Explore "The Tour" by Louis Couperus on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
Uncle Catullus lay under the awning of the thalamegus and asked Cora to come and sit by him:
"Sing and play me some cheerful songs, Cora," he said. "Be kind to me even though I be not your master. For I feel bored here, on this Nile boat, at Memphis. I have been bored ever since Lucius went to the oracle of Ammon, through the barren desert. What an idea, what a mad idea! They have been gone five days now; they will probably arrive tomorrow. I am bored, Cora, I am horribly bored. Egypt will be the death of me! First I am saturated with new impressions, like a sponge with water, and then Lucius abandons me to unlimited boredom. He's an egoist; he never thinks of his old uncle. Cora, be amiable to me and sing and play me some cheerful songs, won't you?"