Half of my day in Cairo was spent keeping out of jail. I began the morning determined to photograph a near-by mosque, magnificent with its slender stately minaret silhouetted against a breathtakingly blue sky.

I focused my camera but hadn't even pressed the shutter when I became aware that someone was watching me. A short distance away stood a policeman, dressed in a shapeless black wool uniform and the ever present red fez. I closed my camera and nonchalantly moved on. Glancing in a showcase, I saw him nearing me. A moment later a heavy hand plummeted down on my shoulder, and another grabbed my camera, nearly ripping the shoulder strap. He pulled me over to a traffic officer and the two jabbered excitedly. A surly crowd gathered. It was decided that my fate should be sealed in the Karakol Abdin Kism -- the Abdin District Police Station.

Flanked by the two policemen, and followed by a crowd yelling "Yahoodi" -- Jew -- we walked on. Once I turned around, and beating my breast like and outraged patriot, I shouted: "I am an American!"

"Then you are worse than a Jew!" someone yelled in perfect English.

Those in front rushed up, tried to jab me with their sticks, and threatened me with the whips. Most Egyptians apparently carried one or the other, handy for warding off flies, urchins, or would-be thugs. Had not the police flailed back savagely, I might easily have been mauled. A few months later an American, Stephen A. Haas of Philadelphia, sight-seeing with his wife and an Arab guide, was fatally beaten while police looked the other way.

...One peddler who came to my table was particularly insistent, although I repeatedly waved him away. He was a keen-faced young man.

"You will maybe like this!" the Arab demonstrated. What seemed to be an ordinary whip suddenly became a vicious, four-sided, ten-inch dagger tapering to a fine point. "This knife for Yahood. But maybe you Amerikans like Yahood, yes?"

I took no chances. "No, I hate Jews. Allah's curse on them."

"Ah," he grinned triumphantly. "Then you buy knife to kill Yahood?"

"No. I have one bigger, a Turkish knife. I kill Armenians and Jews with it."