town, on the day that we visited it. In one quarter were collected all the camels, buffaloes, oxen, donkeys, and sheep, that were for sale. Down the centre of the most crowded part a temporary street of canvas-booths had been erected, where Manchester goods were temptingly displayed: here the country-women were chaffering for the blue cotton, of which their garments are made; Bedouins from the neighbourhood of the Birket, with their independent swagger, were supplying themselves with cooking utensils in the quarter devoted to copper and brass ware; there were Copts, with quite a different cast of countenance, and crushed and downcast manner, haggling and bargaining, with the facility of getting the best of it which is peculiar to them. Here was a man blowing a trumpet as an invitation to a peepshow; there a crétin, with receding skull, epileptic tremor, and idiotic stare, receiving the homage of the unsophisticated fellahin, who kissed his hand as a tribute to his infirmity. Altogether it was an insecty, odoriferous, screaming, wrangling, jostling throng, to shoulder one's way amongst. There was no mistake about the oriental flavour, in more senses

than one. And the satisfaction of our curiosity and interest involved a certain sacrifice of personal comfort, as we came to discover afterwards, during an arduous and protracted effort to reduce the numbers of the hopping mementoes of our visit.

Mere existence, and, much more, sight-seeing, in Egypt, involves a perpetual struggle with fleas; and one goes into a crowd with about the same shiver of reluctance that one would feel before taking a plunge into the Serpentine in the depth of winter. These were our sensations one Sunday when we determined to attend service in the Coptic church. We were escorted thither by some of the leading members of the community, who are largely employed here, as elsewhere in Egypt, as clerks in the public officewriters, accountants, and so forth. The church was a square building, supported by eight columns, and divided by two screens running across it longitudinally. Behind one, which was of open arabesque work, sat the women by themselves. In the centre the male congregation for the most part squatted on their heels; but there were two rows of chairs in

front provided for the more aristocratic portion of the congregation, where we furnished with seats. Immediately in front of us was an opaque screen, ornamented with rude Scripture pictures, and consisting of inlaid ebony and ivory, that divided us from the apse. In the middle of it was an opening through which was visible the altar, a massive brick erection, upon which a sheep might have been conveniently sacrificed. It was now covered with a curtain, upon which the Coptic cross, with its peculiar pendent squares, was designed. In the centre of it was the case, also covered, which contained the chalice. In the midst of the congregation was a reading-desk, at which two of the deacons read from the liturgy, alternately in Coptic and Arabic. This was removed before the service was completed. The congregation, which was composed of four or five hundred persons, was decidedly irreverent; there was a constant movement of places and subdued conversation going on all the while that the priests were intoning the service in the rapid nasal voice peculiar to them. It was a form that apparently had to be got through by the priests in as little time as

possible, and by the people with no attention whatever. The sacrament was celebrated by a priest in a white surplice embroidered with gold, but who, according to invariable usage, was barefoot. When the celebration began we were allowed to take off our shoes and take a couple of chairs into the apse and seat ourselves beside the altar. There were besides ourselves and the priest two or three youths, apparently neophytes, and three little boys leaning over the altar opposite the celebrant, one to fan the flies off, and the others to chant responses: at the door of the apse was a man swinging incense. Four candles were burning on the altar, and a very old chandelier hung from the roof. During the whole time that the priest chanted the service he held extended in either hand a square piece of richly embroidered cloth, emblazoned with the cross and sundry Coptic devices. The bread, on which was stamped a cross, consisted of a substantial cake, something like a hot cross bun, and when the priest took it, one like it was handed to each of us, apparently as a keepsake. Having broken it into a glass saucer and elevated it before the congrega

tion, he uncovered the wine, dipped his finger into it and crossed the bread. He then commenced to partake of the bread, giving it at the same time to a young man by his side, and to a child about seven years old, who walked incessantly round the altar with a candle in his hand and a square embroidered cloth held to his mouth. Every time he passed the priest he stopped, received a mouthful, and then started off again with the cloth held tightly to his mouth, continuing his walk until the bread was finished. I asked a young Copt the meaning of this child's performances, and he said he was, "like Samuel, training for the priesthood from his infancy." All this time, when the priest was not intoning, a group of four boys outside in the church were chanting the responses in Arabic, in a loud discordant key, in alternation with those within the apse, who chanted in C Coptic. It was a wild Arabic cadence, which sounded strangely in connection with a Christian service, and with the constantly recurring refrain of "Kyrie Eleison." When the bread and wine were disposed of, and the vessels divested of the last crumb and drop, the chalice