A COLYTONIAN IN EGYPT.

Feilding Star, Volume XI, Issue 2576, 6 March 1915, Page 2

A COLYTONIAN IN EGYPT.

Trooper Archie Simpson writes from Cairo to a friend in Raumai: "The white man here is a God (with a capital G). At first, our chaps were'inclined to treat the natives as they have been accustomed to treat the brown man of our own land; but one and all dropped to the fnct that in the East the prestige of the dominant race is maintained by the sword, and the sword alone. I saw G. Shannon for the first time last night. Of course, in a big camp like this (there are 10,000 New Zealanders) it is possible to miss -30 people that you know. There are fellows here who went to school with me, and some- of them 1 have come across only once. ." . We have been away on trek for three days, like Moses, in the wilderness. By the way, we were shown the rock which Moses is supposed to have struck for water! In our travels we also crossed tbe range where the ancient Egyptians got the stone for the pyramids. The whole place is one huge quarry, with acres of istone chips. Here is the old course of the Nile and the site of ancient Memphis. Ruins are everywhere. It is hard to realise that the" down-trodden, servile people that we brush aside like vermin from our path are the descendants of an imperial, conquering race. From the spot 1 speak of nine pyramids are visible. ... Vanity Fanwould be a good name for Cairo—all Tghts and glitter' and tinsel, with poverty and sorrow beneath the surface. "The more of different lands I see, the more I am convinced that our own land is the best of all. Several men are missing from the camp, i>n(\ also some Australians, so all leave is stopped while enquiry is being made. Rumour says they have been murdered. People who have lived here for years say the natives never be trusted.