Series 03: John Brady Nash letters, January 1914-December 1915 - Page 77
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[Page 77]
Lieut. Col. Nash
S.S. Kyarra
Mediterranean Sea
Off the Mouths of the Nile
13-1-14 [15]
My dear Girls
Off again on this great treck. As no lunch was to be obtained on board, a strike for some reason or another, I went on shore about 1-30 p.m. Rambled round Port Said by myself, first in one direction then in another. The town is growing rapidly. Soon the whole of the available land will be occupied. The houses are of many stories, 4, 5, or 6, in height, the roofs flat, the windows of varied pattern. They do not look substantial nor expensive. In the main streets there is room for carriages and other vehicles. Plenty of the former are available for hire. The other streets are only lanes. The hotels are of varied class. The largest ones have some attractiveness about them. Some of the shops are large & well stocked. The natives are black, of the Arab class. Nothing picturesque about them, far otherwise than are the Cingalese & others at Colombo. Those who put the coal on board have not shining skins, they are simply black of skin & black with coal dust. The canal works, the coaling of the ships, & the passengers of all classes bring the income to the town, they are all increasing in importance so the town grows apace. Where the Arabs live the streets are mere lanes, there is little idea of cleanliness about the people or in the streets, men, women, children, goats, pigs, donkeys, sheep, fowels wander indiscriminately; in the houses they must be packed like sardines in their tins. Flies abound. Sore & disfigured eyes are everywhere. The food is carried about for sale. If there be aught in what modern sanitarians teach, then all these black people should die before long, yet have they lived during the ages that have passed, & under worse conditions than those of today.