Monday Jan 9. S.S. Orenogne[?] Dearest Mother. I was quite wrong when I said we should arrive today. No one on board this ship had any intention of doing such a thing and indeed the itineraries of the Messageries are drawn up to blind, not to enlighten, the public. However we ought to get to Alexandria tomorrow at midday which will give me time to pay a short visit to the museum and to catch the evening train to Cairo. We have just emerged from 36 hours of storm, not very bad but enough to make this old boat dance like a ballet girl. Every time I travel on a ship of this line, I swear it shall be the last. They get worse and worse, and the company on board is impayable. At my table there sits a Marseillais who talks with the accent of Tartaine and recounts tales that might have issued from his lips if they had been more amusing; an old bore who passes his time in telling us what item of the disgusting menu he is going to choose next (but no one listens); a young bore who dresses in a sweater, nickerbockers [sic] and putties and says little or nothing; a Constantinople [Istanbul] Jew and his wife who comes from Australia and might as well have remained there. I met one acquaintance, a certain M. Henriez who was French Consul at Mosul [Mawsil, Al] when I was there and is now going to his post at Alexandria - not a very interesting little man, but I nearly fell on his neck when he recalled himself to me, so unlikely did it seem that anyone approaching to a human being should form part of this crew. I have a cabin to myself which is a great alleviation, and I have Jean Christophe who has proved the most delightful companion. I am at the 8th vol. now - and with unabated interest. It is admirable. Its immense length is no disadvantage when you read it under these conditions. Perhaps the early volumes are the best, but I don't know - it's full of striking things all through, wonderful scenes which rise up with an astonishing vividness before one; and it is full of poetry and of fine clean sentiment. I love Jean Christophe himself; he is a great creation. Many times I have blessed you for providing me with this good divertisement. By the way, while I think of it, there are two things which I want you to do for me in Rome [Roma]. I will write them on a separate sheet which you can put in your bag and refer to while you are there - if you have time. Though it is calm today, it is sunless; not cold however and everything seems pleasant after yesterday's tossing. It was disagreeable. We ran into the storm after Messina, rain and wind, and the decks so wet with spray that it was scarcely possible to find a dry corner to sit in. Tuesday night. Cairo. [10 January 1911] Here I am safely arrived. Two archaeologists waited on me before I had had my bath! and I'm going to have a regular orgy tomorrow. Your affectionate daughter Gertrude.
It's so deliciously warm!

[On separate sheet] Don't bother about these if it is too much trouble.

Two things I want in Rome.

You know the round church of Sta Costanza, outside the walls? Next to it is the little basilica of St Agnese which has in the inside a double storey of columns on either side of the nave. The capitals of the lower storey are acanthus capitals with tiny garlands hung over the corners. I want a photograph of one of these, showing the garland clearly, for it is the only example I know in Rome of the garlanded capital of the early Christian monuments at Diyarbekr [Diyarbakir (Amida)] and in the Tur Abdin. The photograph does not I think exist. But Eugénie's photographer would take it for me for a few francs. I shall want it as a point for comparison when I write my forthcoming work about the Tur Abdin.

The second thing is in the Museum of the Terme. I was shown it by the curator, Paribene, who took Eugénie and me round. It is part of some architectural fragments from a tomb of the Antonines found some way out of Terme, near Tivoli I think. When I saw these fragments they were not yet being exhibited to the public. Paribene said they had to be sorted and set up. The interesting thing about them was that some of the decoration was the acanthus spinosus, the fat jagged acanthus, not the broad, flat leaved one. Now the earliest example I know of the acanthus spinosus, except this tomb, is at Spalato [Split] - 50 years later than the fragments at the Terme. It is undoubtedly an Asiatic motive (the plant itself is Asiatic) and it points to a school of Asiatic stone cutters having existed in Rome in the time of the Antonines - so I think. If Paribene would be so kind, I should like to have a good photograph of one of these fragments, showing exactly that particular kind of acanthus decoration. It is rather an important point which I should like some day to use. Here again the photograph would probably have to be taken specially for me. Eugénie knows the fragments in the Terme - we saw them together - and she could get permission from Paribene to have them photographed, if she would be so good.