Page:H. D. Traill - From Cairo to the Soudan Frontier.djvu/146

128 outburst, but thought fit to hide his emotion under a mask of cynicism. "Yes, we remain, if that is a matter on which to congratulate ourselves. And I have no doubt we shall see out the present occupants of the country; which, by the way, may be all the worse for the fellah who seems as eternal as ourselves."

"Fear not but we shall outlive this tribe of red coats and black hats as we have outlived the turbaned warriors they have displaced and the mail-clad legionaries of the dynasty before. And then, like enough, that cry of the fellaheen, which has moaned along this valley from the age of the pyramid builders till it was hushed but yesterday, may ascend once more. But we—we shall remain when these things of yesterday have passed away. To the human insects of an hour we shall stand, as we have always stood, for the emblems of an antiquity to which he must bow the head in awe."

The Northern Colossus had hardly ceased speaking when, under the fast-broadening