Web
and Book design, |
Click
Here to return to |
|
|
CHAPTER
XIII. PHILÆ
TO
KOROSKO. SAILING
gently southward – the river opening wide before us,
Philæ dwindling in the
rear – we feel that we are now fairly over the border; and
that if Egypt was
strange and far from home, Nubia is stranger and farther still. The
Nile here
flows deep and broad. The rocky heights that hem it in so close on
either side
are still black on the one hand, golden on the other. The banks are
narrower
than ever. The space in some places is little wider than a towing-path.
In
others, there is barely room for a belt of date-palms and a slip of
alluvial
soil, every foot of which produces its precious growth of durra or
barley. The
steep verge below is green with lentils to the water’s edge.
As the river
recedes, it leaves each day a margin of fresh, wet soil, in which the
careful
husbandman hastens to scratch a new furrow and sow another line of
seeds. He
cannot afford to let so much as an inch of that kindly mud lie idle. Gliding
along with half-filled sail, we observe how entirely the population
seems to be
regulated by the extent of arable soil. Where the inundation has room
to
spread, villages come thicker; more dusky figures are seen moving to
and fro in
the shade of the palms; more children race along the banks, shrieking
for
bakhshîsh. When the shelf of soil is narrowed, on the
contrary, to a mere
fringe of luminous green dividing the rock from the river, there is a
startling
absence of everything like life. Mile after mile drags its slow length
along,
uncheered by any sign of human habitation. When now and then a solitary
native,
armed with gun or spear, is seen striding along the edge of the desert,
he only
seems to make the general solitude more apparent. Meanwhile,
it is not only men and women whom we miss – men labouring by
the river-side;
women with babies astride on their shoulders, or water-jars balanced on
their
heads – but birds, beasts, boats; everything that we have
been used to see
along the river. The buffaloes dozing at midday in the shallows, the
camels
stalking home in single file towards sunset, the water-fowl haunting
the
sandbanks, seem suddenly to have vanished. Even donkeys are now rare;
and as
for horses, I do not remember to have seen one during the seven weeks
we spent
in Nubia. All night, too, instead of the usual chorus of dogs barking
furiously
from village to village, we hear only the long-drawn wail of an
occasional
jackal. It is not wonderful, however, that animal life should be scarce
in a
district where the scant soil yields barely food enough for those who
till it.
To realise how very scant it is, one only needs to remember that about
Derr,
where it is at its widest, the annual deposit nowhere exceeds
half-a-mile in
breadth; while for the most part of the way between Philæ and
Wady Halfeh – a
distance of 210 miles – it averages from six to sixty yards. Here,
then, more than ever, one seems to see how entirely these lands which
we call
Egypt and Nubia are nothing but the banks of one solitary river in the
midst of
a world of desert. In Egypt, the valley is often so wide that one
forgets the
stony waste beyond the corn-lands. But in Nubia, the desert is ever
present. We
cannot forget it, if we would. The barren mountains press upon our
path,
showering down avalanches of granite on the one side and torrents of
yellow
sand on the other. We know that those stones are always falling; that
those
sands are always drifting; that the river has hard work to hold its
own; and
that the desert is silently encroaching day by day. These
golden sand-streams are the newest and most beautiful feature in the
landscape.
They pour down from the high level of the Libyan desert just as the
snows of
Switzerland pour down from the upper plateaux of the Alps. Through
every ravine
and gap they find a channel – here trickling in tiny
rivulets; flowing yonder
in broad torrents that widen to the river. Becalmed
a
few miles above Philæ, we found ourselves at the foot of one
of these largest
drifts. The M. B.’s challenged us to climb the slope, and see
the sunset from
the desert. It was about six o’clock, and the thermometer was
standing at 80°
in the coolest corner of the large saloon. We ventured to suggest that
the top
was a long way up; but the M. B.’s would take no refusal. So
away we went;
panting, breathless, bewailing our hard fate. L.----- and the Writer had
done some
difficult walking in their time, over ice and snow, on lava cold and
hot, up
cinder-slopes and beds of mountain torrents; but this innocent-looking
sand-drift
proved quite as hard to climb as any of them. The sand lies wonderfully
loose
and light, and is as hot as if it had been baked in an oven. Into this
the foot
plunges ankle-deep, slipping back at every step, and leaving a huge
hole into
which the sand pours down again like water. Looking back, you trace
your course
by a succession of funnel-shaped pits, each larger than a wash-hand
basin.
Though your slipper be as small as Cinderella’s, the next
comer shall not be
able to tell whether it was a lady who went up last, or a camel. It is
toilsome
work, too; for the foot finds neither rest nor resistance, and the
strain upon
the muscles is unremitting. But the
beauty of the sand more than repays the fatigue of climbing it. Smooth,
sheeny,
satiny; fine as diamond-dust; supple, undulating luminous, it lies in
the most
exquisite curves and wreaths like a snow-drift turned to gold.
Remodelled by
every breath that blows, its ever-varying surface presents an endless
play of
delicate lights and shadows. There lives not the sculptor who could
render
those curves; and I doubt whether Turner himself, in his tenderest and
subtlest
mood, could have done justice to those complex greys and ambers. Having
paused to rest upon an out-cropping ledge of rock about half-way up, we
came at
length to the top of the last slope and found ourselves on the level of
the
desert. Here, faithful to the course of the river, the first objects to
meet
our eyes were the old familiar telegraph-posts and wires. Beyond them,
to north
and south, a crowd of peaks closed in the view; but westward, a rolling
waste
of hillock and hollow opened away to where the sun, a crimson globe,
had
already half-vanished below the rim of the world. One
could
not resist going a few steps farther, just to touch the nearest of
those
telegraph posts. It was like reaching out a hand towards home. When the
sun dropped, we turned back. The valley below was already steeped in
dusk. The
Nile, glimmering like a coiled snake in the shade, reflected the
evening sky in
three separate reaches. On the Arabian side, a far-off mountain-chain
stood
out, purple and jagged against the eastern horizon. To come
down was easy. Driving our heels well into the sand, we half ran, half
glissaded, and soon reached the bottom. Here we were met by an old
Nubian
woman, who had trudged up in all haste from the nearest village to
question our
sailors about one Yûsef, her son, of whom she had heard
nothing for nearly a
year. She was a very poor old woman – a widow – and
this Yûsef was her only
son. Hoping to better himself, he had worked his passage to Cairo in a
cargo-boat some eighteen months ago. Twice since then he had sent her
messages
and money; but now eleven months had gone by in silence, and she feared
he must
be dead. Meanwhile her date-palm, taxed to the full value of its
produce, had
this year yielded not a piastre of profit. Her mud-hut had fallen in,
and there
was no Yûsef to repair it. Old and sick, she now could only
beg; and her
neighbours, by whose charity she subsisted, were but a shade less poor
than
herself. Our men
knew nothing of the missing Yûsef. Reïs Hassan
promised when he went back to
make inquiries among the boatmen of Boulak: “But
then,” he added, “there are so
many Yûsefs in Cairo!” It made
one’s heart ache to see the tremulous eagerness with which
the poor soul put
her questions, and the crushed look in her face when she turned away. And now,
being fortunate in respect of the wind, which for the most part blows
steadily
from the north between sunrise and sunset, we make good progress, and
for the
next ten days live pretty much on board our dahabeeyah. The main
features of
the landscape go on repeating themselves with but little variation from
day to
day. The mountains wear their habitual livery of black and gold. The
river, now
widening, now narrowing, flows between banks blossoming with lentils
and
lupins. With these, and yellow acacia-tufts, and blue castor-oil
berries, and
the weird coloquintida, with its downy leaf and milky juice and
puff-bladder
fruit, like a green peach tinged with purple, we make our daily bouquet
for the
dinner table. All other flowers have vanished, and even these are hard
to get
in a land where every green blade is precious to the grower. Now,
too,
the climate becomes sensibly warmer. The heat of the sun is so great at
midday
that, even with the north breeze blowing, we can no longer sit on deck
between
twelve and three. Towards sundown, when the wind drops, it turns so
sultry that
to take a walk on shore comes to be regarded as a duty rather than as a
pleasure. Thanks, however, to that indomitable Painter who is always
ready for
an afternoon excursion, we do sometimes walk for an hour before dinner;
striking off generally into the desert; looking for onyxes and
carnelians among
the pebbles that here and there strew the surface of the sand, and
watching in
vain for jackals and desert-hares. Sometimes
we follow the banks instead of the desert, coming now and then to a
creaking
Sakkieh turned by a melancholy buffalo; or to a native village hidden
behind
dwarf-palms. Here each hut has its tiny forecourt, in the midst of
which stand
the mud-oven and mud-cupboard of the family – two dumpy cones
of smooth grey
clay, like big chimney-pots – the one capped with a lid, the
other fitted with
a little wooden door and wooden bolt. Some of the houses have a
barbaric
ornament palmed off, so to say, upon the walls; the pattern being
simply the
impression of a human hand dipped in red or yellow ochre, and applied
while the
surface is moist. The
amount
of “bazaar” that takes place whenever we enter one
of these villages, is quite
alarming. The dogs first give notice of our approach; and presently we
are
surrounded by all the women and girls of the place, offering live
pigeons,
eggs, vegetable marrows, necklaces, nose-rings and silver bracelets for
sale.
The boys pester us to buy wretched half-dead chameleons. The men stand
aloof,
and leave the bargaining to the women. And the
women not only know how to bargain, but how to assess the relative
value of
every coin that passes current on the Nile. Rupees, roubles, reyals,
dollars
and shillings are as intelligible to them as paras or piastres.
Sovereigns are
not too heavy nor napoleons too light for them. The times are changed
since
Belzoni’s Nubian, after staring contemptuously at the first
piece of money he
had ever seen, asked “Who would give anything for that small
piece of metal?” The
necklaces consist of onyx, carnelian, bone, silver, and coloured glass
beads,
with now and then a stray scarab or amulet in the ancient blue
porcelain. The
arrangement of colour is often very subtle. The brow-pendants in gold
repoussée, and the massive old silver bracelets, rough with
knobs and bosses,
are most interesting in design, and perpetuate patterns of undoubted
antiquity.
The M. B.’s picked up one really beautiful collarette of
silver and coral,
which might have been worn three thousand years ago by
Pharaoh’s daughter. When on
board, we begin now to keep a sharp look-out for crocodiles. We hear of
them
constantly – see their tracks upon the sand-banks in the
river – go through
agonies of expectation over every black speck in the distance; yet are
perpetually disappointed. The farther south we go, the more impatient
we
become. The E.’s, whose dahabeeyah, homeward-bound, drifts
slowly past one calm
morning, report “eleven beauties,” seen all
together yesterday upon a sand
island, some ten miles higher up. Mr. C. B.’s boat, garlanded
with crocodiles
from stem to stern, fills us with envy. We would give our ears (almost)
to see
one of these engaging reptiles dangling from either our own mainmast,
or that
of the faithful Bagstones. Alfred, who has set his heart on bagging at
least
half-a-dozen, says nothing, but grows gloomier day by day. At night,
when the
moon is up and less misanthropic folk are in bed and asleep, he rambles
moodily
into the desert, after jackals. Meanwhile,
on we go, starting at sunrise; mooring at sunset; sailing, tracking,
punting;
never stopping for an hour by day, if we can help it; and pushing
straight for
Abou Simbel with as little delay as possible. Thus we pass the pylons
of Dabôd
with their background of desert; Gertássee, a miniature
Sunium, seen towards
evening against the glowing sunset; Tafah, rich in palms, with white
columns
gleaming through green foliage by the water-side; the cliffs, islands,
and
rapids of Kalabsheh, and the huge Temple which rises like a fortress in
their
midst; Dendûr, a tiny chapel with a single pylon; and Gerf
Hossayn, which from
this distance might be taken for the mouth of a rock-cut tomb in the
face of
the precipice. About
half
way between Kalabsheh and Dendûr, we enter the Tropic of
Cancer. From this day
till the day when we repass that invisible boundary, there is a marked
change
in the atmospheric conditions under which we live. The days get
gradually
hotter, especially at noon, when the sun is almost vertical; but the
freshness
of night and the chill of early morning are no more. Unless when a
strong wind
blows from the north, we no longer know what it is to need a shawl on
deck in
the evening, or an extra covering on our beds towards dawn. We sleep
with our
cabin-windows open, and enjoy a delicious equality of temperature from
sundown
to sunrise. The days and nights, too, are of almost equal length. Now,
also,
the Southern Cross and a second group of stars, which we conclude must
form
part of the Centaur, are visible between two and four every morning.
They have
been creeping up, a star at a time, for the last fortnight; but are
still so
low upon the eastern horizon that we can only see them when there comes
a break
in the mountain-chain on that side of the river. At the same time, our
old
familiar friends of the northern hemisphere, looking strangely
distorted and
out of their proper place, are fast disappearing on the opposite side
of the
heavens. Orion seems to be lying on his back, and the Great Bear to be
standing
on his tail; while Cassiopeia and a number of others have deserted en
masse.
The zenith, meanwhile, is but thinly furnished; so that we seem to have
travelled
away from the one hemisphere, and not yet to have reached the other. As
for the
Southern Cross, we reserve our opinion till we get farther south. It
would be
treason to hint that we are disappointed in so famous a constellation. After
Gerf
Hossayn, the next place of importance for which our maps bid us look
out is
Dakkeh. As we draw near, expecting hourly to see something of the temple, the
Nile increases in breadth and beauty. It is a peaceful, glassy morning.
The men
have been tracking since dawn, and stop to breakfast at the foot of a
sandy
bank, wooded with tamarisks and gum-trees. A glistening network of
gossamer
floats from bough to bough. The sky overhead is of a tender luminous
blue, such
as we never see in Europe. The air is wonderfully still. The river,
which here
takes a sudden bend towards the east, looks like a lake, and seems to
be barred
ahead by the desert. Presently a funeral passes along the opposite
bank; the
chief mourner flourishing a long staff, like a drum-major; the women
snatching
up handfuls of dust, and scattering it upon their heads. We hear their
wild
wail long after the procession is out of sight. Going on
again presently, our whole attention becomes absorbed by the new and
singular
geological features of the Libyan desert. A vast plain covered with
isolated
mountains of volcanic structure, it looks like some strange
transformation of
the Puy de Dôme plateau, with all its wind-swept pastures
turned to sand, and
its grassy craters stripped to barrenness. The more this plain widens
out
before our eyes, the more it bristles with peaks. As we round the
corner, and
Dakkeh, like a smaller Edfû, comes into sight upon the
western bank, the whole
desert on that side, as far as the eye can see, presents the
unmistakable
aspect of one vast field of volcanoes. As in Auvergne, these cones are
of all
sizes and heights; some low and rounded, like mere bubbles that have
cooled
without bursting; others ranging apparently from 1000 to 1500 feet in
height.
The broken craters of several are plainly distinguishable by the help
of a
field-glass. One in particular is so like our old friend the Puy de
Pariou,
that in a mere black-and-white sketch, the one might readily be
mistaken for
the other. We were
surprised to find no account of the geology of this district in any of
our
books. Murray and Wilkinson pass it in silence; and writers of travels
– one or
two of whom notice only the “pyramidal” shape of
the hills – are for the most
part content to do likewise. None seem to have observed their obvious
volcanic
origin. Thanks
to
a light breeze that sprang up in the afternoon, we were able to hoist
our big
sail again, and to relieve the men from tracking. Thus we glided past
the ruins
of Maharrakeh, which, seen from the river, looked like a Greek portico
set in a
hollow waste of burning desert. Next came Wady Sabooah, a temple half
buried in
sand, near which we met a tiny dahabeeyah, manned by two Nubians and
flying the
star and crescent. A shabby Government Inspector, in European dress and
a fez,
lay smoking on a mat outside his cabin door; while from a spar overhead
there
hung a mighty crocodile. This monster was of a greenish brown color,
and
measured at least sixteen feet from head to tail. His jaws yawned; and
one flat
and flabby arm and ponderous paw swung with the motion of the boat,
looking
horribly human. The painter, with an eye to foregrounds, made a bid for him on the spot;
but the
shabby inspector was not to be moved by considerations of gain. He
preferred
his crocodile to infidel gold, and scarcely deigned even to reply to
the offer.
Seen in
the half-light of a tropical afterglow – the purple mountains
coming down in
detached masses to the water’s edge on the one side; the
desert with its
volcanic peaks yet rosy upon the other – we thought the
approach to Korosko
more picturesque than anything we had yet seen south of the cataract.
As the
dusk deepened, the moon rose; and the palms that had just room to grow
between
the mountains and the river turned from bronze to silver. It was half
twilight,
half-moonlight, by the time we reached the mooring-place, where
Talhamy, who
had been sent forward in the small boat half an hour ago, jumped on
board laden
with a packet of letters, and a sheaf of newspapers. For here, where
the great
caravan-route leads off across the desert to Khartûm, we
touched the first
Nubian post-office. It was only ten days since we had received our last
budget
at Assûan; but it seemed like ten weeks. |
Click the book image to turn
to the next Chapter.