On the Sitt’s arrival his slave girl was arrogant, and refused to kiss her hand, and spoke saucily of her age, whereupon Seleem gave her in marriage to a black man and pays for her support, as long as she likes to suckle the child he (Seleem) had by her, which child will in due time return to his house. Kurz, the fundamental idea in it all, in the mind of an upright man, is, that if a man ‘takes up’ with a woman at all, he must make himself responsible for her before the world; and above all for the fate of any child he may have by her (you see the Prophet of the Arabs did not contemplate ladies qui savent nager so well in the troubled waters of life as we are now blessed with.  I don’t mean to say that many men are as scrupulous as my excellent friend Seleem, either here or even in our own moral society).  All this was told with expressions quite incompatible with our manners, though not at all leste—­and he expatiated on his wife’s personal charms in a very quaint way; the good lady is now hard upon sixty and looks it fully; but he evidently is as fond of her as ever.  As a curious trait of primitive manners, he told me of her piety and boundless hospitality; how when some friends came late one evening, unexpectedly, and there was only a bit of meat, she killed a sheep and cooked it for them with her own hands.  And this is a Cairene lady, and quite a lady too, in manners and appearance.  The day I dined there she was dressed in very ragged, old cotton clothes, but spotlessly clean; and she waited on me with a kind, motherly pleasure, that quite took away the awkwardness I felt at sitting down while she stood.  In a few days she and her husband are to dine with me, a thing which no Arab couple ever did before (I mean dine out together), and the old lady was immensely amused at the idea.  Omar will cook and all male visitors will be sent to the kitchen.  Now that I understand all that is said to me, and a great deal of the general conversation, it is much more amusing.  Seleem Effendi jokes me a great deal about my blunders, especially my lack of politikeh, the Greek word for what we should call flummery; and my saying lazim (you must, or rather il faut), instead of humble entreaties.  I told him to teach me better, but he laughed heartily, and said, ’No, no, when you say lazim, it is lazim, and nobody wants the stick to force him to say Hadr (ready) O Sheykh-el-Arab, O Emeereh.’

Fancy my surprise the other day just when I was dictating letters to Sheykh Yussuf (letters of introduction for Ross’s inspecting agent) with three or four other people here, in walked Miss North (Pop) whom I have not seen since she was a child.  She and her father were going up the second cataract.  She has done some sketches which, though rather unskilful, were absolutely true in colour and effect, and are the very first that I have seen that are so.  I shall see something of them on their return.  She seemed very pleasant.  Mr. North looked rather horrified at the turbaned society in which he found himself.  I suppose it did look odd to English eyes.