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66 Oriental Cairo
out of doors, for he cannot carry the hose and the water
jar about himself.
This cafe is at the point where the Musky debouches,
the artery up which the natives come when their business
takes them to the European city, and down which the
Europeans ^o when they invade the bazar. Here, as soon
as the weather grows hot, the ranks of the hawkers are
swelled by an army of ice-cream sellers, lemonade-sellers,
water-sellers, and sponge and loofah sellers. The clang of
the trams and the water-sellers never ceases ; the fly-whisk
sellers are incessant.
The Ataba-el-Khadra is a wonderfully busy place ; there
is a never-ending stream of tramways and native buses
and native funerals, and people hurrying to the trams, and
forage camels, and porters carrying enough for a camel.
The forage camels and the stone carts knock against
everything ; they have really good opportunities, for the
tramways start from haphazard places, so every one is
staring at the tram-boards. To see this sport at its best
you must choose a day when it has rained several hours.
Cairo can be quite a rainy city ; has not Pierre Loti
written that the barrages are ruining its climate ? and an
Irish M.P. said, "The Assuan dam is making a damn mess
of its climate " ? Egyptian mud is worse than Egyptian
darkness. The dust in which Egypt is so prolific readily
makes a fine paste, which may be spread over the foot-
path as well as the road to the depth of several inches.
While you are wading through this hasty-pudding to catch
a tram which only goes once in half an hour, and shows
signs of wanting to go without you, and another tram is
bearing down upon you on each side, you are nearly
knocked down every minute by carts laden with building
materials driven by men almost blind with ophthalmia,
camels with stacks of green forage on their backs, flocks
of passover sheep, galloping cabs, and reckless motors.
Then you learn the full capabilities of forage camels. All
the cabmen and donkey-boys lunch their animals on green
forage, and camels with stacks on their backs slouch in