desert chain
closes in so as to overhang the river with its reddish-white cliffs,
which no rain ever comes to freshen, and in which, at different heights,
gape the square holes leading to the habitations of the mummies. These
mountains, which in the distance look so beautiful in their rose-colour,
and make, as it were, interminable back-cloths to all that happens
on the river banks, were perforated, during some 5000 years, for the
introduction of sarcophagi and now they swarm with old dead bodies.

And all that passes on the banks, indeed, changes as little as the
background.

First there is that gesture, supple and superb, but always the same,
of the women in their long black robes who come without ceasing to fill
their long-necked jars and carry them away balanced on their veiled
heads. Then the flocks which shepherds, draped in mourning, bring to
the river to drink, goats and sheep and asses all mixed up together.
And then the buffaloes, massive and mud-coloured, who descend calmly to
bathe. And, finally, the great labour of the watering: the traditional
noria, turned by a little bull with bandaged eyes and, above all, the
shaduf, worked by men whose naked bodies stream with the cold water.

The shadufs follow one another sometimes as far as the eye can see. It
is strange to watch the movement--confused in the distance--of all
these long rods which pump the water without ceasing, and look like the
swaying of living antennae. The same sight was to be seen along this
river in the times of the Ramses. But suddenly, at some bend of
the river, the old Pharaonic rigging disappears, to give place to a
succession of steam machines, which, more even than the muscles of
the fellahs, are busy at the water-drawing. Before long their blackish
chimneys will make a continuous border to the tamed Nile.

Did one not know their bearings, the great ruins of this Egypt would
pass unnoticed. With a few rare exceptions they lie beyond the green
plains on the threshold of the solitudes. And against the changeless,
rose-coloured background of these cliffs of the desert, which follow you
during the whole of this tranquil navigation of some 600 miles, are to
be seen only the humble towns and villages of to-day, which have
the neutral colour of the ground. Some openwork minarets dominate
them--white spots above the prevailing dullness. Clouds of pigeons whirl
round in the neighbourhood. And amongst the little houses, which are
only cubes o