the various
sellers of arms, ornaments, and other things.

[Illustration: INTERIOR OF GREAT TEMPLE AT ESNEH.]

We hired donkeys and a good guide, and then set off to see the quarries
of Syene. From these quarries the obelisks were cut which adorned the
cities of Thebes, Memphis, and Heliopolis thousands of years ago. We
passed the ruins of a burying-ground belonging to an old Saracen town
which was desolated by the plague some hundreds of years ago, and very
gloomy these ruins looked.

On our way back we rode through the bazaar. There was nothing very gay
for sale, but the people interested us. We saw a great many Berbers, a
people quite unlike either the Arabs or the negroes. The Berbers live in
Lower Nubia, and are a wild, fine-looking race. The men wear but little
clothing; they all carry a small dagger, which is bound with a red
leather bracelet round the left arm, above the elbow. They also wear a
_fetish_, or charm, enclosed in a little red leather case. The women
uncover their faces, and wear nose rings of either brass or bone. They
also wear quantities of coloured bead necklaces and bracelets, brass
ear-rings and finger-rings; and whenever they can get them, they wear
gold or silver coins hanging on the foreheads. They tattoo their chins
and dye their under-lips blue, which looks very ugly.

To-day we crossed to the island of Elephanta. We went to the quarries,
visited groups of tombs of sheikhs and dervishes, and the mosque of
Amer. We had a delightful row round the island. Its groves of palms and
its granite rocks are picturesque. But we were disappointed to see no
flowers. The Nubian children offered us some pretty baskets for sale,
and some Egyptian agates. We are bringing some of them back with us:
amongst them a lovely little basket of palm leaves for Lucy.

We sailed towards the cataract with a stiff breeze. The scenery was wild
and beautiful. On the western side the sands of the Great Desert, yellow
as gold, came to the water's edge, with dark masses of rock rising from
them here and there. On the east, granite rocks rose one above the other
in strange forms.

With the help of about fifty Arabs, who shouted at the top of their
voices as they hauled us by a thick rope, we passed the first little
fall of the cataract. Then we passed a succession of rapids. It was an
exciting passage. Great masses of granite towered round our little boat;
sometimes we even struck against them, but not so as to do us a