The father is domestic in spite of looking as
if he belonged to all the clubs, and, much to my delight, I saw one
sitting on the eggs while the mother walked out and took the air.
Ostriches and Arabs do women's work with an admirable disregard of
Mrs. Grundy. Ostriches have an irresistible way of waving their lovely
plumy wings, and one old fellow twenty-five years old actually
imitates the dervishes. The keeper says to him, "Dance," and although
he is about ten feet tall, he sits down with his scaly legs spread out
on each side of him, and, shutting his eyes, he throws his long, ugly
red neck from side to side, making a curious grunting noise, and
waving his wings in billowy line like a skirt-dancer. It was too
wonderful to see him, and it was almost as revolting as a real
dervish.
We saw these dervishes once; nothing could persuade us to go
twice--they were too nasty. The night the Khedive goes to the Citadel,
to the mosque of Mohammed Ali, to pray for his heart's desire (for on
that night all prayers of the faithful are sure to be answered), the
dervishes in great numbers are performing their rites.
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