On December 10th we ran down from Suez Quay in the Bird of the Sea (Tayr el-Bahr), the harbour mouche, or little steam-launch, accompanied by the Governor, Sa'íd Bey, who has not yet been made a Pasha; by Mr. Consul West; by the genial Ra'íf Bey, Wakíl el-Komandaníyyah or acting commodore of the station; by Mr. Willoughby Faulkner, my host at Suez; by the Messieurs Levick, and by other friends. In the highest spirits we boarded our "gun-carriage," the aviso Mukhbir (Captain Mohammed Siráj); and, after many mutual good wishes, we left the New Docks at 6.10 p.m. Nothing could be more promising than the weather, a young moon mirrored in a sea smooth as oil. The "Giver of Good News" (El-Mukhbir), however, for once failed in her mission. She had lately conducted herself well upon a trial trip round the Zenobia lightship ("Newport Rock").[EN#16] But the two Arab firemen who acted engineers, worn-out grey-beards that hated the idea of four months on the barbarous Arabian shore, had choked the tubes with wastage, and had filled the single boiler, taking care to plug up, instead of opening, the relief-pipe. The consequence was that the engines sweated at every pore; steam instead of water streamed from the sides; and the chimney discharged, besides smoke, a heavy shower of rain. The engine (John Jameson, engineer, Newcastle-on-Tyne, 1866), a good article, in prime condition as far as a literally rotten boiler would allow, presently revenged itself by splitting the air-pipe of the condenser from top to bottom; and after two useless halts the captain reported to me that we must return to Suez. What a beginning! The fracture somewhat relieved the machinery; we did better work after than before the accident, but we were ignobly towed into dock by the ship's boats. A telegram with a procès-verbal was at once sent off to the Prince; Sa'íd Bey and Ra'íf Bey hastened to our aid, and Mr. Williams, superintending engineer of the Khedivíyyah line, with the whole of his staff, stripped and set to work at the peccant tubes and air-pump. They commenced with extinguishing a serious fire which burst from the waste-room--by no means pleasant when close to kegs of blasting-powder carefully sewn up in canvas. They laboured with a will, and before sunset Mr. Williams informed us that he would guarantee the engines for eight days, when we were starting on a dangerous cruise for four months. He also supplied us with an Egyptian boiler-maker and with eleven instead of sixty new tubes: we lost forty-two of the old ones between Suez and El-Muwaylah. Before sunset we made a trial trip, the wretched old kettle acting tant bien que mal; we returned to re-embark the soldiers and the mules, and we set out for the second time at 5.30 p.m.