February 12.--The Undine came down famously at sunrise, and joined us soon opposite the upper end of Elephantiné, where we went up to meet her, expecting to round the island and be off at once down the river. But a heavy blow from the north, and consequent great discouragement; we had to lay by all day, not even getting on shore with any comfort, and almost all night. You must know that in Upper Egypt and Nubia a hakim or doctor is a great godsend to the people, and you have to give medicine all day long. On returning to Assouan I was met, when I stepped on shore, by the beaming dark countenance of a papa, to whose son, whom I thought rather far gone, I had given some medicine when going up; he had now brought down the fellow from a village several miles off, to show me how well--or nearly well--he was. Another widely grinning face met me, of a papa who had brought me his boy with a dreadfully ill-looking sore head, which I had dosed with mercurial ointment rubbed in with colza oil. He did not now bring the lad, but came a good distance to recall him to my recollection by expressive pantomime, and to say in the same way that he was “all right.” Eye-wash I dispensed in profuse abundance; and among the men cured several cases of ophthalmia which looked serious; and many a petty surgical operation did the “Hakim-Pacha”--as he came to be called--perform. I cannot tell you how much attached we got to our crews and their officers, and before we parted I made sure that many tears should flow in my behalf, by acceding to requests for eye-lotions, which were most copiously used,--by those who needed it, for cure, by those who did not, for prevention. Two sorts of creatures with which I formerly had little sympathy, I have learned to appreciate and respect,--donkeys and people of color, Arabs and Nubians especially. All idea of anything disagreeable or inferior in color of skin disappeared, or rather the darker fellows seemed the finer. As I remember sundry dark Arabs, they seem to me among the best-looking and best-behaved men I ever knew. But this digression will never do.... At sunset reached Edfou. February 15.--Whole day at the temple, which is all but entire, and large as well as complete, and the acres of sculpture and hieroglyph in excellent preservation, all recently excavated under the care of Mariette and placed under a custodian. If I could be dropped down in Egypt for one morning only, to see only one thing, it should be this temple at Edfou, though only of Ptolemaic date. I cannot stop for a single detail about it.... February 22.--Luxor: across river, tombs, Medinet el Bahree, Ramaseum, again, etc. I and some others dined in the evening on boat with our English friends (Legge, Eaton, and Baird), and celebrated Washington’s Birthday.