244 THE BONDS OF AFRICA 



that even the great brains of to-day can only 

 ponder on them. Egypt taught the world when 

 the nations were young. She was a wise governess 

 and she rocked dynasties in her cradle. She 

 is a nursery-land to-day, when the world has 

 grown old and joyless. She can take us by the 

 hand as though the nations were again little 

 children. She can draw smiles from those who 

 have lost their moods of mirth, she can charm, 

 the most hlase with her gorgeous toys. 



Where the soft warm air blows from off the 

 bosom of the slumbering desert, where the lateen 

 sails dip to the silvery Nile, where colours play 

 at riot and skies are sapphire blue, this is the 

 garden wherein the old may feel young again, 

 where the young may feel younger, and the dying 

 spirit may regain all that is worth living for. 

 For there is that in Egypt to do all this. There 

 is the panacea of Paracelsus which is called 

 Azoth — the joyous tincture of life. 



The Desert Express left Suez with its flat-topped 

 houses and the blue gulf of the sea behind, and 

 tore across the sands. Egypt is a land of deep 

 rich colours; the glaucous green of the date- 

 palm, the silvery sheen of the Nile, the golden 

 red of the desert. Shades and shadows, glare, 

 and soft subdued light, conflict with each other, 

 but there is always that background of golden 

 red, the colour of the desert, the living blush of 

 dead Pharaohs. It is the tint that ever mirrors 

 on the Nile, intensifies the glory of the moonlight, 

 or regilds the golden glamour of the dying sun. 

 Those mountain ranges which look down on 

 Suez from the west give the visitor to Egypt 

 from the south his first impression of this glorious 

 all-pervading undertone, and when they are lost 

 to sight there is the vastness of the plain of sands. 



