Bell war diary, 16 December 1915 - 26 October 1916 / Roy Pinto Bell - Page 24

[Page 24]

brilliant coloured glass. On looking upwards I saw one of the most wonderful ceilings I have ever seen. It consisted of a number of domes with four smaller ones behind these. At the corners of the square formed by these domes are four grand stately pillars of ababaster supporting the ceiling and between these pillars and the walls still four more smaller domes are found. The whole of these domes are decorated by intricate and bold designs in gold on a black background, the whole ceiling being one of graceful curves, deep shadows and small patches of light where the suns rays vainly attempt to pierce the gloom and succeeding in bringing some of the beautiful work to light, but only in the end to be swallowed up by the shadows, which give a sort of vague endlessness to the whole ceiling making it all the more grand – from this roof which is of great height, suspended on long iron chains hangs a hugh circle of electric lights over 50' diameter and containing as far as I could imagine over 100 lamps, the whole only being about 8 feet from the ground. There are also four huge brass chandeliers with four tiers of lights and the effect when they are all lit up must be simply wonderful. Leaving this beautiful mosque we went onto the terrace where you get one of the recognised views in the world. U are standing on the generable old walls of the Citadel,, which still seem to keep some of their ancient strength and stretching before you are the innumerable roofs of Cairo, whilst rising from their midst are the thin graceful monarchs of the mosques in their setting of sky blue and beside them are their more stolid companions the domes. Far out on the horizon to the left, winds the sinuous Nile like a huge silvery backed snake through the beautiful green crops and out further on the edge of the endless desert stands those old monarchs, the pyramids. As a contrast on our immediate right is one of those bare native cemeteries with their rows of mud tombs, far different from the richly decorated tombs of Mohammed Ali in his beautiful Mosque. Leaving this scene we met two Indian soldiers who showed us over the hospital full of wounded Indians from the Peninsular and France and then an English M.P. who was quartered in the barracks took us on the old