things show we are civilized, and that God approves of us more than any other type of creature ever created.  We take possession of nations, not by thunder of war, but by clatter of dinner-plates.  We do not raise armies, we build hotels; and we settle ourselves in Egypt as we do at Homburg, to dress and dine and sleep and sniff contempt on all things but ourselves, to such an extent that we have actually got into the habit of calling the natives of the places we usurp “foreigners.”  We are the foreigners; but somehow we never can see it.  Wherever we condescend to build hotels, that spot we consider ours.  We are surprised at the impertinence of Frankfort people who presume to visit Homburg while we are having our “season” there; we wonder how they dare do it!  And, of a truth, they seem amazed at their own boldness, and creep shyly through the Kur-Garten as though fearing to be turned out by the custodians.  The same thing occurs in Egypt; we are frequently astounded at what we call “the impertinence of these foreigners,” i.e. the natives.  They ought to be proud to have us and our elephant-legs; glad to see such noble and beautiful types of civilization as the stout parvenu with his pendant paunch, and his family of gawky youths and maidens of the large-toothed, long-limbed genus; glad to see the English “mamma,” who never grows old, but wears young hair in innocent curls, and has her wrinkles annually “massaged” out by a Paris artiste in complexion.  The Desert-Born, we say, should be happy and grateful to see such sights, and not demand so much “backsheesh.”  In fact, the Desert-Born should not get so much in our way as he does; he is a very good servant, of course, but as a man and a brother—­ pooh!  Egypt may be his country, and he may love it as much as we love England; but our feelings are more to be considered than his, and there is no connecting link of human sympathy between Elephant-Legs and sun-browned Nudity!

So at least thought Sir Chetwynd Lyle, a stout gentleman of coarse build and coarser physiognomy, as he sat in a deep arm-chair in the great hall or lounge of the Gezireh Palace Hotel, smoking after dinner in the company of two or three acquaintances with whom he had fraternized during his stay in Cairo.  Sir Chetwynd was fond of airing his opinions for the benefit of as many people who cared to listen to him, and Sir Chetwynd had some right to his opinions, inasmuch as he was the editor and proprietor of a large London newspaper.  His knighthood was quite a recent distinction, and nobody knew exactly how he had managed to get it.  He had originally been known in Fleet Street by the irreverent sobriquet of “greasy Chetwynd,” owing to his largeness, oiliness and general air of blandly-meaningless benevolence.  He had a wife and two daughters, and one of his objects in wintering at Cairo was to get his cherished children married.  It was time, for the bloom was slightly off the fair girl-roses,—­the dainty petals of the delicate