lled them, tied them together
and flung them into the Nile near Rhoda, and gave himself into the hands
of the police. All was of course hushed up. He goes to Fazoghlou; and I
don't know what becomes of the slave-girl, his wife. These sort of
things happen every day (as the bodies testify) among the Turks, but the
Europeans never hear it. I heard it by a curious chance.

_September_ 4.--My boat will soon be finished, and now will be as good as
new. Omar has worked like a good one from daybreak till night,
overlooking, buying all the materials, selling all the old wood and iron,
etc., and has done capitally. I shall take a paper from my _Ma-allims_
who are all first class men, to certify what they have done and that the
boat is as good as new. Goodah Effendi has kindly looked at her several
times for me and highly approves the work done. I never saw men do a
better day's work than those at the boat. It is pretty to see the
carpenter holding the wood with one hand and one foot while he saws it,
sitting on the ground--just like the old frescoes. Do you remember the
picture of boat-building in the tomb at Sakkara? Well, it is just the
same; all done with the adze; but it is stout work they put into it, I
can tell you.

If you do not come (and I do not like to press you, I fear the fatigue
for you and the return to the cold winter) I shall go to Luxor in a month
or so and send back the boat to let. I have a neighbour now, Goodah
Effendi, an engineer, who studied and married in England. His wife is
gone there with the children, and he is living in a boat close by; so he
comes over of an evening very often, and I am glad of his company: he is
a right good fellow and very intelligent.

My best love to all at home. I've got a log from the cedars of Lebanon,
my Moslem carpenter who smoothed the broken end, swallowed the sawdust,
because he believed 'Our Lady Mary' had sat under the tree with 'Our Lord
Jesus.'

September 21, 1886: Sir Alexander Duff Gordon

_To Sir Alexander Duff Gordon_.

OFF BOULAK,
_September_ 21, 1886.

I am better again now and go on very comfortably with my two little boys.
Omar is from dawn till night at work at my boat, so I have only Mahbrook
and Achmet, and you would wonder to see how well I am served. Achmet
cooks a very good dinner, serves i