6 UNDER THE AFRICAN SUN 



was raging, and all the ports were tightly closed, yet the fine 

 sand found its way somehow into everything. We were boxed 

 up in the saloon, and the heat was stifling. 



More commonly the apathetic passenger simply " kills 

 time." To his blase eye the pretty canal stations are unin- 

 teresting ; to him the Egyptian ragged urchins scrambling 

 for an orange or a coin are an absolute bore, and the white 

 cloud of ibis, the single file of camels, the sand dunes, the 

 salt lakes, are of supreme indifference. 



A STATION ON THE SUEZ CANAL. 



It is a curious fact that on board a ship every traveller 

 becomes much more chummy ; and when he does throw off 

 the crusty shell of prejudice, he is ready to take to anybody. 

 On board ship one meets, one parts, perhaps never to meet 

 again ; yet many a kindly word or action lingers in the recesses 

 of memory, and is treasured for years. It does not take much 

 to call forth a laugh when everybody is in a mood for it. 



At the Suez end of the canal the steamer only stops to land 

 mails ; there is no time nowadays to go on shore and visit the 

 Well of Moses and other sights of the neighbourhood. In- 

 dustrious hawkers, however, come on board the homeward- 



