Asiatic Breezes Part 27

"A buoy is a floating body in the shape of two inverted cones united at their bases, made of copper or plate iron. They are used all over the world to mark the bounds of channels, sometimes with fog-bells on them, rung by the action of the waves," continued the commander. "They are moored to the bottom here as elsewhere, and have a gas-light burning on them all the time."

"A gas-light!" exclaimed Mrs. Woolridge; "where is the gas-house?"

"There are several of them on the ca.n.a.l, and not one for each buoy, which is filled with gas, and contains a supply that will last for six weeks. Some folks who never went to sea suppose a lighthouse is to give light on the water, when they are only to mark certain localities, and to give ranges to navigators. These buoys are for the same purpose, and not to light up the ca.n.a.l. But here is El Kantara."

"I think you said this place was on the road to Syria," said the magnate. "People who go to the Holy Land from Egypt, and most of them do go that way, take a steamer from Alexandria to Joppa, or Jaffa as it is now generally called, and do not go by camel-back over this road."

"They do not; but they may go over it at some time in the near future,"

added Professor Giroud. "The Egypto-Syrian Railroad has been projected, and it is to pa.s.s over this route."

The travellers found quite a village at El Kantara, with a hotel, and other places for the refreshment of travellers. Pa.s.sengers from the steamers seldom land here. The s.h.i.+p proceeded on her way, and the party caught a glimpse at a boat-load of camels crossing the ca.n.a.l. From this place to Fort Said the course had been perfectly straight through Lake Menzaleh, which ends here.

"If you will look to the left," said the commander after a time, "you will see a considerable body of water. That is the upper part of Lake Balah, through which the ca.n.a.l pa.s.ses. About a mile and a half distant is a lot of sandstone rocks like that of the Memnon statues. They appear to belong to an altar, and the inscription informs the visitor who can read it that they were parts of a temple erected by Seti I. in honor of his father, Ramses I., and completed by Ramses II., his son. There may have been a city here, but there are no signs of it now."

The steamer pa.s.sed through the Balah Lakes; for there are several of them, containing some islands. The ca.n.a.l is protected by high banks of yellow sand, and beyond is the desert, with hills in the distance.

Coming out of the lakes, the ca.n.a.l pa.s.sed through a deep cutting, which was the worst place encountered in doing the work. It is the highest ground on the isthmus, averaging fifty-two feet above the sea; and a ridge of this territory is from seventy to one hundred feet high, through which the digging had to be carried. There are some curves here, the ca.n.a.l is the narrowest in all its course, and vessels more frequently get aground here than in any other portion. The road to Syria pa.s.sed over this elevation, which is called "the causeway" in Arabic.

The Ophir went through without sticking in the sand, and the Guardian-Mother was likely to do as well. A solitary mosque and a chalet of the Khedive were pa.s.sed, and the s.h.i.+p was approaching Lake Timsah when the gong sounded for lunch, and the air of the desert had given the tourists an appet.i.te which caused them to evacuate the promenade with hasty steps.

CHAPTER XXIII

THE MYSTERIOUS ARAB IN A NEW SUIT

The cabin party of the Guardian-Mother were on the promenade in time to observe the entrance into Lake Timsah. It is near the seventy-five kilometre post from Port Said, or half way through the ca.n.a.l to the head of the Gulf of Suez, the most northern portion of the Red Sea. The city of Suez is several miles to the south-west of this point; for Lesseps, for some reason said to be political, avoided the old town, and carried the ca.n.a.l to the other side of the inlet, and below it.

Lake Timsah has an area of about six square miles. It is not a deep body of water, and the ca.n.a.l had to be built through it as through Lake Menzaleh. Its water is now of a pale blue, very pretty to look at.

Before any work was done here, it was a mere pond, filled with reeds; but it has been cleaned out and made more healthy for the surrounding country.

On its northern sh.o.r.e is the town of Ismalia, having about two thousand inhabitants, which has become a place of some importance. The railroad from Cairo is extended to it by a branch, the main line following the ca.n.a.l to Suez. It has a couple of hotels; and its princ.i.p.al square, on which the best one is situated, has the name of Place Champollion, showing that the French remember their learned men.

While the ca.n.a.l was in process of construction, Ismalia was the centre of operations. It was handsomely laid out, not unlike the city of Was.h.i.+ngton, which is one of the handsomest in the world; but, like the new places in our great West, it was built in a hurry, under the pressure of a drive of business, and the sanitary conditions were neglected. The important fresh-water ca.n.a.l, which is near the railroad all the way from the Nile, furnishes the only drinking-water of this town and of Suez; but the sewers of the new town had no other outlet.

Of course the town was soon invaded by fever, which caused it to be deserted; and it has never recovered its former prosperity, though not wholly for this reason, for the completion of the ca.n.a.l destroyed its business basis. Ismalia was the focal point of the great ceremonials at the opening of the ca.n.a.l. The Empress Eugenie of France, the Emperor Frederick of Germany, then crown-prince, and other noted persons, were present; and the celebration is said to have cost the Khedive twenty million dollars.

The town has improved somewhat of late; the viceroy's chateau, which had become much dilapidated, has been restored, and portions of the desert, irrigated from the ca.n.a.l, have been transformed into fine gardens.

Though the climate is agreeable and the air dry, it is not likely to become a pleasure resort. A couple of small steamers run from this port to Port Said, while the railroad connects it with Suez.

The steamer remained a couple of hours at the station, as did the Ophir; and the commander obtained permission for the ladies to pay her a visit.

She is a magnificent specimen of naval architecture. Her saloon, staterooms, drawing-room on the upper deck, were magnificent apartments, most luxuriously furnished. Her appointments for second-cla.s.s pa.s.sengers were extensive and very comfortable, far better than on many Atlantic steamers.

The ubiquitous donkey, and especially the donkey-boy, were here; and the "Big Four," with the exception of Louis Belgrave, who attended Miss Blanche on the visit to the Ophir, accompanied by Don, went on a frolic to the town. They made a great noise and waked up the place, but they committed no excesses. When they returned to the s.h.i.+p, they found Louis and Miss Blanche showing the captain and the surgeon of the big steamer over the Guardian-Mother. The beautiful young lady had evidently fascinated them, and they had been extremely polite to the party, perhaps on her account. They appeared to be interested in the steam-yacht, and expressed their belief that nothing more comfortable and elegant floated.

The steamers got under way again, and proceeded through one of the two channels through the blue lake. The ladies waved their handkerchiefs to the officers and pa.s.sengers of the Ophir; and their greetings were heartily reciprocated, for the American party had plainly made an impression upon the English people, partly perhaps by the style in which they travelled, but probably more by the beauty of the ladies, with Miss Blanche as princess, and the others were under forty and still good-looking. The lake is only five miles long, and the steamers soon pa.s.sed into the cut at the south of it.

"Along this region many ruins have been found, some of them of Persian structures," said the commander after the s.h.i.+p had left the lake.

"Pharaoh-Necho, 600 B.C., built a ca.n.a.l from Suez to Lake Timsah, with gates, which Herodotus describes, and informs us that the vessels of the period went through it in four days."

"I wish you would tell us something about Herodotus, Captain, for his name has been frequently mentioned in Egypt," said Mrs. Woolridge.

"And about Diodorus and Strabo, also mentioned in the lectures," added the magnate. "I have forgotten all that I ever knew about these gentlemen."

"I am in the same boat, Captain," the doctor responded.

"I shall leave those subjects to the professor. But we are approaching some objects of interest, and we will defer the matter to another time,"

replied the commander. "Do you see a white dome on the starboard? That is the tomb of Shekh Ennedek; and it is rather a picturesque affair here in the midst of the desert."

"Was he a fighting character?" asked Mrs. Belgrave.

"Not at all; far from it. He was a wealthy Arab chief. He made the pilgrimage to Mecca, which is the duty of every faithful Mohammedan; and he seems to have been greatly impressed by it, for he gave his cattle and his lands to the poor, and spent the rest of his life on the greenish territory we have just pa.s.sed through, in religious meditation."

"He was a good man if he was a Mohammedan," added the lady.

"We don't believe that all the good people in the world belong to our church," added the captain. "Do you all remember who Miriam was?"

More than half the party could not remember.

"She was the sister of Moses; and she first appears, doubtless as a young girl, watching the Nile-cradle of her infant brother. The land next south of Lake Timsah, made green by the water, is called Gebel Maryam, probably after the sister of Moses. She was a prophetess; but she found fault with the marriage of her brother, for which she was afflicted with Egyptian leprosy. As you find it in the Bible (Numbers xii.), Moses asked the Lord: 'Let her be shut out of the camp seven days, and after that let her be received in again. And Miriam was shut out from the camp seven days.' An Arab legend points out this spot as the place where she spent that time, and from which it gets the name of Maryam."

"That's nice, Captain Ringgold!" exclaimed Mrs. Blossom. "I wish you would tell us more Bible stories."

"Some people believe that the Mediterranean and the Red Seas were connected in some remote age of the world, or at least that the latter extended to the north as far as Lake Timsah," continued the commander, without noticing the suggestion of the amiable lady. "In proof of this supposition, certain sh.e.l.ls found in the Mediterranean, but not in the Red Sea, have been thrown up in digging for the ca.n.a.l through Lake Timsah.

"We are approaching what is called the Serapeum," said the captain.

"What! more of them here? I thought we had used up all the Serapeums,"

said the magnate with a laugh.

"The present one is of a different sort," answered the commander. "But the ruins found in this vicinity were supposed to belong to a Serapeum such as several we have seen on the Nile; but Lepsius says they could not have been a part of a temple to Serapis, but were monuments built on the ancient ca.n.a.l by Darius.

"It is high ground here, comparatively speaking; and you observe that the cutting of the water-way is through a rocky formation, with rather high banks on each side. There is quite a little village above; and, as it is getting dark, we shall pa.s.s the night here in the siding-basin."

"Who is that man on the forecastle of the Maud?" asked Captain Scott as the little steamer came into the basin.

"I don't know," replied Captain Ringgold. "I had not noticed him before.

He looks like an Arab, though he is taller than most of them."

A flight of steps ascended to the top of the embankment at the station of the little town. The Maud pa.s.sed close to them on her way to her berth for the night. Abreast of them the Arab on the forecastle leaped ash.o.r.e, but made a gesture as though the movement had given him pain. He went up the steps and disappeared.

"Who was that man, Knott?" asked the captain when the seaman came on board of the s.h.i.+p.

"I don't know, sir; I called upon him to give an account of himself as we were crossing Lake Timsah; but he could not understand me, pointed to his mouth, and shook his head, meaning that he could not speak English.

He did not do any harm, so I let him alone; for Don was running the engine, and I did not like to call him from his duty. He kept his face covered up with a sort of veil, and would not say anything. I thought I would let him alone till we came to a stopping-place, and I could report to you."

"When did he go on board of the Maud?" asked the captain.