sculptures with mud, occupied one day, and
served to show the spirit of that noble animal
the Egyptian donkey. His long-legged rider
was listlessly gazing at the shabby manœuvres
of some shabby soldiers, when a burst of military
music roused the energies of the Arab steed.
Clothing his neck with thunder, and shouting
"Ha! ha!" to the trumpets, he leaped gallantly
across a tolerably wide ditch, on whose brink he
had been posted, leaving his amazed rider standing
on his feet, with a ditch and four miles of
hot sand between him and the city. Happily the
donkey's views were those of immediate comfort,
and in a few minutes he was standing quietly
under the shade of a giant sycamore, warranted
by tradition to be that which sheltered Joseph
and Mary in their flight from Palestine. Another
day was given to the Petrified Forest, a wide basin
which (whether geologists have explained it or
not) must at one time have been filled with
water, on whose surface floated masses of wood
of all shapes and sizes, from palm-trees a hundred
and twenty feet long (I measured one of that
size) down to innumerable logs, chips, nuts, and
splinters. The bottom of the valley undulates
gently, and it seems as though the water had
drained off gradually, the larger logs (which, of
course, would take ground first) being invariably
on the summits of the small hills; while the
minute portions lie thickly congregated in the
hollows, where they have been swept by the
retiring current. But of what nature was this
water? How comes it that every morsel of the
wood, even to some few stumps of palm yet in
situ, is now converted into solid stone?

Our continual inquiries at the transit-oflice
were at length answered by the joyful news that
a steamer had arrived. Unfortunately she was
timed so as to discharge her passengers at
Alexandria too late to catch the Austrian Lloyd's
boat for Smyrna, the only boat by which there
was any chance of our reaching Europe, and that,
too, by a roundabout road. Vain were our
representations that if the steamer were not to
start till Thursday she might as well, for our
purposes, not start at all; the clerks admitted
the truth of our assertions, and even enhanced
their force by stating that it was more than
probable that the Austrian boat would have to leave
with few or no passengers, for want of the Nile
steamer, which might quite as easily start on
one day as on another; but they also assured
us that any attempt to force these ideas into a
Turkish brain by any process short of cracking
the brainpan would be hopelessly futile. The
British lions now fairly caged began to roar,
when an Italian mouse presented himself to
gnaw asunder the meshes which confined the
desert lords.

An Italian, who, some twelve or fifteen years
before, had been in sufficiently poor
circumstances to find himself wandering about London
streets, had received Christmas welcome in the
servants' hall of one of these travellers. The
fact, long forgotten by the Englishman, had
dwelt in the mind of the Italian, who was now
a prosperous gentleman in commercial relations
with the Egyptian court. Arab horses, guides
to the curiosities of Cairo, admission to the
palaces, all had been pressed by Signor Carlo
on his former benefactor, and now, no sooner
did he hear of the existing difficulty, than he
pledged himself to remove it. He had not
overrated his power. That same night he entered
the billiard-room at Shepherd's with his hat half
full of Spanish dollars, won at écarté from a
Turkish pasha, from whom also he had extracted
an order for the steamer to leave next morning.
Some, says Charles Lamb, have unawares
entertained angels. Gladly did we drop down to
Atfeh and Alexandria, and early the next morning
our party, with a very few additions,
mustered on the deck of the Europa.

The equinoctial gales, which had blown with
annoying punctuality for the last two days, raised
such a sea that the deck was soon all but empty,
and the cabin thronged. With natural hesitation
I linger on the top step of that steep stair,
whose brass handrail smells, methinks, with
unusual pungency. A framed board, of course,
meets my eye. What is it? If it be the usual
steward's list, with inappropriate offers of bottled
stout, and highly repulsive allusions to mutton-
chops, I had better not read it. No! it appeals
to less earthly considerations, being an inscription
in three languages (like the Rosetta stone,
I think, as I feebly court remembrances of the
immovable past), detailing the rules to be obeyed
by passengers on board the Austrian Lloyd's
boats. These, though numerous and verbose,
are not very interesting, till I come to No. 13,
which informs me sententiously that "Gentlemen
passengers, having a proper feeling, will be
expected to show all decorous attention to
ladies;" and No. 14, setting forth that
"Gentlemen passengers are not on any account to
interfere with the management of the vessel, for
which governmentally-constituted officers have
been duty appointed." As I muse upon the
manner of men to whom these regulations may
be addressed, the steam-pipe ceases to scream,
the Europa plunges, not perhaps more deeply
than she did, but far more distractedly, and we
are off. A few minutes more and a sharp cry
of "Starboard!" sounds from the bridge, and
steadily hard-a-port goes the tiller under the
guidance of a squat figure in long tow-coloured
hair and mustachios. A rush, a scuffle, Towhair
is shoved summarily to leeward, and the wheel
is revolving rapidly in the hands of a young
master mariner from the China seas, master of
opium-clippers, and not unconscious of typhoons.
The Europa swerves wildly, a drenching cloud
of spray sweeps from stem to stern, and from,
the middle of it, like old Neptune in the Æneid,
emerges the governmentally-constituted officer,
full charged with polysyllabic wrath, which he
distributes impartially upon the dethroned
helmsman and upon the usurper. What effect
the volley may have upon Towhair, I know not;
the young Scotsman certainly neither
understands nor cares for it, but quietly pointing to
the black fang of a rock that shows itselt in
fearful proximity to our quarter, resigns the