They then hastened out of the caverns, and under the protection of
their guard returned to Cairo.



CHAPTER XLIX--THE CONCLUSION, IN WHICH NOTHING IS CONCLUDED.



It was now the time of the inundation of the Nile. A few days
after their visit to the catacombs the river began to rise.

They were confined to their house. The whole region being under
water, gave them no invitation to any excursions; and being well
supplied with materials for talk, they diverted themselves with
comparisons of the different forms of life which they had observed,
and with various schemes of happiness which each of them had
formed.

Pekuah was never so much charmed with any place as the Convent of
St. Anthony, where the Arab restored her to the Princess, and
wished only to fill it with pious maidens and to be made prioress
of the order. She was weary of expectation and disgust, and would
gladly be fixed in some unvariable state.

The Princess thought that, of all sublunary things, knowledge was
the best. She desired first to learn all sciences, and then
proposed to found a college of learned women, in which she would
preside, that, by conversing with the old and educating the young,