38 A COLLECTING TRIP 
awful to look at, they are so small, and positively not 
even a blade of grass to give them any shade. I do 
not see how they exist or what they live on. I suppose 
fish from the canal and occasionally a shore bird. They 
run along the bank and shout out to the boat as we 
go by for quite a distance. We passed two caravans, 
very interesting sights, the camels slowly walking, 
each one loaded with trading things. We passed the 
town of Suez (this is supposed to be the place where 
the Israelites crossed the Red sea) and anchored for 
an hour or so to take on vegetables, eggs, etc. As soon 
as we stopped swarms of Arabs came climbing up the 
ship selling postal cards, nougat, cigarettes and all 
sorts of trinkets. We bought some ecards which I sent 
to you, some photographs of the canal and views of 
Port Said and Suez; also, six strings of pink coral 
for forty-eight cents. At twelve o’clock we weighed 
anchor and steamed off for Aden. The sea is not very 
wide at first and on one side the coast of Africa was 
plainly visible and on the other the peninsula of 
Sinai. We saw Mt. Sinai. The shores are deserts, 
eliffs, a thousand or more feet high, perfectly bare 
clay, with now and then sand dunes, as far as you 
can see. The colors on these cliffs are wonderful, pink 
and lavender and many shades of blue. It has been 
very hot on the sea these last two days, but this after- 
noon we had quite a good breeze. We went through 
a sand and rain storm; this was most curious; the 
wind blew a gale and then the rain and sand began; 
while it lasted it was so thick that we had to keep 
tooting every few minutes, just as if we had been in a 
heavy fog. The sunsets are magnificent. There is a 
German prince on board and the rest of the boat 
