egabs_ (amulets), which have not availed against the
sickness. It is heart-rending to see the poor beasts and their
unfortunate owners. Some dancing girls came to the boat just now for
cigars which Arthur had promised them, and to ask after their friend el
Maghribeeyeh, the good dancer at Luxor, whom they said was very ill.
Omar did not know at all about her, and the girls seemed much distressed.
They were both very pretty, one an Abyssinian. I must leave off to send
this to the post; it will cost a fortune, but you won't grudge it.

May 15, 1864: Sir Alexander Duff Gordon

_To Sir Alexander Duff Gordon_.

LUXOR,
_May_ 15, 1864,
_Day before Eed-el-Kebir_
(_Bairam_).

DEAREST ALICK,

We returned to Luxor the evening before last just after dark. The salute
which Omar fired with your old horse-pistols brought down a lot of
people, and there was a chorus of _Alhamdulilah Salaameh ya Sitt_, and
such a kissing of hands, and 'Welcome home to your place' and 'We have
tasted your absence and found it bitter,' etc., etc. Mustapha came with
letters for me, and Yussuf beaming with smiles, and Mahommed with new
bread made of new wheat, and Suleyman with flowers, and little Achmet
rushing in wildly to kiss hands. When the welcome had subsided, Yussuf,
who stayed to tea, told me all the cattle were dead. Mustapha lost
thirty-four, and has three left; and poor farmer Omar lost all--forty
head. The distress in Upper Egypt will now be fearful. Within six weeks
_all_ our cattle are dead. They are threshing the corn with donkeys, and
men are turning the sakiahs (water-wheels) and drawing the ploughs, and
dying by scores of overwork and want of food in many places. The whole
agriculture depended on the oxen, and they are all dead. At El-Moutaneh
and the nine villages round Halim Pasha's estate 24,000 head have died;
four beasts were left when we were there three days ago.

We spent two days and nights at Philae and _Wallahy_! it was hot. The
basalt rocks which enclose the river all round the island were burning.
Sally and I slept in the Osiris chamber, on the roof of the temple, on
our air-beds. Omar lay across the doorway to guard us, and Arthur and
his Copt,