1_.
... All day we have glided through the Canal. Imagine a shining band
of silver water, a band of deepest blue sky, and in between a bar of
fine gold which is the desert--and you have some idea of what I am
looking at. Sometimes an Arab passes riding on a camel, and I can't
get away from the feeling that I am a child again looking at a highly
coloured Bible picture-book on Sabbath afternoons.
We landed at Port Said yesterday morning. People told us it was a
dirty place, an uninteresting place, a horribly dull place, not worth
leaving the ship to see, but it was our first glimpse of the East and
we were enchanted. The narrow streets, the white domes and minarets
against the blue sky, the flat roofs of the houses, the queer shops
with the Arabs shouting to draw attention to their wares, and, above
all, the new strange smell of the East, were, to us, wonderful and
fascinating.
When we got ashore the sun was shining with a directness hitherto
unknown to us, making the backs of our unprotected heads feel somewhat
insecure, so we went first to a shop where we spied exposed to sale a
rich profusion of topis. In case you don't know, a topi is a sun-hat,
a white thing, large and saucer-like, lined with green, with cork
about it somewhere, rather suggestive of a lifebelt; horribly
unbecoming but quite necessary.
A very polite man bowed us inside, and we proceeded on our quixotic
search for a topi not entirely hideous. Half an hour later we came out
of the shop, the shopman more obsequious than ever, not only wearing
topis, but laden with boxes of Turkish Delight, ostrich-feather fans,
tinsel scarves, and a string of pink beads which he swore were coral,
but I greatly doubt it.
Pages:
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27