a strong wind by their sails alone, but in ordinary stages they must be taken up by means of tow-ropes. From forty to sixty men are {622}required, and the passage through the five miles of distance will take a whole day. The scene is quite picturesque and full of animation, especially when the rope breaks and lets the boat back over a distance that has been gained with much toil.

There is a sheik who has entire control of the passage of the cataract, and the contract must be made with him. It costs from ten to fifteen pounds to take a boat up from Assouan to Mahatta, a small village at the head of the falls, and sometimes the work will take three or four days.

At Mahatta we found our camels and donkeys, and returned by the bank of the river to Assouan. The Professor was on a camel of enormous size--so large in fact that I suggested the addition of a pilot house and steering gear to keep the animal in the road. We passed two or three villages where the natives offered us necklaces and polished agates for sale, and a few old coins. Skins of crocodiles were offered, and one native tried hard to palm off a lizard on us as a young crocodile.

Crocodiles, by the way, are quite scarce on the Nile below the First Cataract. We saw but one on our whole voyage; twenty years ago you might see two or three dozen of them in a day. In Nubia they are abundant enough, and further up the Nile you can see plenty of hippopotami. Not one of these beasts exists now below the second cataract, though less than sixty years ago one was killed in the delta below Cairo.

After several day’s stoppage at Assouan, we started back for Cairo. All steamboat travellers and most _dahabeeah_ parties do not go beyond Philæ, and nearly all tourists who go further, end their voyage at Wady Haifa, the foot of the Second Cataract, two hundred and forty miles beyond Assouan.

Above Wady Haifa the river makes a wide bend into Dougoula; parties intending to proceed to Khartoum, at the junction of the Blue and White Nile, generally leave the river at Korosko, a hundred miles below Wady Haifa, and make a journey of eight days by camel across the desert to Aboo Hamed, where they take boats again on the river and save going around the bend After passing Khartoum there is good navigation on the Nile, for a long distance, and then--

Well, that is what explorers are endeavoring to find out.

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