GOSSIPY NOTES.

Akaroa Mail and Banks Peninsula Advertiser, Volume 2, Issue 143, 30 November 1877, Page 2

GOSSIPY NOTES.

o—. .

(FROM THE EAST.)

"When I left Lyttelton last April for England vifi Suez, I promised to write and give you some account of my doings, but I little thought at the time how many difficulties would spring up, and how very inconvenient it might be for me to redeem my pledge, and now that I have commenced writing I scarcely know what to toll you about first.

I found Suez to be a horribly dirty hole, where vice and sensuality are encouraged by the Europeans passing through, for the vilest and most abominable photographs and pictures are openly sold and exhibited in the shops. This place being a sort of No-man's-land, the off-scourings of Cairo and Alexandria (which are, I think, the cesspools which receive the scum of Europe) muster here in force.

I left the company's charge at Alexandria (my ticket only taking me that far), which I found a busy and bustling city, where you may meet representatives from nearly every nation under the sun. Here I was so fortunate as to become acquainted with a Mr Geo. P. Tourniere, an attache, or something of the sort, of the American Consul's—a first-rate fellow, with whom I made the trip to Cairo.

Cairo is a queer, romantic looking city, and it seems to have a peculiar attraction in it for Europeans. One cannot help continually glancing up at the latticed windows, expecting to see some bright eyed Zulieka peeping out. After a very short time, however, this feeling wears off. All the charms of the women seem to be concentrated in their eyes—those large, dark, expressive orbs, which seem to look right into one, but when a glimpse is obtained of their unveiled faces, all this, romance dies away, for in nearly all cases their features are coarse and sensual to a degree. ,

I I remained with Tourniere at his 10.dg,----i ing in Cairo for a full week, never once going out of the city, not even to the Pyramids, which were to be seen from my bedroom window, but just loafed about studying the people and exploring the highways and byeways of the place, as you know my wont is., Tourniere and I went down to Alexandria by boat, and from there rode over to see Cleopatra's needle By the way,'' Oleopatra had nothing to do with erecMng thisyriemarkable monument, at least so said my cicerone, who is learned in all the learning of the Egyptians, "and a little.more," as he laughingly affirms. He said'that.the obelisk was brought down the river from Luxor, and was not erected till \ some twenty or twenty-five years after patra's death, and that an earthquake Overthrew it at the beginning of the present century. People were just beginning to talk about its removal to England, and predicted the utter failure of the scheuW.' Getting it down the steep, rocky beach will in itself be no light task. Mr Henry Knewson, who has come out to operations, was extremely sanguine of success, and at the same time most prcvokingly mysterious as to the modus! operufidir- talking about; building a ship under it, and all that sort of thing. ■ (To be continued.) X