24 JOURNEY IN CENTRAL AFRICA.

We rose somewhat stiff from our hard beds, but a cup of

coffee and the fresh morning air restored the amenity of the voyage, The banks of the Canal are flat and dull, and the

country through which we passed, after leaving the marshy

brink of Lake Mareotis, was in many places still too wet from

the recent inundation to be ploughed for the winter crops. It is

a dead level of rich black loam, and produces rice, maize, sugar-

cane and millet. Here and there the sand has blown over it.

and large spaces are given up to a sort of coarse, wiry grass. The villages are miserable collections of mud huts, but the

date-palms which shadow them and the strings of camels that

slowly pass to and fro, render even their unsightliness pictu' resque. In two or three places we passed mud machines, driven

by steam, for the purpose of cleaning the Canal. Kopes were

stretched across the channel on both sides, and a large number

of trading boats were obliged to halt, although the wind was

very favorable. The barrier was withdrawn for us Franks, and

the courteous engineer touched his tarboosh in reply to our

salutations, as we shot through.

Towards noon we stopped at a village, and the Asian went

ashore with Ibrahim to buy provisions, while the European

walked ahead with his fowling-piece, to shoot wild ducks for dinner. The American stayed on board and studied an Arabic

vocabulary. Presently Ibrahim appeared with two fowls, two

pigeons, a pot -of milk and a dozen eggs. The Asian set about preparing breakfast, and showed himself so skilful that our

bark soon exhaled the most savory odors. When we picked

up our European he had only two hawks to offer us, but we

gave him in return a breakfast which he declared perfect. We

ate on deck, seated on a mat ; a pleasant wind filled our sails,