It was nearly three o’clock when our Cairo visitors wished us “bon voyage” and good-by. Then the M. B.’s, who, with their nephew, had been of the party, went back to their own boat; and both captains prepared to sail at a given signal. For the M. B.’s had entered into a solemn convention to start with us, moor with us, and keep with us, if practicable, all the way up the river. It is pleasant now to remember that this sociable compact, instead of falling through as such compacts are wont to do, was quite literally carried out as far as Aboo Simbel; that is to say, during a period of seven weeks’ hard going and for a distance of upward of eight hundred miles. At last all is ready. The awning that has all day roofed in the upper deck is taken down; the captain stands at the head of the steps; the steersman is at the helm; the dragoman has loaded his musket. Is the Bagstones ready? We wave a handkerchief of inquiry--the signal is answered--the mooring ropes are loosened--the sailors pole the boat off from the bank--bang go the guns, six from the Philæ and six from the Bagstones, and away we go, our huge sail filling as it takes the wind! Happy are the Nile travelers who start thus with a fair breeze on a brilliant afternoon. The good boat cleaves her way swiftly and steadily. Water-side palaces and gardens glide by and are left behind. The domes and minarets of Cairo drop quickly out of sight. The mosque of the citadel and the ruined fort that looks down upon it from the mountain ridge above diminish in the distance. The pyramids stand up sharp and clear. We sit on the high upper deck, which is furnished with lounge-chairs, tables and foreign rugs, like a drawing-room in the open air, and enjoy the prospect at our ease. The valley is wide here and the banks are flat, showing a steep verge of crumbling alluvial mud next the river. Long belts of palm groves, tracts of young corn only an inch or two above the surface, and clusters of mud huts, relieved now and then by a little whitewashed cupola or a stumpy minaret, succeed each other on both sides of the river, while the horizon is bounded to right and left by long ranges of yellow limestone mountains, in the folds of which sleep inexpressibly tender shadows of pale violet and blue.