Keeping house in Egypt is great fun, if you can keep your temper. Servants a-plenty are a certainty, but what they will do next is always uncertain. Here a noted Egyptologist tells some amusing stories of his household difficulties.

BY ARTHUR WEIGALL,

Former Inspector General of Antiquities for the
Egyptian Government.

IN ordinary, amiable conversation with people whose interests have little in common with mine, I often find that the introduction of the subject of servants supplies just that touch of nature which makes the whole world kin. When I have been talking about my life in the land of the Pharaohs, for example, I have observed that some stray remark of mine about my domestic staff has kindled the light of interest in eyes that were rolling upward with boredom; and therefore I offer no apology for making this my present theme. Like illnesses and operations, it has an almost universal appeal.

What happens in Egypt, of course, is outside the scope of everyday experience in the West; yet servants are servants wherever they be, and certain of their qualities—such as that of smashing things with a light heart—are common to the whole species.