volume 2 - Robert Bedrosian's Armenian History Workshop

The Odes of Bacchylides. 355
midnight. I spent a delightful evening with my friend,
whom I left at midnight to go down to the quay. A
little way from the shore we ran into a strong southeasterly
breeze, which dashed the sea over us and wetted
us to the skin. Four hours later the ship appeared and
dropped anchor, and I went on board, and the letter
from my well-informed friend in Cairo to the captain
procured me a kind reception, and a comfortable berth
was found for me at once. Whilst Ahmad was sending
away the launch with a generous bukhsMsh, I handed
over the pap5n:us to one of the ship's officers, who stowed
it away in a safe place. Ahmad accompanied me to Port
Sa'id and went ashore there to claim my baggage, and
when he returned with it he told me that the bullock
trunks had been opened and searched by the Customs
authorities before he got to them. He was told that
I was staying in Isma'i-liyiah, and when he asked his
informant if it was not true that I had gone to Suez,
he replied, " What is the good of his going to Suez ?
The P. & O. steamers do not allow passengers to
embark at Suez." Which was, of course, from a general
point of view quite true.
A fortnight later I gave the papyrus into the hands
of the Principal Librarian, and the Trustees of the
British Museum purchased it at their next meeting from
a connection of mine, who signed the Treasury warrant
for payment, and gave it to me. The papyrus contained
nearly forty columns of the text of the Odes of Bacchylides,
a great lyric poet who flourished in the first half of the
fifth century B.C., and the experts thought that it was
written about the middle of the first century B.c.^ Sir
Richard Jebb told me that he thought it was worth
more than all the other things I had acquired for the
Museum put together ! His works were hitherto unknown
except for a few disjointed fragments.
My next five visits to Egypt were made in connection
with journeys to the Sudan on the invitation of Lord
^ See Catalogue of Additions to the MSS. between 1894 and 1899,
London, 1901, p. 543 {Papyrus No. ; 733) and the edition of the text
by Kenyon, The Poems of Bacchylides, London, 1897, with facsimile.
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