One afternoon we wandered into a market and a man tried to sell me a camel. Wherever we go, if a man has something he doesn't want, he tries to sell it to me, and sometimes he does it. But I refused to take the camel. I did not see how I could fold it up and secrete it so as to get it through the custom house. Camels in the Cairo market are now steady, not literally speaking, but as regards their value. A good terra cotta camel, 55 to 60 hands high and broken to single-foot, will fetch as high as $150. The older ones--spavined, hairless, or pigeontoed--can be bought for as low as $50 each. The common or garden camel, trained to collapse like a pocket camera and carry from three to eight tons of cargo, can usually be bought at from $100 to $125. Cairo, as a whole, was a big surprise to us. We knew that it was going to be cosmopolitan, but we were not prepared to find it so metropolitan. We had pictured it as one or two semi-European streets hedged in by a vast area of native quarter. But, unless you seek out the old parts of the town or the bazaars, each showing a distinct type of the Oriental shark, Cairo is outwardly quite modern, very attractive, and decidedly gay--that is, not real wicked gayety of the Parisian brand, but modified, winter-resort gayety, the kind that is induced by the presence of money-spending tourists. There is no hurrah night life, and gambling, which flourished here for many seasons under the skilful direction of our countryman, Mr. Pat Sheedy, has yielded to British reformatory influence. The modern streets in Cairo, with their attractive hotels, residences, and shops, suggest a blending of Paris and the Riviera--consistent architecture, trees, palms, gardens. The streets are of boulevard width, and the houses of cheerful colouring, many of them bearing coloured frescoes in delicate shades. We who live in a country of rainfall and smoke and changing temperatures are impelled to stop and gaze in wonder at a mansion of snowy white with a pattern of pale blossoms drooping down the front of it. That style of decoration would last about twenty minutes in Chicago. CHAPTER XIII ALL ABOUT OUR VISIT TO THE PYRAMID OF CHEOPS During the first three days in Cairo a brilliant and original plan of action had been outlining itself in my mind. At last I could not keep it to myself any longer, so I told Mr. Peasley. "Do you know what I am going to do?" I asked. Mr. Peasley did not. "I am going to write up the Pyramids. I am going to tell who built them and how long it took and how many blocks of stone they contain. I shall have myself photographed sitting on a camel and holding an American flag. Also, I shall describe in detail the emotions that surge within me as I stand in the shadow of the Sphinx and gaze up at that vast and imperturbable expanse of face." "It's a great scheme," said Mr. Peasley, "but you've been scooped. They've been written up already." [Illustration: "_Scooped!_"] "Are you sure?"