idst of the
stream, notwithstanding all the attempts of the officials and crew to
free her from the bar, and it was not until Saturday morning that their
efforts were crowned with success and the steamer floated free.

However, we took the doctor's advice the first morning and finished our
omelet and coffee. Then we hurried to the deck to investigate and ask
numberless questions of the worried officials. Our baggage had been
packed in anticipation of landing before noon at Cairo, which was but
sixty miles distant, and we feared that a delay might interfere with our
plans for a busy afternoon of sight-seeing in the city.

"'Misery loves company,' says an old proverb. If that is true we should
be happy," remarked one of the tourists as we gathered on the deck
gazing at an animated scene. "Look! There are thirty boats in the same
predicament as our own."

[Illustration: PALMS GROW ON THE SITE OF ANCIENT MEMPHIS.]

Within sight in different directions on the wide river lay thirty
loaded feluccas stranded on the bars, and in addition to these were
sixty-five others not aground. Alongside of one laden with live cattle a
dozen sailors were in the shallow water, shouting and splashing,
endeavoring to push their sloop off the bar. On many of the stranded
sloops the sailors were transferring parts of their cargoes to other
boats which were not aground. At some places the dark-hued laborers were
shoveling grain from a stranded felucca into a lighter one; at others
they were carrying unwieldy bundles of sugar-cane from one deck to
another. Here they were handling, with much difficulty, large blocks of
stone; there throwing yellow water-jars one at a time, passing
red-bricks slowly, or shifting stacks of green clover from deck to deck.
They accompanied the work of disburdening the vessels with strange cries
and chants in which the name of Allah noticeably recurred, occasionally
stopping to test the result of their labor by plunging into the water
and pushing the felucca, or by shoving from its deck with long poles.

One of the officers of the Amasis with some sailors in a row-boat
carried an anchor to its cable's length from the steamer and dropped it
in the water, then a donkey-engine on deck to which the cable was
attached was started and the steamer shook with the throbs of the engine
endeavoring to pull it off the bar toward the anchor. Unsuccessful in
tugging the steamer in that direction, they raised the anchor into the
r