me most of all. As Muslims,
Omar and the boatmen laid him down in the grave, and while the English
prayer was read the sun went down in a glorious flood of light over the
distant bend of the Nile. 'Had he a mother, he was young?' said an
Abab'deh woman to me with tears in her eyes and pressing my hand in
sympathy for that far-off mother of such a different race.

Passenger steamboats come now every fortnight, but I have had no letter
for a month. I have no almanack and have lost count of European
time--to-day is the 3 of Ramadan, that is all I know. The poor black
slave was sent back from Keneh, God knows why--because he had no money
and the Moudir could not 'eat off him' as he could off the money and
property--he believes. He is a capital fellow, and in order to
compensate me for what he eats he proposed to wash for me, and you would
be amused to see Khayr with his coal-black face and filed teeth doing
laundry-maid out in the yard. He fears the family will sell him and
hopes he may fetch a good price for 'his boy'--only on the other hand he
would so like me to buy him--and so his mind is disturbed. Meanwhile the
having all my clothes washed clean is a great luxury.

The steamer is come and I must finish in haste. I have corrected the
proofs. There is not much to alter, and though I regret several lost
letters I can't replace them. I tried, but it felt like a forgery. Do
you cut out and correct, dearest Mutter, you will do it much better than
I.

January 8, 1865: Dowager Lady Duff Gordon

_To the Dowager Lady Duff Gordon_.

LUXOR,
_January_ 8, 1865.

DEAR OLD LADY,

I received your kind letter in the midst of the drumming and piping and
chanting and firing of guns and pistols and scampering of horses which
constitute a religious festival in Egypt. The last day of the _moolid_
of Abu-l-Hajjaj fell on the 1st January so you came to wish me 'May all
the year be good to thee' as the people here were civil enough to do when
I told them it was the first day of the _Frankish_ year. (The
_Christian_ year here begins in September.)

I was very sorry to hear of poor Lady Theresa's (Lady Theresa Lewis)
death. I feel as if I had no right to survive people whom I left well
and strong when I came away so ill. As usual the air of Upper Egypt has
revived me again,