IN PASTURES NEW 
 
$ROM " IN .PASTURES NEW " 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 BY 
 
 GEORGE ADE 
 
 M 
 
 GARDEN CITY NEW YORK 
 DOUBLEDAY, PAGE & COMPANY 
 
 1912 
 
Copyright, 1906, by 
 DOUBLEDAY, PAGE & COMPANY 
 
Many of the letters appearing in this volume were 
 printed in a syndicate of newspapers in the early 
 months of 1906. With these letters have been incor 
 porated extracts from letters written to the Chicago 
 Record in 1895 and 1898. For the use of the letters 
 which -first appeared in the Chicago Record, acknowl 
 edgment is due Mr. Victor F. Lawson. 
 
 91S7b5 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 In London 
 
 CHAPTER PAGE 
 
 I. GETTING ACQUAINTED WITH THE ENGLISH 
 
 LANGUAGE 3 
 
 II. A LIFE ON THE OCEAN WAVE, WITH MODERN 
 
 VARIATIONS 17 
 
 III. WITH MR. PEASLEY IN DARKEST LONDON 37 
 
 IV. How IT FEELS TO GET INTO LONDON AND 
 
 THEN BE ENGULFED 55 
 
 V. As TO THE IMPORTANCE OF THE PASSPORT 
 
 AND THE HANDY LITTLE CABLE CODE 63 
 VI. WHAT ONE MAN PICKED UP IN LONDON AND 
 
 SENT BACK TO His BROTHER ... 72 
 
 In Paris 
 VII. How AN AMERICAN ENJOYS LIFE FOR EIGHT 
 
 MINUTES AT A TIME 83 
 
 VIII. A CHAPTER OF FRENCH JUSTICE AS DEALT 
 
 OUT IN THE DREYFUS CASE .... 90 
 IX. THE STORY OF WHAT HAPPENED TO AN 
 
 AMERICAN CONSUL 98 
 
 In Naples 
 X. MR. PEASLEY AND His VIVID IMPRESSIONS 
 
 OF FOREIGN PARTS 117 
 
 vii 
 
viii CONTENTS 
 
 In Cairo 
 
 CHAPTER 
 
 FAOB 
 
 XL CAIRO AS THE ANNUAL STAMPING GROUND 
 FOR AMERICANS AND WHY THEY MARK 
 THE TRIP ... 135 
 
 XII. ROUND ABOUT CAIRO, WITH AND WITHOUT 
 
 THE ASSISTANCE OF THE DRAGOMAN OR 
 SIMON LEGREE OF THE ORIENT . . 152 
 
 XIII. ALL ABOUT OUR VISIT TO THE PYRAMID OF 
 
 CHEOPS 168 
 
 XIV. DASHING UP THE NILE IN COMPANY WITH 
 
 MR. PEASLEY AND OTHERS . . . 185 
 XV. DAY BY DAY ON THE DROWSY NILE, WITH 
 SOMETHING ABOUT THE WONDERFUL 
 
 HASSIM 203 
 
 XVI. THE MOHAMMEDAN FLY AND OTHER CREA 
 TURES ALONG THE NlLE 225 
 
 XVII. IN AND AROUND LuXOR, WITH A SlDE LlGHT 
 
 ON RAMESES THE GREAT .... 242 
 XVIII. THE ORDINARY HUMAN FAILINGS OF THE 
 
 ANCIENT MOGULS 261 
 
 XIX. ROYAL TOMBS AND OTHER PLACES OF 
 
 AMUSEMENT 274 
 
 In Cairo 
 XX. MR. PEASLEY AND His FINAL SIZE-UP OF 
 
 EGYPT . . . 293 
 
IN LONDON 
 
CHAPTER I 
 
 GETTING ACQUAINTED WITH THE 
 ENGLISH LANGUAGE 
 
 IT may be set down as a safe proposition that every 
 man is a bewildered maverick when he wanders out of 
 his own little bailiwick. Did you ever see a stock 
 broker on a stock farm, or a cow puncher at the 
 Waldorf? 
 
 A man may be a large duck in his private puddle, 
 but when he strikes deep and strange waters he 
 forgets how to swim. 
 
 Take some captain of industry who resides in a 
 large city of the Middle West. At home he is un 
 questionably IT. Everyone knows the size of his 
 bank account, and when he rides down to business 
 in the morning the conductor of the trolley holds 
 the car for him. His fellow passengers are delighted 
 to get a favouring nod from him. When he sails into 
 the new office building the elevator captain gives him 
 a cheery but deferential " good morning." In his 
 private office he sits at a $500 roll top desk from 
 Grand Rapids, surrounded by push buttons, and 
 
 3 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 when he giiyes the word soi.aeone is expected to hop. 
 At noon he goes to his club for luncheon. The head 
 waiter jumps ever two cliaiis to get at him and re 
 lieve him of his hat and then leads him to the most 
 desirable table and hovers over him even as a mother 
 hen broods over her first born. 
 
 This Distinguished Citizen, director of the First 
 National Bank, trustee of the Cemetery Association, 
 member of the Advisory Committee of the Y. M. 
 C. A., president of the Saturday Night Poker Club, 
 head of the Commercial Club, and founder of the 
 Wilson County Trotting Association, is a whale 
 when he is seated on his private throne in the corn 
 belt. He rides the whirlwind and commands the 
 storm. The local paper speaks of him in bated 
 capital letters, and he would be more or less than 
 human if he failed to believe that he was a very large 
 gun. 
 
 Take this same Business Behemoth and set him 
 down in Paris or Rome or Naples. With a red 
 guide book clutched helplessly in his left hand and 
 his right hand free, so that he can dig up the cur 
 rency of the realm every thirty seconds, he sets 
 forth to become acquainted with mediaeval architec 
 ture and the work of the old masters. He is just as 
 helpless and apprehensive as a country boy at Coney 
 
 4 
 
GETTING ACQUAINTED 
 
 Island. The guides and cabmen bullyrag him. News 
 boys and beggars pester him with impunity. Children 
 in the street stop to laugh at his Kansas City hat 
 known to the trade as a Fedora. When he goes 
 into a shop the polite brigand behind the showcase 
 
 Stop to laugh at his Kansas City hat 
 charges him two prices and gives him bad money 
 for change. 
 
 Why? Because he is in a strange man s town, 
 stripped of his local importance and battling with a 
 foreign language. The man who cannot talk back 
 immediately becomes a weakling. 
 
 What is the chief terror to travel? It is the lone- 
 5 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 someness of feeling that one cannot adapt himself 
 to the unfamiliar background and therefore is sure 
 to attract more or less attention as a curio. And in 
 what city does this feeling of lonesomeness become 
 most overwhelming? In London. 
 
 The American must go to England in order to 
 learn for a dead certainty that he does not speak 
 the English language. On the Continent if he kicks 
 on the charges and carries a great deal of hand 
 luggage and his clothes do not fit him any too well 
 he may be mistaken for an Englishman. This great 
 joy never awaits him in London. 
 
 I do not wish to talk about myself, yet I can say 
 with truthfulness that I have been working for years 
 to enrich the English language. Most of the time 
 I have been years ahead of the dictionaries. I have 
 been so far ahead of the dictionaries that sometimes 
 I fear they will never catch up. It has been my 
 privilege to use words that are unknown to Lindley 
 Murray. Andrew Lang once started to read my 
 works and then sank with a bubbling cry and did 
 not come up for three days. 
 
 It seems that in my efforts to enrich the English 
 language I made it too rich, and some who tried it 
 afterward complained of mental gastritis. In one of 
 my fables, written in pure and undefiled Chicago, 
 
 6 
 
GETTING ACQUAINTED 
 
 reference was made to that kind of a table d hote 
 restaurant which serves an Italian dinner for sixty 
 cents. This restaurant was called a " spaghetti 
 joint." Mr. Lang declared that the appellation was 
 altogether preposterous, as it is a well-known fact 
 that spaghetti has no joints, being invertebrate and 
 quite devoid of osseous tissue, the same as a cater 
 pillar. Also he thought that " cinch " was merely 
 a misspelling of " sink," something to do with a 
 kitchen. Now if an American reeking with the sweet 
 vernacular of his native land cannot make himself 
 understood by one who is familiar with all the ins 
 and outs of our language, what chance has he 
 with the ordinary Londoner, who gets his vocabu 
 lary from reading the advertisements carried by 
 sandwich men? 
 
 This pitiful fact comes home to every American 
 when he arrives in London there are two languages, 
 the English and the American. One is correct; the 
 other is incorrect. One is a pure and limpid stream; 
 the other is a stagnant pool, swarming with bacilli. 
 In front of a shop in Paris is a sign, " English 
 spoken American understood." This sign is just as 
 misleading as every other sign in Paris. If our Eng 
 lish cannot be understood right here in England, 
 what chance have we among strangers? 
 
 7 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 One of the blessed advantages of coming here to 
 England is that every American, no matter how old 
 he may be or how often he has assisted at the mas 
 sacre of the mother tongue, may begin to get a 
 correct line on the genuine English speech. A few 
 Americans, say fifty or more in Boston and several 
 in New York, are said to speak English in spots. 
 Very often they fan, but sometimes they hit the ball. 
 By patient endeavor they have mastered the sound 
 of " a " as in " father," but they continue to call a 
 clerk a clerk, instead of a " clark," and they never 
 have gained the courage to say " leftenant." They 
 wander on the suburbs of the English language, 
 nibbling at the edges, as it were. Anyone living west 
 of Pittsburg is still lost in the desert. 
 
 It is only when the Pilgrim comes right here to 
 the fountain head of the Chaucerian language that 
 he can drink deep and revive his parched intellect. 
 For three days I have been camping here at the head 
 waters of English. Although this is my fourth visit 
 to London and I have taken a thorough course at the 
 music halls and conversed with some of the most 
 prominent shopkeepers on or in the Strand, to say 
 nothing of having chatted almost in a spirit of 
 democratic equality with some of the most repre 
 sentative waiters, I still feel as if were a little child 
 
 8 
 
GETTING ACQUAINTED 
 
 playing by the seashore while the great ocean of 
 British idioms lies undiscovered before me. 
 
 Yesterday, however, I had the rare and almost 
 delirious pleasure of meeting an upper class English 
 man. He has family, social position, wealth, several 
 capital letters trailing after his name (which is long 
 enough without an appendix), an ancestry, a glori 
 ous past and possibly a future. Usually an American 
 has to wait in London eight or ten years before he 
 meets an Englishman who is not trying to sell him 
 dress shirts or something to put on his hair. In two 
 short days practically at one bound I had realised 
 the full ambition of my countrymen. 
 
 Before being presented to the heavy swell I was 
 taken into the chamber of meditation by the Ameri 
 can who was to accompany me on this flight to glory. 
 He prepared me for the ceremony by whispering to 
 me that the chap we were about to meet went every 
 where and saw everybody; that he was a varsity 
 man and had shot big game and had a place up 
 country, and couldn t remember the names of all his 
 clubs had to hire a man by the year just to remem 
 ber the names of his clubs. 
 
 May I confess that I was immensely flattered to 
 know that I could meet this important person? 
 When we are at long range we throw bricks at the 
 
 9 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 aristocracy and landed gentry, but when we come 
 close to them we tremble violently and are much 
 
 Just to remember the names of his clubs 
 
 pleased if they differentiate us from the furniture 
 of the room. 
 
 Why not tell the truth for once? I was tickled 
 10 
 
GETTING ACQUAINTED 
 
 and overheated with bliss to know that this social 
 lion was quite willing to sit alongside of me and 
 breathe the adjacent atmosphere. 
 
 Also I was perturbed and stage frightened because 
 I knew that I spoke nothing but the American lan 
 guage, and that probably I used my nose instead of 
 my vocal chords in giving expression to such 
 thoughts as might escape from me. Furthermore, 
 I was afraid that during our conversation I might 
 accidentally lapse into slang, and I knew that in 
 Great Britain slang is abhorred above every other 
 earthly thing except goods of German manufacture. 
 So I resolved to be on my guard and try to come as 
 near to English speech as it is possible for anyone 
 to come after he has walked up and down State 
 street for ten years. 
 
 My real and ulterior motive in welcoming this 
 interview with a registered Englishman was to get, 
 free of charge, an allopathic dose of 24-karat 
 English. I wanted to bask in the bright light of 
 an intellect that had no flickers in it and absorb 
 some of the infallibility that is so prevalent in these 
 partso 
 
 We met. I steadied myself and said : " I m glad 
 to know you that is, I am extremely pleased to 
 have the honour of making }~our acquaintance." 
 
 11 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 He looked at me with a kindly light in his steel 
 blue eye, and after a short period of deliberation 
 spoke as follows : " Thanks." 
 
 " The international developments of recent years 
 have been such as should properly engender a feeling 
 of the warmest brotherhood between all branches of 
 the Anglo-Saxon race," I said. " I don t think that 
 any fair-minded American has it in for Great Brit 
 ain that is, it seems to me that all former resent 
 ment growing out of early conflicts between the two 
 countries has given way to a spirit of tolerant under 
 standing. Do you not agree with me ? " 
 
 He hesitated for a moment, as if not desiring to 
 commit himself by a hasty or impassioned reply, 
 and then delivered himself as follows : " Quite." 
 
 " It seems to me," I said, following the same line 
 of thought, " that fair-minded people on both sides 
 of the water are getting sore that is, losing 
 patience with the agitators who preach the old doc 
 trine that our attitude toward Great Britain is neces 
 sarily one of enmity. We cannot forget that when 
 the European Powers attempted to concert their 
 influence against the United States at the outset of 
 the late war with Spain you bluffed them out that is, 
 you induced them to relinquish their unfriendly in 
 tentions. Every thoughtful man in America is on to 
 
 12 
 
13 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 this fact that is, he understands how important 
 was the service you rendered us and he is corre 
 spondingly grateful. The American people and the 
 English people speak the same language, theoreti 
 cally. Our interests are practically identical in all 
 parts of the world that is, we are trying to do 
 everybody, and so are you. What I want to convey 
 is that neither nation can properly work out its des 
 tiny except by co-operating with the other. There 
 fore any policy looking toward a severance of 
 friendly relations is unworthy of consideration." 
 
 "Rot! "said he. 
 
 " Just at present all Americans are profoundly 
 grateful to the British public for its generous recog 
 nition of the sterling qualities of our beloved Execu 
 tive," I continued. " Over in the States we think 
 that * Teddy is the goods that is, the people of 
 all sections have unbounded faith in him. We think 
 he is on the level that is, that his dominant policies 
 are guided by the spirit of integrity. As a fair- 
 minded Briton, who is keeping in touch with the 
 affairs of the world, may I ask you your candid 
 opinion of President Roosevelt? " 
 
 After a brief pause he spoke as follows: 
 "Ripping!" 
 
 " The impulse of friendliness on the part of the 
 14 
 
GETTING ACQUAINTED 
 
 English people seems to be more evident year by 
 year," I continued. " It is now possible for Ameri 
 cans to get into nearly all the London hotels. You 
 show your faith in our monetary system by accept 
 ing all the collateral we can bring over. No identifi 
 cation is necessary. Formerly the visiting American 
 was asked to give references before he was separated 
 from his income that is, before one of your business 
 institutions would enter into negotiations with him. 
 Nowadays you see behind the chin whisker the beau 
 tiful trade mark of consanguinity. You say, * Blood 
 is thicker than water, and you accept a five-dollar 
 bill just the same as if it were an English sovereign 
 worth four dollars and eighty-six cents." 
 
 " Jolly glad to get it," said he. 
 
 " Both countries have adopted the gospel of reci 
 procity," I said, warmed by this sudden burst of 
 enthusiasm. " We send shiploads of tourists over 
 here. You send shiploads of English actors to New 
 York. The tourists go home as soon as they are 
 broke that is, as soon as their funds are exhausted. 
 The English actors come home as soon as they are 
 independently rich. Everybody is satisfied with the 
 arrangement and the international bonds are further 
 strengthened. Of course, some of the English actors 
 blow up that is, fail to meet with any great measure 
 
 15 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 of financial success when they get out as far as 
 Omaha, but while they are mystifying the American 
 public some of our tourists are going around Lon 
 don mystifying the British public. Doubtless you 
 have seen some of these tourists ? " 
 
 The distinguished person nodded his head in grave 
 acquiescence and then said with some feeling: 
 " Bounders ! " 
 
 " In spite of these breaches of international faith 
 the situation taken as a whole is one promising an 
 indefinite continuation of cordial friendship between 
 the Powers," I said. " I am darned glad that such is 
 the case ; ain t you ? " 
 
 " Rather," he replied. 
 
 Then we parted. 
 
 It was really worth a long sea voyage to be per 
 mitted to get the English language at first hand; 
 to revel in its unexpected sublimities, and gaze down 
 new and awe-inspiring vistas of rhetorical splendour. 
 
 16 
 
CHAPTER II 
 
 A LIFE ON THE OCEAN WAVE, WITH 
 MODERN VARIATIONS 
 
 A MONTH before sailing I visited the floating 
 skyscraper which was to bear us away. It was 
 hitched to a dock in Hoboken, and it reminded me of 
 a St. Bernard dog tied by a silken thread. It was the 
 biggest skiff afloat, with an observatory on the roof 
 and covered porches running all the way around. It 
 was a very large boat. 
 
 After inspecting the boat and approving of it, I 
 selected a room with southern exposure. Later on, 
 when we sailed, the noble craft backed into the river 
 and turned round before heading for the Old World, 
 and I found myself on the north side of the ship, 
 with nothing coming in at the porthole except a 
 current of cold air direct from Labrador. 
 
 This room was on the starboard or port side of the 
 ship I forget which. After travelling nearly one 
 million miles, more or less, by steamer, I am still 
 unable to tell which is starboard and which is port. 
 I can tell time by the ship s bell if you let me use a 
 
 17 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 pencil, but " starboard " means nothing to me. In 
 order to make it clear to the reader, I will say that 
 the room was on the " haw " side of the boat. I 
 thought I was getting the " gee " side as the vessel 
 lay at the dock, but I forgot that it had to turn 
 
 I complained to one of the officers 
 
 around in order to start for Europe, and I found 
 myself " haw." I complained to one of the officers 
 and said that I had engaged a stateroom with 
 southern exposure. He said they couldn t back up 
 
 18 
 
LIFE ON THE OCEAN WAVE 
 
 all the way across the Atlantic just to give me the 
 sunny side of the boat. This closed the incident. He 
 did explain, however, that if I remained in the ship 
 and went back with them I would have southern 
 exposure all the way home. 
 
 Our ship was the latest thing out. To say that it 
 was about seven hundred feet long and nearly sixty 
 feet beam and 42,000 tons displacement does not give 
 a graphic idea of its huge proportions. A New 
 Yorker might understand if told that this ship, stood 
 on end, would be about as tall as two Flatiron build 
 ings spliced end to end. 
 
 Out in Indiana this comparison was unavailing, 
 as few of the residents have seen the Flatiron 
 Building and only a small percentage of them have 
 any desire to see it. So when a Hoosier acquaintance 
 asked me something about the ship I led him out 
 into Main Street and told him that it would reach 
 from the railroad to the Presbyterian church. He 
 looked down street at the depot and then he looked 
 up street at the distant Presbyterian church, and 
 then he looked at me and walked away. Every state 
 ment that I make in my native town is received with 
 doubt. People have mistrusted me ever since I came 
 home years ago and announced that I was working. 
 
 Evidently he repeated what I had said, for in a 
 19 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 few minutes another resident came up and casually 
 asked me something about the ship and wanted to 
 know how long she was. I repeated the Presbyterian 
 church story. He merely remarked " I thought 
 * Bill was lyin to me," and then went his way. 
 
 It is hard to live down a carefully acquired reputa 
 tion, and therefore the statement as to the length of 
 the vessel was regarded as a specimen outburst of 
 native humour. When I went on to say that the boat 
 would have on board three times as many people as 
 there were in our whole town, that she had seven 
 decks, superimposed like the layers of a jelly cake, 
 that elevators carried passengers from one deck to 
 another, that a daily newspaper was printed on 
 board, and that a brass band gave concerts every 
 day, to say nothing of the telephone exchange and 
 the free bureau of information, then all doubt was 
 dispelled and my local standing as a dealer in morbid 
 fiction was largely fortified. 
 
 The chief wonder of our new liner (for all of us 
 had a proprietary interest the moment we came 
 aboard) was the system of elevators. Just think of 
 it! Elevators gliding up and down between decks 
 the same as in a modern office building. Very few 
 passengers used the elevators, but it gave us some 
 thing to talk about on board ship and it would give 
 
 20 
 
LIFE ON THE OCEAN WAVE 
 us something to blow about after we had returned 
 home. 
 
 Outside of the cage stood a young German with a 
 blonde pompadour and a jacket that came just below 
 his shoulder blades. He was so clean he looked as if 
 he had been scrubbed with soap and then rubbed with 
 holystone. Every German menial on board seemed 
 to have two guiding ambitions in life. One was to 
 keep himself immaculate and the other was to grow 
 a U-shaped moustache, the same as the one worn by 
 the Kaiser. 
 
 The boy in charge of the elevator would plead 
 with people to get in and ride. Usually, unless he 
 waylaid them, they would forget all about the new 
 improvement and would run up and down stairs in 
 the old-fashioned manner instituted by Noah and 
 imitated by Christopher Columbus. 
 
 This boy leads a checkered career on each voyage. 
 When he departs from New York he is the elevator 
 boy. As the vessel approaches Plymouth, England, 
 he becomes the lift attendant. At Cherbourg he is 
 transformed into a garfon d ascenseur, and as the 
 ship draws near Hamburg he is the Aufzugsbehue- 
 ter, which is an awful thing to call a mere child. 
 
 Goodness only knows what will be the ultimate re 
 sult of present competition between ocean liners. As 
 
 21 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 our boat was quite new and extravagantly up-to- 
 date, perhaps some information concerning it will 
 be of interest, even to those old and hardened travel 
 lers who have been across so often that they no 
 longer set down the run of the ship and have ceased 
 sending pictorial post-cards to their friends at 
 home. 
 
 In the first place, a telephone in every room, con 
 nected with a central station. The passenger never 
 uses it, because when he is a thousand miles from 
 shore there is no one to be called up, and if he needs 
 the steward he pushes a button. But it is there a 
 real German telephone, shaped like a broken pretzel, 
 and anyone who has a telephone in his room feels 
 that he is getting something for his money. 
 
 After two or three lessons any American can use 
 a foreign telephone. All he has to learn is which end 
 to put to his ear and how to keep two or three 
 springs pressed down all the time he is talking. In 
 America he takes down the receiver and talks into the 
 phone. Elsewhere he takes the entire telephone down 
 from a rack and holds it the same as a slide 
 trombone. 
 
 In some of the cabins were electric hair curlers. 
 A Cleveland man who wished to call up the adjoining 
 cabin on the phone, just to see if the thing would 
 
 22 
 
Holds it the same as a slide trombone 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 work, put the hair curler to his ear and began 
 talking into the dynamo. There was no response, so 
 he pushed a button and nearly ruined his left ear. 
 It was a natural mistake. In Europe, anything 
 attached to the wall is liable to be a telephone. 
 
 On the whole, I think our telephone system is su 
 perior to that of any foreign cities. Our telephone 
 girls have larger vocabularies, for one thing. In 
 England the " hello " is never used. When an Eng 
 lishman gathers up the ponderous contrivance and 
 fits it against his head he asks : " Are you there ? " 
 If the other man answers " No," that stops the 
 whole conversation. 
 
 Travellers throughout the world should rise up 
 and unite in a vote of thanks to whoever it was that 
 abolished the upper berth in the newer boats. Maho 
 met s coffin suspended in mid air must have been a 
 cheery and satisfactory bunk compared with the or 
 dinary upper berth. Only a trained athlete can climb 
 into one of them. The woodwork that you embrace 
 and rub your legs against as you struggle upward 
 is very cold. When you fall into the clammy sheets 
 you are only about six inches from the ceiling. In the 
 early morning the sailors scour the deck just over 
 head and you feel as if you were getting a shampoo. 
 The aerial sarcophagus is built deep, like a trough, 
 
LIFE ON THE OCEAN WAVE 
 
 so that the prisoner cannot roll out during the night. 
 It is narrow, and the man who is addicted to the 
 habit of " spraddling " feels as if he were tied 
 hand and foot. 
 
 In nearly all of the staterooms of the new boat 
 there were no upper berths, and the lower ones were 
 wide and springy they were almost beds, and a bed 
 on board ship is something that for years has 
 been reserved as the special luxury of the million 
 aire. 
 
 I like the democracy of a shipboard community. 
 You take the most staid and awe-inspiring notable 
 in the world, bundle him in a damp storm-coat and 
 pull a baggy travelling cap down over his ears and 
 there is none so humble as to do him reverence. One 
 passenger may say to another as this great man 
 teeters along the deck, squinting against the wind: 
 "Do you know who that man is?" 
 
 "No, who is it?" 
 
 " That s William Bilker, the millionaire philan 
 thropist. He owns nearly all the coke ovens in 
 the world has built seven theological seminaries. 
 He s going to Europe to escape a Congressional 
 investigation." 
 
 That is the end of it so far as any flattering 
 attentions to Mr. Bilker are concerned. If he goes 
 
 25 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 in the smoking-room some beardless youth will in 
 vite him to sit in a game of poker. His confidential 
 friend at the table may be a Montana miner, a 
 Chicago real estate agent or a Kentucky horse 
 man. He may hold himself aloof from the betting 
 crowd and discourage those who would talk with 
 him on deck, but he cannot by any possibility be 
 a man of importance. Compared with the captain, 
 for instance, he is a worm. And the captain draws 
 probably $2500 a year. It must be a lot of fun to 
 stay on board ship all the time. Otherwise the ocean 
 liner could not get so many high class and capable 
 men to work for practically nothing. 
 
 On the open sea a baby is much more interesting 
 than a railway president and juveniles in general 
 are a mighty welcome addition to the passenger list. 
 If a child in the house is a wellspring of pleasure, 
 then a child on a boat is nothing less than a water 
 spout. The sea air, with its cool vapours of salt and 
 iodine, may lull the adult into one continuous and 
 lazy doze, but it is an invigorant to the offspring. 
 We had on board children from Buffalo, Chicago, 
 Jamestown, Poughkeepsie, Worcester, Philadelphia, 
 and other points. These children traded names be 
 fore the steamer got away from the dock, and as we 
 went down the bay under a bright sunshine they 
 
 26 
 
LIFE ON THE OCEAN WAVE 
 were so full of emotion that they ran madly around 
 the upper decks, shrieking at every step. Nine full 
 laps on the upper deck make a mile, and one man 
 gave the opinion that the children travelled one hun 
 dred miles that first afternoon. This was probably 
 an exaggeration. 
 
 The older people lay at full length in steamer 
 chairs and drowsed like so many hibernating bears. 
 That is, they slept when they were not eating. The 
 boat was one of a German line, and on a German 
 boat the passenger s first duty is to gorge. In the 
 smoking-room the last night out there was a dispute 
 as to the number of meals, whole or partial, served 
 every day. One man counted up and made it nine. 
 Another, who was trying to slander the company, 
 made the number as low as five. A count was taken 
 and the following schedule was declared to be 
 accurate and official: 
 
 6 a. m. Coffee and rolls in the dining room. 
 
 8 to 10 a. m. Breakfast in the dining room. 
 11 a. m. Sandwiches and bouillon on deck. 
 12:35 p. m. Luncheon. 
 
 4 p. m. Cakes and lemonade on deck. 
 6 p. m. Dinner. 
 
 9 p. m. Supper (cold) in dining room. 
 
 10 to 11:30 p. m. Sandwiches (Swiss cheese, 
 
 27 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 caviar, tongue, beef, cervelat wurst, etc.) in the 
 smoking-room. 
 
 It will be noted that anyone using ordinary dili 
 gence is enabled to stay the pangs of hunger at 
 least eight times a day. But the company in order 
 to cover all emergencies, has made the humane pro 
 vision that articles of food may be obtained at any 
 hour, either in the smoking room or dining room, 
 or by giving the order to a steward. It is said that 
 geese being fattened for the market or encouraged 
 to develop the liver are tied to the ground so that 
 they cannot take any harmful exercise, and large 
 quantities of rich food are then pushed into them by 
 means of a stick. Anyone who has spent a lazy week 
 on a German steamer can sympathise with the geese. 
 
 Of course we had wireless messages to give us 
 an occasional throb of excitement. Wireless teleg 
 raphy, by the way, is more or less of an irritant 
 to the traveller. The man with stocks purchased and 
 lawsuits pending, and all sorts of deals under way, 
 knows that he can be reached (probably) in some 
 sort of a zig-zag manner by wireless telegraphy, no 
 matter where he may be on the wide ocean, and so, 
 most of the time, he is standing around on one foot 
 waiting for bad news. On shore he doesn t fret so 
 much about possible calamities, but as soon as he 
 
 28 
 
LIFE ON THE OCEAN WAVE 
 
 gets away from Sandy Hook he begins to draw 
 mental pictures of the mistakes being made by lunk- 
 headed subordinates, and then he hangs around the 
 Marconi station up on the sun deck, waiting for his 
 most horrible fears to be confirmed. 
 
 In 1895, during my first voyage to Europe, I 
 wrote the following in one of my letters, intending it 
 as a mild pleasantry: 
 
 " Some day, perhaps, there will be invented a 
 device by which ocean steamers may tap the Atlantic 
 cable for news bulletins and stock quotations, or 
 else receive them by special transmission through 
 the water, and then the last refuge will be denied 
 the business slave who is attempting to get away 
 from his work." 
 
 And to think that ten years later the miracle of 
 shooting a message through an open window and 
 across five hundred miles of nothing but atmosphere 
 has become a tame and every-day occurrence! 
 
 On the steamer I met an old friend Mr. Peasley, 
 of Iowa. We first collided in Europe in 1895, when 
 both of us were over for the first time and were 
 groping our way about the Continent and pretend 
 ing to enjoy ourselves. About the time I first en 
 countered Mr. Peasley he had an experience which, 
 in all probability, is without parallel in human his- 
 
 29 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 tory. Some people to whom I have told the story 
 frankly disbelieved it, but then they did not know- 
 Mr. Peasley. It is all very true, and it happened 
 as follows: 
 
 Mr. Peasley had been in Rotterdam for two days, 
 and after galloping madly through churches, gal 
 leries, and museums for eight hours a day he said 
 that he had seen enough Dutch art to last him a 
 million years, at a very conservative estimate, so he 
 started for Brussels. He asked the proprietor of the 
 hotel at Rotterdam for the name of a good hotel in 
 Brussels and the proprietor told him to go to the 
 Hotel Victoria. He said it was a first-class estab 
 lishment and was run by his brother-in-law. Every 
 hotel keeper in Europe has a brother-in-law running 
 a hotel in some other town. 
 
 Mr. Peasley was loaded into a train by watchful 
 attendants, and as there were no Englishmen in the 
 compartment he succeeded in getting a good seat 
 right by the window and did not have to ride back 
 ward. Very soon he became immersed in one of the 
 six best sellers. He read on and on, chapter after 
 chapter, not heeding the flight of time, until the 
 train rolled into a cavernous train shed and was 
 attacked by the usual energetic mob of porters and 
 hotel runners. Mr. Peasley looked out and saw that 
 
 30 
 
LIFE ON THE OCEAN WAVE 
 
 they had arrived at another large city. On the other 
 side of the platform was a large and beautiful bus 
 marked " Hotel Victoria." Mr. Peasley shrieked for 
 a porter and began dumping Gladstone bags, steamer 
 rugs, cameras, and other impedimenta out through 
 the window. The man from the Victoria put these 
 on top of the bus and in a few minutes Mr. Peas- 
 ley was riding through the tidy thoroughfares and 
 throwing mental bouquets at the street-cleaning 
 department. 
 
 When he arrived at the Victoria he was met by 
 the proprietor, who wore the frock coat and whis 
 kers which are the world-wide insignia of hospitality. 
 
 " Your brother-in-law in Rotterdam told me to 
 come here and put up with you," explained Mr. Peas- 
 ley. " He said you were running a first-class place, 
 which means, I s pose, first class for this country. If 
 you fellows over here would put in steam heat and 
 bathrooms and electric lights and then give us some 
 thing to eat in the bargain your hotels wouldn t be 
 so bad. I admire the stationery in your writing 
 rooms, and the regalia worn by your waiters is cer 
 tainly all right, but that s about all I can say for 
 you." 
 
 The proprietor smiled and bowed and said he 
 hoped his brother-in-law in Rotterdam was in gooa 
 
 31 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 health and enj oying prosperity, and Mr. Peasley said 
 that he, personally, had left with the brother-in-law 
 enough money to run the hotel for another six 
 months. 
 
 After Mr. Peasley had been conducted to his room 
 he dug up his Baedeker and very carefully read the 
 introduction to Brussels. Then he studied the map 
 for a little while. He believed in getting a good 
 general idea of the lay of things before he tackled 
 a new town. He marked on the map a few of the show 
 places which seemed worth while, and then he sallied 
 out, waving aside the smirking guide who attempted 
 to fawn upon him as he paused at the main entrance. 
 Mr. Peasley would have nothing to do with guides. 
 He always said that the man who had to be led 
 around by the halter would do better to stay right 
 at home. 
 
 It was a very busy afternoon for Mr. Peasley. 
 At first he had some difficulty in finding the places 
 that were marked in red spots on the map. This was 
 because he had been holding the map upside down. 
 By turning the map the other way and making due 
 allowance for the inaccuracies to be expected in a 
 book written by ignorant foreigners, the whole 
 ground plan of the city straightened itself out, and 
 he boldly went his way. He visited an old cathedral 
 
LIFE ON THE OCEAN WAVE 
 and two art galleries, reading long and scholarly 
 comments on the more celebrated masterpieces. Some 
 of the paintings were not properly labelled, but he 
 knew that slipshod methods prevailed in Europe 
 that a civilisation which is on the downhill and about 
 to play out cannot be expected to breed a business 
 like accuracy. He wrote marginal corrections in his 
 guide book and doctored up the map a little, several 
 streets having been omitted, and returned to the 
 hotel at dusk feeling very well repaid. From the 
 beginning of his tour he had maintained that when 
 a man goes out and gets information or impressions 
 of his own unaided efforts he gets something that 
 will abide with him and become a part of his intellec 
 tual and artistic fibre. That which is ladled into 
 him by a verbose guide soon evaporates or oozes 
 away. 
 
 At the table d hote Mr. Peasley had the good for 
 tune to be seated next to an Englishman, to whom 
 he addressed himself. The Englishman was not very 
 communicative, but Mr. Peasley persevered. It was 
 his theory that when one is travelling and meets a 
 fellow Caucasian who is shy or reticent or suspicious 
 the thing to do is to keep on talking to him until he 
 feels quite at ease and the entente cordiale is fully 
 established. So Mr. Peasley told the Englishman all 
 
 33 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 about Iowa and said that it was " God s country." 
 The Englishman fully agreed with him that is, if 
 silence gives consent. There was a lull in the con 
 versation and Mr. Peasley, seeking to give it a new 
 turn, said to his neighbour, " I like this town best of 
 any I ve seen. Is this your first visit to Brussels ? " 
 
 " I have never been to Brussels," replied the Eng 
 lishman. 
 
 " That is, never until this time," suggested Mr. 
 Peasley. u I m in the same boat. Just landed here 
 to-day. I ve heard of it before, on account of the 
 carpet coming from here, and of course everybody 
 knows about Brussels sprouts, but I had no idea 
 it was such a big place. It s bigger than Rock Island 
 and Davenport put together." 
 
 The Englishman began to move away, at the same 
 time regarding the cheerful Peasley with solemn 
 wonderment. Then he said: 
 
 " My dear sir, I am quite unable to follow you. 
 Where do you think you are ? " 
 
 " Brussels it s in Belgium capital, same as Des 
 Moines in Iowa." 
 
 " My good man, you are not in Brussels. You are 
 in Antwerp." 
 
 " Antwerp ! " 
 
 " Certainly." 
 
 34 
 
LIFE ON THE OCEAN WAVE 
 
 " Why, I ve been all over town to-day, with a 
 
 guide book, and " He paused and a horrible 
 
 suspicion settled upon him. Arising from the table 
 he rushed to the outer office and confronted the 
 manager. 
 
 " What s the name of this town I m in? " he 
 demanded. 
 
 " Antwerp," replied the astonished manager. 
 
 Mr. Peasley leaned against the wall and gasped. 
 
 " Well, I ll be !" he began, and then language 
 
 failed him. 
 
 " You said you had a brother-in-law in Rotter 
 dam," he said, when he recovered his voice. 
 
 " That is quite true." 
 
 " And the Victoria Hotel is there one in Brus 
 sels and another in Antwerp? " 
 
 " There is a Victoria Hotel in every city in the 
 whole world. The Victoria Hotel is universal the 
 same as Scotch whiskey." 
 
 " And I am now in Antwerp ? " 
 
 " Most assuredly." 
 
 Mr. Peasley went to his room. He did not dare to 
 return to face the Englishman. Next day he pro 
 ceeded to Brussels and found that he could work 
 from the same guide book just as successfully as he 
 had in Antwerp. 
 
 35 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 When I met him on the steamer he said that during 
 all of his travels since 1895 he never had duplicated 
 the remarkable experience at Antwerp. As soon as 
 he alights from a train he goes right up to someone 
 and asks the name of the town. 
 
CHAPTER III 
 
 WITH MR. PEASLEY IN DARKEST 
 LONDON 
 
 WE did not expect to have Mr. Peasley with us in 
 London. He planned to hurry on to Paris, but he 
 has been waiting here for his trunk to catch up with 
 him. The story of the trunk will come later. 
 
 As we steamed into Plymouth Llarbour on a damp 
 and overcast Sabbath morning, Mr. Peasley stood 
 on the topmost deck and gave encouraging informa 
 tion to a man from central Illinois who was on his 
 first trip abroad. Mr. Peasley had been over for six 
 weeks in 1895, and that gave him license to do the 
 " old traveller " specialty. 
 
 In beginning a story he would say, " I remem 
 ber once I was crossing on the Umbria," or possibly, 
 " That reminds me of a funny thing I once saw in 
 Munich." He did not practise to deceive, and yet he 
 gave strangers the impression that he had crossed on 
 the Umbria possibly twelve or fourteen times and had 
 spent years in Munich. 
 
 The Illinois man looked up to Mr. Peasley as a 
 37 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 modern Marco Polo, and Mr. Peasley proceeded to 
 unbend to him. 
 
 " A few years ago Americans were very unpopu 
 lar in England," said Mr. Peasley. " Every one of 
 them was supposed to have either a dynamite bomb 
 or a bunch of mining stock in his pocket. All that 
 is changed now all changed. As we come up to 
 the dock in Plymouth you will notice just beyond the 
 station a large triumphal arch of evergreen bearing 
 the words, Welcome, Americans ! Possibly the band 
 will not be out this morning, because it is Sunday 
 and the weather is threatening, but the Reception 
 Committee will be on hand. If we can take time be 
 fore starting for London no doubt a committee from 
 the Commercial Club will haul us around in open 
 carriages to visit the public buildings and breweries 
 and other points of interest. And you ll find that 
 your money is counterfeit out here. No use talkin , 
 we re all one people just like brothers. Wait till 
 you get to London. You ll think you re right back 
 among your friends in Decatur." 
 
 It was too early in the morning for the Reception 
 Committee, but there was a policeman one solitary, 
 water-logged, sad-eyed policeman waiting grew- 
 somely on the dock as the tender came alongside. He 
 stood by the gangplank and scrutinised us carefully 
 
 88 
 
MR. PEASLEY IN DARKEST LONDON 
 
 as we filed ashore. The Illinois man looked about for 
 the triumphal arch, but could not find it. Mr. Peas- 
 ley explained that they had taken it in on account 
 of the rain. 
 
 While the passengers were kept herded into a 
 rather gloomy waiting room, the trunks and larger 
 baggage were brought ashore and sorted out accord 
 ing to the alphabetical labels in an adjoining room 
 to await the customs examination. When the doors 
 opened there was a rush somewhat like the opening 
 of an Oklahoma reservation. In ten minutes the 
 trunks had been passed and were being trundled out 
 to the special train. Above the babel of voices and 
 the rattle of wheels arose the sounds of lamentation 
 and modified cuss words. Mr. Peasley could not find 
 his trunk. It was not with the baggage marked " P." 
 It was not in the boneyard, or the discard, or what 
 ever they call the heap of unmarked stuff piled up 
 at one end of the room. It was not anywhere. 
 
 The other passengers, intent upon their private 
 troubles, pawed over their possessions and handed 
 out shillings right and left and followed the line of 
 trucks out to the " luggage vans," and Mr. Peasley 
 was left alone, still demanding his trunk. The sta 
 tion agent and many porters ran hither and thither, 
 looking into all sorts of impossible places, while the 
 
 39 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 locomotive bell rang warningly, and the guard 
 begged Mr. Peasley to get aboard if he wished to 
 go to London. Mr. Peasley took off his hat and leaned 
 his head back and howled for his trunk. The train 
 
 And howled for his trunk 
 
 started and Mr. Peasley, after momentary inde 
 cision, made a running leap into our midst. There 
 were six of us in a small padded cell, and five of the 
 six listened for the next fifteen minutes to a most 
 
 40 
 
MR. PEASLEY IN DARKEST LONDON 
 
 picturesque and impassioned harangue on the sub 
 ject of the general inefficiency of German steamships 
 and English railways. 
 
 " Evidently the trunk was not sent ashore," some 
 one suggested to Mr. Peasley. " If the trunk did not 
 come ashore you could not reasonably expect the 
 station officials to find it and put it aboard the 
 train." 
 
 " But why didn t it come ashore? " demanded Mr. 
 Peasley. " Everyone on the boat knew that I was 
 going to get off at Plymouth. It was talked about 
 all the way over. Other people got their trunks, 
 didn t they? Have you heard of any German 
 being shy a trunk? Has anybody else lost anything? 
 No ; they went over the passenger list and said, If 
 we must hold out a trunk on anyone, let s hold it 
 out on Peasley old good thing Peasley." 
 
 " Are you sure it was put on board at Hoboken ? " 
 he was asked. 
 
 " Sure thing. I checked it myself , or, rather, I 
 got a fellow that couldn t speak any English to 
 check it for me. Then I saw it lowered into the cel 
 lar, or the subway, or whatever they call it." 
 
 " Did you get a receipt for it? " 
 
 " You bet I did, and right here she is." 
 
 He brought out a congested card case and fum- 
 41 
 
MR. PEASLEY IN DARKEST LONDON 
 
 bled over a lot of papers, and finally unfolded a 
 receipt about the size of a one-sheet poster. On top 
 was a number and beneath it said in red letters at 
 least two inches tall, " This baggage has been 
 checked to Hamburg." 
 
 We called Mr. Peasley s attention to the reading 
 matter, but he said it was a mistake, because he 
 had been intending all the time to get off at Ply 
 mouth. 
 
 "Nevertheless, your trunk has gone to Ham 
 burg." 
 
 "Where is Hamburg?" 
 
 " In Germany. The Teuton who checked your 
 baggage could not by any effort of the imagination 
 conceive the possibility of a person starting for any 
 where except Hamburg. In two days your trunk will 
 be lying on a dock in Germany." 
 
 " Well, there s one consolation," observed Mr. 
 Peasley ; " the clothes in that trunk won t fit any 
 German." 
 
 When he arrived in London he began wiring for 
 his trunk in several languages. After two days came 
 a message couched in Volapuk or some other hybrid 
 combination, which led him to believe that his prop 
 erty had been started for London. 
 
 Mr. Peasley spent a week in the world s metropolis 
 43 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 with no clothes except a knockabout travelling out 
 fit and what he called his " Tuxedo," although, over 
 here they say " dinner jacket." In Chicago or 
 Omaha Mr. Peasley could have got along for a week 
 without any embarrassment to himself or others. 
 Even in New York the " Tuxedo " outfit would have 
 carried him through, for it is regarded as a passable 
 apology for evening dress, provided the wearer 
 wishes to advertise himself as a lonesome " stag." 
 But in London there is no compromise. In every 
 hotel lobby or dining-room, every restaurant, theatre 
 or music hall, after the coagulated fog of the day 
 time settles into the opaque gloom of night, there is 
 but one style of dress for any mortal who does not 
 wish to publicly pose as a barbarian. The man who 
 affects a " Tuxedo " might as well wear a sweater. 
 In fact it would be better for him if he did wear a 
 sweater, for then people would understand that he 
 was making no effort to dress ; but when he puts on 
 a bobtail he conveys the impression that he is trying 
 to be correct and doesn t understand the rules. 
 
 An Englishman begins to blossom about half -past 
 seven p. M. The men seen in the streets during the 
 day seem a pretty dingy lot compared with a well- 
 dressed stream along Fifth Avenue. Many of the tall 
 hats bear a faithful resemblance to fur caps. The 
 
 .44 
 
MR. PEASLEY IN DARKEST LONDON 
 
 trousers bag and the coat collars are bunched in the 
 rear and all the shoes seem about two sizes too large. 
 Occasionally you see a man on his way to a train 
 and he wears a shapeless bag of a garment made of 
 some loosely woven material that looks like gunny- 
 sack, with a cap that resembles nothing so much as 
 
 tf Dressed down " and re Dressed up 
 
 a welsh rabbit that has " spread." To complete the 
 picture, he carries a horse blanket. He thinks it is 
 a rug, but it isn t. It is a horse blanket. 
 
 If the Englishman dressed for travel is the most 
 45 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 sloppy of all civilised beings, so the Englishman in 
 his night regalia is the most correct and irreproach 
 able of mortals. He can wear evening clothes with 
 out being conscious of the fact that he is " dressed 
 up." The trouble with the ordinary American who 
 owns an open-faced suit is that he wears it only 
 about once a month. For two days before assuming 
 the splendour of full dress he broods over the ap 
 proaching ordeal. As the fateful night draws near 
 he counts up his studs and investigates the " white 
 vest " situation. In the deep solitude of his room 
 he mournfully climbs into the camphor-laden gar 
 ments, and when he is ready to venture forth, a tall 
 collar choking him above, the glassy shoes pinching 
 him below, he is just as much at ease as he would be 
 in a full suit of armour, with casque and visor. 
 
 However, all this is off the subject. Here was Mr. 
 Peasley in London, desirous of " cutting a wide 
 gash," as he very prettily termed it, plenty of good 
 money from Iowa burning in his pocket, and he could 
 not get out and " associate " because of a mere defi 
 ciency in clothing. 
 
 At the first-class theatres his " bowler " hat con 
 demned him and he was sent into the gallery. When 
 he walked into a restaurant the head waiter would 
 give him one quick and searching glance and then 
 
 46 
 
MR. PEASLEY IN DARKEST LONDON 
 put him off in some corner, behind a palm. Even in 
 the music halls the surrounding " Johnnies " re 
 garded him with wonder as another specimen of the 
 eccentric Yankee. 
 
 We suggested to Mr. Peasley that he wear a 
 
 His bowler hat condemned him 
 
 placard reading " I have some clothes, but my trunk 
 is in Hamburg." He said that as soon as his swell 
 duds arrived he was going to put them on and revisit 
 all of the places at which he had been humiliated and 
 
 47 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 turned down, just to let the flunkeys know that they 
 had been mistaken. 
 
 Mr. Peasley was greatly rejoiced to learn one day 
 that he could attend a football game without wear 
 ing a special uniform. So he went out to see a non- 
 brutal game played according to the Association 
 rules. The gentle pastime known as football in 
 America is a modification and overdevelopment of 
 the Rugby game as played in Great Britain. The 
 Association, or " Seeker " game, which is now being 
 introduced in the United States as a counter-irritant 
 for the old-fashioned form of manslaughter, is by 
 far the more popular in England. The Rugby Asso 
 ciation is waning in popularity, not because of any 
 outcry against the character of the play or any talk 
 of " brutality," but because the British public has 
 a more abiding fondness for the Association game. 
 
 In America we think we are football crazy because 
 we have a few big college games during October and 
 November of each year. In Great Britain the foot 
 ball habit is something that abides, the same as the 
 tea habit. 
 
 We are hysterical for about a month and then we 
 forget the game unless we belong to the minority 
 that is trying to debrutalise it and reduce the deatk 
 rate. 
 
 48 
 
MR. PEASLEY IN DARKEST LONDON 
 
 Here it was, February in London, and on the first 
 Saturday after our arrival forty-five Association 
 games and thirty-eight Rugby games were reported 
 in the London papers. At sixteen of the principal 
 Association games the total attendance was over two 
 hundred and fifty thousand and the actual receipts 
 at these same games amounted to about $45,000. 
 There were two games at each of which the attend 
 ance was over thirty thousand, with the receipts ex 
 ceeding $5,000. A very conservative estimate of the 
 total attendance at the games played on this Satur 
 day would be five hundred thousand. In other words, 
 on one Saturday afternoon in February the attend 
 ance at football games was equal to the total 
 attendance at all of the big college games during an 
 entire season in the United States. No wonder that 
 the English newspapers are beginning to ask editori 
 ally "Is football a curse?" There is no clamour 
 regarding the roughness of the game, but it is said 
 to cost too much money and to take up too much 
 time for the benefits derived. 
 
 The game to which Mr. Peasley conducted us was 
 played in rather inclement weather that is, inclem 
 ent London weather which means that it was the 
 most terrible day that the imagination can picture 
 a dark, chilly, drippy day, with frequent downpours. 
 
 49 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 It has been said that one cannot obtain icewater in 
 London. This is a mistake. We obtained it by the 
 hogshead. 
 
 In spite of the fact that the weather was bad be 
 yond description, seventeen thousand spectators 
 attended the game and saw it through to a watery 
 finish. 
 
 Mr. Peasley looked on and was much disappointed. 
 He said they used too many players and the number 
 of fatalities was not at all in keeping with the ad 
 vertised importance of the game. It was a huge 
 crowd, but the prevailing spirit of solemnity worried 
 Mr. Peasley. He spoke to a native standing along 
 side of him and asked : " What s the matter with 
 you folks over here? Don t you know how to back 
 up a team? Where are all of your flags and ribbons, 
 your tally-hos and tin horns? Is this a football game 
 or a funeral? " 
 
 " Why should one wear ribbons at a football 
 game? " asked the Englishman. 
 
 " Might as well put a little ginger into the exer 
 cises," suggested Mr. Peasley. " Do you sing during 
 the game? " 
 
 "Heavens, no. Sing? Why should one sing dur 
 ing a football game? In what manner is vocal music 
 related to an outdoor pastime of this character? " 
 
 50 
 
MR. PEASLEY IN DARKEST LONDON 
 
 " You ought to go to a game in Iowa City. We 
 sing till we re black in the face all about Eat em 
 up, boys, Kill em in their tracks, and c Buck 
 through the line. What s the use of coming to a 
 game if you stand around all afternoon and don t 
 take part? Have you got any yells? " 
 
 "What are those?" 
 
 " Can you beat that ? " asked Mr. Peasley , turn 
 ing to us. " A football game without any yells ! " 
 
 The game started. By straining our eyes we could 
 make out through the deep gloom some thirty ener 
 getic young men, very lightly clad, splashing about 
 in all directions, and kicking in all sorts of aimless 
 directions. Mr. Peasley said it was a mighty poor 
 excuse for football. No one was knocked out ; there 
 was no bucking the line ; there didn t even seem to be 
 a doctor in evidence. We could not follow the fine 
 points of the contest. Evidently some good plays 
 were being made, for occasionally a low, growling 
 sound a concerted murmur would arise from the 
 multitude banked along the side lines. 
 
 " What is the meaning of that sound they are 
 making?" asked Mr. Peasley, turning to the native 
 standing alongside of him. 
 
 " They are cheering," was the reply. 
 
 "They are what? " 
 
 51 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 " Cheering." 
 
 "Great Scott! Do you call that cheering? At 
 home, when we want to encourage the boys we get 
 up on our hind legs and make a noise that you can 
 hear in the next township. We put cracks in the 
 azure dome. Cheering ! Why, a game of croquet in 
 the court house yard is eight times as thrilling as 
 this thing. Look at those fellows juggling the ball 
 with their feet. Why doesn t somebody pick it up 
 and butt through that crowd and start a little rough 
 work? " 
 
 The native gave Mr. Peasley one hopeless look 
 and moved away. 
 
 We could not blame our companion for being dis 
 appointed over the cheering. An English cheer is 
 not the ear-splitting demoniacal shriek, such as an 
 American patriot lets out when he hears from 
 another batch of precincts. 
 
 The English cheer is simply a loud grunt, or 
 a sort of guttural " Hey ! hey ! " or " Hurray ! " 
 
 When an English crowd cheers the sound is similar 
 to that made by a Roman mob in the wings of a 
 theatre. 
 
 After having once heard the " cheering " one can 
 understand the meaning of a passage in the Parlia 
 mentary report, reading about as follows : " The 
 
 52 
 
MR. PEASLEY IN DARKEST LONDON 
 
 gentleman hoped the house would not act with haste. 
 (Cheers). He still had confidence in the committee 
 (cheers), but would advise a careful consideration 
 (cheers), etc." 
 
 It might be supposed from such a report that 
 Parliament was one continuous " rough house," but 
 we looked in one day and it is more like a cross 
 between a Presbyterian synod and bee-keepers 
 convention. 
 
 About four o clock we saw a large section of the 
 football crowd moving over toward a booth at one 
 end of the grounds. Mr. Peasley hurried after them, 
 thinking that possibly someone had started a fight 
 on the side and that his love of excitement might 
 be gratified after all. Presently he returned in a 
 state of deep disgust. 
 
 " Do you know why all those folks are flockin 
 over there? " he asked. " Goin after their tea. Tea! 
 Turnin their backs on a football game to go and 
 get a cup of tea ! Why, that tea tiling over there is 
 worse than the liquor habit. Do you know, when the 
 final judgment day comes and Gabriel blows his 
 horn and all of humanity is bunched up, waitin for 
 the sheep to be cut out from the goats and put into a 
 separate corral, some Englishman will look at his 
 watch and discover that it s five o clock and then the 
 
 53 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 whole British nation will turn its back on the pro 
 ceedings and go off looking for tea." 
 
 After we had stood in the rain for about an hour 
 someone told Mr. Peasley that one team or the other 
 had won by three goals to nothing, and we followed 
 the moist throng out through the big gates. 
 
 " Come with me," said Mr. Peasley, " and I will 
 take you to the only dry place in London." 
 
 So we descended to the " tuppenny tube." 
 
CHAPTER IV 
 
 HOW IT FEELS TO GET INTO LONDON 
 AND THEN BE ENGULFED. 
 
 ONE good thing about London is that, in spite of 
 its enormous size, you are there when you arrive. 
 Take Chicago, by way of contrast. If you arrive 
 in Chicago along about the middle of the afternoon 
 you may be at the station by night. 
 
 The stranger heading into Chicago looks out of 
 the window at a country station and sees a police 
 man standing on the platform. Beyond is a sign 
 indicating that the wagon road winding away to 
 ward the sunset is 287th street, or thereabouts. 
 
 " We are now in Chicago," says someone who has 
 been over che road before. 
 
 The traveller, surprised to learn that he has arrived 
 at his destination, puts his magazine and travelling 
 cap into the valise, shakes out his overcoat, calls on 
 the porter to come and brush him, and then sits 
 on the end of the seat waiting for the brakeman to 
 announce the terminal station. After a half-hour 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 of intermittent suburbs and glorious sweeps of vir 
 gin prairie he begins to think that there is some 
 mistake, so he opens his valise and takes out the 
 magazine and reads another story. 
 
 Suddenly he looks out of the window and notices 
 that the train has entered the crowded city. He 
 puts on his overcoat, picks up his valise and stands 
 in the aisle, so as to be ready to step right off as 
 soon as the train stops. 
 
 The train passes street after street and rattles 
 through grimy yards and past towering elevators, 
 and in ten minutes the traveller tires of standing and 
 goes back to his seat. The porter comes and brushes 
 him again, and he looks out at several viaducts lead 
 ing over to a skyline of factories and breweries, 
 and begins to see the masts of ships poking up in the 
 most unexpected places. At last, when he has looked 
 at what seems to be one hundred miles of architec 
 tural hash floating in smoke and has begun to doubt 
 that there is a terminal station } he hears the welcome 
 call, "Shuh-kawgo!" 
 
 When you are London bound the train leaves the 
 green country (for the country is green, even in 
 February), dashes into a region of closely built 
 streets, and you look out from the elevated train 
 across an endless expanse of chimney-pots. Two or 
 
 56 
 
ENGULFED IN LONDON 
 
 three stations, plated with enameled advertising 
 signs, buzz past. The pall of smoky fog becomes 
 heavier and the streets more crowded. Next, the 
 train has come to a grinding stop under a huge 
 vaulted roof. The noise of the wheels give way to 
 the roar of London town. 
 
 You step down and out and fall into the arms of 
 a porter who wishes to carry your " bags." You are 
 in the midst of parallel tracks and shifting trains. 
 Beyond the platform is a scramble of cabs. The 
 sounds of the busy station are joined into a deafen 
 ing monotone. You shout into the ear of your travel 
 ling companion to get a " four-wheeler " while you 
 watch the trunks. 
 
 He struggles away to hail a four-wheeler. You 
 push your way with the others down toward the 
 front of the train to where the baggage is being 
 thrown out on the platform. You seize a porter and 
 engage him to attend to the handling of the trunks. 
 As you point them out he loads them onto a truck. 
 Your companion arrives in a wild-eyed search for 
 you. 
 
 "I ve got a four-wheeler," he gasps. "All the 
 baggage here? " 
 
 " Yes, yes, yes." 
 
 Everybody is excited and hopping about, put 
 57 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 into a state of hysteria by the horrible hubbub and 
 confusion. 
 
 " It s number 48." 
 
 The porter handling the truck leads the way to 
 the cab platform and howls " Forty-ite ! Forty-ite ! " 
 
 " Ere you are," shouts forty-eight, who is wedged 
 in behind two hansoms. 
 
 By some miracle of driving he gets over or under 
 or past the hansoms and comes to the platform. The 
 steamer trunks are thrown on top and the porter, 
 accepting the shilling with a " k you, sir," slams 
 the door behind you. 
 
 Then you can hear your driver overhead man 
 aging his way out of the blockade. 
 
 " Pull a bit forward, cahn t you? " he shouts. Then 
 to someone else, " Urry up, urry up, cahn t you? " 
 
 You are in a tangle of wheels and lamps, but you 
 get out of it in some way, and then the rubber tires 
 roll easily along the spattering pavement of a street 
 which seems heavenly quietude. 
 
 This is the time to lean back and try to realise 
 that you are in London. The town may be common 
 and time-worn to those people going in and out of 
 the shops, but to you it is a storehouse of novelties, 
 a library of things to be learned, a museum of the 
 landmarks of history. 
 
 58 
 
ENGULFEi) IN LONDON 
 
 We could read the names on the windows, and they 
 were good homely Anglo-Saxon names. We didn t 
 have to get out of the four-wheeler and go into the 
 shops to convince ourselves that Messrs. Brown, 
 Jones, Simpson, Perkins, Jackson, Smith, Thompson, 
 Williams, and the others were serious men of defer 
 ential habits, who spoke in hollow whispers of the 
 king, drank tea at intervals and loved a pipe of 
 tobacco in the garden of a Sunday morning. 
 
 Some people come to London to see the Abbey and 
 the Tower, but I fear that our trusty little band 
 came to see the shop windows and the crowds in the 
 streets. 
 
 May the weak and imitative traveller resist the 
 temptation to say that Fleet street is full of publish 
 ing houses, that the British museum deserves many 
 visits, that the Cheshire Cheese is one of the ancient 
 taverns, that the new monument in front of the 
 Courts of Law marks the site of old Temple Bar, 
 that the chapel of King Henry VII. is a superb 
 example of its own style of decoration, and that 
 one is well repaid for a trip to Hampton Court. Whjr 
 seek to corroborate the testimony of so many letter- 
 writers ? 
 
 Besides, London does not consist of towers, abbeys, 
 and museums. These are the remote and infrequent 
 
 59 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 things. After you have left London and try to call 
 back the huge and restless picture to your mind, the 
 show places stand dimly in the background. The 
 London which impressed you and made you feel 
 your own littleness and weakness was an endless 
 swarm of people going and coming, eddying off into 
 dark courts, streaming toward you along sudden 
 tributaries, whirling in pools at the open places, 
 such as Piccadilly Circus and Trafalgar Square. 
 Thousands of hansom cabs dashed in and out of 
 the street traffic, and the rattling omnibuses moved 
 along every street in a broken row, and no matter 
 how long you remained in London you never saw the 
 end of that row. 
 
 You go out in London in the morning, and if you 
 have no set programme to hamper you, you make 
 your way to one of those great chutes along which 
 the herds of humanity are forever driven. 
 
 If you follow the guide-book it will lead you to a 
 chair in which a king sat 300 years ago. If you can 
 get up an emotion by straining hard enough and find 
 a real pleasure in looking at the moth-eaten chair, 
 then you should follow the guide-book. If not, es 
 cape from the place and go to the street. The men 
 and women you find there will interest you. They 
 are on deck. The chair is a dead splinter of his- 
 
 60 
 
ENGULFED IN LONDON 
 
 tory. All the people in the street are the embodi 
 ment of that history. For purposes of actual obser 
 vation I would rather encounter a live cabman than 
 the intangible, atmospheric suggestion of Queen 
 Elizabeth. 
 
 After you have been in London once you under 
 stand why your friends who have visited it before 
 were never able to tell you about it so that you 
 could understand. It is too big to be put under one 
 focus. The traveller takes home only a few idiotic 
 details of his stay. He says that he had to pay for 
 his programme at the theatre, and that he couldn t 
 get ice at some of the restaurants. 
 
 " But tell us about London," says the insistent 
 friend who has constructed a London of his own out 
 of a thousand impressions gathered from books and 
 magazines. Then the traveller says that London is 
 large, he doesn t remember how many millions, and 
 very busy, and there wasn t as much fog as he had 
 expected, and as for the people they were not so 
 much different from Americans, although you never 
 had any difficulty in identifying an American in 
 London. The traveller s friends listen in disappoint 
 ment and agree that he got very little out of his 
 trip, and that when they go to London they will 
 come back and tell people the straight of it. 
 
 61 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 As a matter of fact, London is principally a sense 
 of dizziness. This dizziness comes of trying to keep 
 an intent gaze on too many human performances. 
 The mind is in a blur. The impressions come with 
 rolling swiftness. There is no room for them. The 
 traveller overflows with them. They spill behind him. 
 You could track an American all around London by 
 the trail of excess information which he drops in 
 his pathway. 
 
 Of course, I have kept a journal, but that doesn t 
 help much. It simply says that we went out each day 
 and then came back to the hotel for dinner. There 
 was not much chance for personal experiences, be 
 cause in London you are not a person. You are 
 simply a drop of water in a sea, and any molecular 
 disturbances which may concern you are of small 
 moment compared to the general splasho 
 
 6*2 
 
CHAPTER V 
 
 AS TO THE IMPORTANCE OF THE PASS 
 PORT AND THE HANDY LITTLE 
 CABLE CODE 
 
 ADVICE to those following along behind. Stock 
 up on heavy flannels and do not bother about a 
 passport. v?:nii 
 
 Before we became old and hardened travellers --totef 
 were led to believe that any American who appeared 
 at a frontier without a passport would be hurried 
 to a dungeon or else marched in the snow all the 
 way to Siberia. nl 
 
 When I first visited the eastern hemisphere (I do 
 love to recall the fact that I have been over herd; 
 before), our little company of travellers prepared 
 for European experiences by reading a small hand 
 book of advice. The topics were arranged alpha 
 betically, and the specific information set out under 
 each heading was more valuable and impressive at 
 the beginning of the trip than it was after we had 
 come home and read it in the cold light of ex- 
 
 63 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 perience. We paid particular heed to the fol 
 lowing : 
 
 "PASSPORTS Every American travelling in 
 Europe should carry a passport. At many frontiers 
 a passport, properly * vised, must be shown before 
 the traveller will be allowed to enter the country. A 
 passport is always valuable as an identification 
 when money is to be drawn on a letter of credit. 
 Very often it will secure for the bearer admission to 
 palaces, galleries and other show places which are 
 closed to the general public. It is the most ready 
 answer to any police inquiry, and will serve as a 
 letter of introduction to all consular offices." 
 
 We read the foregoing and sent for passports 
 before we bought our steamship tickets. 
 
 I have been a notary public; I have graduated 
 from a highschool; I have taken out accident insur 
 ance, and once, in a careless moment, I purchased one 
 thousand shares of mining stock. In each instance I 
 received a work of art on parchment something 
 bold and black and Gothic, garnished with gold seals 
 and curly-cues. But for splendour of composition and 
 majesty of design, the passport makes all other im 
 portant documents seem pale and pointless. There 
 is an American eagle at the top, with his trousers 
 turned up, and beneath is a bold pronouncement to 
 
 64 
 
PASSPORT AND CABLE CODE 
 the world in general that the bearer is an Ameri 
 can citizen, entitled to everything that he can afford 
 to buy. No man can read his own passport without 
 being more or less stuck on himself. I never had a 
 chance to use the one given to me years ago, but 
 I still keep it and read it once in a while to bolster 
 up my self-respect. \ 
 
 When we first landed at Liverpool each man had 
 his passport in his inside coat pocket within easy 
 reach, so that in case of an insult or an imperti-^j 
 nent question he could flash it forth and say : " Stand 
 back ! I am an American citizen ! " After a week in 
 London we went to the bank to draw some more 
 money. The first man handed in his letter of credit 
 and said: " If necessary, I have a pass " % 
 
 Before he could say any more the cashier reached 
 out a little scoop shovel loaded with sovereigns and 
 said : " Twenty pounds, sir." 
 
 We never could find a banker who wanted to look 
 at our passports or who could be induced to take 
 so much as a glance at them. I said to one banker: 
 " We have our passports in case you require any 
 identification." He said : " Rully , it isn t necessary, 
 you know. I am quite sure that you are from 
 Chicago." 
 
 We couldn t determine whether this was sheer 
 65 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 courtesy on his part or whether we were dif 
 ferent. 
 
 After we were on the continent we hoped that 
 some policeman would come to the hotel and in 
 vestigate us, so that we could smile coolly and say: 
 " Look at that," at the same time handing him the 
 blue envelope. Then to note his dismay and to have 
 him apologise and back out. But the police never 
 learned that we were in town. 
 
 As for the art galleries and palaces, we had be 
 lieved the handbook. We fancied that some day or 
 other one of us would approach the entrance to a 
 palace and that a gendarme would step out and say : 
 " Pardon, monsieur, but the palace is closed to all 
 visitors to-day." 
 
 " To most visitors, you mean." 
 
 " To all, monsieur." 
 
 " I think not, do you know who I am? " 
 
 " No, monsieur." 
 
 " Then don t say a word about anything being 
 closed until you find out. I am an American. Here is 
 my passport. Fling open the doors ! " 
 
 At which the gendarme would prostrate himself 
 and the American would pass in, while a large body 
 of English, French and German tourists would stand 
 outside and envy him. 
 
 66 
 
PASSPORT AND CABLE CODE 
 
 Alas, it was a day-dream. Every palace that was 
 closed seemed to be really closed, and when we did 
 find the gendarme who was to be humiliated, we dis 
 covered that we couldn t speak his language, and, 
 besides, we felt so humble in his presence that we 
 wouldn t have ventured to talk to him under any 
 circumstances. 
 
 We travelled in England, Ireland, Holland, Bel 
 gium, Germany, Switzerland, Italy, and France, 
 crossing and recrossing frontiers, and we never en 
 countered a man, woman or child who would consent 
 to look at our passports. 
 
 On the other hand, the cable code is something 
 that no tourist should be without. Whenever he is 
 feeling blue or downcast he can open the code book 
 and get a few hearty laughs. Suppose he wishes to 
 send a message to his brother in Toledo. The code 
 permits him to concentrate his message into the 
 tabloid form and put a long newsy letter into two 
 or three words. He opens the blue book and finds that 
 he can send any of the following tidings to Toledo : 
 
 Adjunctio Apartments required are engaged and 
 will be ready for occupation on Wednesday. 
 
 Amalior Bills of lading have not been endorsed. 
 
 Animatio Twins, boy and girl, all well. 
 
 Collarla Received invitation to dinner and theatre. 
 67 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 Illaqueo Have a fly at the station to meet train 
 arriving at eight o clock. 
 
 Napina Machinery out of order. Delay will be 
 great. 
 
 Remlssus Can you obtain good security? 
 
 And so on, page after page. Theoretically, this 
 vest pocket volume is a valuable helpmate, but when 
 Mr. Peasley wanted to cable Iowa to have his Masonic 
 dues paid and let Bill Levison take the river farm 
 for another year and try to collect the money from 
 Joe Spillers, the code book did not seem to have 
 the proper equivalents. 
 
 We had with us on the boat an American who 
 carried a very elaborate code book. All the way up 
 from Plymouth to London he was working on a cable 
 gram to his wife. When he turned it over to the oper 
 ator, this is the joyous message that went singing 
 through the water back to New York : 
 
 " LIZCAM, New York. Hobgoblin buckwheat ex 
 plosion manifold cranberry suspicious. 
 
 JAMES." 
 
 He showed us a copy and seemed to be very proud 
 of it. 
 
 " That s what you save by having a code," he 
 explained. 
 
 68 
 
PASSPORT AND CABLE CODE 
 
 "What will Lizcam think when he receives 
 that?" 
 
 "He? That s my wife s registered cable address. 
 
 * Liz for Lizzie and * Cam for Campbell. Her 
 maiden name was Lizzie Campbell." 
 
 " Well, what does that mean about a buckwheat 
 hobgoblin having a suspicious explosion ? " 
 
 " Oh, those words are selected arbitrarily to repre 
 sent full sentences in the code. When my wife gets 
 that cable she will look up those words one after 
 the other and elaborate the message so that it will 
 read like this : 
 
 He showed us the following: 
 
 " Mrs. Chauncey Cupple, Mount Joy Hotel, New 
 
 York Dear Wife : Well, here we are at London, 
 
 after a very pleasant voyage, all things considered. 
 We had only two days of inclement weather and I 
 was not seasick at any time. We saw a great many 
 porpoises, but no whales. The third day out I won the 
 pool on the run. Formed the acquaintance of several 
 pleasant people. (Signed) James." 
 
 " It s just as good as a letter," said the man from 
 Buffalo. 
 
 " Yes, and I save fifty-eight words," said Cupple. 
 
 * I wouldn t travel without a code." 
 
 " Why don t you tack on another word and let her 
 69 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 know how many knots we made each day ? " asked the 
 Buffalo man, but his sarcasm was wasted. 
 
 A week later I met Mr. Cupple and he said that 
 the cablegram had given his wife nervous pros 
 tration. 
 
 Mr. Cupple is not a careful penman and the cable 
 operator had read the last word of the message as 
 "auspicious " instead of " suspicious." A reference 
 to the code showed that the mistake changed the sense 
 of the message. 
 
 " Suspicious Formed the acquaintance of several 
 pleasant people. 
 
 " Auspicious After a futile effort to work the 
 pumps the captain gave orders to lower the boats. 
 The passengers were in a panic, but the captain coolly 
 restrained them and gave orders that the women and 
 children should be sent away first." 
 
 The message, as altered in transmission, caused 
 Mrs. Cupple some uneasiness, and, also, it puzzled 
 her. It was gratifying to know that her husband had 
 enjoyed the voyage and escaped seasickness, but she 
 did not like to leave him on the deck of the ship with 
 a lot of women and children stepping up to take the 
 best places in the boat. Yet she could not believe that 
 he had been lost, otherwise, how could he have filed 
 a cablegram at London? 
 
 70 
 
PASSPORT AND CABLE CODE 
 
 She wanted further particulars, but she could 
 not find in the code any word meaning " Are you 
 drowned? " 
 
 So she sent a forty-word inquiry to London, and 
 when Mr. Cupple counted the cost of it he cabled 
 back: 
 
 " All right. Ignore code." 
 
 71 
 
CHAPTER VI 
 
 SYHAT ONE MAN PICKED UP IN LONDON 
 AND SENT BACK TO HIS BROTHER 
 
 A MAN is always justly proud of the information 
 which has just come to hand. He enjoys a new piece 
 of knowledge just as a child enjoys a new Christmas 
 toy. It seems impossible for him to keep his hands 
 off of it. He wants to carry it around and show it to 
 his friends, just as a child wants to race through the 
 neighbourhood and display his new toy. 
 
 Within a week the toy may be thrown aside, having 
 become too familiar and commonplace, and by the 
 same rule of human weakness the man will toss his 
 proud bit of information into the archives of memory 
 and never haul it out again except in response to a 
 special demand. 
 
 These turgid thoughts are suggested by the be 
 haviour of an American stopping at our hotel. He is 
 here for the first time, and he has found undiluted 
 joy in getting the British names of everything he 
 saw. After forty-eight hours in London he was gifted 
 
 72 
 
WHAT A MAN SENT HIS BROTHER 
 with a new vocabulary, and he could not withstand the 
 temptation to let his brother at home know all about 
 it. The letter which he wrote was more British than 
 any Englishman could have made it. 
 
 In order to add the sting of insult to his vain 
 glorious display of British terms he inserted par 
 enthetical explanations at different places in his letter. 
 It was just as if he had said, " Of course, I ll have 
 to tell you what these things mean, because you never 
 have been out of America, and you could not be ex 
 pected to have the broad and comprehensive knowl 
 edge of a traveller." 
 
 This is the letter which he read to us last evening : 
 
 "DEAR BROTHER: I send you this letter by the first 
 post (mail) back to America to let you know that I 
 arrived safely. In company with several pleasant chaps 
 with whom I had struck up an acquaintance during our 
 ride across the pond (ocean) I reached the landing stage 
 (dock) at Southampton at 6 o clock Saturday. It re 
 quired but a short time for the examination of my box 
 (trunk) and my two bags (valises),, and then I booked 
 (bought a ticket) for London. My luggage (baggage) 
 was put into the van (baggage car) and registered 
 (checked) for London. I paid the porter a bob (a shil 
 ling, equal to 24 cents in your money), and then showed 
 
 72 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 my ticket to the guard (conductor), who showed me into 
 a comfortable first-class carriage (one of the small com 
 partments in the passenger coach), where I settled back 
 to read a London paper, for which I had paid tuppence 
 (4 cents in your money). Directly (immediately after) 
 we started I looked out of the window, and was deeply 
 interested in this first view of the shops (small retail 
 establishments) and the frequent public houses (saloons). 
 Also we passed through the railway yards, where I saw 
 many drivers (engineers) and stokers (firemen) sitting 
 in the locomotives, which did not seem to be as large as 
 those to which you are accustomed in America. 
 
 " Our ride to London was uneventful. When we 
 arrived at London I gave my hand luggage into the keep 
 ing of a porter and claimed the box which had been in the 
 van. This was safely loaded on top of a four-wheeled 
 hackney carriage (four-wheeled cab), and I was driven 
 to my hotel, which happened to be in (on) the same street, 
 and not far from the top (the end) of the thoroughfare. 
 Arrived at the hotel, I paid the cabby (the driver) a 
 half-crown (about 60 cents in your money), and went in 
 to engage an apartment. I paid seven shillings (about 
 $1.75) a day, this to include service (lights and attend 
 ance), which was put in at about 18 pence a day. The 
 lift (elevator) on which I rode to my apartment was 
 very slow. I found that I had a comfortable room, with 
 
 74 
 
WHAT A MAN SENT HIS BROTHER 
 a grate, in which I could have a fire of coals (coal). As 
 I was somewhat seedy (untidy) from travel, I went to the 
 hair-dresser s (the barber), and was shaved. As it was 
 somewhat late I did not go to any theatre, but walked 
 down the Strand and had a bite in a cook-shop (restau 
 rant). The street was crowded. Every few steps you 
 would meet a Tommy Atkins (soldier) with his * doner 
 (best girl). I stopped and inquired of a bobby (police 
 man) the distance to St. Paul s (the cathedral), and 
 decided not to visit it until the next morning. 
 
 " Yesterday I put in a busy day visiting the abbey 
 (Westminster) and riding around on the buses (omni 
 buses) and tram cars (street cars). In the afternoon I 
 went up to Marble Arch (the entrance to Hyde Park), 
 and saw many fashionables; also I looked at the Row 
 (Rotten Row, a drive and equestrian path in Hyde Park). 
 There were a great many women in smart gowns (stylish 
 dresses), and nearly all the men wore frock coats (Prince 
 Alberts), and top hats (silk hats). There are many 
 striking residential mansions (apartment houses) facing 
 the park, and the district is one of the most exclusive 
 up west (in the west end of London). Sunday evening is 
 very dull, and I looked around the smoking-room of the 
 hotel. Nearly every man in the room had a B and S 
 (brandy and soda) in front of him, although some of 
 them preferred polly (apollinaris) to the soda. A few 
 
 75 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 of them drank fizz (champagne) ; but, so far as I have 
 observed, most of the Englishmen drink spirits (whis 
 key), although they very seldom take it neat (straight), 
 as you do at home. I went to bed early and had a good 
 sleep. This morning when I awoke I found that my boots 
 (shoes), which I had placed outside the door the night 
 before, had been neatly varnished (polished). The tub 
 (bath) which I had bespoken (ordered) the night before 
 was ready, and I had a jolly good splash." 
 
 We paused in our admiring study of the letter and 
 remarked to the author that "jolly good splash" 
 was very good for one who had been ashore only two 
 days. 
 
 " Rahther," he said. 
 
 "I beg pardon?" 
 
 66 Rahther, I say. But you understand, of course, 
 that I m giving him a bit of spoof." 
 
 "A bit of what?" 
 
 " Spoof spoof. Is it possible that you have been 
 here since Saturday without learning what * spoof 
 means? It means to chaff, to joke. In the States the 
 slang equivalent would be c to string someone." 
 
 "How did you learn it ? " 
 
 " A cabby told me about it. I started to have some 
 fun with him, and he told me to give over on the 
 
 76 
 
WHAT A MAN SENT HIS BROTHER 
 spoof. But go ahead with the letter. I think there 
 are several things there that you ll like." 
 So we resumed. 
 
 " For breakfast I had a bowl of porridge (oatmeal) 
 and a couple of eggs, with a few crumpets (rolls). 
 Nearly all day I have been looking in the shop windows 
 marvelling at the cheap prices. Over here you can get a 
 good lounge suit (sack suit) for about three guineas (a 
 guinea is twenty-one shillings) ; and I saw a beautiful 
 poncho (light ulster) for four sovereigns (a sovereign 
 is a pound, or twenty shillings). A fancy waistcoat 
 (vest) costs only twelve to twenty shillings ($3 to $5), 
 and you can get a very good morning coat (cutaway) 
 and waistcoat for three and ten (three pounds and ten 
 shillings). I am going to order several suits before I 
 take passage (sail) for home. Thus far I have bought 
 nothing except a pot hat (a derby), for which I paid a 
 half-guinea (ten shillings and sixpence). This noon I 
 ate a snack (light luncheon) in the establishment of a 
 licensed victualer (caterer), who is also a spirit merchant 
 (liquor dealer). I saw a great many business men and 
 clarks (clerks) eating their meat pies (a meat pie is a 
 sort of a frigid dumpling with a shred of meat concealed 
 somewhere within, the trick being to find the meat), and 
 drinking bitter (ale) or else stout (porter). Some of 
 
 77 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 them would eat only a few biscuit (crackers) for their 
 lunch. Others would order as much as a cut of beef, or, 
 as we say over here, a lunch from the joint.* This after 
 noon I have wandered about the busy thoroughfares. All 
 the street vehicles travel rapidly in London, and you are 
 chivied (hurried) at every corner." 
 
 " You have learned altogether too much," said 
 Mr. Peasley. Where did you pick up that word 
 chivy ?" 
 
 " I got that before I had been asbore a half hour. 
 Didn t I hear one of those railroad men down at 
 Southampton tell another one to chivy the crowd 
 out of the custom house and get it on the train? I 
 suppose that chivy means to rush or to hurry. 
 Anyway, he won t know the difference, and it sounds 
 about as English as anything I have heard over here." 
 
 The letter continued: 
 
 " One of the common sights in London is the coster s 
 (costermonger s) little cart, drawn by a diminutive moke 
 (donkey) ; but you do not see many of them west of the 
 City (the original London confined within the boundaries 
 of the ancient wall, but now comprising only a small part 
 of the geographical area of the metropolis). I saw so 
 many novel things that I would like to tell about them, 
 
 78 
 
WHAT A MAN SENT HIS BROTHER 
 but I will reserve my further experiences for another 
 letter." 
 
 " I don t want to write again until I have got a 
 new stock of words," the author explained. 
 He read as follows in conclusion : 
 
 " This evening I am going to the theatre, having made 
 a reservation (that is, having purchased) two orchestra 
 stalls (parquet chairs) at the Lyceum. You may gather 
 from this letter that I am having a ripping (very good) 
 time, and in no hurry to terminate my stay in town 
 (in London). I am your awfully devoted brother, 
 
 " ALEXANDER/ 
 
IN PARIS 
 
CHAPTER VII 
 
 HOW AN AMERICAN ENJOYS LIFE FOR 
 EIGHT MINUTES AT A TIME 
 
 IHEY were all waiting for us there at the corner, 
 where the Avenue de 1 Opera hooks on to the string 
 of boulevards. They have been waiting for years 
 without starving to death, so it is possible that once 
 in a while some misguided American really em 
 ploys one of them. They call themselves guides, but 
 they are tramps shabby genteel tramps, oiled and 
 cheaply perfumed, full of shamefaced gayety, speak 
 ing wretched English. They come out of doorways 
 at you, and in grovelling whispers beg of you to come 
 with them and see all the wickedness of Paris. They 
 attempt insulting familiarities, such as taking you by 
 the arm or crowding close alongside and keeping up 
 with you while they continue their blandishing argu 
 ments. Mr. Peasley expressed our violent emotions 
 when he said : " When I m tackled by one of those 
 fellows I get hopping mad, because I know then that 
 I must look easy." 
 
 We did not need any guide because we were looking 
 83 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 for a cafe, and without any particular effort on our 
 part we found more than one thousand. On a crisp 
 evening in February, with snow lying in the neglected 
 corners, we should have hunted for a grate fire ; but 
 no, we were in Paris and we wanted to sit in front of 
 a cafe. For a week Mr. Peasley had been saying, 
 " Wait until we get to Paris and then we will go 
 and sit in front of a cafe." 
 
 We saw many natives, all bundled up, sitting in 
 the open street and slowly freezing to death, and so 
 we joined one of the frigid little clusters and found 
 some nice iron chairs waiting for us. It was a most 
 heroic performance, but we took our coffee in the 
 open air. A true Parisian can sit under a striped awn 
 ing for hours at a time with nothing to entertain him 
 except a few cigarettes, made of autumn leaves, and 
 a large goblet filled with sweetened water. The newly 
 arrived American wants to be truly Parisian, so he 
 plants himself at a small table and settles back for 
 an evening of calm enjoyment. In five minutes he has 
 made a careful study of all the people at the neigh 
 bouring tables, he has watched the passing crowds 
 until he is dizzy, and he is beginning to squirm and 
 hanker for real excitement. He wants something to 
 happen. It occurs to him that he is wasting time. He 
 wonders if there isn t something doing a block or 
 
 84 
 
HOW AN AMERICAN ENJOYS LIFE 
 two to the east. So he moves on. By nine o clock 
 we had become sated with the cafe life of Paris and 
 were scouting for a music hall. 
 
 When we were shown to our seats in the temple of 
 art we found ourselves near three Americans, two 
 sedate old men and a motherish woman in whom good 
 ness and piety were plainly advertised. They were 
 the kind of people who would not go to an entertain 
 ment in the church parlours at home unless assured 
 by the pastor that the performance would be proper 
 in all details. Here in Paris they sat in the front 
 row of a music hall frequented by the gay char 
 acters of the boulevard and watched a pantomime 
 which was calculated to peel the frescoes off the wall. 
 They were not greatly amazed or shocked, but simply 
 regarded the proceedings with sober interest. They 
 were doing their plain duty as sight-seers. 
 
 Whenever I am in Paris I go to a show-shop in the 
 evening and sit enthralled, listening to the musical 
 singsong dialogue, of which I comprehended not one 
 word. The pantomime gives an occasional flash-light 
 on the story of the play and guess-work does the rest. 
 
 After making the rounds of the theatres, it is 
 pleasant relaxation to watch the outdoor shows. I 
 remember a travelling amusement enterprise that 
 passed our hotel in the early morning of a fete day. 
 
 85 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 A big, square-shouldered fellow, with an overcoat 
 almost concealing his suit of tights, was pulling a 
 hand-cart containing a roll of carpet, some coils of 
 rope, two chairs, several dumbells, and those worn 
 blue-painted odds and ends that seem to litter the 
 " show business " wherever it is encountered. 
 
 A smaller man, who did not wear tights, but whose 
 attire, by its faded jauntiness, suggested his connec 
 tion with the profession, walked behind the cart and 
 pushed, although it seemed at times that he leaned 
 more than he pushed. 
 
 Last of all came a stocky and erect young fellow, 
 with a muscular frame dignifying an over-worn suit 
 of clothes. He carried a valise and one did not need 
 to see it open to know that it contained the powder, 
 grease-paint, comb and brush, pocket mirror and bar 
 of soap that accompany the entertainer on his travels 
 and abide with him so long as hope remains. 
 
 Later in the day the aggregation was seen again, 
 and this time at its best. 
 
 A crowd had formed a fringe around an open 
 space in one of the boulevard " places " and was 
 watching a performance. The big man who had 
 pulled the cart seemed to be the workhorse of the 
 company. 
 
 His smaller companion, who had held to the cart, 
 86 
 
HOW AN AMERICAN ENJOYS LIFE 
 was now transformed into a clown, with baggy cos 
 tume and painted face. 
 
 With much grunting and some grinding of the 
 teeth the big man lifted dumb-bells into the air and 
 held them there. His face was moist with perspira 
 tion and around the belt line of his tights there were 
 damp spots. 
 
 When he had shown his prowess with dead weights 
 he gathered up the stocky man, who was also in 
 tights, and held him at arm s length above his head 
 while his broad abdomen heaved like bellows. 
 
 The crowd was moved to applause, whereupon the 
 clown, taking quick advantage of the demonstration, 
 began passing the hat. The clown s duties were very 
 simple. He made confidential remarks to the spec 
 tators, evoked some laughter by his comments on the 
 various feats, and watched his opportunty to reach 
 for the coppers. The big man worked incessantly, 
 but the clown seemed to be the more popular with 
 the lounging sight-seers. He had taken the safe atti 
 tude of a critic, and he must have known the secrets 
 of business welfare. He allowed his associates to do 
 the heavy work while he kept cool and gathered in 
 the money. 
 
 j One evening while passing a row of canvas booths 
 on one of the open play-grounds we saw a young 
 
 87 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 man with his hat off and his hair roughed up, taking 
 deliberate aim with a rifle at a very small target 
 twenty feet distant. The target was placed above a 
 miniature prison about two feet high. Extending 
 from the prison gate was a broad platform, on which 
 was erected a guillotine perhaps eighteen inches high. 
 
 Evidently there was some hidden connection be 
 tween the small target and the puny prison. The 
 young Frenchman seemed unable to hit the target. 
 First the bullet would strike just below and then 
 just above or off at one side. He became discouraged 
 once and started away, but this was too much like 
 surrender, so he came back, paid for three more shots 
 and vowed that he would not give up until he had 
 succeeded. 
 
 On the second shot there was a sudden buzzing, 
 and then the striking of a bell, which announced that 
 he had hit the target. The prison doors flew open and 
 out came three figures abreast, moving with slow and 
 jerky deliberation. 
 
 The Frenchman who had invoked the spectacle 
 dropped the gun and shouted with joy. At last he 
 was to see it ! 
 
 The three figures continued to move with mechan 
 ical gait toward the guillotine, and it could be seen 
 that the bareheaded doll in the middle had its hands 
 
 88 
 
HOW AN AMERICAN ENJOYS LIFE 
 
 iied behind it and that the printed lines of the face 
 expressed mournful resignation. The two other men 
 were fiercely bearded and appeared to be cruel and 
 determined. 
 
 As they came to the guillotine the figure in the 
 middle toppled forward without bending a joint and 
 lay with its head in the groove of the block. This 
 was time to turn away, sick at heart ; but the French 
 man, who had spent as much as a franc to see this 
 show, giggled with elation. 
 
 One of the bearded manikins raised his arm as if 
 it were the handle of a pump. The tin blade fell, 
 and the head, which was as large as a hickory nut, 
 rolled into the basket. 
 
 Liberty, equality and fraternity! The reign of 
 terror three shots for ten centimes. 
 
CHAPTER VIII 
 
 A CHAPTER OF FRENCH JUSTICE AS DEALT 
 OUT IN THE DREYFUS CASE 
 
 A GOOD many people do not understand the 
 method of French courts of law. Take the 
 Dreyfus case, for instance. It has been dragging 
 along for years, and the more evidence accumulated 
 by Captain Dreyfus to prove His innocence, the 
 greater seems to be his portion of woe. He has been 
 vindicated over and over again and the vindications 
 simply make him more unpopular with those who 
 prefer to regard him as a mysterious and melo 
 dramatic villain. 
 
 People living at home have never understood why 
 Captain Dreyfus was convicted in the first place. 
 That is because they are not familiar with the work 
 ings of a French court and cling to the Anglo-Saxon 
 rule, that every man must be regarded as innocent 
 until he is proven guilty. The French say that trials 
 may be greatly simplified if the presumption of guilt 
 is attached to every defendant in a criminal case. 
 
 90 
 
CHAPTER OF FRENCH JUSTICE 
 
 When the presumption of guilt is combined with a 
 personal unpopularity, the prisoner usually finds it 
 advisable to throw himself on the mercy of the court 
 and accept a life sentence. 
 
 In order to elucidate the rules of procedure in a 
 French court and show how and why Captain Drey 
 fus was convicted, let us suppose that French methods 
 could be transferred to the United States and applied 
 to an ordinary criminal case say the theft of a dog. 
 Here is what would happen. 
 
 The Court " Prisoner, you are accused of steal 
 ing a dog. Are you guilty or not guilty? " 
 
 Prisoner" Not guilty." 
 
 Court " Well, someone stole a dog, and if you 
 refuse to acknowledge your guilt, we may be com 
 pelled to cast suspicion on gentlemen who would be 
 deeply pained to have themselves interrogated. 
 
 The Prisoner " How can I acknowledge my guilt 
 when I didn t steal the dog? " 
 
 Court" That isn t the point. The point is that 
 a great many prominent and influential people have 
 said at different times that you stole the dog. Now, 
 if you come before the tribunal and prove that you 
 didn t steal the dog you are going to humiliate a 
 great many well known and sensitive parsons and 
 make the whole situation very distressing to me. It 
 
 91 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 would simplify matters greatly if you would admit, 
 that you stole the dog." 
 
 The Prisoner " But how can I admit stealing the 
 dog when I am entirely innocent? " 
 
 The Court " Did you ever see the dog said to have 
 been stolen ? " 
 
 Prisoner " Yes, sir." (Profound sensation.) 
 
 Court " And yet you have the audacity to stand 
 there and say you didn t steal it? " 
 
 Prisoner " A great many other people saw the 
 dog." 
 
 Court " Perhaps so ; but they would make 
 trouble if you or anyone else began insinuating 
 against them, so I don t propose to have their names 
 hauled in here. Of all the men who saw the dog and 
 had a chance to steal it, you are the only one whose 
 conviction would satisfy the general public." 
 
 Prisoner " I can bring witnesses who saw another 
 man steal the clog. I can prove that he confessed to 
 stealing the clog and that he has fled to escape 
 punishment." 
 
 Court "You ought not to bring any such testi 
 mony into this court, for if you do so you are going 
 to upset some theories held by very dear friends of 
 mine, and if I permit the introduction of such testi 
 mony, there is no telling what they will say about me. 
 
 92 
 
CHAPTER OF FRENCH JUSTICE 
 
 If you didn t steal the dog isn t there something else 
 you have done that is punishable in one way or 
 another?" 
 
 Prisoner " I can t think of anything just now." 
 
 Court " Oh, pshaw ! Aren t you guilty of some 
 thing? Just think a moment. Nearly every man is 
 guilty of something. If we can find you guilty of 
 any old crime it will help some." 
 
 Prisoner " I refuse to acknowledge any degree 
 of guilt. I am innocent." 
 
 Court " I don t see how you can be when so many 
 estimable people think otherwise, but I suppose we 
 shall have to give you a trial. Call the first witness." 
 
 First Witness " Your Honor, I am a very high- 
 minded and aristocratic person, and I have always 
 disliked this defendant. (Sensation.) As soon as I 
 had heard that someone had accused him of stealing 
 a dog, I knew he must be guilty. I still hold to the 
 opinion that he is guilty. I know that another man 
 has confessed to stealing the dog, and has skipped 
 out in order to avoid arrest, but these details have no 
 weight with me. I am satisfied that if the defendant 
 did not steal the dog mentioned in this affidavit, he 
 must have stolen some other dog that we know noth 
 ing about. Ever since this wretched defendant was 
 first accused of this crime I have been going around 
 
 93 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 saying that he was guilty beyond the shadow of a 
 doubt. Naturally I am not going to come here now 
 and acknowledge his innocence. If he is acquitted, 
 I ll be the subject of ridicule. That is why I urge 
 the court to convict him. No matter what the testi 
 mony may show, you take my personal assurance that 
 he is guilty. Remember one thing, that I have a 
 large pull. 
 
 The Court " Thank you very much for your tes 
 timony. Call the second witness." 
 
 Second Witness " Your Honor, one day last 
 spring I met a man whose friend told him that one day 
 he saw the defendant pass the house from which the 
 dog was stolen. From that moment I became con 
 vinced of the defendant s guilt. (Terrific sensa 
 tion.) Another day a stranger walked into my office 
 and told me that D was the first letter of the name 
 of the man who stole the dog. Although there are 
 100,000 persons in town whose names begin with 
 * D, I had no difficulty in coming to the conclusion 
 that the particular * D who stole the dog was the 
 scoundrel now on trial. The reason that I came to 
 this conclusion was that he used to wear a red neck 
 tie, and I dislike any man who wears a red necktie. 
 Also I attach great importance to the fact that the 
 letter D, which is the first letter in his name, is 
 
 94 
 
CHAPTER OF FRENCH JUSTICE 
 
 also the first letter in Dog, thus proving that he 
 stole the dog. (Profound sensation.) In conclu 
 sion I would like to request the court to bring in a 
 verdict of guilty. 
 
 The Court " We will now have some expert tes 
 timony." 
 
 First Expert " Your Honor, I never saw the 
 prisoner before, and I had no personal acquaintance 
 with the dog, but I am convinced that he stole 
 the dog, and I will tell you why. You know, of 
 course, that another man has confessed to stealing 
 the dog. My theory, evolved after much thought, is 
 that the man who confessed did not steal the dog at 
 all, but that the dog was stolen by the defendant, who 
 disguised himself so as to resemble the man who has 
 confessed. (Great sensation.) There seems to be a 
 universal admission that the man who stole the dog 
 was a brunette. Some people claim that this fact 
 points to the innocence of the defendant, who is a 
 blonde; but my theory is that the defendant dyed 
 his hair and whiskers so as to cause them to resemble 
 the hair and whiskers of a certain innocent man, then 
 he borrowed a suit of the innocent man s clothes and 
 went and stole the dog, and the resemblance was so 
 perfect that even the innocent man and the dog were 
 both deceived. The innocent man thought that he, 
 
 95 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 and not the defendant, had stolen the dog, so he con 
 fessed and then ran away. But I am here to save him 
 in spite of his confession. I maintain that if this 
 defendant were to dye his hair and whiskers and put 
 on a suit of clothes belonging to the man who has con 
 fessed to stealing the dog, then to anyone a short 
 distance away he would bear a striking resemblance 
 to the man who has confessed. Therefore the dog was 
 not stolen by the man who has confessed, but by this 
 infamous defendant cleverly disguised to resemble 
 the man who has confessed." 
 
 The Court " Then you think he is guilty? " 
 Expert Witness " If there is anything in my the 
 ory, it is simply impossible for him to be innocent." 
 
 The Court "Much obliged. Call the next wit 
 ness." 
 
 Next Witness " I would like to state to the court 
 that the defendant is not very well liked down in our 
 neighbourhood, where he formerly resided, and if the 
 court will only convict him it will be a distinct per 
 sonal favour to several of us." 
 
 The Court" Do you think him guilty? " 
 
 Next Witness " I haven t the slightest doubt of 
 
 it. Neither has my wife. I have been convinced of his 
 
 guilt ever since I heard him say one morning, I have 
 
 something to do this afternoon. It is evident to my 
 
 96 
 
CHAPTER OF FRENCH JUSTICE 
 
 mind that when he said, I have something to do this 
 afternoon, he meant, I am going to steal a dog this 
 afternoon. (Sensation.) 
 
 The Court " Then you are quite sure that he 
 did steal the dog?" 
 
 Next Witness" Of course." 
 
 The Court " Are there any other witnesses? " 
 
 Prisoner " I have several witnesses here who saw 
 the other man steal the dog. I can prove that at the 
 time of the stealing I was ten miles away, attending 
 a picnic. I can prove, also, that I didn t need a dog ; 
 that I never liked dogs ; that I had no earthly motive 
 for stealing a dog ; and that from the time of my first 
 accusation I have consistently and emphatically 
 denied any knowledge of the crime." 
 
 The Court " Well, I don t see that the dog has 
 anything to do with the case. I ll sentence you to six 
 months in the bridewell for being so blamed un 
 popular." 
 
 97 
 
CHAPTER IX 
 
 THE STORY OF WHAT HAPPENED TO AN 
 AMERICAN CONSUL 
 
 IN undertaking a trip to foreign parts I have had 
 two objects in view: 
 
 (a) To strengthen and more closely cement our 
 friendly relations with foreign Powers I to furnish 
 the cement. 
 
 (b) To reform things in general over here. 
 
 I found that there was no opening for a real re 
 former in the U. S. A., inasmuch as the magazines 
 were upsetting municipal rings, cornering the Beef 
 Trust, and camping on the trail of every corpora 
 tion that seemed to be making money. I said: "If 
 I wish to make a ten strike as a reformer I must seek 
 new fields." 
 
 So I decided to flit to Europe and spend all 
 the time I could spare from dodging table d hote 
 dinners to bolstering up and regulating the consular 
 service. 
 
 In writing to-day about the happy experiences of 
 98 
 
STORY OF AN AMERICAN CONSUL 
 
 an American consul I am following the advice of a 
 friend who urged me to send some letters back 
 home. 
 
 " Don t put in too much about your travels," he 
 said. " People have read about European travel until 
 they know Munich better than they do Montana. 
 Whenever the opportunity presents itself write some 
 thing entirely irrelevant something that has noth 
 ing to do with anything in particular. The less you 
 say about foreign countries the better you will please 
 your readers, and if you can arrange to write a series 
 of letters in which no reference is made to either 
 Europe or Africa who knows but what you will 
 score a hit? " 
 
 With no desire to boast of my accomplishments, 
 I feel that up to date I have followed instructions 
 rather closely. If any dates, statistics, or useful infor 
 mation have crept into these communications it is 
 through oversight and not by intention. 
 
 In writing from Paris the natural impulse is to 
 describe Napoleon s tomb and tell how the Champs 
 Elysees runs right out to the Arc de Triomphe and 
 then cuts through the Bois de Boulogne. Fearing 
 that this subject matter had been touched upon by 
 other visitors, I shall disregard Paris and go straight 
 to my task of reforming the consular service. 
 
 99 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 To begin with, usually the American Consul is all 
 right in his place, but his place is at home. Over 
 paid, possibly, but he does his best to earn his $800 
 per annum. If he kept all the money that he han 
 dled in the course of the year, he couldn t be a really 
 successful grafter. He finds himself plumped down 
 in a strange country. About the time that he begins 
 to learn the language and has saved up enough 
 money to buy evening clothes he is recalled and goes 
 back home with a " dress suit " on his hands. Take 
 the case of Mr. Eben Willoughby, of Michigan. It 
 is a simple narrative, but it will give you a line on the 
 shortcomings of our consular service, and it will 
 carry its own moral. 
 
 " Old Man " Willoughby, as he was known at 
 home, owned and edited a successful daily paper on 
 the outskirts of the Michigan pine belt. He was a 
 wheel horse in the party and for forty years had 
 supported the caucus nominees. The aspiring poli 
 tician who wished to go to Congress had to go and 
 see Willoughby with his hat in his hand. He helped 
 to make and unmake United States Senators and 
 was consulted regarding appointments. But he never 
 had asked anything for himself. His two boys went 
 to college at Ann Arbor, and when the younger came 
 home with his degree and began to take a hand in 
 
 100 
 
STORY OF AN AMERICAN CONSUL 
 running the paper Mr. Willoughby found himself, 
 for the first time in his li f e, relieved of wearing 
 responsibilities. He was well fixtfd fytey$l$!fy aad still 
 
 Had to go and see Willoughby 
 
 in the prime of life not due to retire permanently, 
 but ready to take it easy. For years he had nursed 
 a vague desire to travel beyond the limits of his 
 native land. Mrs. Willoughby, who in the home cir 
 cle was known as " Ma," was a devotee of the Chan- 
 
 101 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 tauqua Circle, and she, too, had an ambition born 
 of much reading to p : ack up and go somewhere. The 
 family dwtoi - said thA,t a visit .to some milder climate, 
 far from the rigours of northern winter, would be 
 a positive benefit to her. 
 
 So Mr. and Mrs. Willoughby began to study the 
 atlas. One of the sons suggested to " Old Man " 
 Willoughby that he could take a trip to an attrac 
 tive southern country at the minimum expense by se 
 curing an appointment as consul. And, of course, 
 apart from the financial advantage, there would be 
 the glory of representing a great nation and hoist 
 ing the flag over a benighted foreign population. 
 The suggestion appealed very strongly to Mr. Wil 
 loughby. He wrote to the Congressman and the Sen 
 ator, and wanted to know if there was a vacancy 
 salary no object, but he would like to go into a mild 
 and equable climate where he could pick cocoanuts. 
 
 His friends at Washington simply overturned the 
 State Department in their eagerness to give him what 
 he wanted. They discovered that there was some 
 where on the map a city called Gallivancia. It was 
 down by the southern seas the abode of perpetual 
 summer and already enjoying a preliminary boom as 
 a resort. The acting consul had been a British sub 
 ject. The pay was so small that no enterprising 
 
 102 
 
STORY OF AN AMERICAN CONSUL 
 
 American had wanted the job. " United States Con 
 sul at Gallivancia " reverberated pleasantly in the 
 imagination of Mr. Willoughby. He told his friends 
 at Washington to go after the place, and in less than 
 no time his daily paper announced that he had " ac 
 cepted " the appointment. 
 
 The politicians represented to the State Depart 
 ment that Mr. Willoughby was a sturdy patriot of 
 unimpeachable character and great ability all of 
 which was true. They might have added that he 
 would be just as much at home in Gallivancia as a 
 polar bear would be on India s coral strand. 
 
 The news of his appointment gave one section of 
 Michigan the trembles for several days, and the Wil 
 loughby family was bathed in a new importance. 
 Mrs. Willoughby was given a formal farewell by 
 the ladies of the congregation assembled in the 
 church parlours. Mr. Willoughby was presented with 
 a jewelled badge by the members of his lodge, and 
 the band serenaded him the night before he went 
 away. 
 
 He and " ma " stood on the back platform and 
 gazed with misty eyes at the flutter of handkerchiefs 
 on the station platform until the train swung around 
 a curve and they found themselves headed straight 
 for Gallivancia and glory. Both of them felt a little 
 
 103 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 heart-achey and dubious, but it was too late to back 
 out. At New York they boarded a ship and after 
 several days of unalloyed misery they landed at 
 Gallivancia. 
 
 Now, Gallivancia is the make-believe capital of a 
 runt of an island having no commercial or other im 
 portance. No matter where an island may be dropped 
 down, some nation must grab it and hold it for fear 
 that some other nation will take charge of it and 
 pay the expenses. That is why Gallivancia had a 
 governor general and a colonel in command, and the 
 Right Honourable Skipper of the gunboat and a 
 judge and a cluster of foreign consuls. The men had 
 a club at which whiskey and water could be obtained, 
 unless the bottle happened to be empty. The women 
 exchanged calls and gave formal dinners and drove 
 about in rickety little victorias with terrified natives 
 in livery perched upon the box. The lines of social 
 precedence were closely drawn. At a dinner party 
 the wife of the governor preceded the wife of the 
 military commander who, in turn, queened it over 
 the wife of the gunboat, who looked down upon the 
 wife of the magistrate, and so on. The women smoked 
 cigarettes and gambled at bridge, while every man 
 who had won a medal at a shooting match pinned it 
 on his coat when he went to a ball. It was a third- 
 
 104 
 
STORY OF AN AMERICAN CONSUL 
 rate copy of court life, but these small dignitaries 
 went through the motions and got a lot of fun out 
 of it in one way and another. If we cannot afford a 
 social position that is real ivory, the next best thing 
 is to get one that is celluloid. It had all the intricate 
 vices of a true nobility without the bona fide titles 
 to back them up and give the glamour. 
 
 Into this nest of pretentious, ceremonious, strut 
 ting little mortals came " Old Man " Willoughby 
 and " Ma " Willoughby of Michigan. Of the out 
 ward form and artificialities of a Europeanised aris 
 tocratic society they were most profoundly ignorant. 
 Mr. Willoughby did not even own a " dress suit." 
 When he got a clean shave and put on a string tie 
 and backed into a " Prince Albert " coat he felt that 
 he had made a very large concession to the mere frip 
 peries of life. And " Ma " had her own ideas about 
 low-necked gowns. 
 
 Can you see Mr. and Mrs. Willoughby in Galli- 
 vancia? Can you understand what must have been 
 the attitude of these gold-braid pewees toward an 
 old-fashioned apple pie couple from the tall timber? 
 
 Mind you, I am not poking fun at the Willough- 
 bys. In the opinion of every real American a man 
 of the Willoughby type is worth a ten-acre lot full 
 of these two-by-four titles. The Willoughbys were 
 
 105 
 
106 
 
STORY OF AN AMERICAN CONSUL 
 good people the kind of people one likes to meet 
 in Michigan. But when the Ladies of the foreign 
 colony came to call on " Ma " and said " Dyuh me ! " 
 and looked at her through their lorgnettes, she was 
 like a staid old Plymouth Rock hen who suddenly 
 finds herself among the birds of paradise. She told 
 Mr. Willoughby that it was the queerest lot of 
 " women folks " she had ever seen, and although she 
 didn t like to talk about people until she knew her 
 ground, some of them did not seem any more re 
 spectable than the law allowed. Poor Mrs. Wil 
 loughby! She did not know it was good form for a 
 woman to smoke and drink, but bad form for her 
 to be interested in her husband. She tried to apply a 
 Michigan training to Gallivancia conditions, and 
 the two didn t seem to jibe. 
 
 If Mrs. Willoughhby amused the women, Mr. Wil 
 loughby more than amused the men. He upset them 
 and left them gasping. 
 
 The Acting Consul had used a small office adjoin 
 ing his own place of business on the water front. 
 Mr. Willoughby called on the former consul and 
 found him to be a dignified Britisher of the gloomy 
 and reticent sort, with a moustache shaped like a 
 horseshoe. The dethroned official was courteous, but 
 not cordial. He was saying good-by to some easy 
 
 107 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 money, and the situation was not one calculated to 
 promote good cheer. Mr. Willoughby s action in 
 coming down and pulling the Consulate from under 
 neath him seemed to him almost unfriendly. How 
 ever, he formally turned over to Mr. Willoughby a 
 table, four chairs, several account books, and a let 
 ter press, all being the property of the United States 
 of America. 
 
 Mr. Willoughby had rented a house on the hill 
 overlooking the town and decided to plant the Con 
 sulate in the front room of his residence. Inasmuch 
 as the Consul had a business caller about once a 
 month, there was no need of maintaining two estab 
 lishments. Already he had taken into his employ and 
 his warmest personal friendship a native named Fran- 
 ciotto. This name seemed formal and hard to remem 
 ber, so Mr. Willoughby rechristened him " Jim." He 
 liked this native in spite of his colour because he was 
 the only man in Gallivancia who seemed to be per 
 vaded by the simple spirit of democracy. Mr. Wil 
 loughby said that the others put on too many " dam- 
 lugs " whatever that may mean. 
 
 If U. S. Consul Willoughby s social standing in 
 Gallivancia was at all subject to doubt that doubt 
 vanished on the day when he and " Jim " came down 
 to move the office effects to the house on the hill. 
 
STORY OF AN AMERICAN CONSUL 
 Mr. Willoughby did something that day which 
 convulsed Gallivancia as it never had been convulsed 
 before not even when a neighbouring volcano blew 
 off. For days afterward the official set, the men at 
 the little club, and the women pouring tea at each 
 other, talked of nothing else. Many would not be 
 lieve when they first heard it, but there were witnesses 
 reliable witnesses who saw the whole thing and 
 were called upon time and time again to testify re 
 garding the most extraordinary performance of the 
 United States Consul. Other Consuls may come and 
 go and the years spin their weary lengths and the 
 obliterating drift of time may hide some of the lesser 
 events in the history of Gallivancia, but until time 
 shall be no more the residents of that city will tell the 
 story of " Old Man " Willoughby, of Michigan. 
 
 What do you suppose he did? No effort of the 
 imagination can carry you within hailing distance 
 of the horrible truth, so let the suspense be ended. 
 Mr. Willoughby, with his own hands, helped to move 
 the furniture from the old Consulate up to his new 
 residence. He put the table on top of his head and 
 balanced it carefully and carried it through the open 
 streets of Gallivancia ! An official, a representative 
 of a great Power, performing cheap manual labour! 
 Words are altogether inadequate to describe the 
 109 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 degree of obloquy which Mr. Willoughby earned for 
 himself by this unheard-of exhibition. In Gallivancia 
 it was not considered quite the thing to indulge in 
 mental effort, and for anyone except a menial of 
 the lowest social order to perform physical labour 
 
 What do you suppose Tie did? 
 
 was almost inconceivable. The new consul was set 
 down as either a harmless imbecile or an altogether 
 new specimen of barbarian. In either case he was 
 not a fit associate for well-bred gentlemen, and Galli- 
 
 110 
 
STORY OF AN AMERICAN CONSUL 
 vancia proceeded to ignore him and " Ma." That 
 is, they pretended to ignore them, but as a matter 
 of fact, they watched them at a distance and heard 
 daily reports of their familiarities with servants, 
 their fondness for outlandish American cookery, and 
 other eccentricities. It was all vastly diverting to 
 the tiny aristocrats of Gallivancia, but it was pretty 
 hard on Mr. and Mrs. Willoughby homesick, hun 
 gry for spring chicken and garden truck, and yet 
 ashamed to pick up and go home so soon after all 
 those elaborate good-bys. 
 
 One morning Mr. Willoughby walked out on the 
 veranda of his hillside cottage and looked across 
 the harbour and saw something that smote him with 
 an overpowering joy. A white cruiser, flying the 
 Stars and Stripes, had steamed through the narrow 
 entrance and was bearing down to an anchorage. 
 
 " Come here, mother ! " he shouted. " Come here, 
 if you want to see something that s good for sore 
 eyes!" 
 
 Mrs. Willoughby came running, and nearly ca 
 reened with happiness. There it was, an American 
 war vessel, with real Yankees on board boys from 
 home ; boys who had been brought up to believe that 
 a man s character and his abilities give him a worth 
 which cannot be altered by putting a mere handle 
 
 111 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 to his name. Mr. and Mrs. Willoughby were eager 
 to go down and call on the " folks from home." 
 After the prolonged boycott which had been hang 
 ing over them they were pining for white society. 
 Mr. Willoughby put on his long black coat and 
 Mrs. Willoughby got out her flowered bonnet and 
 together they went down to the water front walked 
 instead of going as they should have gone, in one 
 of the decrepit local hacks. Before they could 
 charter a humble rowboat and go out to the ship 
 the Governor General and the Lord High Com 
 mander of the Scow and the Imperial Collector of 
 Customs and all the other residents of real impor 
 tance had gone out in a launch and taken charge of 
 the naval officers. Dinner parties and a ball at the 
 " Palace " were arranged at once. The servant at 
 the club hurried out and got another bottle of Scotch 
 whiskey, and the town band began to mobilise at a 
 cafe. Gallivancia had no use for a humble American 
 of the Willoughby type, but it gave hysterical wel 
 come to the splendid war vessel and the natty men 
 in uniform. Over the first drink the Americans were 
 told the remarkable story of the new Consul and were 
 assured that he was a " queer sort." And the naval 
 officers, being accustomed to hearing United States 
 consuls maligned, took no further interest in their 
 
STORY OF AN AMERICAN CONSUL 
 government s representative; merely shook hands 
 with him when he came aboard, told him to make him 
 self at home, and then flocked away to the high 
 lights and the gayety which had been provided for 
 them by the court circles of Gallivancia. 
 
 Mr. and Mrs. Willoughby found themselves side 
 tracked, and they went back home not daring to 
 talk about what had happened. But that was the 
 day which caused them to decide to go back to Michi 
 gan. Mr. Willoughby wrote to the State Department 
 and said that the climate did not agree with him. 
 And when they sailed away " Jim " was the only 
 person who came to the dock to bid them good-by. 
 
 As the "Ex-Consul to Gallivancia" Mr. Wil 
 loughby is more than ever an honoured figure in his 
 own town. Doubtless he has more gray matter, 
 more Christian charity, and more horse sense than 
 could be collectively assembled by all the petty 
 officials at Gallivancia. And yet Gallivancia re 
 garded him as a very poor excuse for a Consul. 
 The naval officers saw in him a well-meaning " j ay " 
 who was bringing discredit on their native land be 
 cause of his ignorance of social forms. 
 
 Therefore let us send out Consuls who can put up 
 a " front." Have each Consul wear the uniform of 
 a drum major. Make sure that he can dance all 
 
 113! 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 night, play bridge, and keep up with the naval crowd 
 when it comes to drinking. Let him be haughty with 
 the serving classes, but jovial with the military. 
 Make sure that he is averse to all forms of labour. 
 Such a Consul will shed glory upon our beloved 
 country, and will never suffer the unhappy fate of 
 " Old Man " Willoughby. 
 
IN NAPLES 
 
CHAPTER X 
 
 MR. PEASLEY AND HIS VIVID IMPRES 
 SIONS OF FOREIGN PARTS 
 
 IN NAPLES and Mr. Peasley is still with us. 
 
 We waited for him in London until he recovered 
 his lost trunk, and he was so grateful that he decided 
 to go along with us. 
 
 He said that he was foot-loose and without any 
 definite plans and it always made him feel more at 
 home to travel with people who were just as green 
 and as much scared as he was. 
 
 A week ago we were in London sloshing about 
 in the damp and dismal mixture of mud and snow 
 which lined the dark thoroughfares. 
 
 This morning we are basking in the crystal sun 
 light of Naples the blue bay, with the crescent out 
 line on one side, the white walls of the mounting city 
 on the other, Vesuvius looming in the distance behind 
 a hazy curtain, and tourists crowding the landscape 
 in the immediate foreground. 
 
 Three big steamers are lying at anchor within the 
 breakwater one from Genoa, one from Marseilles, 
 
 117 
 
118 
 
MR. PEASLEY S IMPRESSIONS 
 
 and one from New York and all heavily laden with 
 Americans, some sixty of whom will be our fellow- 
 passengers to Alexandria. The hotels are overflowing 
 with Yankee pilgrims, and every Neapolitan who has 
 imitation coral and celluloid tortoise shell for sale is 
 wearing an expectant smile. 
 
 The jack-rabbit horses attached to the ramshackle 
 little victorias lean wearily in their shafts, for these 
 are busy days. The harvest days are at hand. The 
 Americans have come. An English woman who had 
 seen the horde in the streets here remarked to a friend 
 this morning, " It must be awfully lonesome in Amer 
 ica just at present." 
 
 And she meant it, too. 
 
 It has been a fairly busy week for Mr. Peasley. 
 Mr. Peasley is addicted to the habit of taking notes. 
 Every night at the hotel he takes out a small leather- 
 bound book presented to him by an insurance com 
 pany in America in appreciation of the fact that he 
 has paid the company all his ready money for the 
 last fifteen years, and in this small volume he jots 
 down brief memoranda. 
 
 Mr. Peasley has a terse style. Sometimes he uses 
 abbreviations. His English is not of the most schol 
 arly brand. As he is merely writing for himself, it 
 makes no difference. 
 
 119 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 The Peasley notebook, after twenty days in 
 Europe, is full of meaty information, and contains 
 many a flashlight on life in the Old World. By per 
 mission we are reproducing it herewith. 
 
 LONDON 
 
 " By Warrant. Every man in London who sells 
 anything, from a collar button to a chariot-and-f our, 
 does so by appointment or by warrant. Poor 
 man opens shop business bad. He is trying to sell 
 shaving soap. One day royal personage floats in and 
 buys a cake for 6d., whatever that means. Dealer 
 puts out gold sign to the effect that he is supplying 
 the royalty with lather. Public breaks down show 
 cases getting at his merchandise. All true democrats 
 theoretically ignore this second-hand worship of roy 
 alty, but, just the same, take notice that the shops 
 with the rared-up unicorns in front and the testi 
 monials from their Royal Majesties are the ones 
 that catch the humble American tourist. 
 
 " Opera Hats. Wandered into a hat store and dis 
 covered, to my amazement, that the proprietor was 
 the inventor of the opera, or concertina, hat. Sur 
 prised always supposed that at least a dozen men 
 had worked on it. Establishment had documents to 
 prove that the first folding hat had been manufac- 
 
 120 
 
MR. PEASLEY S IMPRESSIONS 
 
 tured on the very spot where I stood. Proprietor has 
 not yet been knighted probably an oversight. 
 
 " Rubber Pavement. The large covered court of 
 the Savoy Hotel is paved with blocks of soft rubber 
 three feet square. Constant procession of cabs in 
 and out of court, and rubber deadens sound. Good 
 idea should be used in all the streets of New York. 
 New cab horse comes along never has tackled rub 
 ber pavement is clattering noisily over the as 
 phalt suddenly hits the soft rubber and begins to 
 bounce up and down like a tennis ball. Strange look 
 comes into horse s eye and he crouches like a rabbit, 
 looks over his shoulder at the driver, and seems to be 
 asking, What am I up against? Mean trick to 
 play on a green horse. Should be a warning sign 
 displayed. 
 
 "Famine in Trousers. One type of English 
 chappy, too old for bread and jam and not quite old 
 enough for music halls, wears extraordinary trousers 
 legs very narrow and reefed above tops of shoes 
 (I mean boots) causes them to look thin and bird- 
 like. 
 
 " English Drama. Saw new problem play last 
 evening new play, but same old bunch of trouble. 
 Each principal character failed to marry the person 
 
 121 
 
What am I up against?. " 
 
 122 
 
MR. PEASLEY S IMPRESSIONS 
 
 of the opposite sex with whom he or she was really in 
 love. Marriages did not interfere with love affairs, 
 but helped to complicate the plot. Discovered why 
 we can never have a great native drama in the States 
 we have no open fireplaces in which to destroy the 
 incriminating papers. Impossible to destroy papers 
 at a steam radiator. 
 
 " L. C. C. In musical comedies, pantomimes, and 
 at music halls, many sarcastic references to L. C. C., 
 meaning London County Council. Council is plough 
 ing open new streets, tearing down old buildings, 
 putting up new buildings, and spending money like 
 a sailor on a holiday. Their extravagance has given 
 great offence to the low comedians and other heavy 
 rate payers, while the very poor people, who are get 
 ting parks, sunshine and shower baths free of 
 charge, bless the L. C. C. The dress coat crowd in the 
 theatres seem to have it in for the L. C. C., but they 
 are very strong for Mr. Chamberlain, notwithstand 
 ing his recent defeat. Mr. Chamberlain seems to be 
 a great deal like Mr. Bryan that is, nearly everyone 
 admires him, but not enough people vote for him. In 
 spite of protest from property holders, L. C. C. is 
 going bravely ahead with gigantic task of modern 
 ising and beautifying London. Asked an English 
 man why there was so much criticism of L. C. C. He 
 
 123 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 said if you touch a Britisher in the region of his 
 pocketbook he lets out a holler that can be heard in 
 Labrador. Didn t use those words, but that s what 
 he meant. 
 
 " Snowstorm. Last night a few snowflakes 
 drifted into Piccadilly Circus ; hardly enough to 
 cover the ground this morning, but everyone is talk 
 ing about the snowstorm. London is away ahead of 
 us on fogs, but their snowstorms are very ama 
 teurish. 
 
 " Coals. Buying my coal by the quart forty 
 cents a quart. If I fed the fire the way I do at home 
 would spend $100 a day. The official who brings fuel 
 to my room in a small tin measure insists upon call 
 ing it coals, but I didn t think there was enough of 
 it to justify use of plural. 
 
 PARIS 
 
 " Coming Across. The turbine boat from Dover 
 to Calais ran like a scared deer and rolled like an 
 intoxicated duck. Held to rail all the way across, 
 looking fixedly at oscillating horizon and wondering 
 why I had left home bleak, snowy landscape all the 
 way from Calais to Paris. After dinner went to 
 music hall and learned that Paris could be fairly 
 warm, even in the dead of winter. 
 
 124 
 
MR. PEASLEY S IMPRESSIONS 
 " Keeping Tab on the Cab. The taximetre cab 
 is a great institution small clockwork arrangement 
 alongside of seat, so that passenger may sit and 
 watch the indicator and know how his bill is running 
 up. The indicator is set at seventy-five centimes at 
 the start. In other words, you owe fifteen cents be 
 fore you get away. Then it clicks up ten centimes 
 at a time, and when you reach your destination there 
 is no chance for an argument regarding the total. 
 What they need now in Paris is a mechanism to pre 
 vent the driver from taking you by a roundabout way. 
 " Just for Fun. Strange epidemic of killing in 
 Paris. Two or three murders every night, not for 
 revenge or in furtherance of robbery, but merely to 
 gratify a morbid desire to take life. Among certain 
 reckless classes of toughs, or * Hooligans, it is said 
 to be quite the fashion for ambitious characters to 
 go out at night and kill a few belated pedestrians 
 merely in a spirit of bravado and to build up 
 a reputation among their associates. Seems un 
 fair to the pedestrians. At one of the thea 
 tres where a * revue * or hodge-podge 4 take-off on 
 topics of current interest, was being presented, the 
 new type of playful murderer was represented as 
 waiting at a corner and shooting up, one after 
 another, some twenty-five citizens who chanced to 
 
 125. 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 stray along. This performance was almost as good 
 as the Buffalo Bill show and gave much delight to 
 the audience. 
 
 " Costly Slumber. From Paris to Marseilles is 
 about as far as from Chicago to Pittsburg. Sleeping 
 car fare is about $10; total fare by night train, 
 about $30. Two cents a pound for all baggage in 
 excess of a measly fifty-six pounds. No wonder peo 
 ple travel by day in the refrigerator cars and try to 
 keep warm by crawling under hundreds of pounds of 
 6 hand luggage. Anything with a handle to it is 
 * hand luggage. Some of the cowhide bags must 
 have used up two or three cows. 
 
 " Tea Habit. The tea habit has struck Paris. At 
 Grand Hotel and many cafes general round-up about 
 five in the afternoon, everyone gulping tea and eat 
 ing cakes. Not as demoralising as the absinthe habit, 
 but more insidious. 
 
 " American Music. After a * coon song has 
 earned a pension in the United States it comes over 
 to Paris and is grabbed up as a startling novelty. 
 All the revues studded with songs popular at home 
 about two years ago Frenchmen believe that all 
 Americans devote themselves, day in and day out, to 
 accumulating vast wealth and singing coon songs. 
 
 " Oysters. Went to famous fish and oyster res- 
 126 
 
MR. PEASLEY S IMPRESSIONS 
 
 taurant for dinner. The Gallic oyster wears a deep 
 blush of shame and tastes like the day after taking 
 calomel. Thought horseradish might improve, mod 
 ify or altogether kill the taste, so I tried to order 
 some. Knew that horse was cheveau and red * 
 was * rouge, 9 but could not think of the French for 
 * ish, so I had to do without. Somewhat discouraged 
 about my French. Almost as bad as former Ameri 
 can Consul, who, after eight years in Paris, had to 
 send for an interpreter to find out what oui 
 meant. Have got merci down pat, but still pro 
 nounce it mercy. 
 
 MARSEILLES 
 
 " More Snow. The further south we go the colder 
 the weather and the deeper the snow. Getting my 
 furs ready for Cairo. Ten hours on the train from 
 Paris to Marseilles, wrapped in a blanket and count 
 ing the warts on r foreign commercial traveller who 
 sat opposite. No two counts agreed. Had looked for 
 ward during a long month to this ride through 
 sunny France. Had dreamed of green landscapes 
 that lay smiling in the genial warmth, the stately 
 poplars leading away to purple hills, and the happy 
 labourers looking up from their toil in the fields to 
 smile at us and bid us welcome as we flashed by. Not 
 a bit like it. More on the order of North Dakota. 
 
 127 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 Everybody says it is the coldest snap that Southern 
 France has known in many years. They saved up all 
 their cold weather so as to hand it to me when I came 
 along. 
 
 " Bouillabaisse (spelling not guaranteed). There 
 is only one thing to do in Marseilles, and that is to 
 drive out to an excellent restaurant built on a rock 
 overlooking the bay and partake of bouillabaisse. 
 Dish famed in song and story. Mentioned often in 
 * Trilby. Possibly that is what ailed Svengali. The 
 bouillabaisse and the Marseillaise were both in 
 vented in Marseilles. The mayonnaise comes from 
 elsewhere. The bouillabaisse is a combination of 
 soup, ragout, chowder, and New England boiled din 
 ner. There are many ingredients. It is said they put 
 in whatever they have the most of sea bass, lobsters, 
 crayfish, vegetables, sauces everything except the 
 license. Liked the taste very much first when I ate 
 it, and then all during the afternoon and evening. 
 
 " Chateau d lf. Coming out of the harbour we 
 ran very close to the Chateau d lf, a stern fortress 
 prison topping a huge rock rising sharply from the 
 bay. Count of Monte Cristo was imprisoned here. 
 Man on board said that the character of Edmund 
 Dantes was wholly fictitious, manufactured by Du 
 mas. Must be a mistake, as I saw the small rock on 
 
 128 
 
MR. PEASLEY S IMPRESSIONS 
 which James O Neill used to stand at the end of the 
 first act and exclaim, The world is mine ! It is ex 
 actly as represented on the stage, except for the 
 calcium light. 
 
 NAPLES 
 
 " The Ship s Barber. Coming across from Mar 
 seilles in the dampfer (Germ, for boat) the weather 
 moderated so that I needed only one overcoat. Got 
 acquainted with barber. Often have some trouble in 
 making up with a captain, but can usually hit it off 
 with the barber. A good barber is a bureau of infor 
 mation, headquarters for scandal, and knows what 
 the run is going to be. The barber on our dampfer 
 no good. Shy on conversation, but great on arith 
 metic. Charged me two francs for a shave, and when 
 I suggested that he was rather high he said he was 
 compelled to ask one franc and thirty centimes for 
 the extract of vanilla he had put on my hair. Told 
 him I did not want any extract of vanilla, but he said 
 there was no way of getting it back into the bottle. 
 Besides, he had the money, so we compromised by 
 permitting him to keep it. Said he longed to go to 
 America. I told him there would probably be an open 
 ing in America for anyone so energetic and muscular, 
 and I promised to give him a letter to Armour & Co., 
 of Chicago. 
 
 129 
 
Promised him a letter to Armour $ Co., Chicago 
 130 
 
MR. PEASLEY S IMPRESSIONS 
 "Free Fireworks. A full hundred miles out at 
 sea we could make out an irregular oval of fire sus 
 pended in the sky the two streams of lava now 
 trickling down Vesuvius. Finest landmark and sail 
 ing target a sailor could ask for. When we were 
 forty miles away we wanted the captain to slow up 
 for fear he would run into the mountain and injure 
 it. Next morning in harbour we discovered that we 
 were still ten miles away from it. 
 
 " The New Naples. In ten years Naples has done 
 a lot of sprucing up. Streets are cleaner, new and 
 pretentious buildings have multiplied, smells have 
 been eliminated. Guides, beggars and cabmen not so 
 pestiferous as of yore, but still bad enough to deserve 
 electrocution, provided some more lingering form of 
 death could not be substituted. Cabmen seemed 
 downcast. Municipality recently forbade any extra 
 charge for cab service on a fiesta, or holiday. In 
 Italy 300 days out of every 365 can be rung in 
 under the head of fiestas. Every American who 
 landed in Naples found himself right in the midst of 
 a fiesta and had to pay two fares, or as much as 
 thirty cents in gold, to ride around in one of the 
 open hacks. Thirty cents would seem a reasonable 
 charge, but not after you have seen the hack. The 
 smaller the horse in Naples the heavier the harness. 
 
 131 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 Evidently a desire to have about the same total 
 weight in each case. 
 
 " Emigrants. Alongside of our ship lay a German 
 steamer about to sail for America. The tender made 
 trips to and from the dock, and every time she came 
 out she was filled to the last inch with Italian emi 
 grants. We saw hundreds of them disappear into the 
 ship, so many it seemed they must have been packed 
 in below by hydraulic pressure, otherwise there 
 wouldn t have been room for them. All headed for 
 the land of the free to build railroads. Englishman 
 wanted to know why there was such heavy emigrant 
 traffic at this particular season. Told him they were 
 hurrying over to vote at the April election in Chi 
 cago. He believed it. Come to think of it, I believe it 
 myself." 
 
 This is Mr. Peasley s notebook up to the present 
 moment, just as we are departing for Alexandria. 
 He admits that he may have overlooked a few minor 
 points of interest, but he more than made up by 
 neglecting to mention Napoleon s tomb or the Moulin 
 Rouge. 
 
 Since arriving in Naples this morning Mr. Peasley 
 has arranged with the tourist agency to change his 
 ticket, and he will accompany us to Egypt. 
 
 132 
 
IN CAIRO 
 
CHAPTER XI 
 
 CAIRO AS THE ANNUAL STAMPING GROUND 
 
 FOR AMERICANS AND WHY THEY 
 
 MAKE THE TRIP 
 
 IT S a small world." 
 
 This is one of the overworked phrases of the globe 
 trotter. It is used most frequently by those who fol 
 low the beaten paths. In other words, we find it diffi 
 cult to get away from our acquaintances. Not that 
 WG wish to get away from them ; on the contrary, when 
 we are stumbling along some unfamiliar thorough 
 fare six thousand miles from home and bump into a 
 man with whom we have a nodding acquaintance in 
 Chicago, we fall upon his neck and call him brother. 
 It must be very annoying to criminals and celebrities 
 who are trying to hide their identities, but to the 
 ordinary traveller it is always a glad surprise to find 
 a friend coming right out of the ground in a corner 
 of the world supposed to be given over to strangers. 
 
 There are certain spots on the earth which may 
 be classed as definite headquarters for wanderers. It 
 is said that in the summer season any person of any 
 
 135 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 nationality who seats himself in front of the Cafe de 
 la Paix in Paris may confidently gamble on hailing 
 an acquaintance in less than fifteen minutes. Trafal 
 gar Square, in London, is called by the Britishers 
 the actual kernel of civilisation. The long corridor 
 
 Very annoying to criminals and celebrities 
 
 of the Waldorf is the temporary abode of folks from 
 almost everywhere. The big " front porch " here at 
 Shepheard s Hotel, in Cairo, will surely have two or 
 three friends waiting for you when you arrive. The 
 
 136 
 
CAIRO AS A STAMPING GROUND. 
 
 Grand Hotel, in Yokohama, has been for many years 
 a sort of clearing-house for travellers circumnavi 
 gators moving aside to let the other crowd pass. 
 Then there is (was, alas !) the Palace, in San Fran 
 cisco, and the Auditorium, in Chicago definite rally 
 ing points for mortals who move about. 
 
 It is when we meet our long-lost friend in the 
 remote by-way that we are induced to throw up our 
 hands and exclaim, " The world is small." 
 
 For instance, before the German steamer left 
 Naples for Alexandria a launch load of new passen 
 gers came aboard. As we were heading out of the 
 bay and almost under the shadow of Capri I glanced 
 at the man in the adjoining steamer chair and recog 
 nised the banker from Tien-tsin. He was just as 
 much surprised as I was. 
 
 About a year ago we parted at San Francisco 
 after a long and pleasant voyage from Shanghai 
 he to continue a leisurely trip around the world, I to 
 carry my priceless treasures of Oriental art and 
 shattered letter of credit back to Indiana. When we 
 parted there was the usual stereotyped remark about 
 meeting again, but neither of us believed that there 
 was one chance in a million of our paths crossing, it 
 being a far cry from Tien-Tsin to Terre Haute. I 
 don t know what a " far cry " is, but I have come 
 
 137. 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 across it in some of our most opaque disserta 
 tions, and accordingly I welcomed the opportunity 
 to use it. 
 
 The man from Tien-Tsin had loitered in Europe 
 and was now heading straight for China. I had made 
 up my mind in a hurry to go to Egypt to help 10,000 
 other students investigate the tombs, and here we 
 were, side by side, in the Mediterranean. 
 
 A few minutes after colliding with him I had the 
 pleasure of meeting a young woman who said that she 
 was the sister of Henry Billkamp, of Chicago. She 
 asked me if I remembered the circumstances under 
 which I met Henry, and I told her that I couldn t 
 very well forget them. 
 
 A few years ago in Chicago I resided in a large es 
 tablishment which had as an auxiliary feature a fine 
 Turkish bath. Many of our best people would come 
 to the bath every afternoon, first steaming themselves 
 in the vapour room, then scrubbing themselves, then a 
 shower, and after that a plunge by which time most 
 of the coal dust could be removed. Henry Billkamp 
 came to the bath one afternoon and brought with him 
 a suit case containing his evening clothes and acces 
 sories. Henry was to be married the next day, and 
 that evening he and the bride elect were to be guests 
 at a large dinner party on the south side. Henry 
 
 138 
 
CAIRO AS A STAMPING GROUND 
 
 looked at his watch and found that he could loll 
 around the bath for an hour before jumping into 
 his evening clothes. So he put his suit case over in 
 one corner of a dressing-room, and in a few minutes 
 had joined the informal circle which was commonly 
 known as the " Perspiration Club." 
 
 It may be said in passing that Henry was a very 
 estimable young man of first-class abilities and that 
 he was built on the general outlines of a flagpole. 
 He pierced the atmosphere for a considerable dis 
 tance, in an up and down direction, but he never 
 blocked the view of any person who chanced to be 
 standing behind him. 
 
 While Henry Billkamp was in the steam chamber 
 engaged in the superfluous task of further reducing 
 himself, Bob Grimley came into the bath department 
 carrying a suit case. The suit case habit is very 
 strongly intrenched in busy towns. To go all the way 
 out home and then come back would use up two 
 hours. 
 
 Bob Grimley was a short man, weighing about two 
 hundred and fifty pounds, and shaped like an olive. 
 He wanted his vapour in a hurry, because he had to 
 grab a train and go away out to Oak Park and then 
 dress in a hurry and have a bite of dinner and play 
 poker. So he made a running splash and jump 
 
 139 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 through the bath department, came out, hopped into 
 his garments, picked up Henry Billkamp s suit case, 
 and rushed away to Oak Park. 
 
 It was half past six when Henry Billkamp arose 
 from the plunge and hurried to the dressing-room. 
 The dinner was to be at seven. He opened the suit 
 case and began to take out balloon-shaped garments, 
 and then he shrieked for an attendant. Where was 
 his suit case? No one seemed to know. Oh, yes; Mr. 
 Grimley had come out of that room with a suit case 
 and had gone no one knew whither. Henry stood 
 there with a huge article of raiment clutched in each 
 hand and slowly froze with horror as a full under 
 standing of the situation grew upon him. In less than 
 a half-hour he must join them bride, relatives, 
 friends. The lights were already up, the flowers on 
 the table, the wine cooling, the carriages beginning 
 to arrive. It was to be the night of his life. Could he 
 appear at this glittering function as a chief attrac 
 tion in an eight dollar sack. suit and make some lame 
 explanation about losing his other things in a Turk 
 ish bath? He had an old suit at home, but he was 
 miles from home. The carriage man sent in word that 
 Mr. Grimley and suit case had gone to a railway 
 station. That settled it. Henry decided to jump into 
 the plunge and end it all. 
 
 140 
 
CAIRO AS A STAMPING GROUND 
 
 While he was lamenting, a friend came in from 
 another dressing-room to find out what was the mat 
 ter. Henry, scantily attired, leaned against the wall 
 and in a voice choked with sobs and cuss words out 
 lined his frightful predicament. The friend, listen 
 ing, suddenly emitted a glad shout. 
 
 " I have it ! " he exclaimed. " There s only one 
 man in all the world with a figure anything like 
 yours, and he happens to be right here in the build 
 ing. Come ! Get into a dressing gown. We have 
 twenty minutes ! We can make it. Come ! " 
 
 A few seconds later two agitated persons, one at 
 tired and the other semi, burst into my room. It was 
 a long story, but could they borrow an assortment of 
 evening clothes? Could they? I was delighted to 
 know that someone in the world wanted to wear that 
 suit. 
 
 No fireman going to a fire ever dressed himself 
 with such rapidity as we dressed the hysterical Henry. 
 Everything fitted him perfectly. Shirt, collar, trou 
 sers, waistcoat, swallowtail, opera hat, tie, gloves, 
 studs, buttons everything just his size. Nothing in 
 the outfit had ever fitted me, but when we got through 
 with Henry he was beyond criticism. He actually 
 wept with joy as we ran him out to the carriage and 
 boosted him in and started him southward, with 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 eleven minutes to spare. He arrived on the dot. For 
 weeks afterward he would sit down every day and 
 write me a letter of thanks and declare that he would 
 never forget me and the service I had done him. Of 
 course, it would have been impossible for me to for 
 get anyone who had looked well in my evening clothes, 
 and it was a positive pleasure to meet Henry s sister. 
 She said she had long desired to have a look at me. 
 She had not believed it possible that there was another 
 living mortal whose clothes would fit Henry, but now 
 she saw that she had been mistaken. 
 
 It is flattering to learn that people we have never 
 met have been interested in us for a long time. Con 
 tinuing the same line of thought, it is often disap 
 pointing to learn that the people most deeply 
 interested in us are those who have never met us. 
 For fear of getting mixed up, let us return to the 
 boat. 
 
 Our principal cargo was honeymoon. We had six 
 newly married couples, who were advertising to all 
 the world the fact of their sudden happiness, and 
 three other couples were under suspicion. The men 
 lounged in the smoking-room, as if to give the im 
 pression that they were hardened in matrimony, but 
 they peeked out through the portholes too often and 
 made many trips to the deck. 
 
 142 
 
CAIRO AS A STAMPING GROUND 
 
 One German couple was the most newly married 
 team that any of us had ever seen. I don t think they 
 knew they were in a boat. They may have suspected, 
 but it really didn t make any difference. They were 
 in a trance, riding on a cloud of incense, saturated 
 
 Three other couples under suspicion 
 
 with bliss. He was middle aged, with red flaring whis 
 kers, and a nose showing an angular break in the 
 middle. She was short and plump, with a shiny, oil- 
 finish countenance. Neither had been constructed ac- 
 
 143 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 cording to the plans and specifications of Love s 
 Young Dream, and yet the devouring adoration 
 which played back and forth between Romeo and 
 Juliet was almost icy compared with this special 
 brand of Teutonic love. They were seldom more than 
 three inches apart, he gazing into her eyes with a 
 yearning that was unutterable (even in German) and 
 she gazing right back at him in blushing rapture and 
 seeming to say to herself : " Just think ! He belongs 
 to me, whiskers and all ! " It was almost enough to 
 induce one to get married. 
 
 They were drifting so far above the earth that 
 they forgot to be seasick. The other honeymooners 
 took to their cabins. 
 
 Is there anything so perverse, so whimsical, so 
 tantalising, and so full of surprises as our old friend 
 the weather? When the warm sunshine trickled down 
 our backs in Naples we rejoiced and said, "At last 
 we have found summer." We looked forward to three 
 balmy days on the blue Mediterranean, and even be 
 gan to remember where we had packed the summer 
 clothes at the bottom of the trunk. During the first 
 night out we passed between Scylla and Charybdis. 
 They sound like a team of acrobats, but really they 
 are the promontories guarding the narrow Strait of 
 Messina. It was pitch dark when we passed, and we 
 
 144 
 
CAIRO AS A STAMPING GROUND 
 
 had turned in, but we read about them in Baedeker 
 next morning and were much gratified to know that 
 
 Whiskers and all " 
 
 we had been so near them. Not that we can describe 
 them, but hereafter we can refer to them. 
 
 After we rounded the south coast of Italy and 
 145 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 pointed for Alexandria, we ran into a mess of 
 weather that had lost its bearings and wandered down 
 from the north Atlantic. The wind blew a gale. We 
 sat huddled in our heaviest wraps. The good ship 
 pitched and pitched, and then pitched some more. 
 And this was the Mediterranean ! We had promised 
 ourselves to lie basking in the gentle warmth and 
 count the lateen sails as they went drifting by. We 
 had expected to see the whole surface of the Mediter 
 ranean almost as busy as State and Madison, or 
 Broadway and Forty-second craft of all descrip 
 tions criss-crossing the blue ripples, a continuous 
 aquatic bioscope. As a matter of fact, we rode for 
 three days across waters as lonesome and empty as 
 those of the north Pacific, where the course is so clear 
 that the captain, after putting to sea, can tie the 
 wheel and go below and play dominoes. 
 
 Our chilly voyage from Naples to Alexandria has 
 suggested a few reflections on travel in general. Why 
 the Anglo-Saxon passion for gadding about? Cairo 
 to-day is absolutely congested with Americans. The 
 continent of Europe is two days away by speedy 
 boat; Paris is two days more, and London less than 
 a week by ordinary modes of travel. America lies 
 three thousand miles beyond the most remote Euro 
 pean city and across stormy waters, and yet America 
 
 14-6 
 
CAIRO AS A STAMPING GROUND 
 
 seems to claim a plurality of all the transients. If 
 an Egyptian began to pack up his things to take a 
 four thousand mile jump to look at the stock yards 
 of Chicago or the Mammoth Cave of Kentucky, his 
 friends would have him consigned to some Mohamme 
 dan institution for the treatment of those mentally 
 deranged. But the Americans are here in flocks, 
 droves, coveys decrepit old people ; blooming debu 
 tantes, boys just out of college, tired-out business 
 men, women who have been studying Egypt at their 
 clubs, and, of course, the 8000 (more or less) newly 
 married couples. And most of them are working like 
 farm hands to generate some real enthusiasm for 
 tombs and hieroglyphics. Hard pulling, but they will 
 make it if their legs hold out. 
 
 What is the charm the siren call of Egypt that 
 has lured these thousands so far away from home 
 and friends? It is not climate, for we have a better 
 climate of our own. If the traveller seeks merely 
 warmth and sunshine, he can find them in Southern 
 California, the West Indies, or at Palm Beach. It is 
 not a genuine and deep-seated interest in ancient rec 
 ords, inasmuch as ninety per cent, of the fresh 
 arrivals from America do not know the difference 
 between a cartouche and a scarab. I know, because I 
 looked it up yesterday. It is not a snobbish desire to 
 
 147 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 rub up against the patchouli and rice powder of 
 European hothouse aristocracy, because nearly all 
 of the Americans flock by themselves and make dis 
 paraging remarks about other nationalities, and vice 
 versa. 
 
 No doubt the one great reward of the persistent 
 traveller is to find new varieties of his fellow man. 
 Cairo is the pousse cafe of humanity probably the 
 most cosmopolitan city in the world. The guide books 
 talk about rock tombs and mosques, but the travellers 
 find their real enjoyment in the bazaars and along the 
 crowded streets and on the sheer banks of the Nile, 
 which stand out as an animated panorama for hun 
 dreds of miles. The first hour in Cairo is compensa 
 tion for many an hour of tedious travel. Once more 
 in the sunshine, the soft but gamey flavour of Orien 
 talism soothing the nostrils, a lively chatter of unfa 
 miliar languages ; an interweaving throng of turbans, 
 gowns, fezes, swarthy faces ; the pattering hoof- 
 beats of spangled donkeys and the stealthy sweep of 
 dignified camels so much to see that one needs four 
 pairs of eyes to catch all parts of the picture and at 
 least a half-dozen fountain pens to keep score of the 
 attractions. 
 
 The first hour in a new land! It is that which 
 repays the patient traveller. It gives him the gasping 
 
 148 
 
CAIRO AS A STAMPING GROUND 
 surprises and the twinges of delight which are not to 
 be found in southern California or at Palm Beach. 
 And it is the very first hour which is memorable and 
 crowded with large emotions. Because, after about 
 two hours, the American has adapted himself to his 
 new environment, and is beginning to be blase. Along 
 about the second day, when the guide attempts to 
 dazzle him by showing another variety of bazaar he 
 murmurs " Chestnut " and suggests going back to 
 the hotel. 
 
 It may afford consolation to the large number of 
 people who remain at home to know that only about 
 five per cent, of foreign travel is really worth while. 
 Mr. Emerson s beautiful law of compensation holds 
 true in regard to travel just as it applies to all other 
 things that are coveted by mortals. You must pay 
 for what you get, not in money alone, but in hard 
 ships, annoyances, and long periods of dumb, patient 
 waiting. 
 
 The better half of one of the honeymoon combina 
 tions that came with us from Naples told a plaintive 
 story. She had been travelling for three weeks in 
 weather that had been a crescendo of the disagreeable. 
 All the way across the Atlantic she had been desper 
 ately ill in her cabin. In London they found fogs. In 
 Paris it rained. And now they were fighting their 
 
 149 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 way through a storm in the Mediterranean. Notwith 
 standing all this, she was trying to be cheerful, for 
 she believed that she would like Egypt. 
 
 The blessedness of travel is that when the sun 
 comes from behind the cloud and a new city begins to 
 arise from the sea, we forget all the gloomy days 
 on board ship, all the crampy rides in the stuffy rail 
 way compartments, all the overcharges and vexations 
 and harassments and get ready to tear ashore and 
 explore a new wonderland. 
 
 Who can forget the first hour of the first railway 
 ride through rural England? The storybook pictures 
 that you have seen all your life come true at last. 
 
 Or the first hour in London? That tall thing loom 
 ing right in front of yon is really the Nelson monu 
 ment and not a papier mache deception put up for 
 the entertainment of tourists. 
 
 In the first hour of rickshaw riding in Japan I 
 saw so much that was funny and fantastic and nerve 
 kinking that at the end of the ride I wanted to pay 
 the coolie for a year instead of an hour. 
 
 And how about the first hour up the Grand Canal 
 in Venice? Or the first hour in the tangled bedlam 
 of Canton ? Or the first hour in front of Shepheard s 
 Hotel, here in Cairo, when it really seems that a won 
 derful pageant has been ordered for your special 
 
 150 
 
CAIRO AS A STAMPING GROUND 
 joy? With bulging eyes and reeling senses you view 
 the changing kaleidoscope and ask, in the language 
 of Mr. Peasley, " Is this on the level? 9 
 
 Yes, travel is hard work, and your true traveller 
 is a mighty grumbler, but he goes on buoyed always 
 by the hope of another " first hour." 
 
 151 
 
CHAPTER XII 
 
 ROUND ABOUT CAIRO, WITH AND WITHOUT 
 
 THE ASSISTANCE OF THE DRAGOMAN 
 
 OR SIMON LEGREE OF THE ORIENT 
 
 MR. PEASLEY is a secretive student of the guide 
 book. 
 
 He reads up beforehand and on the quiet. Then 
 when we come face to face with some " sight " and 
 are wondering about this or that, Mr. Peasley opens 
 the floodgate of his newly-acquired knowledge and 
 deluges the whole party. He is seldom correct, and 
 never accurate, but he knows that he is dealing 
 with an ignorance more profound than his own, and 
 that gives him confidence. 
 
 For instance, the first afternoon in Cairo we 
 chartered an open conveyance and rode out to the 
 citadel and the mosque of Mohammed Ali, both of 
 which are perched on a high limestone cliff overlook 
 ing the city. The mosque is modern and very gorge 
 ous with alabaster columns, a profusion of gay rugs, 
 stained windows, and crystal chandeliers. We were 
 rhapsodising over the interior and were saying it was 
 almost as swell and elegant as the new Claypool Hotel 
 
 152 
 
ROUND ABOUT CAIRO 
 
 in Indianapolis, when we happened to overhear one of 
 our countrywomen reading aloud from a very enter 
 taining book on Egypt written thirty years ago by 
 Amelia B. Edwards. Miss Edwards allowed that the 
 mosque of Mohammed All was a tawdry and hideous 
 specimen of the most decadent period of the mixed- 
 up architectures imported from Araby and Turkey. 
 When we heard that we made a quick switch and 
 began to find fault with the decorations and told the 
 guide we had enough. 
 
 On the way out to the parapet to enjoy the really 
 wonderful view of the city and the Nile Valley, with 
 the pyramids lifting themselves dimly from the old 
 gold haze of the desert, Mr. Peasley wished to repay 
 the lady who had read to us, so he paused, and, 
 making a very indefinite and non-committal gesture, 
 said, " Near this very spot Mohammed AH killed 
 more than one hundred and fifty mamelukes in one 
 day." 
 
 Our fair countrywoman looked at Mr. Peasley with 
 a puzzled frown on her brow and then timidly asked, 
 " What is a mameluke ? " 
 
 We thought she had him, but not so. He wasn t 
 even f eazed. He replied promptly, " A mameluke is 
 something like a mongoose, only larger." 
 
 That is Mr. Peasley s way. If he doesn t know, at 
 153 
 
ROUND ABOUT CAIRO 
 
 least he will make a stab at it. One evening at dinner 
 we had anchovies as a curtain raiser, and a man sit 
 ting next to Mr. Peasley poked at the briny minnows 
 with his fork and asked, " What are these? " 
 
 " Those are anchorites," replied Mr. Peasley, with 
 out the slightest hesitation. 
 
 As a rule he gets one syllable right, which is pretty 
 good for him. At present he is much interested in 
 the huge dams of masonry and iron gates that have 
 been thrown across the Nile at Assiut and Assouan. 
 Over here they are called " barrages." Mr. Peasley 
 insists upon calling them " garages." We tried to 
 explain to him that a garage was a place where auto 
 mobiles were cared for, but he said that automobile 
 and " dam " belonged in the same category and often 
 meant practically the same thing, so he continues to 
 speak of the " garage." 
 
 By the way, when a pious Englishman over here, 
 say a bishop on a vacation, wishes to relieve his feel 
 ings without the actual use of profanity he exclaims 
 " Assouan ! " If he falls off his donkey, " Assouan ! " 
 If his tea is served to him at less than 212 degrees 
 Fahrenheit, " Assouan ! " 
 
 " Assouan " means the superlative of all dams, the 
 biggest dam in the world. It takes the place of a 
 
 whole row of these: -. 
 
 155 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 Mr. Peasley uses the word, when he can think of it. 
 If his memory fails him, he falls back on the Amer 
 ican equivalent. 
 
 Inasmuch as I reside in Indiana, where it is a 
 social offence to crave a cigarette, a misdemeanor to 
 
 "Assouan! 
 
 keep one in the house, and a high crime to smoke one, 
 Cairo during the first day gave me many a shock. 
 Cairo is unquestionably the cigarette headquarters 
 of the universe. If the modern Egyptians followed 
 
 156 
 
ROUND ABOUT CAIRO 
 
 the ancient method of loading the tomb with sup 
 plies for the lately departed they would put in each 
 sarcophagus about ten thousand cigarettes and a few 
 gallons of Turkish coffee. The food wouldn t matter. 
 
 In Cairo, men, women, and children smoke. Only 
 the camels and donkeys abstain. 
 
 Cigarettes are sold nearly everywhere not only 
 by tobacconists, but also by milliners, undertakers, 
 real estate agents, etc. Those who do not sell them 
 give them away. A cigarette across the counter is 
 the usual preliminary to driving a bargain. 
 
 It surprised us to learn that although the Egyp 
 tians have been addicted to this enfeebling vice ever 
 since they first had a chance to cultivate it, they have 
 managed to survive and flourish as a distinct breed 
 of humanity for some seven thousand years, as 
 nearly as I can figure it off hand. By eliminating the 
 cigarette from Indiana the Hoosiers should beat this 
 record. No doubt they will retain their primitive 
 vigour for a longer period, say nine thousand years. 
 If so, the anti-cigarette law will be vindicated. 
 
 We certainly had a feeling of guilty pleasure when 
 we sat in front of Shepheard s Hotel and smoked the 
 wicked little things, and knew that the policeman 
 standing a few feet away did not dare to raise his 
 hand against us. 
 
 157 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 A very clever young American owns a shop near 
 the hotel. He is a student of Egyptology and a 
 dealer in genuine antiquities, including mummies. 
 While I was nosing through his collection of scarabs, 
 idols, coins, and other time-worn trinkets, he sug 
 gested that I purchase a mummy. 
 
 " Can I get one? " I asked, in surprise. 
 
 " I can get you a gross, if you want them," he 
 replied. 
 
 " What would a man do with a gross of 
 mummies ? " 
 
 " You can give them away. They are very orna 
 mental. Formerly my only customers were colleges 
 and museums. Now I am selling to people who put 
 them in private residences. Nothing sets off an Ori 
 ental apartment to better effect, or gives it more 
 colour and atmosphere, as you might say, than a dec 
 orated mummy case." 
 
 I told him I would not object to the " colour," but 
 would draw the line at " atmosphere." He assured 
 me that after a few thousand years the mortuary 
 remains become as dry as a London newspaper and 
 as odourless as a Congressional investigation. 
 
 I followed him into a large back room and saw 
 two beautifully preserved specimens in their rigid 
 overcoats being packed away for shipment to Amer- 
 
 158 
 
ROUND ABOUT CAIRO 
 
 ica, while others leaned against the wall in careless 
 attitudes. 
 
 What a grisly reflection ! Here was a local poten 
 tate, let us say Ipekak II. of Hewgag ruler of a 
 province, boss of his party, proud owner of broad 
 fields and grazing herds. When he died, 1400 B. c., 
 and was escorted to his rock tomb by all the local 
 secret societies, the military company, and a band of 
 music, his friends lowered his embalmed remains into 
 a deep pit and then put in a rock filling and cut 
 hieroglyphics all over the place, telling of his wealth 
 and social importance, and begging all future gen 
 erations to regard the premises as sacred. 
 
 Some two thousand years later along comes a 
 vandal in a cheap store suit and a cork helmet, en 
 gages Ipekak s own descendants to pry open the tomb 
 and heave out the rock at fifteen cents per day, hauls 
 the mummy into the daylight, and ships it by lug 
 gage van to Cairo, where it is sold to a St. Paul man 
 for $125 ! 
 
 Until I talked to the dealer I had no idea that 
 mummies were so plentiful. In some parts of Egypt 
 people go out and dig them up just as they would 
 dig potatoes. The prices vary greatly, somewhat 
 depending upon the state of preservation of the 
 party of the first part and the character of the deco- 
 
 159 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 rations on the case, but more particularly on account 
 of the title or historical importance of the once 
 lamented. For instance, a Rameses or Ptolemy can 
 not be touched for less than $1000. A prince, a trust 
 magnate, or a military commander brings $150; the 
 Governor of a city or the president of a theological 
 seminary anywhere from $60 to $75. Within the 
 last three years perfect specimens of humourist have 
 been offered for as low as $18, and the dealer showed 
 me one for $7.50 probably a tourist. 
 
 At Naples, proceeding eastward, one enters the 
 land of Talk. The French are conversational and 
 animated, but Southern Italy begins to show the real 
 Oriental luxuriance of gab. A Neapolitan trying to 
 sell three cents worth of fish will make more noise 
 than a whole Wanamaker establishment. The most 
 commonplace and everyday form of dialogue calls 
 for flashing eyes, swaying body, and frantic ges 
 ticulations. 
 
 In front of a cafe in Naples Mr. Peasley became 
 deeply interested in a conversation between two well- 
 dressed men at a table near ours. At first we thought 
 they were going to " clinch " and fight it out, but 
 then we saw that there was no real anger exhibited, 
 but that apparently one was describing to the other 
 some very thrilling experience. He waved his arms, 
 
 160 
 
ROUND ABOUT CAIRO 
 
 struck at imaginary objects, made pinwheel move 
 ments with his fingers, and carried on generally in a 
 most hysterical manner. Mr. Peasley, all worked up, 
 beckoned the head waiter, who had been talking to 
 us in English. 
 
 " Look here," he said confidentially, " I want you 
 to listen and tell me what those fellows are talking 
 about. I can t catch a word they say, but as near as 
 I can make out from the way they act that fellow 
 with the goatee is describing some new kind of tor 
 pedo boat. It goes through the water at about thirty 
 miles an hour, having three or four screw propellers. 
 When it comes within striking distance of the enemy 
 bang! they cut her loose and the projectile goes 
 whizzing to the mark, and when it meets with any 
 resistance there is a big explosion and everything 
 within a quarter of a mile is blown to flindereens. 
 Now, that s the plot, as near as I can follow it from 
 watchin that short guy make motions. You listen 
 to them and tell me if I am right." 
 
 The head waiter listened and then translated to us 
 as follows : " He is saying to his friend that he 
 slept very well last evening and got up feeling good, 
 but was somewhat annoyed at breakfast time because 
 the egg was not cooked to suit him." 
 
 " How about all these gymnastics? " asked the sur- 4 
 161 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 prised Mr. Peaslcy. " Why does he hop up and down, 
 side step and feint and wiggle his fingers and all that 
 monkey business ? " 
 
 " Quite so," replied the head waiter. " He is de 
 scribing the egg." 
 
 What a people to take five cents worth of cheap 
 information and garland it with twenty dollars 
 worth of Delsarte and rhetoric ! 
 
 Talk is one of the few things of which there is a 
 superabundance in the Levant. In nearly all partic 
 ulars the Arab is economical and abstemious. He 
 eats sparingly and cheaply, wears just enough cloth 
 ing to keep from violating the municipal ordinances, 
 smokes conservatively, so as to get the full value of 
 his tobacco, and lives in a house which is furnished 
 with three or four primitive utensils. But when it 
 comes to language, he is the most reckless spend 
 thrift in the world. He uses up large bales of con 
 versation. 
 
 Suppose that three porters at a railway station 
 are to take a trunk from a car and put it on a truck 
 and wheel it out to a cab. The talk made necessary 
 by this simple operation would fill several pages in 
 the Congressional Record. All three talk incessantly, 
 each telling the others what to do and finding fault 
 because they don t do it his way. One seems to be 
 
 162 
 
\ 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 superintendent, the second is foreman, and the third 
 is boss. 
 
 Endless disputes of a most vivid character rage 
 among the donkey boys and peddlers who assemble 
 near the hotels and lie in wait for victims. " What 
 do they find to talk about? " is the question that 
 comes to one every time he hears the babel of ex 
 cited voices. And while we are smiling at their child 
 ish tantrums they are splitting their sides over new 
 stories relating to that strange being from the an 
 tipodes, the barbarian with the mushroom helmet 
 who exudes money at every pore, who keeps him 
 self bundled in unnecessary clothes and rides out to 
 the desert every day to stand in the baking sun and 
 solemnly contemplate a broken column and a heap of 
 rubbish. Truly it all depends on the point of view. 
 
 We held back the Pyramids and the Sphinx so as 
 to make our visit to them the cap sheaf of the 
 stay in Cairo. As for sightseeing, most of the time 
 we just rambled up one street and down another, 
 looking in shop windows, watching the workmen kill 
 time with their prehistoric implements, smelling the 
 bazaars, dodging dog carts, donkeys and camels, and 
 having a fine time generally. 
 
 Aimless excursions are the best, after all. It is 
 more fun to drift around a new town and rub up 
 
 164 
 
ROUND ABOUT CAIRO 
 
 against the people than to deliver yourself, body and 
 soul, over to a guide. In Egypt the guide is called 
 a dragoman. He puts on airs and has an inside 
 pocket bulging with testimonials from people who 
 were so glad to get out of his clutches that they 
 willingly perjured themselves by giving him half 
 hearted certificates of good character. While you 
 are in the hands of the dragoman you feel like a 
 dumb, driven cow. You follow the fluttering night 
 shirt and the tall red fez of this arch villain for 
 hours at a time, not knowing where you are going, 
 or why. He takes absolute charge of you, either by 
 making specious representations or boldly assuming 
 authority, and when you start out to visit the famous 
 mosque of old Midullah Oblongahta or some other 
 defunct celebrity you finish up in a junk shop for 
 the sale of antiques, all of which are personally 
 guaranteed by the dragoman, because he is a silent 
 partner in the business. 
 
 In many countries, especially at times when the 
 traveller must condense his itinerary, the guide is a 
 necessary evil, and in Egypt he is supposed to be 
 a sort of ornamental body guard. We found that 
 we could wander about without being haltered and 
 led, so we spent pleasant hours in the Mouski, which 
 is the native shopping street, and also we went to the 
 
 165 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 race meeting and saw native horses and ponies, 
 carrying 140 to 160 pounds each, saunter around a 
 half-mile track while a large number of English in 
 Mardi Gras costumes drank gallons of tea and sim 
 ulated a polite interest. 
 
 One afternoon we wandered into a market and a 
 man tried to sell me a camel. Wherever we go, if a 
 man has something he doesn t want, he tries to sell 
 it to me, and sometimes he docs it. But I refused to 
 take the camel. I did not see how I could fold it up 
 and secrete it so as to get it through the custom 
 house. 
 
 Camels in the Cairo market are now steady, not 
 literally speaking, but as regards their value. A 
 good terra cotta camel, 55 to 60 hands high and 
 broken to single-foot, will fetch as high as $150. 
 The older ones spavined, hairless, or pigeontoed 
 can be bought for as low as $50 each. The common 
 or garden camel, trained to collapse like a pocket 
 camera and carry from three to eight tons of cargo, 
 can usually be bought at from $100 to $125. 
 
 Cairo, as a whole, was a big surprise to us. We 
 knew that it was going to be cosmopolitan, but we 
 were not prepared to find it so metropolitan. We 
 had pictured it as one or two semi-European streets 
 hedged in by a vast area of native quarter. But, 
 
 166 
 
ROUND ABOUT CAIRO 
 
 unless you seek out the old parts of the town or the 
 bazaars, each showing a distinct type of the Oriental 
 shark, Cairo is outwardly quite modern, very attrac 
 tive, and decidedly gay that is, not real wicked 
 gayety of the Parisian brand, but modified, winter- 
 resort gayety, the kind that is induced by the pres 
 ence of money-spending tourists. There is no hurrah 
 night life, and gambling, which flourished here for 
 many seasons under the skilful direction of our 
 countryman, Mr. Pat Sheedy, has yielded to British 
 reformatory influence. 
 
 The modern streets in Cairo, with their attractive 
 hotels, residences, and shops, suggest a blending of 
 Paris and the Riviera consistent architecture, trees, 
 palms, gardens. The streets are of boulevard width, 
 and the houses of cheerful colouring, many of them 
 bearing coloured frescoes in delicate shades. We who 
 live in a country of rainfall and smoke and changing 
 temperatures are impelled to stop and gaze in wonder 
 at a mansion of snowy white with a pattern of pale 
 blossoms drooping down the front of it. That style 
 of decoration would last about twenty minutes in 
 Chicago. 
 
 167 
 
CHAPTER XIII 
 
 ALL ABOUT OUR VISIT TO THE PYRAMID 
 OF CHEOPS 
 
 DURING the first three days in Cairo a brilliant 
 and original plan of action had been outlining itself 
 in my mind. At last I could not keep it to myself any 
 longer, so I told Mr. Peasley. 
 
 " Do you know what I am going to do ? " I asked. 
 
 Mr. Peasley did not. 
 
 " I am going to write up the Pyramids. I am going 
 to tell who built them and how long it took and how 
 many blocks of stone they contain. I shall have my 
 self photographed sitting on a camel and holding 
 an American flag. Also, I shall describe in detail the 
 emotions that surge within me as I stand in the 
 shadow of the Sphinx and gaze up at that vast and 
 imperturbable expanse of face." 
 
 "It s a great scheme," said Mr. Peasley, " but 
 you ve been scooped. They ve been written up 
 already." 
 
 " Are you sure? " 
 
 " Yes, sir ; the whole outfit of Pyramids has been 
 168 
 
A VISIT TO THE PYRAMID OF CHEOPS 
 
 described in a special article by a man named Herod 
 otus." 
 
 " How long since? " 
 
 " About 470 B. c." 
 
 He produced a guide book and proved that he was 
 right. All the things that I had been getting ready 
 
 "Scooped!" 
 
 to say about the Pyramids had been said by Herod 
 otus. He had got there ahead of me just 2376 
 
 169 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 years ahead of me. In daily newspaper competition, 
 when some man gets his news twenty-four hours 
 ahead of another one he is proud of his " beat " and 
 is the hero of the office for fifteen or twenty minutes. 
 But think of trailing along twenty-four centuries 
 behind a Greek space writer! It took all the starch 
 out of me. 
 
 Mr. Peasley suggested that inasmuch as consid 
 erable time had elapsed since the appearance of the 
 first write-up, possibly the average reader would have 
 only a dim recollection of it and accept my account 
 as brand new stuff. But I knew better. I knew that 
 some old subscriber, with a complete file put away in 
 the bureau, would rise up and draw the deadly par 
 allel on me. All I can safely do in regard to the 
 Pyramids is touch up a few points overlooked by 
 my predecessor. 
 
 Herodotus, by the way, had quite a time in Egypt. 
 At that time Shepheard s Hotel was not in opera 
 tion, although it must have been under way, and no 
 round trip tickets were being issued by Cook, so 
 Herodotus had to do his own booking and put up at 
 a boarding house. In Memphis, which is now a frag 
 mentary suburb of Cairo, Herodotus engaged a 
 guide. He does not tell us what he paid, but he does 
 give us a line on the character of the dragoman, who 
 
 170 
 
A VISIT TO THE PYRAMID OF CHEOPS 
 was full of superfluous and undesirable information, 
 but who fell down when asked to divulge facts of real 
 importance. This proves that the breed has not 
 changed since 500 B. c. 
 
 The guide took Herodotus out to the Pyramids 
 and filled him up. It is now believed that most of 
 what Herodotus sent back was merely hearsay, but it 
 made good reading. The Pyramids had been stand 
 ing some two thousand years, and any information 
 in regard to their origin could hardly come under 
 the head of personal recollections. Whatever Herod 
 otus had to say about the Pyramids is now accepted 
 as gospel, in spite of the fact that he never saw 
 them until twenty centuries after the last block of 
 stone had been put in place and Cheops had taken 
 possession of the tomb chambers. Rather late for 
 a grand opening. 
 
 When he arrived at the Great Pyramid he stepped 
 it off and put down the dimensions, and then he re 
 marked to some of the natives standing around that 
 it must have been quite a job to build a tomb of that 
 size. They said yes ; it had been a big contract, and 
 as the work had been completed only two thousand 
 years they were enabled to go into details. They 
 gave Herodotus a fine lay-out of round figures. They 
 said that one hundred thousand men had worked on 
 
 171 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 the job and that the time required was thirty years- 
 ten years to build the road and the huge incline for 
 bringing the blocks of stone into place, and then 
 twenty years to quarry the stone and transport it 
 across the Nile and the valley. The stone cutters 
 worked all the year, and during the three months 
 inundation, when farming was at a standstill, the 
 entire rural population turned out, just as they 
 would at a husking bee or a barn raising, and helped 
 Cheops with his tomb. They did this year after year 
 for thirty years, until they had piled up 2,300,000 
 blocks of stone, each containing forty cubic feet. 
 
 Herodotus discovered some large hieroglyphics on 
 the face of the Pyramid and asked the guide for a 
 translation. It is now supposed that the guide could 
 not read. Anyone with education or social standing 
 wouldn t have been a guide, even in that remote 
 period. But this guide wanted to appear to be earn 
 ing his salary and be justified in demanding a tip, 
 so he said that the inscription told how much garlic 
 and onions the labourers had consumed while at work 
 on the job, and just how much these had cost. Herod 
 otus put it all down in his notebook without batting 
 
 an eye. 
 
 " How much did they spend for onions and gar 
 lic? " he asked, poising his pencil. 
 
A VISIT TO THE PYRAMID OF CHEOPS 
 
 Herodotus put it all down without batting an eye 
 173 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 The guide waited for a moment, so that his imagi 
 nation could get a running start, and then he replied, 
 " They cost 1600 talents of silver." 
 
 Now, that sum in talents is equivalent, under mod 
 ern computation, to 350,000 English pounds, or 
 $1,750,000. Think of a million dollars worth of gar 
 lic ! Try to imagine the bouquet that permeated the 
 desert when one hundred thousand men who had been 
 eating garlic began to call for more bricks and 
 mortar ! 
 
 Herodotus told his story and got away with it. 
 By the time the next letter-writing traveller came 
 along, a good many centuries later, the outer casing 
 of the Pyramid had been stripped off and the inscrip 
 tion had disappeared. His story has stood because 
 he was here ahead of the rest of us and saw the marks 
 with his own eyes and had them translated by a ten- 
 cent guide. But can you believe that a great monarch 
 would devote thirty years and sacrifice thousands of 
 lives and work the whole male population of his king 
 dom to skin and bones putting up a colossal sepul 
 chre and then set aside the most valuable space on 
 this glorious monument for telling how much onions 
 and garlic had been fed to the help? 
 
 Marco Polo, Mark Twain, and all the other great 
 travellers of history love to tell tall ones once in a 
 
 174 
 
A VISIT TO THE PYRAMID OF CHEOPS 
 
 while, but the garlic story by Herodotus will doubt 
 less be regarded as a record performance for a long 
 time to come. 
 
 Cheops was possibly the most successful con 
 tractor in history. It is estimated that he really did 
 work one hundred thousand men in the building 
 of the great Pyramid, as related by Herodotus, and 
 that he must have devoted at least thirty years to 
 the big undertaking. During all that time he never 
 had a strike or even a clash with the walking dele 
 gate. The eight hour day was unknown, and no one 
 dreamed of such a thing as an arbitration committee. 
 All he had to do was to give orders and the entire 
 population obeyed him. Everybody worked but 
 Cheops. He didn t even pay salaries. It is true that 
 in a spirit of generosity he set out a free lunch for 
 the labourers about $2,000,000 worth of garlic and 
 onions. If he had tried to feed them on quail prob 
 ably he would have gone broke. 
 
 Nowadays visitors go out to the Pyramids by 
 tramcar. For some reason we had the notion, doubt 
 less shared by many who have not been there, that to 
 get to the Pyramids one simply rides through Cairo 
 and out onto the flat desert. As a matter of fact, the 
 Great Pyramid at Ghizeh, its two smaller companions 
 and the Sphinx are on a rocky plateau five miles to 
 
 175 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 the west of the city. There is a bee-line road across 
 the lowlands. It is a wide and graded thoroughfare, 
 set with acacia trees, and as you ride out by trolley 
 or carriage you look up at the Pyramids, and when 
 you are still three miles away they seem to be at least 
 a half-mile distant. At the end of the avenue and at 
 the foot of the hill there is a hotel, and from 
 this point one may climb or else charter a dumb 
 animal. 
 
 Not knowing the ropes, we engaged a carriage at 
 100 piastres to take us from the city out to the 
 plateau. This is not as much as it sounds, but it is 
 about twice the usual rate. After we struck the long 
 road leading across the valley and saw the trolley 
 cars gliding by and leaving us far behind, we de 
 cided to send the carriage back to the city and take 
 to the trolley, where we would feel at home. The 
 driver informed us that he could not return to the 
 city, as the big bridge had been opened to permit the 
 passing of boats, and that it would be three hours 
 before he could drive back to town. It seems that he 
 was right. The big bridge swings open but once a 
 day, and then it stays open for a few hours, and the 
 man who finds himself " bridged " must either swim 
 or engage a boat. 
 
 It is a five minutes climb from the end of the 
 176 
 
A VISIT TO THE PYRAMID OF CHEOPS 
 
 drive up to the rocky plateau on which the pyramids 
 are perched, and the ordinary tourist goes afoot. 
 But we were pining for Oriental extravagance and 
 new sensations, so we engaged camels. The camel 
 allotted to me was destitute of hair, and when first 
 discovered was in a comatose condition. His or her 
 name was Zenobia, and the brunette in charge said 
 that its age was either six or sixty. It sounded more 
 like " six," but the general appearance of the animal 
 seemed to back up the " sixty " theory. As we ap 
 proached, Zenobia opened one eye and took a hard 
 look at the party, and then made a low wailing sound 
 which doubtless meant " More trouble for me." The 
 venerable animal creaked at every joint as it slowly 
 rose into the air on the instalment plan, a foot or 
 two at a time. 
 
 We had come thousands of miles to see the Pyra 
 mids, and for the next ten minutes we were so busy 
 hanging on to those undulating ships of the desert 
 that we overlooked even the big Pyramid, which was 
 spread out before us 750 feet wide and 450 feet 
 high. Riding a camel is like sitting on a high trestle 
 that is giving way at the joints and is about to col 
 lapse. The distance to the ground is probably ten 
 feet, but you seem to be fifty feet in the air. As soon 
 as we could escape from the camels we walked around 
 
 177 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 and gazed in solemn silence at the Sphinx and the 
 three Pyramids and doubtless thought all of the 
 things that were appropriate to the time and place. 
 
 The great Pyramid of Cheops has been advertised 
 so extensively that doubtless many people will be sur 
 prised to learn that there is a whole flock of Pyra 
 mids on this plateau along the edge of the Libyan 
 desert. There are Pyramids to the north and Pyra 
 mids to the south, five groups in all, sixty of them, 
 and they vary in size from a stingy little mound 
 looking like an extinct lime kiln up to the behemoth 
 specimen which is photographed by every Cook 
 tourist. 
 
 Why do these Pyramids vary so greatly in size? 
 Each was built by some royal personage as an en 
 during monument to his administration and the last 
 resting place of his remains. The most eminent stu 
 dents of Egyptology now agree that the size of each 
 of these Pyramids is a fair measure of the length of 
 each king s reign. The reason that Cheops has the 
 biggest Pyramid is that he held office longer than the 
 others. When a king mounted the throne, if he was 
 feeling rugged and was what an insurance company 
 would call a " preferred risk " he would block out 
 the foundation of a Pyramid tomb that would re 
 quire, say, ten years for the building. If, at the end 
 
 178 
 
A VISIT TO THE PYRAMID OF CHEOPS 
 
 of ten years, he was still feeling in good physical 
 condition and confident of lasting a while longer he 
 would widen the foundations and put on additional 
 layers up to the summit. Labor was free and materi 
 als were cheap, and he kept everybody working on 
 his tomb as long as he lived. Finally, when the court 
 physicians began to warn him that his time was lim 
 ited, he would begin putting on the outer coating of 
 dressed stone and arrange for the inscriptions. The 
 ruler who lasted only three or four years was buried 
 in a squatty little Pyramid, which soon became hid 
 den under the drifting sands of the desert. Cheops 
 kept piling up the huge blocks for thirty years, and 
 that is why his Pyramid holds the record. If Me- 
 thusaleh had been a Pyramid builder he would have 
 been compelled to put up a tomb probably a mile and 
 a half high and about eleven miles around the base. 
 In a revolutionary South American republic the ruler 
 would probably get no further than laying the cor 
 ner stone. 
 
 We visited the pyramids. Also, we looked at the 
 golf links, staked out across the barren sands not to 
 be played on, but merely to be featured in the hotel 
 advertisement. Think of a golf course which is one 
 huge hazard ! Drive the ball in any direction and you 
 can t play out of the sand! Forty centuries gazing 
 
 179 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 down on a bow-legged tourist in fuzzy Scotch 
 stockings ! 
 
 Most of the pleasure seekers that we encountered 
 in the neighbourhood of the Pyramids seemed to be 
 quite elderly some of the more sprightly as young 
 as sixty, and from that going up to where it would 
 be better to stop guessing. Mr. Peasley gave an ex 
 planation of their presence. He said that the dry 
 climate of Egypt would preserve antiquities for an 
 indefinite period. 
 
 Here they were, these male and female octogena 
 rians, not propped up in arm chairs dividing the 
 family silverware and arranging bequests to hospi 
 tals and libraries, but out on the blinding desert, 
 thousands of miles from home, falling off donkeys, 
 climbing up on camels, devouring guide books, rum 
 maging around for time tables, kicking on the 
 charges, and leading on the whole a life of purple 
 strenuosity. We heard of two English women, sis 
 ters, both over seventy, who had just returned from 
 Khartoum, from which point they had gone on a 
 hunting expedition still further into the interior. 
 They had to wear mosquito bags and semi-male at 
 tire, and were out in the wild country for days at 
 a time, chasing gazelles, hyenas, and other indig 
 enous fauna. 
 
 180 
 
A VISIT TO THE PYRAMID OF CHEOPS 
 Just as I am about to conclude this treatise it 
 occurs to me that, although I have given a wealth 
 of useful information regarding the Pyramids, I 
 have rather overlooked our old friend the Sphinx. 
 I can only say in passing that it looks exactly like 
 the printed advertisements. There is no deception 
 about it. It is in a bad state of repair, but this is 
 not surprising when we consider its age. Herodotus 
 does not mention the Sphinx. It was right there at 
 the time. In fact, it had been there fourteen hundred 
 years when he first arrived. It seems strange that an 
 observing traveller should have overlooked a monu 
 ment sixty-six feet high, with a face nearly fourteen 
 feet wide, a nose five feet and seven inches long, and 
 wearing a smile that measures over seven feet! 
 Herodotus either walked by without seeing it or else 
 he did not think it worthy of mention. The only 
 plausible explanation is that he was too busy figuring 
 up the garlic statistics. 
 
 181 
 
ON THE NILE 
 
CHAPTER XIV 
 
 DASHING UP THE NILE IN COMPANY WITH 
 
 MR. PEASLEY AND OTHERS 
 
 I HE dream of many years has come true. We are 
 moving (southward) up the Nile. Like busy sand flies 
 we are flitting, almost daily, across white patches of 
 desert to burrow into second-hand tombs and crick 
 our necks looking up at mutilated temples. 
 
 Ten years ago not one of us had ever heard of 
 Koti or Khnemhotep. Now we refer to them in the 
 most casual way, as if we had roomed with them for 
 a while. It is certainly a gay life we are leading over 
 the cemetery circuit. Just think what rollicking fun 
 it must be to revel day after day in sarcophagi and 
 sepulchres, stumbling through subterranean pas 
 sages and kicking up the dust of departed kings, 
 peering down into mummy pits, also trying to stretch 
 the imagination like a rubber band so that we may 
 get the full significance of what is meant by 1500 
 B. c. People come to Egypt to cure nervous depres 
 sion and then spend nine-tenths of their time hang 
 ing around tombs. Why come all the way to Egypt? 
 
 185 
 
186 
 
DASHING UP THE NILE 
 
 Why not go out to Woodlawn and run foot races 
 from one family vault to another? 
 
 Mr. Peasley has no use for the tombs we have seen 
 up to date. At Beni-Hassan we rode on donkeys and 
 climbed hills for half an hour to inspect several large 
 cubes of dim atmosphere surrounded by limestone. 
 At Assiut we put in the best part of the afternoon 
 toiling up to another gloomy cavern. While we stood 
 in the main chamber of the tomb of Hapzefai (who 
 ever he was), trying tc pump up some enthusiasm, 
 Mr. Peasley mopped his brow and declared himself. 
 
 " I ll tell you what I can do, he said. " I can 
 take a hundred pounds of dynamite and a gang of 
 dagoes and go anywhere along the Hudson and blow 
 out a tomb in a week s time that will beat anything 
 we ve seen in Egypt. Then I ll hire a boy with a 
 markin brush to draw some one-legged men and 
 some tall women with their heads turned the wrong 
 way, and I ll charge six dollars to go in, and make 
 my fortune." 
 
 The significance of the " six dollars " is that every 
 traveller who wishes to visit the antiquities must 
 pay a government tax of 120 piastres. He receives 
 a " monument ticket," which he must show to the 
 guard before entering any tomb or temple. I regret 
 to say that the tickets are often passed along by de- 
 
 187 
 
188 
 
DASHING UP THE NILE 
 
 parting travellers to those newly arrived, and as the 
 guards do not read English, anything that looks like 
 a monument ticket will satisfy the man at the door. 
 At Beni-Hassan Mr. Peasley discovered, when he 
 arrived at the tombs, that he had left his ticket at 
 the boat. Fortunately, a fellow traveller had an 
 extra ticket with him and Mr. Peasley had no dif 
 ficulty in gaining admission to all the tombs under 
 the name of " Miss Ella McPherson." 
 
 Before plunging into the details of our voyage, it 
 is only fair that the indulgent reader should know 
 how and why we came boating up the Nile. And 
 first of all he should know something about this 
 wonderful river. The Nile has been described one 
 million times, at a rough guess, and yet at the risk 
 of dealing out superfluous information I am going 
 to insert some geography. 
 
 Total length, nearly four thousand miles. For 
 thousands and thousands of years it has supported a 
 swarming population along its banks, and yet until 
 fifty years ago no one knew from whence it came. 
 The inhabitants suspected that it came from some 
 where, but they were too busy paying taxes and 
 building pyramids to worry about scientific discov 
 eries. For 1200 miles up stream from the delta out 
 let the Nile does not receive any tributary. It winds 
 
 189 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 over a limestone base and through a rainless desert 
 between high and barren tablelands. Occasionally, 
 where there is a granite formation, the stream is 
 narrowed and forces its way through rushing rapids, 
 and these are known as the " cataracts." The first 
 of these is at Assouan, about six hundred miles up 
 stream. 
 
 Assouan has for many centuries marked the bor 
 der line of Egypt proper. To the south is the land 
 of the warlike blacks, who have been trouble-makers 
 from the beginning of time. This First Cataract is 
 the usual terminus of tourist travel, but those who 
 wish to see Nubia and the Soudan board a small 
 steamer, pass through the locks of the new dam, and 
 go by river 210 miles to Wadi Haifa, thence by rail 
 576 miles to Khartoum. It is here, about thirteen 
 hundred and fifty miles up stream, that the White 
 and Blue Niles converge and bring down from the 
 rainy equatorial regions the floods of muddy water 
 which are the annual salvation of Egypt. 
 
 Ten years ago Khartoum seemed as inaccessible 
 as the North Pole. It was headquarters for the most 
 desperate swarm of frenzied fanatics that ever swept 
 a region with fire and sword. They had wiped out 
 British armies and put Gordon s head on a pole. 
 They were in a drunken ecstasy of Mohammedan 
 
 190 
 
DASHING UP THE NILE 
 
 zeal, eager to fight and ready to die, and they got 
 all that they were looking for. 
 
 It is less than eight years since Kitchener went 
 down to call on them. Of all the cold-blooded and 
 frozen-featured military tacticians of the inexorable 
 school, Kitchener stands pre-eminent. General Grant 
 in his grimmest moment was absolutely emotional 
 and acrobatic as compared with Kitchener. He car 
 ried ice water in his veins, and his mental machinery 
 ticked with Birmingham regularity. He did not get 
 excited and dash into the open trap, as all the others 
 had done. He moved slowly but relentlessly into the 
 dread country and built a railroad as he went along. 
 He carried everything that a British army needs 
 marmalade, polo ponies, Belfast ginger ale, tinned 
 meats, pipe clay, etc. 
 
 u We cannot stampede them, because stampeding 
 is their specialty," said Kitchener, " but I will lick 
 them by algebra." 
 
 He did not say this, because he never said any 
 thing, but this is what he indicated by his calm prep 
 arations. He knew that the dervishes were frothing 
 
 o 
 
 at the mouth and praying Allah to give them another 
 chance to swim in gore, so he simply edged up to 
 within striking distance of them and picked out his 
 ground and waited. A kinetoscope hero would have 
 
 191 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 galloped up and down the line shouting, " Up, men, 
 and at them ! " But Kitchener was not a hero. He 
 was business manager of an abattoir. His object 
 was not to win a great battle, but to exterminate a 
 species. And he probably did one of the neatest jobs 
 of house cleaning on record. 
 
 The bloodthirsty mob, led by the Khalifa, as 
 principal maniac, charged across an open plain. 
 Each determined dervish carried in his right hand a 
 six foot spear, with which he hoped to do consider 
 able damage. When he still lacked about a mile of 
 being within poking distance of the hated infidel, the 
 machine guns opened up and began to sweep the plain 
 back and forth in long regular swaths, just as the 
 sickle sweeps through the yellow grain. It was quite 
 a handicap for the invincible children of Allah. They- 
 could not use their six foot spears on anyone a mile 
 away, and before they could recover from the cha 
 grin occasioned by this unexpected move on the part 
 of the enemy, about eleven thousand of them had 
 winged their way to eternal happiness and the others 
 were radiating in all directions, pursued by those 
 who wished to civilise them and bring them under 
 British control. Those of the dervishes who escaped 
 are supposed to be still running. At least they never 
 came back to start another Messiah movement. 
 
 192 
 
DASHING UP THE NILE 
 
 Ten years ago the Soudan was sealed to the whole 
 world and death waited for the unbeliever who 
 crossed the border. To-day the table d-hote roams 
 unafraid, and the illustrated post card blooms even 
 as the rose. 
 
 The Nile of which you have read and along which 
 are scattered the simon pure monuments of antiquity 
 is the six hundred miles of winding river between 
 Assouan, or First Cataract, and the sea. For the 
 entire distance, until it spreads into a fan-shaped 
 delta and filters into the Mediterranean, the stream 
 is walled in by flat-topped hills of barren aspect. 
 They are capped with limestone and carpeted about 
 with shifting sands, and they look for all the world 
 like the mesas of New Mexico and Arizona, for they 
 lie baking in the same kind of clarified sunshine. 
 This meandering hollow between the rugged hill 
 ranges is the Valley of the Nile. Here and there the 
 hills close in until the river banks are high and 
 chalky cliffs. At one point the valley spreads to a 
 width of thirty-three miles. 
 
 East and west of the hills are vast areas of desert 
 without even a spear of vegetation except where 
 there is a miraculous rise of water to the surface. 
 These spots are grateful landmarks of clustered palms 
 and are known as oases. 
 
 193 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 The Valley of the Nile would be just as bare and 
 monotonous as an asphalt pavement were it not for 
 the fact that once a year the Nile overflows. It has 
 been overflowing every year for thousands of years, 
 bringing down from the mountains of Abyssinia 
 and the far-away regions of tropical rains a spread 
 ing volume of muddy water. Every winter, when the 
 dwindling stream gets back into the customary bed, 
 it has left a layer of black sediment over the inun 
 dated district. So many layers of sediment have been 
 deposited that now the rich black soil is thirty to 
 fifty feet deep along the river, thinning out as it 
 meets the slope of the desert. Unlike our prairie soil 
 of the Middle West, the Nile farms are not under 
 laid with clay. The Nile soil is black all the way down 
 to limestone a floury mineral powder of even com 
 position. The only parts of Egypt which can be cul 
 tivated are those touched by the annual overflow. 
 Egypt is really a ribbon of alluvial soil following the 
 stream on either side. The tourist standing on the 
 top deck of a Nile steamer can see both east and west 
 the raw and broken edges of the desert. 
 
 The entire population lives on the river, literally 
 and figuratively. Dark-robed women come down to 
 the stream in endless processions to fill their water 
 jars, and it seems that about every forty feet or so 
 
 194 
 
DASHING UP THE NILE 
 
 all the way up from Cairo the industrious fellah is 
 lifting water up the bank and irrigating his little 
 field with the same old-fashioned sweep and bucket 
 arrangement that was in use when Joseph came over 
 to Egypt and attracted the attention of Potiphar s 
 wife. The Egyptian farmer is called a fellah. The 
 clothing that he wears would wad a gun that is, 
 a rifle, not a shotgun. He puts in at least fourteen 
 hours a day and his pay is from ten to fifteen cents. 
 Mr. Peasley told a tourist the other day that the song 
 " He s a jolly good fellah " originated in Egypt 
 during the time of the Ptolemies. This is a sample 
 of the kind of idiotic observation that is supposed 
 to enliven a so-called pleasure trip. 
 
 But let us get back to the river, for in Egypt one 
 must get back to the river at least once every twenty 
 minutes. The Nile is Egypt and Egypt is the Nile. 
 All this description may sound like a few pages 
 from the trusty red guide book, and yet the word 
 " Egypt " will have no meaning to the reader who 
 does not get a clear panoramic vision of this wonder 
 fully slim-waisted country. Nearly six hundred miles 
 long and yet containing only twelve thousand five 
 hundred square miles about the size of Maryland. 
 
 The strip of black land which yields the plentiful 
 crops is nowhere more than ten miles wide, a mere 
 
 195 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 fringe of fertility weaving along through dryness 
 and desolation. Anywhere along the river if you will 
 climb to the rocky plateau, you will see the slow 
 moving river, probably a half-mile wide, as a glassy 
 thread on which are strung fields of living green, 
 bordered by the dreary uplifts of desert. The trav 
 eller who goes by boat from Cairo to Assouan sees 
 all of Egypt. The cities and temples and tombs of 
 olden times were perched on the high spots or planted 
 in the bare hills, so as to be safe from the annual 
 rise of waters. Anything worth seeing in the whole 
 country is within an easy donkey ride of the river 
 bank. The river is the only artery of travel. There 
 is a railway, but it follows the river all the way up 
 to Assouan. 
 
 It would seem that the country was especially 
 laid out and punctuated with " sights " for the con 
 venience of the modern traveller, for the visitor who 
 goes up the Nile and stops off at the right spots can 
 do a clean job of sight seeing without doubling on 
 his tracks. 
 
 Until a few years age the tourist going up the Nile 
 had to take a dahabeah. This sounds like the name 
 of a disease, but it is really a big, roomy, flat-bot 
 tomed sailboat. The dahabeah moves only when the 
 wind is in the right direction, and to go from Cairo 
 
 196 
 
DASHING UP THE NILE 
 
 to Assouan requires the greater part of a lifetime. 
 Those travellers who have money to burn and who 
 are content to settle down to many weeks of rest 
 and indolence charter the private dahabeahs. When 
 a traveller goes aboard a dahabeah he tears up the 
 calendar and lets his watch run down. Those who 
 have more money and are in a hurry use the private 
 steam dahabeahs. 
 
 A majority of travellers go by passenger boats. 
 The tourist steamers devote three weeks to a loafing 
 voyage up to Assouan and back, with daily excur 
 sions to the graveyards and ruins. The express 
 steamers, carrying freight and native passengers, 
 take less time for the round trip, as they skip some 
 of the less interesting antiquities. We took an ex 
 press steamer, thereby missing many of the tombs 
 and temples, but still getting enough of them to last 
 us for the next hundred years or so. 
 
 Our steamer is a frail affair, double decked and 
 of no draught worth mentioning. It resembles the 
 old style of Missouri River boat, built to run on a 
 heavy dew. There are thirty passengers, who devote 
 most of their time to lolling on deck waiting for the 
 next meal. Mud banks, natives hoisting water, green 
 fields stretching away to the bald range of hills, 
 dobe huts, spindly palms, now and then a solemn 
 
 197 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 row of camels, always several donkeys and goats in 
 evidence, every few miles the tall stack of a sugar 
 mill, perpetual sunshine it is monotonous travel, 
 and yet there is continually something doing along 
 the banks, and the traveller cannot get away from 
 
 Lying back to watch others work 
 
 that feeling of satisfaction which results from lying 
 back to watch other people work. 
 
 And the sunsets ! You cannot estimate the real 
 dignity and artistic value of a camel until you see 
 
 198 
 
DASHING UP THE NILE 
 
 him or her silhouetted against a sky of molten gold 
 just at twilight. I have made two or three attempts 
 to describe the glory of a sunset in the desert, but 
 I find myself as helpless as Mr. Peasley, who, after 
 gazing for five minutes at the flaming horizon can 
 only murmur a low but reverent " Gosh ! " 
 
 It may interest the reader to hear what Baedeker 
 has to say on the subject. Baedeker says (p. 216) 
 " The sunsets are very fine." That s what I like 
 about Baedeker. He doesn t fuss over a lot of words 
 and tack on superfluous adjectives. As soon as he 
 has imparted the necessary information in a trim 
 and concise manner he moves on to the next subject. 
 
 I am sending herewith two sketches which show 
 the beauty and variety of landscape to which we are 
 treated every day. View No. 1 is most characteristic. 
 We see before us the rippling Nile and beyond it 
 the sheer river bank of black dirt. Then the field of 
 waving grain, in the distance the range of hills, and 
 over all a dazzling sunshine. 
 
 No. 2 is more varied. Again we have the river, the 
 mud bank, and the growing crops, together with the 
 distant hills, behind which the sun is silently sinking. 
 In the foreground at the left is a majestic palm. 
 The structure at the right is a native house and will 
 indicate something of the simple life of the agricul- 
 
 199 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 turist. The complicated device on the river bank at 
 stage centre is the shadouf, used for lifting water 
 from the stream. The cavernous opening in the dis 
 tant hill (marked X in the drawing) is the entrance 
 to a rock tomb. By studying this picture the reader 
 
 Fie TV of the Nile No. 1 
 
 may get a very fair understanding of the architec 
 tural splendour of these ancient seuplchrcs. 
 
 Travelling on the Nile has two reliable features 
 to commend it. The weather is always fair and the 
 native population constantly enlivens the picture, for 
 the lower river is crowded with sails and every inch 
 along the banks is under cultivation. Also, the Nile 
 
 200 
 
DASHING UP THE NILE 
 
 has some surprises in store. Two definite delusions 
 are soon shattered. 
 
 Delusion No. 1. HEAT. It is not always warm 
 in Egypt. In the middle of the day, out of the wind 
 
 View of the Nile No. 2 
 
 and on the desert, it may work up to a good summery 
 temperature at this season, but in the shade it is cool, 
 and as soon as the sun has set, a bracing autumnal 
 chill comes into the air and the heavy overcoat is 
 needed. The north wind can be very chiselly at 
 times. If coming to Egypt, bring your flannels 
 along. 
 
 201 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 Delusion No. 2. CROCODILES. There are no 
 crocodiles in the Nile. We have always supposed that 
 the bank of the river was polka-dotted with these 
 monsters, lying in wait for small, dark children. It is 
 said that two thousand years ago the Nile was bor 
 dered with papyrus reeds or bullrushes, within the 
 tangles of which lurked hippopotami, crocodiles, 
 dragomans, and other reptiles, but the animals have 
 disappeared, and so has the river vegetation. The 
 other day we visited the island on which Pharaoh s 
 daughter discovered little Moses. The island is still 
 there, but there isn t a bullrush within a mile of it. 
 
 One of the penalties of travel is to have old and 
 settled beliefs uprooted. For instance, there are no 
 Maltese cats in Malta, no Venetian blinds in Venice, 
 no Roman punch in Rome. If you want Neapolitan 
 ice cream in Naples you must send out for it. You 
 may walk about all day in Bologna without seeing 
 a pound of Bologna sausage. Egyptian cigarettes 
 are known throughout the world, and yet no tobacco 
 is grown in Egypt. Go to Manhattan Beach and 
 everybody is drinking Martinis. Truly, the stereo 
 typed labels are deceptive. 
 
 202 
 
CHAPTER XV 
 
 DAY BY DAY ON THE DROWSY NILE. WITH 
 SOMETHING ABOUT THE WON 
 DERFUL HASSIM 
 
 WHILE we were in London we dined one evening 
 at a gorgeous hotel with a Mr. Brewster, of Con 
 necticut. After dinner, Mr. Peasley told the waiter 
 to bring some " good cigars." Mr. Peasley resides 
 in Iowa, where it is customary to stroll down to the 
 drug store after supper and buy a couple of Lottie 
 Lees, which are so good that the druggist cannot 
 afford to give six for a quarter. Not being familiar 
 with the favourite brands of London, he called on 
 Mr. Brewster to name the cigar of his choice, and 
 Mr. Brewster said he was very fond of the Corona 
 del Matadora, or something like that, because the 
 entire crop in Cuba was taken over by a London 
 dealer, and they could not be obtained in New York 
 for love or money. The waiter brought what ap 
 peared to be a very superior article of stogie, and 
 after they had been passed around, Mr. Peasley put 
 several into his pockets, as we were going to a music 
 
 203 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 hall, and Mr. Peasley had learned that tobacco acted 
 as a sedative and helped one to remain calm while 
 listening to British jokes. 
 
 " How much? " he asked. 
 
 " Three and six," replied the waiter. 
 
 Y4HN 
 
 ft Each/ 3 said the waiter 
 
 Mr, Peasley handed him three and six. 
 " Each," said the waiter. 
 
 Mr. Peasley swallowed something and his eyes 
 leaned from their sockets, but he said nothing. He 
 
 204 
 
THE WONDERFUL HASSIM 
 
 handed over two sovereigns, and the change that 
 came back to him was almost sufficient for the 
 waiter s tip. There was a brief silence and then Mr. 
 Peasley said : " Three shillings is seventy-five cents 
 seventy-five and twelve make eighty-seven." 
 
 Another silence. 
 
 " Eighty-seven cents, 95 sighed Mr. Peasley. 
 " Three bushels of oats for a cigar ! " 
 
 When Mr. Brewster crossed our trail in Egypt 
 and became our fellow passenger on a Nile steamer 
 Mr. Peasley remembered him and longed for a chance 
 to get even. 
 
 Our friend from Connecticut was wearing a large 
 canopy helmet the kind that makes a short man 
 look like a walking piano-stool. We were wearing the 
 same outlandish style of headgear and for some rea 
 son or other, no person being responsible for what 
 he does when he is away from home, Mr. Peasley 
 had his name boldly marked in Arabic on the front 
 of his helmet. It didn t look like anything, but it 
 was real Arabic and said his name was Peasley and 
 that he came from Iowa and he was very proud of 
 it. He urged Mr. Brewster to have his helmet marked 
 in a similar way. 
 
 " I hardly like the idea of wearing my name on 
 my hat," said the man from Connecticut. 
 
 205 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 * But when you get home and hang the thing up 
 in your den with the Navajo blankets and swords 
 and other curios, think what a fine souvenir it will 
 be," urged Mr. Peasley. 
 
 Mr. Brewster finally consented and Mr. Peasley 
 took the helmet to the head steward, who was a 
 native, and in a few minutes he brought it back 
 magnificently lettered all over the front. It surely 
 did look Oriental and decorative and Mr. Brewster 
 was grateful when he saw how beautifully his name 
 and New England address showed up in Arabic. 
 
 That afternoon we landed at Assiut, which is head 
 quarters for a most wolfish assortment of guides, 
 street peddlers, and hold-up men who work in the 
 bazaars. Most of them are Copts and claim to be 
 good Christians, but we did not feel impelled to 
 throw up our hats on that account. When they bore 
 down upon us and started to wrestle with us we 
 could hardly distinguish any difference between them 
 and the ordinary heathen. 
 
 From the moment that we landed, Mr. Brewster 
 of Connecticut attracted more attention than any 
 other person in the party. Four guides laid hold of 
 him at the same moment and declined to let go. 
 Later on, in the bazaar, every dealer who sighted 
 him gave a glad guttural cry and tried to drag him 
 
 206 
 
207 
 
IN PASTURES NEW, 
 
 into one of the stuffy little shops. The arrival of an 
 ordinary tourist is calculated to agitate a bazaar, 
 but when Mr. Brewster appeared the general effect 
 was the same as when the raw meat is carried into 
 the zoo. He was pulled and hauled and for the whole 
 length of the winding bazaar his way was blocked 
 by frantic villains in white gowns and huge turbans, 
 who dangled tawdry merchandise in front of him 
 and begged him to make an offer. Mr. Brewster was 
 a good deal amazed, and we were more or less puzzled 
 until we came back to the boat and Mr. Peasley 
 confessed that the Arabic characters boldly dis 
 played on Mr. Brewster s helmet did not stand for 
 his name and address at all, but meant, as nearly as 
 could be translated, " Rich American Easy Mark." 
 
 Poor Mr. Brewster! At the present writing he is 
 still wearing that bold label, wandering in and out 
 of shops and around hotels, inviting the attacks 
 of guides, donkey boys, servants, and peddlers. It 
 seemed a rather low-down trick, but Mr. Peasley 
 said that probably it would flatter Mr. Brewster to 
 learn that anyone from Connecticut could attract 
 so much attention in a foreign country. 
 
 Arabic is surely a weird excuse for a language. 
 In its written form it looks like the bird-track illus 
 trations in one of Thompson Seton Thompson s 
 
 208 
 
THE WONDERFUL HASSIM 
 
 books, and instead of reading it from left to right 
 you begin at the tail end of a sentence and back up 
 all the way. In reading an Arabic novel you turn 
 to the end of the book and read the last chapter 
 first, and if it develops that the fellow marries the 
 girl, naturally that saves a lot of trouble. In its 
 right to left character the Arabic is somewhat like 
 the Hebrew or Lower Broadway language, which 
 also begins at the leaving-off place. This fact re 
 minded a New York man of a story. He said that 
 in one of the east side Assembly districts of New 
 York city a large body of Yiddish voters, recently 
 arrived in the land of the somewhat free and the 
 home of the more or less brave, had been rounded up 
 very carefully by the Tammany workers. The voters 
 were not familiar with the workings of the Australian 
 ballot system, and had to be instructed by the Tam 
 many ward heelers, who said : -" All you have to do 
 is to put a cross mark in the circle at the top of the 
 first column, see?" That seemed simple enough, so 
 the voters went into the booths and marked the first 
 that is, the right hand column, and elected the 
 Prohibition candidate. 
 
 The Arabic language, when spoken, sounds very 
 much like an agitated person trying to dislodge a 
 fish bone. It is one of the most unmusical tongues 
 
 209 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 in the world and offers no tempting inducements to 
 the student, yet Mr. Peasley actually bought one 
 of those " Arabic at a Glance " books and started 
 to learn some of the more useful sentences. He said 
 that if he could get Arabic down pat he would pass 
 as a native and be enabled to buy things at about 
 half price. After two days of hard study he at 
 tempted a conversation with a military policeman 
 standing on the river bank at Dendera. Mr. Peasley 
 strolled up to him, careless like, and said, " Ana 
 awez arabiyet kwayesset min shan arookh el balad." 
 That was supposed to mean, " I want a first-class 
 carriage for driving in the town." The stalwart 
 soldier gazed at Mr. Peasley with a most bewildered 
 look in his jet black eyes and then began to edge 
 away. 
 
 " Hold on," said Mr. Peasley. " How about hal 
 yel zamna ghafar yerafegua bill tareeg? " 
 
 Mr. Peasley thought he was asking, " Shall we 
 require a guide or an escort in this town? " 
 
 The soldier beckoned to us to come over and help 
 him out. 
 
 " Tell him, please, that I am educate at the Presby 
 terian Mission," said he. " I speak only English and 
 Arabic." 
 
 We questioned him later and learned that he took 
 210 
 
THE WONDERFUL HASSIM 
 Mr. Peasley to be a Russian. This one little experi 
 ence rather discouraged our travelling companion. 
 He said it was foolish to waste important dialogue 
 
 " How about hal yel zamna ghafar yerafegua 
 bill tareeg?" 
 
 on a lot of benighted ignorami who did not know their 
 own language. 
 
 As a matter of fact, English carries the tourist 
 everywhere in Egypt. The American Mission School, 
 
 211 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 supported by the Presbyterians, is a proud local 
 institution in each good-sized town. At every land 
 ing along the river small boys from the mission 
 schools would come down to the boat to ask for 
 English books. These requests were such a welcome 
 variation from the everlasting howl for " bak 
 sheesh " that the over-generous passengers soon gave 
 away all the reading matter on board and had noth 
 ing left for themselves except Baedekers and time 
 tables. I saw a silver-haired old lady from Phila 
 delphia give to a coal-black and half-naked child 
 of eight a volume of Browning s poems in paper 
 cover. The dusky infant clasped the book to his 
 bare bosom and shouted his thanks as the boat headed 
 up stream, and the old lady was so gratified and 
 happy that she stood looking at him with tear-dim 
 med eyes and never gave a thought as to what might 
 happen to his intellect. At one town, just as we 
 were casting off, I threw an American magazine to 
 a handsome little tike who had been asking for Eng 
 lish literature. It fell on the dock, and twenty 
 small boys began fighting for it and tearing it to 
 pieces. I never saw such a thirst for advertising 
 matter. 
 
 Our voyage from Cairo to Luxor was punctuated 
 with so many new experiences that possibly it would 
 
 212 
 
THE WONDERFUL HASSIM 
 
 be better to take them in order. Egypt is the land 
 of leisurely travel. If you look at the map the dis 
 tance from Cairo to Luxor seems only a good hop, 
 skip, and jump. It is 458 miles by rail and the 
 lightning express does it in fifteen hours, the same 
 being considered a record performance. Our boat 
 left Cairo one Friday afternoon and arrived at Luxor 
 the following Thursday morning. We chugged 
 slowly against the current all the way, tying up every 
 night and getting away before daybreak next morn 
 ing. Several times we changed pilots. The Nile 
 pilot is usually a grizzled old sheikh with the doubt 
 ful combination of a department store spring over 
 coat and a red fez. He stands at the wheel bossing 
 the crew while the ostensible captain or manager, 
 who is a budding European in a neat uniform, has 
 nothing much to do except circulate on the upper 
 deck and pour tea for a little cluster of intellectual 
 giantesses from England. Two sailors stand well 
 forward on the lower deck, one on each side, jabbing 
 at the river with poles in order to get the depth of 
 the channel. If the boat runs into water less than 
 six inches deep they become alarmed and start to 
 yelp. Occasionally the gallant craft strikes a bar 
 and comes to a tired pause, whereupon all the passen 
 gers say "Mgh!" and lurch out of their camp 
 
 213 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 stools. Then there is a little welcome excitement and 
 the natives of the crew run around in circles and 
 call upon Allah for temporary assistance. With 
 much grunting, both by the boat and the men at 
 the poles, the good Hatasoo backs out of the mud 
 and takes a fresh start, zigzagging through the 
 shallows until deep water is found that is, a depth 
 of anywhere from three to four feet. The Nile is 
 just as finical and unreliable as a Missouri or Missis 
 sippi, the tortuous channel constantly shifting, and 
 the pilot needs to be an expert with a memory like an 
 encyclopaedia. Fortunately there are no snags. 
 Wood is about the most precious commodity in 
 Egypt, and all the snags were fished out and utilised 
 some two thousand years before we happened along. 
 Although our voyage lasted five full days we went 
 ashore only three times. As I have already explained, 
 the traveller need not leave the Nile steamer in order 
 to see nearly everything that is happening in Egypt. 
 Leaving Cairo late on Friday afternoon, we made 
 two stops on Saturday to discharge freight and take 
 on natives. Many of the women came aboard closely 
 veiled and were at once secreted in a canvas compart 
 ment on the lower deck. These precautions seemed 
 to be needless. Two adjectives will best describe the 
 pride of the harem shabby and flabby. Unless you 
 
THE WONDERFUL HASSIM 
 wish to lose all enthusiasm for the Arabian Nights, 
 keep away from Egypt. 
 
 Sunday. Arriving at Beni Hassan at ten o clock 
 we went ashore and climbed on midget donkeys and 
 rode away to explore the rock tombs. Beni Hassan 
 has been for several centuries the home of an ob 
 streperous breed of cutthroats. Repeated attempts 
 have been made to exterminate or scatter the tribe, 
 but it is still in existence, although somewhat sub 
 dued. The government keeps a guard of soldiers at 
 the town, and when we landed we found ourselves sur 
 rounded by the military, while the natives stood back 
 of the dead-line and gazed at us hungrily. There 
 we began to get close glimpses of the domestic life 
 of the plain people. 
 
 A mud wall enclosure with a hut at one end. 
 Within this squalid pen, women in bedraggled 
 black gowns, children in semi-attire and closely at 
 tended by swarms of flies, two or three emaciated 
 goats, a few chickens, and a somnolent burro. At 
 present the live stock and the Egyptians live on 
 terms of democratic equality, but since the English 
 have introduced the Society for the Prevention of 
 Cruelty to Animals it is hoped that the situation will 
 be remedied. 
 
 On Monday, at two o clock, we landed at Assiut, 
 215 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 after passing through the locks of the first big 
 barrage or dam built under British direction and 
 intended to regulate the water level of the lower 
 Nile and the delta during the dry season. Assiut is 
 a big town with some showy buildings, an attractive 
 bazaar, and a guide who represents the thirty-third 
 degree of scoundrelism. His name is Hassim. If you 
 should visit Assiut and wish to become acquainted 
 with the very pink and flower of villainy, hunt up 
 Hassim. Perhaps it will be unnecessary to hunt him 
 up. He will be waiting for you, just as he was wait 
 ing for us. When we went ashore we were attacked 
 by a flying wedge of donkey boys and carriage driv 
 ers, all shrieking like demons and kicking up such 
 clouds of dust as can be found only in a country 
 where the showers are a century apart. By striking 
 out right and left we held off our assailants and suc 
 ceeded in boarding a rickety victoria. When we 
 escaped from the clamour and the clouds of dust and 
 took our bearings Hassim was on the box alongside 
 of the driver. He had attached himself to us on his 
 own invitation and we are glad that he did so, for 
 he proved to be a rascal of such inventive fancy and 
 such unusual methods of attack that our natural 
 resentment was fairly lost in admiration. He was tall 
 and lean, with a stern and military countenance and 
 
 216 
 
THE WONDERFUL HASSIM 
 
 one eye set at an angle. His manner was imperious 
 and from the moment when he fastened himself upon 
 us he was in absolute charge of the expedition. 
 
 " Fear not," he said, holding up his hand im 
 pressively, " I shall protect you. You shall see the 
 rock tombs and the grand view of the valley and the 
 great bazaar of Assiut and no one shall do you harm, 
 for I am Hassim, son of Abdalla." 
 
 This had a most assuring sound, so we made no 
 resistance. For several hours he marched ahead of 
 us, proclaiming our social importance and ordering 
 people out of the way, and every ten minutes he led 
 us into some carefully concealed trap and tried to 
 separate us from our piasters. All the time he went 
 through the motions of defending our interests and 
 fighting back those who would defraud us. For 
 instance, in the bazaar. In a thoughtless moment I 
 had said that I wished to purchase an ebony walking- 
 stick. He led us to a dealer in walking-sticks, and 
 here the following drama was played for our 
 benefit : 
 
 Hassim (to dealer) This distinguished gentle 
 man wishes to buy an ebony walking-stick. Show him 
 your best goods and let the price be fair or never 
 more shall I bring customers to your vile shop. (To 
 the crowd jostling in upon us) Stand back! Do 
 
 217 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 not crowd upon the honourable gentlemen from 
 America. 
 
 Dealer (showing an ebony stick with a badly 
 carved handle of bone, supposed to be ivory) Ah, 
 see ! Yes ! Verra good stick ! Is it not? Verra cheap. 
 
 I (looking at it coldly and shaking my head as if 
 in disapproval) How much? 
 
 Dealer Verra cheap only twenty shilling. 
 
 Hassim Wha-a-t! (He rushes upon the dealer, 
 smites him on the chest with his open hand and then 
 tries to choke him). Oh, dog! Oh, unclean animal! 
 Twenty shilling! (To us) Come! Let us go away. 
 He is bad man. Come! 
 
 Dealer (entreatingly) You make me offer. How 
 much you give? 
 
 Hassim Oh, child of darkness ! Oh, crawling 
 crocodile ! You are trying to cheat the high-born 
 visitors. 
 
 Dealer (cringingly) How much you give? 
 
 Hassim (to me) Come, I will speak with you 
 alone. (He leads me away from the crowd and talks 
 to me in a husky whisper.) This man is bad man. 
 Do not pay him twenty bob. No one is looking. You 
 slip the money to me and I will buy it for fifteen. 
 
 Now, fifteen shillings is $3.75 in real money, and 
 the stick is worth a dollar at the most extravagant 
 
 218 
 
THE WONDERFUL HASSIM 
 
 valuation^ so I say to Hassim, " Are you in on 
 this?" 
 
 He does not understand, but he looks at me as if 
 hurt or disappointed, and then says, " I try to get 
 it for ten. Wait here." 
 
 Then I catch him by the slack of the blue gown 
 and say that I will not give ten. I authorise him to 
 offer fifteen piasters seventy-five cents. He says it 
 will be useless to offer such a small sum, as the Ivory 
 comes from the elephant and hunters must search 
 many days to find the elephant and then carry the 
 tusk forty-seven thousand miles across the burning 
 desert to sell it to the dealer in Assiut. So I tell him 
 to stand back and I will negotiate in my own behalf. 
 So I break through the crowd and offer three shill 
 ings. Derisive laughter by the dealer, the crowd 
 assisting. I offer four shillings. The dealer says, 
 " I am a ruined man, but no matter take it along 
 for eight." Then Hassim elbows his way back to the 
 scene of trouble and helps to complicate matters. 
 He curses the dealer in Arabic and says to me in 
 a side whisper that he has succeeded in buying the 
 stick for seven shillings. I offer five. To make a 
 long story short, after using up $8 worth of time 
 and $52 worth of vocal energy, I buy the stick for 
 six shillings, and when I return to the boat the head 
 
 219 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 steward exhibits one just like it which he bought 
 for two. 
 
 This farcical " grand stand " play was repeated 
 every time we stopped to purchase some trifling 
 specimen of native junk. One of the best per 
 formances of the afternoon involved a mysterious 
 trip up a narrow alley and into a tumbledown house, 
 where Hassim exhibited to us four squalling infants, 
 attended by many flies and richly encrusted with the 
 soil of their native land. Although all four of the 
 children seemed to be of about the same age, he as 
 sured us that they belonged to him, and we, being 
 unfamiliar with the customs of Egypt, were not 
 prepared to contradict him. He said it was custom 
 ary for visitors to give a small present to each of 
 the children, or, better still, we could give the money 
 to him and he would hand it to them later. 
 
 We shall remember Hassim. He surrounded his 
 cheap trickeries with such a glamour of Oriental 
 ceremony and played his part with such a terrific 
 show of earnestness that he made the afternoon 
 wholly enjoyable. When we arrived at the landing 
 he and the driver had a verbal war, and then he took 
 me aside for another heart to heart talk. 
 
 " The driver is a child of evil," said he. " I 
 tremble with rage! He is demanding fifty piasters. 
 
 220 
 
THE WONDERFUL HASSIM 
 Do not pay him fifty. Give the money to me and I 
 will say to him, Take forty or nothing ! " 
 
 The driver s legal fare was twenty piasters. 
 Finally we paid him twenty-five. Everybody was sat 
 isfied. Then we paid Hassim for his services and sent 
 presents to his four simultaneous children, and the 
 last we saw of him he was making a bee-line for the 
 bazaar to collect his commissions. 
 
 The decorative tail piece to this chapter is my 
 name in Arabic. 
 
 > 7- 
 
 221 
 
IN LUXOR 
 
CHAPTER XVI 
 
 THE MOHAMMEDAN FLY AND OTHER CREA 
 TURES LIVING ALONG THE NILE 
 
 EGYPTIAN civilisation is supposed to be station 
 ary, except in the larger cities. The fellahin scratch 
 the rich alluvial soil with the same kind of clumsy 
 wooden plough that was used when Marc Antony 
 came down from Rome on a business trip and got all 
 snarled up with Cleopatra. They live in the same type 
 of snug mud hut about the size of a lower berth. 
 They lift the water from the Nile by exactly the 
 same wooden sweep that was in vogue when Cheops 
 began work on the Pyramids. It may be remarked, 
 en passant, that the fellahin are the farmers of 
 Egypt. I might have said " farmers " in the first 
 place, but what is the use of spending a month in 
 a place and paying large hotel bills if one cannot 
 pick up words of the fellahin description to parade 
 up and down in front of his friends and cause them 
 to feel ignorant and untravelled? The en passant, 
 which is tucked in so neatly above, I found in Paris. 
 It means " under your hat," or something like that. 
 
 225 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 It is impossible to translate these French phrases 
 without sacrificing some of the piquant significance 
 of the original. For instance, " string beans " can 
 never be haricots vert. They may look the same and 
 taste the same, but when they are both on the bill, 
 me for the haricots vert every time. 
 
 To resume : The outlying districts of Egypt are 
 supposed to be absolutely nonprogressive. This is 
 a mistake. While driving out from Assiut to visit 
 another cheerful group of tombs we came upon a 
 large gang of workmen engaged in improving the 
 road. As soon as the carriage ahead of ours struck 
 the improved road it turned turtle, and for a moment 
 the air was full of jumping tourists. Our convey 
 ance started over the improved section, but mired 
 down, so we got out and walked until we came to an 
 unimproved road, and then we jumped in and 
 sped merrily on our way. I stopped for several 
 minutes to watch the men at work, and I was deeply 
 impressed by the fact that here in this heathen land, 
 where they had no normal schools or farmers insti 
 tutes to guide them, no agricultural weeklies to 
 beacon them out of the darkness, the simple children 
 of the Orient were " improving " the roads just as 
 I had seen them improved during my boyhood days 
 in Indiana. In other words, they were scooping dirt 
 
 226 
 
THE MOHAMMEDAN FLY 
 
 out of the ditch on either side and dumping it in 
 tall, unsurmountable hillocks right in the middle of 
 the roadway. The most hydrocephalous township 
 supervisor in the whole Middle West could not have 
 done a more imbecilic job. 
 
 In Indiana every voter is required to " work 
 the roads " or pay a road tax. Of late years, under 
 intelligent direction, the highways have been vastly 
 improved, but there was a time when " working the 
 roads " was a large joke. To avoid paying the tax 
 the farmer would have to go out with a team and 
 do something to a public highway. Usually he 
 selected a road which he would not traverse in going 
 to town, and he would plough it up and " scrape " 
 it into hollows and leave it looking like a sample of 
 the Bad Lands of Montana. As soon as the tax was 
 " worked out " he discontinued the improvement. 
 After two or three days of " working," a fairly bad 
 road could be made altogether impassable. If I were 
 a military commander and had to execute a retreat 
 and cut off any pursuit by a superior force I would 
 have a corps of flat-headed township supervisors 
 bring up the rear and " work " the roads. 
 
 It was in this same town of Assiut that we visited 
 one of the greatest bazaars in Egypt. We had heard 
 about this bazaar every day since landing. The 
 
 227 
 
228 
 
THE MOHAMMEDAN FLY 
 
 traveller who had been up the Nile and who had 
 come back to Cairo, sunbaked and full of the patro 
 nising airs of the veteran, invariably said, " By the 
 way, when you are in Assiut you must see the ba 
 zaar." He might as well have said, " When you are 
 in Washington be sure to take a look at the Washing 
 ton Monument." 
 
 ; " Bazaar " has a seductive, Far Eastern sound, 
 the same as " mosque." It is much luckier to shut 
 your eyes and think of a mosque than to actually see 
 a deserted lime kiln with an upturned sugar bowl on 
 top of it. The same for " bazaar," only it goes 
 double. A bazaar is a cosey corner gone wrong. If 
 you will take the long corridor of an American 
 second-class hoteL tear off the roof and substitute 
 a canopy of tattered rag carpets, cover the walls 
 with the imitation merchandise of a five and ten cent 
 store, kick up a choking dust, turn loose twenty or 
 thirty ripe odours and then have one hundred and 
 fifty coffee-coloured lunatics all begin talking at the 
 same time, you will have a rather tame imitation of 
 the genuine Oriental bazaar as made famous in 
 song and story. The crude articles sold in these 
 bazaars, if displayed in the windows of a department 
 store in America, would attract no attention what 
 ever, but the tourist, as soon as he has had a touch 
 
 229 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 of the Egyptian sun, seems to become easy and irre 
 sponsible, and he wants to bargain for everything 
 in sight. It is a kind of temporary mania, known as 
 curiosis, and is closely allied to the widely prevalent 
 souveniria, or post card fever, which attacks even 
 the young and innocent. 
 
 The intelligent reader may have noticed that now 
 and then I have referred to the dust of Egypt. 
 Egypt makes all the other dusty spots on earth seem 
 dank and waterlogged. We asked truthful Hassim, 
 our guide at Assiut, if there had been any rainfall 
 lately. He said that about five years ago there had 
 been a light shower, arid during one of the Ptolemy 
 administrations there had been a regular old 
 drencher. The Ptolemy family occupied the throne 
 about two thousand years ago. At home, take it in the 
 dog days, if we have no rain for two weeks and the 
 crick dries up, all the local apostles of gloom and ad 
 vance agents of adversity clot themselves together in 
 front of the Post Office and begin pronouncing fune 
 ral orations over the corn crop. Fourteen days with 
 out rain and the whole country is on the toboggan, 
 headed straight for bankruptcy. Yet here in Egypt, 
 where they haven t experienced a really wet rain for 
 twenty centuries, the people go about cheerfully, 
 and there is no complaint regarding Providence. 
 
 230 
 
THE MOHAMMEDAN FLY 
 
 231 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 But what an unsatisfactory hang-out for the 
 weather shark ! In Egypt the oldest inhabitant never 
 gets up in the morning and says, " I m satisfied we re 
 going to have rain to-day, because my rheumatiz 
 bothered me all night." There is no need of looking 
 for rings around the moon. You never hear anyone 
 say, " It looks a little black in the north, but I think 
 it ll blow around, because the wind is in the wrong 
 direction." Every morning the sun rolls up in silvery 
 splendour and surveys the same old parched land 
 scape, with the strip of irrigated green, and after a 
 leisurely and monotonous day sinks through a golden 
 glow into the far-stretching desert. No one is look 
 ing for rain or hoping for it. When it comes it is 
 regarded as a calamity. It washes down the mud 
 huts, collects in pools and makes breeding spots for 
 microbes and leaks through hotel roofs, so that 
 tourists have to carry umbrellas in going to the 
 dining-room. In March of this year there was a 
 heavy rainfall around Assouan, extending as far 
 north as Luxor, and when we came along, a few 
 weeks later, the natives were still bewailing the visi 
 tation of Allah s wrath. 
 
 The extreme dryness of the air in Egypt causes 
 the visiting microbe to feel like an alien. It becomes 
 enervated and discouraged, incapable of initiating 
 
 232 
 
THE MOHAMMEDAN FLY 
 
 any new and fashionable epidemics. This same air, 
 however, seems to have a tonic effect on the flea. In 
 no other clime is he so enterprising, so full of rest 
 less energy, so given to unexpected achievements. 
 During a dull season, if there is a short supply of 
 tourists, he associates with the natives. He prefers 
 the tourist, but come what may, he is never idle. 
 The bacillus, on the other hand, has circumscribed 
 opportunities. Inasmuch as the entire population of 
 the country lives along the river one might suppose 
 that harmful germs would be bred and disseminated 
 by the billion. Yet both natives and visitors drink 
 from the river with impunity. " The sweet water of 
 the Nile " it is called and even the most apprehensive 
 travellers learn to take it after putting in about 
 twenty drops of Scotch, so as to benumb the bacilli, 
 if any should be present. There is an explanation 
 of the micro-organism s failure to do very much 
 harm in Egypt. If a bacillus living anywhere along 
 the Nile starts for a ramble on shore he is sunstruck, 
 and falls helpless in the sand. If he sticks to the 
 water the monotony of travel begins to wear upon 
 him, and after about seven miles he dies of ennui. 
 
 If Egypt is a happy hunting ground for the flea it 
 is likewise a paradise for the fly. If I had to be some 
 thing in Egypt I should prefer to be a Mohammedan 
 
 233 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 fly. This little creature, which in most countries is 
 hounded and persecuted and openly regarded as a 
 pest, is treated with consideration in Egypt hu 
 moured, petted ; indulged, actually spoiled. In the U. 
 S. A. a fly is almost as unpopular as the millionaire. 
 
 In the U. S. A. the fly is almost as unpopular as a 
 millionaire 
 
 He is wary, fretful, and suspicious, because he knows 
 that all humanity is joined in a conspiracy to put 
 him out of business. If he strolls up to a pool of 
 
 234 
 
THE MOHAMMEDAN FLY 
 
 water, temptingly set forth in a white bowl, he finds 
 himself a few minutes later writhing in cramps and 
 full of corrosive sublimate. He sees what appears to 
 be a tempting luncheon of sweets and when he starts 
 in to serve himself he discovers that he is caught and 
 held by the treacherous " tanglefoot " mixture. He 
 sees a sign, " This way to the dining-room," and 
 after passing through a long corridor he lands in 
 a wire trap from which there is no escape. If he 
 alights on a bald head and trys to use it as a rink 
 somebody strikes at him and calls him names. 
 
 It is all different in Egypt. The greatest indignity 
 that a Mohammedan ever offers a fly is to give him 
 a gentle shove and request him to move on. It is 
 contrary to the religious teachings to kill or even 
 cripple this diminutive household companion. The 
 belief in the transmigration of souls seems to prevail 
 everywhere in the mystical East, and perhaps the 
 fly that follows and nags you all afternoon may 
 harbour the spiritual essence of a former head waiter 
 or a bey or some other dignitary. When the flies 
 assemble in large numbers around the various aper 
 tures of a baby s face, the child, obeying an instinct 
 of self-defence, tries to " spat " them and drive them 
 away. But the mother restrains the infant by hold 
 ing its hands and the flies give themselves over to 
 
 235 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 unmolested enjoyment. The older children have 
 learned their lesson and seldom make any effort to 
 brush away the flies which loiter all over their bright 
 young features. This is not a pleasant thing to talk 
 about, but inasmuch as the fly is omnipresent during 
 a trip up the Nile and this friendly understanding 
 between the fly and the native is constantly under the 
 traveller s observation, a description of Egypt would 
 be sadly incomplete without a chapter on the fly. 
 
 Having been a privileged class for many genera 
 tions, the flies are impudent and familiar to a degree. 
 When the white unbeliever, with no conscientious 
 scruples against murder, comes up the river, they 
 swarm about him and buzz into his ears, " Welcome 
 to our city." Then when he begins sparring with 
 them and using sulphurous language, they gather 
 about him in augmented numbers and dodge when 
 he strikes and side step when he slaps himself and 
 seem to think that he is trying to teach them some 
 new kind of a " tag " game. The Mohammedan fly 
 cannot by any effort of the imagination bring him 
 self to believe that a human being would wilfully 
 injure him. This feeling of overconfidcnce in man 
 kind breeds carelessness, and during the open season 
 for tourists many of them are laid low. Mr. Peasley 
 said that if there was anything in the transmigra- 
 
 236 
 
THE MOHAMMEDAN FLY 
 
 tion theory, he figured that he had massacred a 
 regiment of soldiers, several boards of directors, a 
 high school and an insane asylum. The mortalities 
 during the tourist season do not seem to lower the 
 visible supply or in any way discourage the sur 
 viving millions. 
 
 When we started up the river a peddler came to 
 the boat and offered us some small fly brooms. They 
 are very much like the brush used by the apprentice 
 in a blacksmith shop to protect the horse that is 
 being shod. The brush part is made of split palm 
 leaves or horsehair and the handle is decorated with 
 beadwork. The idea of a person sitting about and 
 whisking himself with this ornamental duster struck 
 us as being most unusual, not to say idiotic. Before 
 we travelled far up the Nile we had joined the grand 
 army of whiskers. The fly broom is essential. It is 
 needed every eight seconds. At Luxor we went out 
 to see a gymkhana under the auspices of the Luxor 
 Sporting Club and every one of the two hundred 
 spectators sat there wearily slapping himself about 
 the head with the tufted fly brush while looking at 
 the races. 
 
 The Luxor Sporting Club is not as dangerous as 
 it sounds. The presiding judge of the races was a 
 minister of the gospel and the receipts were given 
 
 237 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 to local charities. A gymkhana is the last resort of 
 a colony shut off from the metropolitan forms 
 of amusement, and yet it can be made the source of 
 much hilarious fun. Nothing could have been more 
 frivolous than the programme at Luxor, and yet the 
 British spectators seldom gave way to mirth. Doubt 
 less they were laughing inwardly. Several ponder 
 ous committees had charge of the arrangements and 
 attended to them with due solemnity. 
 
 First there was a race between native water-car 
 riers, distance about three hundred yards, and each 
 contestant carrying a goat skin filled with water. 
 Then there was a donkey boys race, each rider being 
 required to ride backward. This enabled him to en 
 courage his mount by twisting the tail. In the 
 donkey race for ladies several of the contestants fell 
 off gracefully and were carried to the refreshment 
 booth, where they revived on tea. The " affinity 
 race " was an interesting feature. The contestants 
 rode their donkeys in pairs, a gentleman and a lady 
 holding a long ribbon between them. They were re 
 quired to gallop about two hundred yards, turn a 
 post, and return to the starting point without letting 
 go of the ribbon. By far the most exciting features 
 of the programme were the camel and buffalo races. 
 These animals have associated with the hysterical 
 
 238 
 
THE MOHAMMEDAN FLY 
 
 natives so long that they have lost all of their 
 natural horse sense and are quite daft and irre 
 sponsible. At the word " Go ! " instead of running 
 down the course, the} would snort madly and start 
 off in all directions. If any of them finished under 
 the wire it was by mere chance and not because of 
 any guiding intelligence. One demented water buf 
 falo turned and ran at right angles to the course. 
 The last we saw of him he was disappearing over a 
 hill toward the setting sun, with the native jockey 
 riding on all parts of the upper deck, from the horns 
 back to the tail. 
 
 The gymkhana is intended to provide an afternoon 
 of undiluted nonsense, and for the benefit of those 
 who find reason tottering on her throne and who 
 don t care what they do as long as they enjoy them 
 selves, I shall append a few sample competitions 
 from an Egyptian programme and suggest that they 
 be tried in America. 
 
 Bucket Contest Competitors to gallop past 
 three buckets, throwing a potato into each bucket. 
 Marks to be given for pace. Best of two runs. 
 
 Hat Trimming Competition Gentleman to ride 
 to lady with parcel containing hat and trimmings. 
 Lady to trim hat and gentleman to return to the 
 winning post wearing hat. 
 
 239 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 Dak Race Competitors to drive at the trot about 
 one-half mile, unharness and saddle same pony and 
 ride 200 yards, returning to the winning post. 
 
 Housekeeping Stakes Gentleman on side saddle 
 to ride to lady and give her envelope containing an 
 addition sum. Lady to open envelope, add up this 
 sum and return it to gentleman. First past the post 
 with correct sum wins. 
 
 Needle Threading Competition Lady carries 
 needle and thread 100 yards to gentleman partner. 
 He threads the needle and returns it to lady. First 
 past the post with needle properly threaded wins. 
 
 Egg Carrying Competition for Ladies Each 
 lady carries an egg in an ordinary teaspoon for a 
 distance of about fifty yards. If egg is dropped it 
 must be recovered with the spoon and must not be 
 touched with the hands. First past the post with 
 unbroken egg wins. 
 
 There are many other contests which tax the in 
 tellect in a similar manner, but possibly the fore 
 going will be sufficient to provide a fairly demoralis 
 ing afternoon. Of course, in America it is impossible 
 to secure the real Levantine donkey. In Egypt the 
 donkey takes the place of the motor car, the trolley, 
 the hansom, and the bicycle. In size he ranges from 
 an average goat to a full grown St. Bernard. 
 
 240 
 
THE MOHAMMEDAN FLY 
 
 Ordinarily he is headstrong and hard to manage, 
 having no bridle wisdom whatever, but he is of tough 
 fibre and has a willing nature, and behind his mourn 
 ful countenance there always seems to be lurking a 
 crafty and elusive sense of humour. The names are 
 marvellous. At the various stops on our way up the 
 Nile I became personally acquainted with Rameses 
 the Great, Rameses Telegraph, Rameses Telephone, 
 Jim Corbett, Whiskey Straight, Lovely Sweet, 
 Roosevelt, Sleeping Car, Lydia Pinkham, and others 
 equally appropriate which I cannot now recall. 
 
 As I have indicated above, our wanderings have 
 carried us as far as Luxor. Luxor (the ancient 
 Thebes) is the superlative of all that is old and 
 amazing in Egypt and therefore it calls for at 
 least one separate chapter. 
 
 241 
 
CHAPTER XVII 
 
 IN AND AROUND LUXOR, WITH A SIDE 
 LIGHT ON RAMESES THE GREAT 
 
 UNTIL we arrived at Luxor we did not know the 
 total meaning of the word " old." The ruins, which 
 are the stock in trade of this ancient City of Thebes, 
 date so far back into the dimness of Nowhere that 
 all the other antiquities of earth seem as fresh and 
 recent as a morning newspaper. 
 
 " Old " is merely a relative term, after all. I re 
 member in my native town we small boys used to 
 gaze in reverent awe at a court house that was 
 actually built before the Civil War. We would look 
 up at that weather-beaten frame structure, two 
 stories high, with a square bird cage on top of it, 
 and to us it had all the historic interest of a 
 mediaeval castle. Later, in Chicago, when the special 
 writer on the newspaper ran short of topics he would 
 dish up an illustrated story on the oldest building in 
 town. It was constructed away back in 1833. 
 
 When a man from the West goes East for the first 
 time and sees Independence Hall in Philadelphia, he 
 
 242 
 
IN AN AROUND LUXOR 
 
 takes off his hat and tries to grasp the overwhelm 
 ing fact that the building stood there even in the far 
 distant Colonial period. When he travels to London 
 and walks through St. Paul s or stands in the Henry 
 VII. Chapel at Westminster he begins to get a new 
 line on the meaning of " old." Later he sees the 
 Forum at Rome and declares to himself : " At last 
 I have found something really ancient." 
 
 But when he arrives at Luxor and rambles among 
 the elephantine ruins and sits in the deep cool shade 
 of temples that had been standing a good many cen 
 turies before anyone thought of laying out the 
 Forum in Rome he will begin to understand how 
 everything else in the world is comparatively hot 
 from the griddle. One day we were in the shop of 
 Mouhammed Mouhassib, in Luxor, and the old 
 antiquarian reached under the counter and lugged 
 out a mummy. The body was well preserved, and the 
 embalming cloth in which it was wrapped and cross- 
 wrapped still retained a definite texture. 
 
 " This mummy dates back beyond any of the 
 dynasties of which we have a record," said the dealer. 
 " There were no inscriptions on the mummy case, 
 because when this gentleman lived it was not the 
 custom to inscribe the cocoon. You will observe, 
 however, that he was buried in a sitting posture, and 
 
 243 
 
IN PASTURES "NEW 
 
 we know that this manner of burial was discontinued 
 about 6000 u. c." 
 
 As we stood there gazing into the calm features 
 of the unidentified has-been and realised that he had 
 been sitting in that easy attitude for eight thousand 
 years waiting for us to come along and be presented 
 to him, we began to get a faint inkling of what the 
 word " old " really means. 
 
 Goodness knows I am not going to attempt any 
 detailed description of the stupendous ruins which 
 make Luxor the most interesting spot in Egypt. 
 Anyone who is going to describe Luxor needs a new 
 box of adjectives every few minutes, and, besides, 
 to repeat over and over again that the columns and 
 cavernous sanctuaries at Karnak are " gigantic," 
 and " colossal," and " huge," and so on, cannot 
 bring the reader to any actual conception of the 
 barbaric massiveness of these ancient structures. 
 
 The rulers who built the main temple of Karnak, 
 a section at a time, thought they were not doing 
 themselves credit unless they piled up columns about 
 the size of the redwood trees in California and 
 guarded each entrance with statues as big as the 
 Goddess of Liberty in New York Harbour, and when 
 they made a wall to enclose a courtyard, they put 
 up something to resemble a mountain range. The 
 
 244. 
 
IN AND AROUND LUXOR 
 
 ordinary 150 pound mortal edging his way through 
 the corridors and under the vast shadows of these 
 overwhelming uplifts of masonry feels about as large 
 and as important as a gnat. 
 
 Everywhere about these temples there are uni 
 formed guards whose duty it is to protect the re 
 mains against the vandal and the relic hunter. The 
 guard follows a few feet behind you as you roam 
 through the many acres of toppling ruin. He is 
 afraid that you will steal something. Inasmuch as 
 the smallest fragment of one of these huge statues, 
 or obelisks, would weigh probably six hundred pounds, 
 we felt that he was not justified in suspecting us. 
 But he followed along and then, when we were 
 leaving, he calmly came forward and indicated that 
 he was ready to take a money insult. This move on 
 his part was most characteristic of the Egyptian 
 attitude toward visitors in general. Every native ex 
 pects to get something out of a traveller for the 
 simple reason that he needs the money. Suppose that 
 a suspicious character should arrive in an American 
 city and the chief of police sent out a detective to 
 shadow him and see that he did not blow open any 
 safes or crawl into any second stories. The detective, 
 having followed the suspect all day, approaches him 
 at nightfall and says, " Look here ; you have put 
 
 245 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 me to a lot of trouble. I have been on my feet all 
 day watching you for fear that you were going to 
 commit a burglary, and I think it is only right that 
 you should pay me something." 
 
 Every time we visited an antiquity these guards 
 tagged at our heels, watching us like hawks, and 
 invariably they tried to hold us up for a piece of 
 silver before we departed. There is a Masonic 
 understanding among the natives that the tourist 
 is to be fleeced. For instance, although the copper 
 coins are in common use among the natives, and in 
 the cheaper shops the prices are usually reckoned 
 in milliemes, it is almost impossible for a traveller 
 to get any of these copper coins because the natives 
 want him to bestow his gratuities in piastres. A 
 millieme is worth one-half cent, and then the mill- 
 ieme is further subdivided into fractional coins, some 
 of which are about the size of the mustard seed and 
 worth about as much as a share of mining stock. 
 
 Egyptian money is very easily understood by 
 Americans. The piastre is the same as our five-cent 
 piece or nickel. The silver five piastre piece resem 
 bles our quarter and has the same value. The ten 
 piastre piece is the same as our half-dollar. The 
 100 piastre bill is worth five dollars. Inasmuch as 
 many of the prices sound large and important when 
 
 246 
 
IN AND AROUND LUXOR 
 
 quoted in piastres, the dealers have learned to de 
 mand English pounds sterling or American dollars. 
 That is, they name their first prices in sovereigns 
 and dollars and then gradually work down to pias 
 tres. I saw a native trying to sell a scarab to a 
 tourist. His first price was 7, equivalent to $35. 
 After a half-hour of haggling he had cut it to 
 7 piastres, or 35 cents, and the deal was con 
 summated. 
 
 The old city of Thebes was a huge and hustling 
 metropolis, surrounded by a high wall of a hundred 
 gates, with countless regiments of soldiers march 
 ing out to conquer distant lands and bring back 
 slaves in little batches of 80,000 or so. This was 
 along about 2000 B. c. The city began to lose 
 some of its importance a few centuries before the 
 Christian era and dwindled in size until twenty years 
 ago it was a mere village of huts nestling in the 
 shade of the great temples. Then the tourist travel 
 set in very heavily, and to-day Luxor is a hustling 
 city with large hotels and fancy shops and a gen 
 eral air of prosperity. The magnificent temple of 
 Luxor is in the very heart of the new city. The 
 rambling temple of Karnak is a short donkey ride to 
 the north, and across the river, some three miles to 
 the west, there are more temples and shattered statues 
 
 247 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 and the wonderful tombs of the kings. In olden days 
 there was a broad avenue leading north to Karnak 
 and thence west to the valley in the desert, where 
 the kings were buried, and this boulevard was 
 guarded on either side, for the entire distance, by 
 huge recumbent Sphinxes carved out of granite. 
 Can you imagine a double row of gigantic figures 
 crouched on each side of the street and about 
 twenty feet apart all the way up Broadway to Cen 
 tral Park and then through the Park to Riverside 
 Drive and up the drive to the distant suburbs? If 
 so, you will understand to what an extent these old 
 rulers " went in " for sphinxes. Labour cost nothing 
 and time did not count for anything and if a king 
 wished to build an avenue of sphinxes leading to his 
 private temple or tomb all he had to do was to give 
 the word. 
 
 As soon as a king mounted the throne he began 
 making his funeral preparations, and ordered the 
 entire staff of stone cutters to chisel out hieroglyphs 
 explaining that he was great and good and just, 
 and that he never took off his hat to anyone except 
 the gods, and then not ordinary picayune gods, but 
 only those of the very first magnitude. According 
 to the hieroglyphs, every king that ruled in Egypt 
 was as wise as Solomon, as brilliant in military 
 
 248 
 
IN AND AROUND LUXOR 
 
 1 
 
 o 
 .8 
 09 
 
 (3 
 
 24*9 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 strategy as Napoleon, and as hard on the evildoer 
 as our own beloved T. R. 
 
 This unanimous outpouring of eulogy is largely 
 explained by the fact that every memorial in honour 
 of a ruler was erected and supervised by that ruler 
 himself. It s a fact! Of all the countless temples 
 and obelisks and godlike granite figures and festal 
 tomb chambers remaining in Egypt to testify to 
 the majesty and splendour of the ancient dynasties, 
 every one was built under the personal supervision 
 of the man who gets all of the glory out of the in 
 scriptions. The succeeding generation never got up 
 subscription lists, to build monuments to statesmen 
 or military commanders. The dutiful and loving 
 son never ordered a memorial in honour of his illus 
 trious father. He was too busy carving his own 
 biography on the sandstone and depicting himself 
 as pursuing the enemy or taking afternoon tea with 
 haughty three-headed gods. 
 
 In old Egypt every king was his own press agent. 
 These rulers could have written some great " per 
 sonal recollections " for the magazines, because they 
 remembered all the incidents that brought them to 
 the centre of the stage with the calcium turned on, 
 and wisely forgot all details calculated to injure 
 their standing with posterity. 
 
 250 
 
IN AND AROUND LUXOR 
 
 You take Rameses the Great. He is regarded as 
 perhaps the king pin of all the rulers during Egypt s 
 long period of national splendour. Have you ever 
 heard anyone say a word in criticism of Rameses 
 fiscal policy, his treatment of the rebate system, 
 management of the Senate, or his social relations 
 with the dark emissaries that came up from Nubia? 
 No ! Everyone has a good word for Rameses. The 
 writers of ancient history extol him, and the guide 
 books print his name in big black letters, and the 
 travellers to Egypt gather about his glass-covered 
 coffin in the Ghizeh Museum at Cairo and try to trace 
 noble lineaments in the shrunken features. They sigh 
 over his departure and look down at him mournfully, 
 with their hats in their hands, as if they had lost 
 him this spring, instead of 3164 years ago this 
 spring. They say : " Well, he certainly was a 
 grand character and it s too bad we haven t got 
 some rulers of his calibre nowadays." 
 
 It is not my desire to attack Rameses, but I feel 
 it my duty to submit to students of history and 
 archaeologists a very interesting papyrus, which 
 came into my possession at Luxor. If this docu 
 ment is accepted as authentic and the statements 
 are believed, then it would appear that Rameses was 
 the champion advertiser of ancient times. If Ram- 
 
 251 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 252 
 
IN AND AROUND LUXOR 
 
 eses were alive to-day he would own all the bill 
 boards in America. He would take a full page in 
 every Sunday paper and have his picture on free 
 calendars. He would give Lawson cards and spades. 
 
 In all accepted records discovered up to this time 
 Rameses has received nothing but praise. Why? 
 Because all the records were doctored by Rameses 
 himself. He was the great builder of Egypt and all 
 over the walls of every building that he erected he 
 had his picture and tales of his mighty achievements 
 blazoned forth in bright colors like the row of ban 
 ners in front of a side show,. Wherever in Egypt he 
 could find a large smooth-faced rock he would engage 
 a member of the Royal Academy to sculp something 
 about Rameses, and he would always stand and look 
 over the sculptor s shoulder to make sure that the 
 king didn t get the worst of it. If the army of Ram 
 eses suffered a defeat at the hands of the Hittites, 
 did any mention of the fact find its way into the 
 inscriptions? Most assuredly not. Rameses had the 
 hieroglyphs report that he made a masterly man 
 oeuvre in order to develop the strength of the 
 enemy and then retired to a new and more strategic 
 position. 
 
 We cannot discover from the old inscrip 
 tions that any Egyptian army ever suffered defeat, 
 
 253 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 and yet it has been learned from other sources that 
 now and then an invading army had the whole native 
 population running foot races up and down the Nile. 
 
 To make sure the King didn t get the worst of it 
 
 However, it was not considered good form for his 
 torians to mention these painful incidents. The rate 
 of mortality among those who criticised the admin 
 istration was exactly 100 per cent. It is because all 
 
 254 
 
IN AND AROUND LUXOR 
 
 of the familiar records are known to have been under 
 censorship that the papyrus discovered by me at 
 Luxor possesses a most startling interest. 
 
 As a cold matter of fact, I discovered this manu 
 script by proxy. That is, I bought it from the man 
 who said he had found it concealed in the funeral 
 vestments of a mummy uprooted near Thebes in the 
 month of February. I cannot give the name of this 
 Egyptian for the reason that all valuable antiquities 
 discovered in Egypt are supposed to belong to the 
 government, and anyone concealing an art treasure 
 or some document of rare value may be severely pun 
 ished. I can say this much, however the native from 
 whom I bought the papyrus assured me that he was 
 an honourable and truthful guide, and he gave me his 
 personal guarantee that he had removed the docu 
 ment from the mummy s undergarment with his own 
 hands and had been waiting an opportunity to 
 offer it to a traveller who was really a connoisseur 
 of antiquities and a reverent student of ancient lan 
 guages. All this he told me while we were out on the 
 desert together, and after looking apprehensively in 
 all directions to make sure that no human being was 
 within three miles of us, he pulled a tin cylinder from 
 under his robe and carefully removed from it the 
 time-stained but still intact roll of papyrus. I must 
 
 255 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 say that I never saw a more convincing document. 
 The hieroglyphs looked as Egyptian as anything 
 could be, and as soon as I saw them I had a burn 
 ing curiosity to know what message to future genera 
 tions this poor mummy had been hugging in his 
 bosom through all these centuries. I asked regarding 
 the mummy on which the papyrus had been found 
 and learned that the inscription on his outer coffin 
 indicated that he had been an officer assigned to the 
 royal palace of Rameses II., the type of courtier 
 who must bend the supple knee and wear the smiling 
 face, at all times concealing his real opinion of things 
 in general. 
 
 The guarantee which accompanied the papyrus 
 was so heartfelt and altogether emphatic that I 
 made the purchase. The price was large, but I felt 
 justified in paying it, for the native assured me that 
 I could sell it to the British Museum at any time for 
 twice as much. I promised faithfully that I would 
 never mention his name in connection with the deal, 
 and this promise was easily kept, because he had a 
 name that no one could have remembered for two 
 minutes. 
 
 For obvious reasons I did not show the document 
 to my travelling companions. I knew that if people 
 heard of my discovery and got to talking about it 
 
 256 
 
IN AND AROUND LUXOR 
 
 I might not be permitted to take it out of the coun 
 try. When we arrived at Cairo I went to Mr. Ralph 
 
 The original papyrus 
 
 Blanchard, an American who is noted as an anti 
 quarian, Egyptologist, and mummy collector, and 
 
 257, 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 after a few cautious preliminaries told him that I 
 had a document in hieroglyphics of which I desired 
 a translation. I begged him not to inquire where or 
 how I had obtained the papyrus. All I wanted him to 
 do was to tell me what the fool thing meant. 
 
 Blanchard was startled as soon as he looked at 
 the document. I could see that. He said he had de 
 ciphered a good many acres of hieroglyphics, but 
 this record was unique and the most interesting that 
 had ever come under his observation. He spent two 
 days on the translation, so as to be absolutely accu 
 rate regarding every fine point and get not only the 
 cold words but also the literary style and the real 
 spirit of the original communication. 
 
 Let the translation speak for itself. I must con 
 fess that when it was completed I was overwhelmed. 
 Not only had a flood of light been let in upon a most 
 important epoch, but there were also surprising rev 
 elations as to the origin of valued words and phrases. 
 Here is the translation : 
 
 Rameses Second is a Smooth Citizen. His Foxy 
 Scheme is to bunko Posterity. His Soldiers go out 
 and put up a hard Scrap and do up the enemy and he 
 hires a Stonecutter to give an Account of it on a 
 Granite Rock and hand all the Bouquets to Rameses. 
 He is building many Temples. The Architects draw 
 
 258 
 
IN AND AROUND LUXOR 
 
 the Plans. The Labourers do the Work. The Public 
 foots the Bill. Rameses and the Local Deities are the 
 only ones who "butt into the Inscriptions. He has the 
 future doped out as follows: Three thousand years 
 
 RAMe&es_seco A SMOOTH crptefl *u POXY SCMUI*. s n> y*KO 
 
 HI* oupiER o OUT AND PUT UP A KA HP CRAP ANDjDOUP THEEHSMY, 
 AND HE HIREA A _6TONE Ci/TTt\ TO ClVi AN ACCOUNT OP IT; 
 
 OH A OAANITC ROCK AND HANf> ALL THC OUaUbT& TO RAWCS.CS. HC IS 
 
 - H ^ A ^ % o*$ 
 
 BUILBINO MANV TEMPLES. T E ARCHITECTS C^AW TH< M.AN&. THE LABORERS 
 
 0-1 H ?Si ^-I^-^^i^^fp, 
 
 00 TWl WORK. THE Puftl.lC FOOTS THE BILL. fUMECCA AND TM6 DOme 
 
 THE ONUY ONES WHO BUTT INTO THU INSCRIPTIONS. HE HAS 
 
 *~ IIS- Qg. - ^?.K|! - 
 
 Re DOPED OUT AS POLLOWS TKR.EE TMOUAANO VEAfts PROM NOW 
 
 SEE MY PlCTURBi ALL OVft THE HOp&-, THBY WILL 
 
 -S> ^ - . ^ Q . ffj-. 
 
 CONCLUDE THAT I MUST HAVE BEEN THE R.EAI. WORKA ANP 
 
 \ft - &# ^ 51 
 
 THEY WILL CALU Mft RAME6ES THB CROAT ^*~ 
 
 Translation of the Rameses papyrus 
 from now, when Cook s Tourists see my Pictures all 
 over the Shop, they will conclude that I must have 
 been the real Works and they will call me Rameses 
 the Great. 
 
 259 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 This revelation in regard to the self-advertising 
 proclivities of the great monarch, coming, as it did, 
 from one who had been intimately associated with 
 him, was so vastly important that Mr. Blanchard 
 thought it better to verify the translation. He took 
 a copy of the document to several eminent Egyptol 
 ogists, and they agreed with him on every point. 
 They said there was no getting away from " scraps " 
 and " butt in " and " dope out " and other charac 
 ters which seemed to me to have somewhat of a 
 modern flavour. 
 
 After a man has been universally respected for 
 nearly three thousand two hundred years it does 
 seem a low down trick to show him up. And, pos 
 sibly, the anonymous writer was prejudiced because 
 he had failed to secure an appointment. Did the 
 papyrus really come from the bosom of the mummy ? 
 Who knows? Sometimes it is the duty of the trav 
 eller to record facts as they come under his observa 
 tion and not to draw hasty conclusions. 
 
 The documentary evidence is submitted herewith 
 first a copy of the original papyrus and then the 
 translation, word for word and phrase by phrase. 
 The testimony should convince any who are disposed 
 to be sceptical. My only hope is that it will not 
 entirely blast the reputation of Rameses. 
 
 260 
 
CHAPTER XVIII 
 
 THE ORDINARY HUMAN FAILINGS OF THE 
 ANCIENT MOGULS 
 
 1AKEN by themselves, as mere mouldering chunks 
 of antiquity that have been preserved to us because 
 they happened to be dropped down in a dry climate, 
 the fragmentary remains of old Egypt are not very 
 inspiring. They were big, but seldom beautiful. As 
 records proving that humanity old-fashioned, un 
 reliable humanity, with its fears, jealousies, hatreds, 
 and aching ambitions is just about the same as it 
 was five thousand years ago, the temples and the 
 decorated tombs seem to bring us direct and heart 
 felt messages from our brethren of the long ago. 
 
 For instance, from the beginning of time prob 
 ably the most maddening and unbearable persecution 
 that can be visited upon a sensitive human being is 
 to have some other human being always held up 
 before him as a shining moral example. 
 
 Do you recall, O male reader, how you writhed in 
 humiliation and laid plans for assault and battery 
 when the good little Rollo of your native town was 
 
 261 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 constantly dangled before your depraved soul as the 
 paragon of juvenile virtues? " Hollo never smokes 
 corn silk." " Hollo never puts tick-tacks on teacher s 
 bedroom window." " Hollo never carries craw dab- 
 
 TTie paragon of juvenile virtues 
 
 bers in his Sunday clothes." " Hollo never runs away 
 to go swimming and then comes back with his ears 
 full of gravel." 
 
 No, indeed, Hollo never showed any of the traits 
 262 
 
FAILINGS OF ANCIENT MOGULS 
 that have been the essence of boyhood since Adam 
 and Eve started the original brood. And do you re 
 member how bright and sunshiny that day seemed 
 when Rollo, having grown to pale and sidewhiskered 
 manhood, was arrested for stealing money from 
 the Building and Loan Association? 
 
 Take the story of Queen Hatasoo. She was the 
 Victoria of the eighteenth dynasty, and was on the 
 throne just about 1500 B. c. The lineal male de 
 scendant of that period had a blot on the scutcheon 
 or a bar sinister across his pedigree or something 
 wrong with his registry certificate anyway, he 
 could not qualify as king, and so his sister Hatasoo 
 was made ruler and he was permitted to hang around 
 the palace as a kind of shawl holder and cab opener. 
 He led the cotillons and attended public dinners and 
 wore decorations, but Hatasoo ran Egypt and Thut- 
 mes Second was merely a trailer. When he dropped 
 off there did not seem to be any considerable vacancy 
 in court circles. Queen Hatasoo continued as chief 
 monarch, although her step-nephew, Thutmes Third, 
 carried the honourary title of co-regent. Hatasoo 
 was energetic and ambitious. She put nephew into 
 a remote back seat and ran things to suit herself, 
 waging wars, building temples, and organising expe 
 ditions to far distant lands. Also, according to an- 
 
 263 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 cient custom, she had her portrait and the record of 
 her accomplishments carved on the obelisks and 
 painted all over the walls of her private temple, 
 which is still standing, about three miles west of the 
 present city of Luxor. 
 
 She reigned for thirty-five years, and then Thut- 
 mes Third, gray bearded and worn with much wait 
 ing, emerged from the nursery and took up the reins 
 of government. According to the judgment of later 
 historians, his reign was about the most glorious in 
 the whole history of Egypt. He was possessed of 
 military genius, and under his direction Syria was 
 recaptured, and the influence of Egypt was firmly 
 established in Western Asia. But no matter how 
 many battles he won or how many captives he brought 
 back to Thebes to exhibit in the courthouse square, 
 the old-timers around the court wagged their heads 
 and said, " Yes, he s doing fairly well for a begin 
 ner, but he ll never come up to the mark set by his 
 Aunt Hattie." Hatasoo was her full name, but 
 those who had known her for a long time called her 
 " Hattie," and to a few of her intimates she was 
 known as " Hat." 
 
 Thutmes was merely human. For years his dom 
 ineering aunt had kept him out of the running, and 
 now that he was on the throne the glory of her 
 
 264. 
 
FAILINGS OF ANCIENT MOGULS 
 
 achievements was constantly being dinged into him. 
 Every time he rode out in his chariot, standing up 
 and sawing away at four horses, just as they do 
 
 " He ll never come up to the mark set by his aunt 
 Hattie " 
 
 in Ringling s circus at the present time, he saw her 
 name and picture on all the public buildings, and, of 
 course, two or three years after her departure, every 
 body bragged about her a good deal harder than 
 they had while she was alive. Even the English news- 
 
 265 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 papers speak in kindly terms of an American states 
 man who is safely deceased. 
 
 Thutmes stood it as long as he could, and then he 
 broke over. He ordered the stonecutters to go forth 
 and gouge out all the inscriptions relating to his 
 superior aunt. The temple which she had built as a 
 special memorial he appropriated to himself, and 
 put his name over the main entrance. It may have 
 been pretty spiteful, but the whole proceeding some 
 how seems to establish a sympathetic link between 
 those remote heathen days and the unselfish Utopian 
 civilisation that we now enjoy in Chicago, Omaha, 
 West Superior, and other centres of brotherly love. 
 
 After Thutmes had put in years erasing and chis 
 elling out all complimentary references to Hata- 
 soo, he passed away and was carried to a winding 
 subterranean tomb in the valley to the west. For 
 two hundred years the great monuments which he had 
 erected in his own honour, or quietly borrowed from 
 his aunt, remained intact. Then along came Rameses 
 Second, to whom we have already referred as the best 
 little advertiser of ancient times. He had the name 
 of Thutmes removed from all the temples, obelisks, 
 and public buildings, and put his own glaring label 
 on everything in sight. In the language of Mr. 
 Peasley, the Kings seemed to spend most of their 
 
 266 
 
FAILINGS OF ANCIENT MOGULS 
 
 time in " knocking their predecessors " and " boost 
 ing " themselves. 
 
 Nearly every ancient structure has been defaced 
 
 or altered to gratify a private jealousy or some 
 prejudice founded on religious belief. The Romans 
 
 267 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 tried to obliterate the old Egyptian deities. The 
 early Christians hacked away at anything that failed 
 to strike them as being orthodox. Then the Turks 
 capped the climax by coming in and burning every 
 thing non-Mohammedan that was at all combustible. 
 A few ancient records remain because they are 
 carved in huge characters on very hard stone. The 
 theologians wanted to batter them down, but it 
 would have meant a lot of hard work and they had 
 been leading sedentary lives. So they merely criss 
 crossed them and wrote the equivalent for " Rats " 
 underneath, and let it go at that. 
 
 Even the modern circus bill is not more exuberant 
 and given to joyful hyperbole than the inscriptions 
 and paintings of the Egyptian temples. A few of 
 them are reproduced herewith. Take No. 1, for ex 
 ample. This represents our old friend Rameses 
 the Great in the act of overcoming his enemies. It 
 was designed by Rameses himself. Now we know 
 where Kaiser Wilhelm got all of his tips. 
 
 Some warriors are content with overcoming one 
 man at a time, but Rameses is seen holding ten of 
 them by the hair, getting ready to clout them into 
 insensibility. The picture is an artistic success, but 
 is somewhat shy anatomically. The ten enemies have 
 a total of only three legs for the whole crowd. They 
 
 268 
 
FAILINGS OF ANCIENT MOGULS 
 
 are better supplied with arms, the total being thir 
 teen, or about one and one-third to the man. Notice 
 also the relative size of Rameses and his foes. There 
 
 Where Kaiser Willielm got all his tips 
 
 we have the real, unchanging spirit of autobiog 
 raphy the great I triumphant and the petty antag 
 onists all coming about knee high to him. 
 
 No. 2 is also very characteristic. One of the kings 
 is represented as defeating two burly warriors. He 
 is walking on one and pushing his spear through the 
 other. Undoubtedly a glorious achievement. It would 
 
 269 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 be still more glorious if the two gentlemen putting 
 up the fight against the King had carried weapons 
 of some sort. The one on the ground, who is lifting 
 his hands in mild protest against being used as a 
 rug, has nothing on his person to indicate that he is 
 a soldier. The one who is being harpooned carries in 
 his left hand what appears to be a box of handker 
 chiefs. The raised right arm would suggest that 
 he attempted to slap the King, who caught him by 
 the arm and held him until he could select a good 
 vital spot in which to prong him. Attention is called 
 to the fact that both of the victims wear the long 
 and protuberant chin whisker, which would indicate 
 that the honest farmer was getting the worst of it 
 even four thousand years ago. 
 
 The carvings and paintings which do not depict 
 warlike scenes usually show the monarchs receiving 
 homage from terrified subjects or else mingling on 
 terms of equality with the principal deities of the 
 period. Illustration No. 3 is a very good specimen. 
 King Amenophis and his wife are seen seated on 
 their square-built Roycroft thrones, while two head 
 priests of Ammon burn incense before them and sing 
 their praises and tell them that the people are with 
 the administration, no matter how the Senate may 
 carry on. There was no race prejudice in those days. 
 
 270 
 
FAILINGS OF ANCIENT MOGULS 
 The Queen is shown to be a coal-black Nubian. In 
 one hand she carries what seems to be a fly brush of 
 the very kind that we used all the time we were up 
 the Nile, and if the article in her other hand is not 
 a cocktail glass then the artist has wilfully libelled 
 her. 
 
 No. 4 is interesting as a fashion plate. Ptolemeus 
 and Cleopatra are making offers to the hawk-headed 
 god and the goddess Hathor. This picture will ap 
 peal to women inasmuch as it gives us a correct like 
 ness of Cleopatra, the man trapper. No one can 
 dispute the fact that she is beautiful, but how about 
 the combination of an Empress gown with a habit 
 back? Is it not a trifle daring? And the hat. Would 
 you call it altogether subdued? 
 
 Another well-preserved painting to be found in the 
 temple at Edfou reveals the innate modesty of the 
 Ptolemies. The King (No. 5) is represented as being 
 crowned by the goddesses of the south and the north 
 that is, of Upper and Lower Egypt. These divin 
 ities seem to be overcome with admiration of the 
 athletic monarch. One has her hand resting on his 
 shoulder, as if she hated to see him go. The other, 
 having just fitted him with his new gourd-shaped 
 hat, has both hands in the air, and you can almost 
 hear her say, " Oh, my ! It looks just fine ! " 
 
 271 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 Seti I. was another shrinking violet. In one of his 
 private three-sheet advertisements (No. 6) he has the 
 sublime effrontery to represent the great goddess 
 Hathor as holding his hand tenderly and offering him 
 the jewelled collar which she is wearing. Notice the 
 uplifted hand. He is supposed to be saying, " This 
 is all very sudden, and besides, would it be proper 
 for me to accept jewelry from one of your sex?" 
 Of course, there never was any Hathor, and if there 
 had been she wouldn t have hob-nobbed with a man 
 who had his private interviews done into oil paintings. 
 But this painting and one thousand others that we 
 have seen in Egypt help to give us a line on the an 
 cient Kings. If there was any one of them that failed 
 to get the swelled head soon after mounting the 
 throne, the hieroglyphs are strangely silent regard 
 ing his case. They were a vain, self -laudatory lot, 
 and all of them had that craving for the centre of 
 the stage and the hot glare of the spot-light which 
 is still to be found in isolated cases. 
 
 After all is said and done can we blame them? 
 Rameses wanted to be remembered and talked about 
 and he laid his plans accordingly. He carved the 
 record of his long and successful reign on the un 
 yielding granite and distributed his pictures with the 
 careful prodigality of a footlight favourite. What 
 
 272 
 
FAILINGS OF ANCIENT MOGULS 
 has been the result? His name is a household joke all 
 over the world. People who never heard of Professor 
 Harry Thurston Peck or Marie Corelli or the present 
 Khedive of Egypt know all about Rameses the Great, 
 although no two of them pronounce it the same. 
 
 273 
 
CHAPTER XIX 
 
 ROYAL TOMBS AND OTHER PLACES OF 
 AMUSEMENT 
 
 ONE morning we rode across the Nile from Luxor 
 in a broad and buxom sailboat, climbed on our don 
 keys, and rode to the west. We followed the narrow 
 road through the fresh fields of wheat and alfalfa 
 until we struck the desert, and then we took to a 
 dusty trail which leads to a winding valley, where 
 the kings of the eighteenth, nineteenth, and twen 
 tieth dynasties are being dug up. 
 
 This narrow valley, with the steep hills rising on 
 either side, is the sure-enough utterness of desolation ; 
 not a tree, not a shrub, not a blade of grass, not even 
 a stingy little cactus. No wonder the old kings 
 picked out this valley for a cemetery. Life has no 
 charm in this dreary region. Eternal sleep would 
 seem to offer peculiar advantages. After winding 
 through the sun-baked gravel for about a mile we 
 came to a settlement of houses and a high fence 
 
 274 
 
ROYAL TOMBS AND OTHER PLACES 
 
 thrown across the roadway. Also there was an elec 
 tric light plant buzzing away merrily. The tombs 
 of the kings are now strung with incandescent lights. 
 Can you beat that for sacrilegious enterprise? 
 
 There are forty-one of these royal tombs that 
 have been discovered and opened to date. The less 
 important are not lighted, and are mere tunnels 
 leading back to one or two bare chambers. Those 
 really worth visiting are dug far back into the hills. 
 The halls are spacious and brilliantly decorated, and 
 before you get through exploring one of them you 
 think that you are pretty well down toward the cen 
 tre of the earth. 
 
 Mr. Peasley had read up on the Tomb of Amenho- 
 tep Third and when we entered it he pushed the reg 
 ular guide out of the way and gave us one of his 
 own vivid lectures. The native guide lacks imagina 
 tion. His idea of showing the traveller a f rolicksome 
 time is to point out a lot of paintings in which the 
 deceased is seen travelling across the Nile in a 
 funeral barge. Mr. Peasley, on the other hand, gave 
 us an insight into the character of the wily Amen- 
 hotep. 
 
 " Now, look at the entrance to this tomb," he said, 
 as we started down the new wooden steps. " It looks 
 as if someone had been blasting for limestone. The 
 
 275 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 walls are rough and unfinished. Old Amenhotep fig 
 ured that if anyone ever came across the opening to 
 the tomb he would size up this ordinary hole in the 
 ground and conclude that it was either a cave used 
 
 L -> 
 
 
 
 " Now look at the entrance to this tomb," lie said 
 
 as a storehouse or the last resting place of some 
 cheap two-dollar official." 
 
 After descending some twenty feet we came to a 
 small chamber which was rudely frescoed about half 
 of the way around. 
 
 " Do you know why he left this job unfinished? " 
 276 
 
ROYAL TOMBS AND OTHER PLACES 
 asked Mr. Peasley. " He knew that some day or other 
 an inquisitive foreigner would be prowling around 
 here trying to uncover ancient treasures, and he put 
 this measly little antechamber here to throw Mr. 
 Archaeologist off the scent. He wanted it to appear 
 that the man who was buried here had been so poor 
 that he couldn t complete the decorations. And now 
 I ll show you something more foxy still. Come with 
 me down this long flight of steps to the second 
 chamber." 
 
 He led us down another flight to a tall chamber 
 about the size of a freight car stood on end. 
 
 " When the French explorers opened this place in 
 1898 the chamber which you are now inspecting 
 seemed to be the end of the tunnel," continued Mr. 
 Peasley. " The four side walls were perfectly smooth 
 and unbroken, but down at the bottom they found a 
 pit which had been filled with heavy stones. They 
 supposed, of course, that this was the mummy pit, 
 and that if they removed the stones they would find 
 some royal remains at the other end of the hole. 
 So they worked day after day, lifting out the boul 
 ders, and finally they came to the end of the pit and 
 found that they had drawn a blank. Naturally they 
 were stumped. They thought they had been explor 
 ing a tomb, but it was only an April fool joke. One 
 
 277 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 of the professors was not satisfied. He felt sure that 
 there must be a royal mummy tucked in somewhere 
 about the premises, so he took a ladder and climbed 
 around and began tapping all over the walls of this 
 second chamber. What do you think? He discovered 
 that the wall had a hollow sound just opposite the 
 tunnel at which they had entered. So he used a bat 
 tering ram and broke through into the real tomb. 
 Yes, sir ; these two outer chambers, w r ith their cheap 
 stencil frescoes and fake mummy pit, had been a 
 blind." 
 
 We passed over a narrow wooden bridge and en 
 tered the tunnel beyond the second chamber. The 
 whole place was brightly illuminated and one could 
 readily believe that he was in a modern hallway 
 decorated in the most gorgeous Egyptian style. 
 The bordering frescoes and the historical paintings 
 were as fresh in tone as if they had been put on 
 only yesterday. One of the larger chambers looked 
 exactly like the gaudy u Oriental apartment " of a 
 Paris or New York hotel, and we shouldn t have been 
 surprised or displeased to see a waiter come in with 
 a tray full of cool drinks. 
 
 At last we came to the tomb chamber, and there in 
 a deep hollow, with a modern wooden railing around 
 it, reclined the great King Amenhotep, with the in- 
 
 278 
 
ROYAL TOMBS AND OTHER PLACES 
 
 candescent lamps dangling above him and flooding 
 him in a radiant light. The original granite cover 
 of the outer case has been removed and plate glass 
 substituted. We leaned on the rail and gazed down 
 at the serene countenance of the once mighty mon 
 arch who had been lying there for 3300 years. The 
 funeral garlands which had been laid on his breast 
 were still undisturbed, and the shrunken face was 
 illumined by that calm smile of triumph which Amen- 
 hotep wore when he passed away confident in the 
 belief that the Nile tourist would never discover his 
 hiding place. 
 
 We visited the tomb in company with a bustling 
 swarm of American excursionists of the happy, ir 
 reverent kind. The fact that they were strolling 
 about in a private and highly aristocratic sarcopha 
 gus did not seem to repress their natural gush of 
 spirits or induce any solemn reflections. They were 
 all steaming hot, but very happy and having a lot 
 of fun with the King. One enterprising Yankee, who 
 carried his coat and vest on his arm, started to climb 
 over the w r ooden railing in order to make a close in 
 spection of the mortuary remains, but was restrained 
 by the guards. 
 
 After leaving the valley of tombs we made a short 
 cut over a very hot and a very high hill to the " rest 
 
 279 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 house " which has been erected far out on the desert 
 by one of the tourist agencies. We collapsed on the 
 shady side of the building, dusty and short of breath, 
 and immediately we were attacked by a most vocif 
 erous horde of native peddlers. And what do you 
 suppose they were selling? We landed there on Fri 
 day, and the remnant sale of mummies was in full 
 blast. Here are some of the cut prices: 
 
 Head of adult 4 shillings. 
 
 Foot of adult 1 shilling. 
 
 Hand of adult 1 shilling. 
 
 Two feet and two hands (warranted 
 
 mates) 3 shillings. 
 
 Arm and head 6 shillings. 
 
 Special reduction for juvenile sizes. 
 
 Can you imagine anything more disquieting to the 
 nerves, when you are resting and getting ready for 
 luncheon, than to have a villainous child of the des 
 ert rush up and lay a petrified human head in your 
 lap and beg you to make an offer? Within two min 
 utes after we arrived we had fragments of former 
 humanity stacked all around us. And they were un 
 mistakably genuine. The native swindlers can make 
 imitation scarabs and potteries, or else import them 
 
 280 
 
ROYAL TOMBS AND OTHER PLACES 
 
 by the gross from Germany and Connecticut, but the 
 mummy heads which they offer for sale are horribly 
 bona fide. It would not pay to manufacture an imi 
 tation article, inasmuch as the whole desert region 
 
 For the loved ones at home 
 
 to the west of ancient Thebes is a vast cemetery. If 
 the merchant s stock runs low he can go out with a 
 spade and dig up a new supply, just as a farmer 
 would go after artichokes. 
 
 281 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 Our guide co-operated with the ghouls. He rushed 
 about hunting up strange and grisly specimens and 
 brought them to us and begged us to examine them 
 and then pick out a few for the loved ones at home. 
 I regret to say that we did purchase a few of these 
 preserved extremities. The guide said we could use 
 them as paper weights. 
 
 This same dragoman, or guide, or highbinder, or 
 whatever you may choose to call him and Mr. Peas- 
 ley called him nearly everything gave us a lot of 
 cheerful entertainment during our four days in 
 Luxor. Mr. Peasley was in hot pursuit of guaran 
 teed antiquities. He said he had an old bookcase at 
 home which he was going to convert into a curio 
 cabinet. There is one dealer in Luxor who is said to 
 be absolutely trustworthy. He supplies museums and 
 private collections throughout the world, and if you 
 buy a scarab or a carved image from him you know 
 that you have something genuine and worth keeping. 
 Mr. Peasley in a thoughtless moment requested the 
 dragoman to conduct us to this shop. We went in 
 and burrowed through the heaps of tempting rubbish 
 and began to dicker for a job lot of little images, 
 tear jars, amulets, etc., that are found in the mummy 
 cases. That dragoman saw the covetous gleam in the 
 Peasley eye and he knew that the man from Iowa in- 
 
 282 
 
ROYAL TOMBS AND OTHER PLACES 
 
 tended loading up with antiques, and he also knew 
 that Mr. Peasley wished to do this purchasing single- 
 handed and without the assistance of a dragoman, 
 who would come in for a ten per cent, commission. 
 We told the dealer we would drop around later. So 
 we went to the hotel and dismissed the dragoman 
 told him to go home and get a good night s rest and 
 be on hand at nine o clock the next morning. 
 
 After we were safely in the hotel Mr. Peasley con 
 fided his plans to us. 
 
 " I don t want to buy the stuff while that infernal 
 Mahmoud is along," he said. " Why should he get 
 a rake-off? We didn t go to the shop on his recom 
 mendation. Now, I ll go over there by myself, pick 
 out what I want, and strike a bargain." 
 
 We offered to go along and assist, so we started 
 up a side street, and after we had gone a block Mah 
 moud stepped out from a doorway and said, " Come, 
 I will show you the way." We told him we had just 
 sauntered out for a breath of air, so we walked aim 
 lessly around a block and were escorted back to the 
 hotel. 
 
 " I ll go over the first thing in the morning," said 
 Mr. Peasley. " I ll be there at eight o clock, because 
 he isn t due here until nine." 
 
 When he arrived at the shop early next morning 
 283 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 MaKmoud was standing in the doorway wearing a 
 grin of devilish triumph. Mr. Peasley kept on walk 
 ing and pretending not to see him, but he came back 
 to the hotel mad all the way through. 
 
 " We re up against an Oriental mind-reader, but 
 I ll fool him yet," he declared. " When we come 
 
 Mahmoud wearing a grin of devilish triumph 
 
 back to the hotel for luncheon and he is waiting for 
 us with the donkey boys on the east side of the hotel 
 we will go out the west door to the river bank and cut 
 
 284 
 
ROYAL TOMBS AND OTHER PLACES 
 
 south around the Presbyterian Mission and come 
 back to the shop." 
 
 Mr. Peasley did not know that Mahmoud had or 
 ganised all the hotel servants into a private detect 
 ive agency. He must have known of our escape on 
 the river side before we had gone a hundred feet from 
 the hotel, for when, after executing our brilliant 
 flank movement, we arrived at the shop of the anti 
 quarian, Mahmoud and the proprietor were sitting 
 in the front room drinking Turkish coffee and wait 
 ing for the prey to wander into the trap. Mahmoud 
 did not seem surprised to see us. He bade us welcome 
 and said that his friend the dealer was an Egyptolo 
 gist whose guarantee was accepted by every museum 
 in the world, and if we were in the market for an 
 tiques he would earnestly advise us to seek no fur 
 ther. After this evidence of a close and friendly 
 understanding between the dragoman and the dealer 
 we had a feeling that Mahmoud would get his ten 
 per cent, even if we succeeded in eluding him and 
 buying on our own hook. 
 
 But we hated to acknowledge ourselves beaten. At 
 dusk that evening we started toward the shop, in a 
 half-hearted and experimental spirit, and presently 
 we observed Mahmoud following along fifty feet be 
 hind us. We went to the garden of a neighbouring 
 
 285 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 hotel and sat there until eleven o clock. When we 
 came out Mahmoud was at the gateway. He said it 
 was not always safe for travellers to be about the 
 streets at night, so he would protect us and show us 
 the way back to our hotel. 
 
 We found it impossible to get away from him. 
 No Siberian bloodhound ever followed a convict s 
 trail more closely. If we ventured forth, early or 
 late, we found ourselves shadowed by that smiling 
 reprobate. When it came to the last day in Luxor 
 Mr. Peasley did the bold thing. He permitted Mah 
 moud to escort him to the shop, and then he said to 
 the dealer : " This man is our guide, but he is not 
 entitled to any commission because he did not bring 
 us to your shop. If he had recommended your shop 
 in the first place we would not have come here at all. 
 He is a bluff. He is trying to ring in. I want to buy 
 a few things here, with the understanding that he 
 doesn t get anything out of it. We have already paid 
 him two salaries for guiding us and he isn t a guide 
 at all he s a night watchman." 
 
 The dealer vowed and protested that he never paid 
 commissions to anyone. Mahmoud, not at all ruf 
 fled by the attack on his character, said that his 
 only ambition in life was to serve the noble gentleman 
 from the famous country known as Iowa. So Mr. 
 
 286 
 
ROYAL TOMBS AND OTHER PLACES 
 
 Peasley bought his assortment of antiques, and Mah- 
 moud looked on and then carried the parcel back to 
 the hotel, walking respectfully behind the " noble 
 gentleman." 
 
 " Well, I blew myself," reported Mr. Peasley. 
 " And I ll bet a thousand dollars that Mahmoud gets 
 his ten per cent." 
 
 Whereupon Mahmoud smiled the pensive, pat 
 ronising smile of a civilisation five thousand years 
 old looking down on the aboriginal product of the 
 Western prairies. 
 
 On the morning of our departure from Luxor 
 Mahmoud came around for his letter of recommenda 
 tion. I had worked for an hour to write something 
 evasive which would satisfy him and not perjure me 
 too deeply. When he came to the hotel I gave him 
 the following: 
 
 To Whom It May Concern: The bearer, Mahmoud, 
 has been our dragoman for four days and has attended 
 us faithfully at all hours; also, he has shown us as 
 many temples as we wished to see. 
 
 He looked at the paper blankly and said, " I do 
 not read English." At that Mr. Peasley brightened 
 up. He read the testimonial aloud to Mahrnoud and 
 declared that it was incomplete and unworthy of the 
 
 287 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 subject matter. In ten minutes he completed the fol 
 lowing and the dragoman took it away with him, 
 highly pleased: 
 
 To Whom It May Concern Greeting: The bearer, 
 Mahmoud,, is a dragoman of monumental mendacity and 
 commercial Machiavellism. His simulated efforts to 
 faithfully serve us and protect our interests have had 
 an altogether negative effect. Anyone employing him will 
 find him possessed of moral turpitude and a superlative 
 consciousness of his own worth. His knowledge of Egyp 
 tian history is enormously inconsequential, while his 
 English vocabulary is amazing in its variety of verbal 
 catastrophes. We commend him to travellers desirous of 
 studying the native characteristics of the most geolog 
 ical stratum of society. 
 
 " He has made a lot of trouble for us, and now 
 we ve got even by ruining him," said Mr. Peasley. 
 
 It seemed a joke at the time, but later on, when we 
 thought it over, we felt sorry for Mahmoud and 
 wished we had not taken such a mean advantage of 
 him. After all is said and done, a man must make a 
 living. 
 
 On our way back to Cairo from Assouan we 
 stopped over at Luxor. Mahmoud, by intuition or 
 through telepathy, knew that we were coming and 
 
 288 
 
ROYAL TOMBS AND OTHER PLACES 
 
 met us at the station. He was overjoyed to see us 
 again. 
 
 " I showed your letter to a gentleman from the 
 Kingdom of Ohio," said he, " and it procured for 
 me one of the best jobs I ever had." 
 
 289 
 
IN CAIRO 
 
CHAPTER XX 
 
 MR. PEASLEY AND HIS FINAL SIZE-UP 
 OF EGYPT 
 
 ON the morning of our hurried pack up and get 
 away from Luxor we lost Mr. Peasley. It was a half- 
 hour before the sailing of the boat, and we were at 
 tempting to lock trunks, call in the porters, give 
 directions as to forwarding mail, and tip everybody 
 except the proprietor all at the same time. 
 
 This excruciating crisis comes with every depar 
 ture. The fear of missing the boat, the lurking sus 
 picion that several articles have been left in lower 
 drawers or under the sofa, the dread of overlooking 
 some worthy menial who is entitled to baksheesh, the 
 uneasy conviction that the bill contains several over 
 charges all these combine to produce a mental con 
 dition about halfway between plain " rattles " and 
 female hysteria. And then, to add to the horror of 
 the situation, Mr. Peasley had disappeared. 
 
 All hands were needed one to boss the porters, 
 another to round up the tippees, another to audit the 
 charges for " extras," another to make a final search 
 
 293 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 for razor strops and hot water bags (of which we 
 had left a trail from Chicago to Cairo). Instead of 
 attending to these really important duties we were 
 loping madly about the hotel looking for Peasley. 
 We asked one another why we had invited him to 
 join the party. We called him all the names that we 
 had invented on the trip to fit his unusual personality. 
 One of these was a " flat-headed f ush." I don t know 
 know what a " f ush " is, but the more you study it 
 and repeat it over to yourself, the more horrible 
 becomes the full significance of the word. Also we 
 called him a " swozzie," which means a chump who 
 has gone on and on, exploring the furthermost re 
 gions of idiocy, until even his most daring compan 
 ions are left far behind. We called Mr. Peasley a 
 " wall-eyed spingo," the latter being a mullet that has 
 lost all sense of shame. Ordinary abuse and profanity 
 became weak and ineffective when pitted against 
 words of this scathing nature. 
 
 Reader, if you have a life-long friend and you 
 feel reasonably sure that you never could quarrel 
 with him or be out of patience with him or find fault 
 with any of his small peculiarities, go on a long trip 
 with him in foreign lands. You will be together so 
 much of the time that finally each will begin to hate 
 the sight of the other. There will come off days, 
 
FINAL SIZE-UP OF EGYPT 
 
 fraught with petty annoyances, when each will have 
 a fretful desire to hurl cameras and suit cases at his 
 beloved playmate. Suppose your lifelong friend has 
 some little eccentricity of manner or speech, some 
 slight irregularity of behaviour at the table, or a per- 
 
 You discover every one of his shining faults 
 
 verted and stubborn conviction which reveals itself 
 in every controversy. You may have overlooked this 
 defect for years because you meet him only at inter 
 vals, but when you begin to camp with him you dis 
 cover every one of his shining faults. And how they 
 
 295 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 do get on your nerves ! Next to matrimony, perhaps 
 travelling together is the most severe test of com 
 patibility. 
 
 We liked Mr. Peasley. Looking back over the trip, 
 we can well believe that the expedition would have 
 been rather tame if deprived of his cheering pres 
 ence. But he was so full of initiative and so given to 
 discovering byways of adventure that he was always 
 breaking in on the programme and starting little 
 excursions of his own. He was a very hard man to 
 mobilise. If we had solemnly agreed to get together 
 for luncheon at one o clock, three of us would be wait 
 ing at the food garage while Mr. Peasley would be 
 a mile away, trying to buy a four-dollar Abyssinian 
 war shield for $2.75. 
 
 And where do you suppose he was on the morning 
 we were making our frenzied departure from Luxor? 
 We found him in the barber shop, having his hair 
 cut. A native stood alongside of him, brushing away 
 the flies. The barber, a curly Italian, had ceased work 
 when we came in, and, encouraged by the questions 
 of Mr. Peasley, was describing the Bay of Naples, 
 pointing out Capri, Sorrento, Vesuve, and other 
 points of interest, with a comb in one hand and a pair 
 of scissors in the other. This barber had made an 
 indelible impression on Mr. Peasley, because of his 
 
 296 
 
FINAL SIZE-UP OF EGYPT 
 
 name, which was Signer Mosquito. Mr. Pcasley said 
 he didn t see how anyone with a name like that could 
 live. 
 
 We lined up in front of Mr. Peasley and gazed 
 at him in withering silence. He was not feazed. 
 
 "Talk about oriental luxury," he said. "Little 
 did I think twenty years ago, when I was measurin 
 
 He was not feazed 
 
 unbleached muslin and drawin New Orleans syrup 
 in a country store, that one day I d recline on a spot* 
 
 297 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 ted divan and have a private vassal to keep the flies 
 off of me. To say nothing of bein waited on by 
 Signer Mosquito." 
 
 I tried to hold down the safety valve of my wrath. 
 
 " We have just held a meeting and by unanimous 
 vote we have decided that you are an irresponsible 
 fush, a night blooming swozzie, and a vitrified 
 spingo," I said. 
 
 " Thanks," he replied. " I ll do as much for you 
 sometime." 
 
 " Are you aware of the fact that the boat departs 
 in twenty minutes ? " asked No. 2. 
 
 " The boat will not leave its mooring until Peaslcy, 
 of Iowa, is safely aboard," he replied. " Why is it 
 that you fellows begin to throw duck fits every time 
 we have to catch a boat or train? Kindly send my 
 luggage aboard, and as soon as Signor Mosquito has 
 concluded his amputations, I shall join you." 
 
 Words failed us. We hurried to the boat, feeling 
 reasonably certain that he would follow us to As 
 souan by rail. When it came time to cast off, Mr. 
 Peasley had not appeared, and our irritation was 
 gradually softening into a deep joy. The warning 
 whistle blew twice, and then Mr. Peasley came down 
 the bank, carrying a Nubian spear eight feet long 
 over his shoulder. By the time he had arrived on the 
 
 298 
 
FINAL SIZE-UP OF EGYPT 
 
 upper deck the gangplank was drawn and we were 
 swinging in the current. 
 
 He bestowed on us a cool smile of triumph, and 
 then removed his hat. His hair had been given a 
 shellac finish and smelled like the front doorway of a 
 drug store. 
 
 " Signor Mosquito is well named," said Mr. Peas- 
 ley. " When he got through with me he stung me for 
 fifteen piastres." 
 
 For several hours we refused to speak to him or 
 sit near him on deck, but finally we needed him to fill 
 out a four-handed game of dominoes and he was 
 taken back on probation. While we were engaged in 
 a very stubborn session of u double nines," we no 
 ticed that most of our fellow passengers, and 
 especially those of English persuasion, were making 
 our little group the target for horrified glances. 
 Some of them actually glared at us. We began to 
 wonder if dominoes was regarded as an immoral 
 practice in Egypt. 
 
 " These people keep on looking at us as if we 
 were a happy band of burglars," said Mr. Peasley. 
 " We think we are travelling incog., but our repu 
 tation has preceded us." 
 
 Then we heard one old lady ask another if there 
 would be any evening services in the dining saloon, 
 
 299 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 and Mr. Pcasley, who was reaching into the tt bone 
 yard," suddenly paused with his hand up and ex 
 claimed: "Sanctified catfish! Boys, it s Sunday!" 
 
 " Boys, it s Sunday! " 
 
 It was. We had been sitting there among those 
 nice people throughout the calm Sabbath afternoon 
 playing a wicked game of chance. After two weeks 
 among the Mohammedans and other heathen, with 
 every day a working day and the English Sun 
 day a dead letter, we had lost all trace of dates. Mr. 
 
 300 
 
FINAL SIZE-UP OF EGYPT 
 
 Peasley said that if anyone had asked him the day 
 of the week he would have guessed Wednesday. 
 
 This unfortunate incident helped to deepen and 
 solidify the dark suspicion with which we, as Amer 
 icans, were regarded by the contingent from Great 
 Britain. If our conduct had been exemplary we could 
 not have cleared away this suspicion, but after the 
 domino debauch we were set down as hopeless. The 
 middle class English guard their social status very 
 carefully, and you can t blame them. It is a tender 
 and uncertain growth that requires looking after 
 all the time. If they didn t water it and prune it 
 and set it out in the sunshine every day it would soon 
 wither back to its original stalk. 
 
 Did you ever come across a bunch of melancholy 
 pilgrims from the suburban villas and the dull gray 
 provincial towns of dear old England? Did you ever 
 observe the frightened manner in which they hold 
 aloof from Germans, Americans, Bedouins, Turks, 
 and other foreigners? They fear that if they drift 
 into friendly relationship with people they meet while 
 travelling, later on some of these chance acquaint 
 ances may look them up at Birmingham or Stoke- 
 on-Trent and expect to be entertained at the 
 foundry. 
 
 A large majority of our fellow passengers from 
 301 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 Luxor to Assouan were of elderly pattern. We esti 
 mated the average age to be about eighty-three. Mr. 
 Peasley said an irreverent thing about these vener 
 able tourists. 
 
 " Why do these people come all the way to Egypt 
 to look at the ruins?" he asked. "Why don t they 
 stay at home and look at one another? " 
 
 We rebuked him for saying it, but somehow or 
 other these rebukes never seemed to have any per 
 manent restraining effect. 
 
 Our boat arrived at Assouan one morning accom 
 panied by a sand storm and a cold wave. The Cat 
 aract Hotel stood on a promontory overlooking a 
 new kind of Nile a swift and narrow stream stud 
 ded with gleaming boulders of granite. We liked 
 Assouan because the weather was ideal (after the 
 sand storm ran out of sand), the hotel was the best 
 we had found in Egypt, and there were so few an 
 tiques that sightseeing became a pleasure. Besides, 
 after one has been to Luxor, anything in the way 
 of ancient temples is about as much of a come-down 
 as turkey hash the day after Thanksgiving. 
 
 Here, on the border of Nubia, we began to get 
 glimpses of real Africa. We rode on camels to a 
 desert camp of hilarious Bisharins. They are the 
 gypsies of Nubia dress their hair with mud instead 
 
 302 
 
FINAL SIZE-UP OF EGYPT 
 
 of bay rum and reside under a patch of gunnysack 
 propped up by two sticks. On the hills back of the 
 town we saw the barracks where the English army 
 gathered itself to move south against the Mahdists. 
 We were invited to go out in the moonlight and hunt 
 hyenas, but did not think it right to kill off all the 
 native game. 
 
 The big exhibit at Assouan, and one of the great 
 engineering achievements of modern times, is the dam 
 across the Nile. It is a solid wall of granite, a mile 
 and a quarter long, 100 feet high in places and 88 
 feet through the base, and it looks larger than it 
 sounds. We went across it on a push car after taking 
 a boat ride in the reservoir basin, which is said to 
 contain 234,000,000 gallons of water. This estimate 
 is correct, as nearly as we could figure it. The dam 
 is about four miles above the town. We rode up on 
 a dummy train, with cars almost as large as Sara 
 toga trunks, and came back in a small boat. We shot 
 the rapids, just for excitement, and after we had 
 caved in the bottom of the boat and stopped an hour 
 for repairs we decided that we had stored up enough 
 excitement, so after that we followed the more placid 
 waters. 
 
 The black boatmen had a weird chant, which they 
 repeated over and over, keeping time with the 
 
 303 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 stroke. It was a combination of Egyptian melody 
 and American college yell, and ran as follows: 
 
 Hep! Hep! Horay! 
 Hep! Hep! Horay! 
 Hep! Hep! Horay! 
 All right! Thank you! 
 
 This effort represented their sum total of English, 
 and they were very proud of it, and we liked it, too 
 that is, the first million times. After that, the 
 charm of novelty was largely dissipated. 
 
 Many people visit Assouan because of the kiln- 
 dried atmosphere, which is supposed to have a dis 
 couraging effect on rheumatism and other ailments 
 that flourish in a damp climate. Assouan is as dry 
 as Pittsburg on Sunday. It is surrounded by desert 
 and the sun always seems to be working overtime. 
 The traveller who does much rambling out of doors 
 gradually assumes the brown and papery complex 
 ion of a royal mummy, his lips become parched and 
 flaky, and he feels like a grocery store herring, 
 which, it is believed, is about the driest thing on 
 record. 
 
 We did love Assouan. Coming back from a camel 
 ride, with a choppy sea on, gazing through the heat 
 waves at the tufted palms and the shimmering white 
 
 304 
 
FINAL SIZE-UP OF EGYPT 
 
 walls, we would know that there was ice only a mile 
 ahead of us, and then our love for Assouan would 
 become too deep for words. 
 
 Burton Holmes, the eminent lecturer and travel 
 ogue specialist, was lying up at Assouan, having a 
 tiresome argument with the germ that invented ma 
 laria. He had come up the Nile in a deep draught 
 boat and had succeeded in finding many sand bars 
 that other voyagers had overlooked. Just below As 
 souan the boat wedged itself into the mud and could 
 not be floated until thirty natives, summoned from 
 the surrounding country, had waded underneath and 
 " boosted " all afternoon. When it came time to pay 
 the men the captain of the boat said to Mr. Holmes : 
 " What do you think? They demand eight shil 
 lings." 
 
 " It is an outrage," said Mr. Holmes. " Eight 
 shillings is two dollars. Even in America I can get 
 union labour for two dollars a day. There are thirty 
 of them. Couldn t we compromise for a lump sum of 
 fifty dollars?" 
 
 " You do not understand," said the captain. " We 
 are asked to pay eight shillings for the whole crowd. 
 I think that six would be enough." 
 
 Whereupon Mr. Holmes gave them ten shillings, 
 or 8 1-3 cents each, and as he sailed away the grate- 
 
 205 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 fill assemblage gave three rousing cheers for Mr. 
 Rockefeller. 
 
 When we left Assouan we scooted by rail direct 
 to Cairo, to rest up and recover from our recupera 
 tion. 
 
 It is customary in winding up a series of letters 
 
 to draw certain profound conclusions and give hints 
 to travellers who may hope to follow the same beaten 
 path. Fortunately, Mr. Peasley had done this for 
 
 306 
 
FINAL SIZE-UP OF EGYPT 
 
 us. He promised a real estate agent in Fairfield, 
 Iowa, that he would let him know about Egypt. 
 One night in Assouan he read to us the letter to his 
 friend, and we borrowed it : 
 
 Assouan, Some time in April. 
 Deloss M. Gifford, 
 
 Fairfield, Iowa, U. S. A. 
 My Dear Giff: 
 
 I have gone as far up the Nile as my time and the 
 letter of credit will permit. At 8 G. M. to-morrow I turn 
 my face toward the only country on earth where a man 
 can get a steak that hasn t got goo poured all over it. 
 Meet me at the station with a pie. Tell mother I am 
 coming home to eat. 
 
 Do I like Egypt? Yes hecause now I will be satis 
 fied with Iowa. Only I m afraid that when I go back 
 and see 160 acres of corn in one field I won t believe it. 
 Egypt is a wonderful country, but very small for its 
 age. It is about as wide as the court house square, but 
 it seems to me at least 10,000 miles long, as we have 
 been two weeks getting up to the First Cataract. Most 
 of the natives are farmers. The hard-working tenant 
 gets one-tenth of the crop every year and if he looks up 
 to see the steamboats go by he is docked. All Egyptians 
 who are not farmers are robbers. The farmers live on 
 the river. All other natives live on the tourists. 
 
 307 
 
IN PASTURES NEW 
 
 I have seen so many tombs and crypts and family 
 vaults that I am ashamed to look an undertaker in the 
 face. For three weeks I have tried to let on to pretend 
 to make a bluff at being deeply interested in these open 
 graves. Other people gushed about them and I was 
 afraid that if I didn t trail along and show some senti 
 mental interest they might suspect that I was from Iowa 
 and was shy on soulfulness. I ll say this much, however 
 I m mighty glad I ve seen them, because now I ll never 
 have to look at them again. 
 
 Egypt is something like the old settler you d like to 
 roast him and call him down, but you hate to jump on 
 anything so venerable and weak. Egypt is so old that 
 you get the headache trying to think back. Egypt had 
 gone through forty changes of administration and was 
 on the down grade before Iowa was staked out. 
 
 The principal products of this country are insects, 
 dust, guides, and fake curios. I got my share of each. I 
 am glad I came, and I may want to return some day, 
 but not until I have worked the sand out of my ears 
 and taken in two or three county fairs. I have been walk 
 ing down the main aisle with my hat in my hand so long 
 that now I am ready for something lively. 
 
 Americans are popular in Egypt, during business 
 hours. Have not been showered with social attentions, 
 but I am always comforted by the thought that the ex 
 clusive foreign set cannot say anything about me that I 
 
 308 
 
FINAL SIZE-UP OF EGYPT 
 
 haven t already said about it. Of course, we could retal 
 iate in proper fashion if we could lure the foreigners 
 out to Iowa, but that seems out of the question. They 
 think Iowa is in South America. 
 
 I shall mail this letter and then chase it all the way 
 home. 
 
 Give my love to everybody, whether I know them or 
 not. Yours, PEASLEY. 
 
 P- S. Open some preserves. 
 
 Not a comprehensive review of the fruits of our 
 journey and yet fairly accurate. 
 
 THE END 
 
THE COUNTRY LIFE PRESS 
 GARDEN CITY, N. Y. 
 
x HE LAST DATE 
 .BELOW 
 THIS BOOK IS D E 
 
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 cSSED FOR FAILURE TO RETURN 
 
 AN I^ T N THE DATE DUE. THE PENALTY 
 
 |F ^CREASE TO 50 CENTS ON THE FOURTH 
 
 AND TO $1.OO ON THE SEVENTH DAY 
 
 VERDUE. 
 
 OCT 27 1939 
 
 APR 19 1944 
 
 MAY 02 /41 
 
 OCT 1 1ST8 
 
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 THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LIBRARY