, Lord's day, October
twenty-third, and at seven o'clock that evening I took the train for
Cairo, arriving there about four hours later. I had no difficulty in
finding a hotel, where I took some rest, but was out very early the next
morning to see something of the largest city in Africa. The population
is a great mixture of French, Greeks, English, Austrians, Germans,
Egyptians, Arabians, Copts, Berbers, Turks, Jews, Negroes, Syrians,
Persians, and others. In Smyrna, Damascus, and Jerusalem, cities of the
Turkish empire, the streets are narrow, crooked, and dirty, but here
are many fine buildings, electric lights, electric cars, and good, wide
streets, over which vehicles with rubber tires roll noiselessly.

I first went out to the Mokattam Heights, lying back of the city, at an
elevation of six hundred and fifty feet. From the summit an extensive
view can be obtained, embracing not only the city of Cairo, with its
many mosques and minarets, but the river beyond, and still farther
beyond the Gizeh (Gezer) group of the pyramids. The side of the Heights
toward the city is a vast quarry, from which large quantities of rock
have been taken. An old fort and a mosque stand in solitude on the top.
I went out by the citadel and passed the mosque tombs of the Mamelukes,
who were originally brought into the country from the Caucasus as
slaves, but they became sufficiently powerful to make one of their
number Sultan in 1254. The tombs of the Caliphs, successors of Mohammed
in temporal and spiritual power, are not far from the Heights.

As I was returning to the city, a laborer followed me a little distance,
and indicated that he wanted my name written on a piece of paper he was
carrying. I accommodated him, but do not know for what purpose he wanted
it. I stopped at the Alabaster Mosque, built after the fashion of one of
the mosques of Constantinople, and decorated with alabaster. The outside
is full of little depressions, and has no special beauty, but the inside
is more attractive. The entrance is through a large court, paved with
squares of white marble. The floor of the mosque was nicely covered with
carpet, and the walls are coated for a few feet with alabaster, and
above that they are painted in imitation of the same material. The
numerous lamps do much towards making the place attractive. The
attendant said the central chandelier, fitted for three hundred and
sixty-six candles, was a present from Louis Philippe, of France.