Can you thank the Prince of Wales for Omar, or shall I write?  He was most pleasant and kind, and the Princess too.  She is the most perfectly simple-mannered girl I ever saw.  She does not even try to be civil like other great people, but asks blunt questions, and looks at one so heartily with her clear, honest eyes, that she must win all hearts.  They were more considerate than any people I have seen, and the Prince, instead of being gracious, was, if I may say so, quite respectful in his manner:  he is very well bred and pleasant, and has the honest eyes that makes one sure he has a kind heart.

My sailors were so proud at having the honour of rowing him in our own boat, and of singing to him.  I had a very good singer in the boat.  Please send some little present for my Reis:  he is such a good man; he will be pleased at some little thing from you.  He is half Turk, and seems like whole one.  Maurice will have told you all about us.  Good-bye for the present, dearest Alick.

July 9, 1869:  Sir Alexander Duff Gordon

To Sir Alexander Duff Gordon. 
HELWAN,
OPPOSITE BEDRESHAYN,
July 9, 1869.

Dearest Alick,

Don’t make yourself unhappy, and don’t send out a nurse.  And above all don’t think of coming.  I am nursed as well as possible.  My two Reises, Ramadan and Yussuf, are strong and tender and Omar is admirable as ever.  The worst is I am so strong.

I repeat I could not be better cared for anywhere than by my good and loving crew.  Tell Maurice how they all cried and how Abd el-Haleem forswore drink and hasheesh.  He is very good too.  But my Reises are incomparable.  God bless you.  I wish I had seen your dear face once more—­but not now.  I would not have you here now on any account.

Footnotes: 

{1} See my ‘Three Generations of English Women.’

{4} See ‘Three Generations of English Women.’

{48} A smoker or eater of hasheeshs (hemp).

{55} Lady Mary and Lord Jesus.

{188} About 7.5 bushels.

{293} Now, I believe, abolished.  The Sheykh of the Saadeeyeh darweeshes, passing part of the night in solitude, reciting prayers and passages of the Koran, went to the mosque, preached and said the noonday prayer; then, mounting his horse, proceeded to the Ezbekeeyeh.  Many darweeshes with flags accompanied him to the house of the Sheykh of all the darweeshes where he stayed for some time, whilst his followers were engaged in packing the bodies of those who wished to be trampled under the hoofs of the Sheykh’s horse as closely together as they could in the middle of the road.  Some eighty or a hundred, or more men lay side by side flat on the ground on their stomachs muttering, Allah Allah! and to try if they were packed close enough about twenty darweeshes ran over their