RETRIBUTION FOR OUR FOES
We reached Ghail Babwazir in three hours, at half-past five, passing
through several oases. It is a large town. Some children, as I came round
a corner, cried, 'Let us flee! here is a demon' (_afrit_).
All the guns of our escort were fired, and we were ushered into a house,
where there was a good-sized room with some matting.
We were all very tired, hot and hungry, but alas for Arab hospitality! No
coffee was brought, not even water, and when our servants asked for water
and wood--'Show us first your money' was the answer they got.
We had a very public visit from the governor, who is called sultan, and
who asked us if we had had a pleasant journey, and wondered how we could
have been so many days on the road.
He was told of all our troubles, and took the Hamoumi, Mohammad, who shot
at us, a prisoner, and his _jembia_ (or as they say in Southern Arabia
_ghembia_), without which he is ashamed to be seen, was given into my
husband's custody.
Our expedition all passed a peaceful night, thankful to be in security
after eighteen days of anxiety, never knowing what ambushes we might be
led into; but Talib we heard did not sleep at all and was quite ill from
fright, as contrary to his wishes he was, said the sultan, to be taken to
Sheher with us on the morrow.
Ghail Babwazir is an oasis or series of oases of rank fertility, caused
by a stream the water of which is warm and bitter, and which is conducted
by channels cut in the rock in various directions.
Acres and acres of tobacco, bananas, Indian corn, cotton, and other crops
are thus produced in the wilderness, and this cultivation has given rise
to the overgrown village.
The stream was discovered about five hundred years ago by one Sheikh
Omar, and before that time all this part was waste ground.
This fertilising spring rises under a hill to the east, where a large
reservoir has been dug out. Above on the hill are some Arab ruins, places
where things were stored, and there is a road up. Canals cut some twenty
feet deep, like the _kanats_ of Persia, conduct the water to the fields.
The chief product is tobacco, known as Hamoumi tobacco.
Our roof happened to command a view of the terrace where a bride and her
handmaidens were making merry with drums and coffee. In spite of the
frowns and gesticulations of the order-keeper, who flourished her stick
at us and bade us begone, we were able to get a peep, forbidden to males,
at the blushing bride. She wore on her head large silver bosses like tin
plates, her ears were weighed down with jewels, her fingers were straight
with rings, and her arms a mass of bracelets up to the elbow, and her
breast was hidden by a multiplicity of necklaces. Her face, of course,
was painted yellow, with black lines over her eyes and mouth like heavy
moustaches, and from her nose hung something which looked to us like a
gold coin. The bride herself evidently had no objection to my husband's
presence, but the threatening aspect of her women compelled us
reluctantly to retire.
On the 29th we set out for Sheher, or Shaher Bander as it is called, a
most cheerful set of people, at least as far as our own immediate party
was concerned; some of the others had little cause for pleasant
anticipations.
We were in advance of the baggage camels, riding our horses and donkey,
and accompanied by Talib, without his dagger, on his camel. Matthaios,
the Jabberi, and the soldiers surrounding the prisoner Mohammad, attached
by a long rope to my husband's horse, an arrangement not invented by my
husband, but which we enjoyed very much, and no wonder, after all we had
suffered!
The servants all thought that as soon as might be after getting to Sheher
we should take ship for Aden, and many were the plans made for vengeance
upon Saleh once he was safe in our clutches on board that ship.
We, however, had quite another design, which was that my husband and Imam
Sharif and I should go off to Bir Borhut, if the safety of our lives
could in any way be guaranteed, we taking only Noura, one of the Indian
servants, as our own attendant. Of course the others would be with their
master.
Several times we went by small passes through gypsum hills, lovely to
behold, and twice we passed water, not so bitter as Ghail Babwazir. We
had plenty of up and down hill, but never had to dismount. The way was,
for the most part, arid and uninteresting. Four years before, in these
passes, the Hamoumi had attacked a caravan and killed nine men, taking
eighty camels and 2,000 rupees. They must have had _siyara_, though, from
some tribe. Each tribe has its fixed tariff. The Hamoumi have
twenty-seven dollars, the Jabberi seventy, the Tamimi one hundred, &c.,
and when this sum is paid, if you have only one of each tribe with you,
you are safe.
When we had gone two-thirds of our way we reached a palm-shadowed village
called Zarafa. Here we went into a house to eat our luncheon and obtain
some coffee, which had to be prepaid.
We reached Sheher about four o'clock. The last three miles, going
eastward, were close along the shore at low tide. It was quite
delightful, and we were very much amused at all the crabs we put to
flight.
We were very glad to dismount in the middle of the town, at the gate of
an old castle, and were shown up into a room about 50 feet by 30 feet,
with a good many chairs, tables, and sofas, arranged stiffly, and all
dusty. Indian cotton carpets covered the floor, and there was a great
number of very common lamps with lustres.
We waited wearily nearly an hour, while the Sultan Hussein Mia and his
brother, Sultan Ghalib Mia, put on their best clothes, and at last we
became so out of patience that my husband sent a message to the wazir,
asking him to be kind enough to send a man to point out to us a spot
where we might pitch our tents, and an answer then was returned that the
sultans were coming. When they appeared, very gorgeous, our letter from
Aden was given, with that from Sultan Salàh of Shibahm, and my husband
requested leave to make a camp. Sultan Hussein looked round him and asked
if this room would not do? Imam Sharif explained to him that we were
rather a large party for such accommodation (the whole of our expedition
being then present in the room), that we should require separate
apartments, and, therefore, would prefer a private house. We were given
tea in crockery of the commonest kind; I had an odd cup and saucer which
both leaked badly, and I feared my cup would fall into four pieces, but
they had come from afar, and I dare say the sultans would be astonished
at the care we take of cracked cups from foreign parts.
We were then led on foot quite to the other side of the town, where there
was a 'summer-house' partly constructed and partly furnished, the
builders were on one side and we on the other. We had a room with a
carpet, a settee, and two little tables, and set up our own beds and
chairs. We had rather a good dinner served by an Indian butler who could
talk English, so we had hopes of being very comfortable. The summer-house
at that time consisted of two very long rooms back to back, and several
rooms at each end projecting so as to form a verandah for each of the
long rooms. The back one was quite unfinished then, and upstairs there
were only rudimentary walls traced out, three or four feet high. There
was a great square wall surrounding a piece of desert in process of being
transformed into a garden; the sea sand came quite up to the wall.
We found the heat intense, so we had our tent somehow fastened up on the
roof to sleep. All the sides had to be tied up for coolness, but the
defences against mosquitoes and fleas were very stifling. Goats had been
kept on the roof, and hence the fleas. We could only stay there till
sunrise, and then had to betake ourselves to our suffocating room, to
find the flies wide awake. We had to use our mosquito curtains by day on
their account. In Shibahm the mosquitoes are awake by day only, and at
Aden both by day and night.
Imam Sharif found great favour in the eyes of the two sultans, who asked
him to supper every day. The conversations he had with them about us, and
the letters they had received from their cousin at Shibahm, did us far
more good than the letter from the wali of Aden. They said this gave them
no idea other than that my husband was 'only a merchant' or a person of
that rank. They were very hospitable to us while we were in their town.
They examined into our complaints with regard to the treatment we had
experienced on our journey. Mohammad, who had shot at us, and Ali, the
one who had extorted the money from us, were both imprisoned, and this
money was made to pay for our last two days' journey. Talib was forced
to repay the thirty dollars and sent to summon the heads of those
villages which had fired upon us, his sword being taken from him as a
disgrace, and all were to wait in Sheher, till after Ramadan was over, to
be judged.
This, of course, was pleasing to us; however, no money could repay us for
the anxiety of this journey under the protection of the Jabberi, and we
considered it as quite the worst experience we had ever undergone in the
course of any of our travels.
On reflection we could attribute these troubles neither to any
indiscretion on our part, nor to neglect of care on the part of the
sultan of Shibahm.
We have always been perfectly polite in respecting the prejudices of the
inhabitants of the countries through which we have travelled, never, on
the one hand, classing all non-Europeans as 'natives' and despising high
and low alike as inferior to ourselves in intelligence and everything
else, nor, on the other, feeling that, having seen a few men, not quite
as white as ourselves, in no matter what country or continent, we
thoroughly understood how to manage 'these niggers.'
Sultan Salàh did, assuredly, his very uttermost to secure our safety and
comfort, quite disinterestedly. He absolutely refused to take a sum of
money, saying, 'I want nothing, I have plenty.' When we determined to
have some money melted and to have a silver-gilt present made for him, he
heard of our vain inquiries for a non-existent jeweller, and earnestly
begged that we would do no such thing. 'He loved the English, and only
asked that my husband would mention him favourably to the English
Government'--and this favourable mention has gained him nothing.
If when my husband asked that a reliable interpreter should be
recommended to him, he had been sent a man favourably disposed towards
ourselves, and capable of inspiring respect in others, instead of a
little clerk, aged twenty, from a coal-office, a fanatical Moslem who
hated his employers, we should have been in a much better position, and
have been able to pass on from the Jabberi to the Hamoumi, whereas
travelling with the Jabberi through the Hamoumi country we had to
encounter their enemies as well as our own.
Sheher is a detestable place by the sea, set in a wilderness of sand.
Once it was the chief commercial port of the Hadhramout valley, but now
Makalla has quite superseded it, for Sheher is nothing but an open
roadstead with a couple of _baggalas_ belonging to the family of Al
Kaiti, which generally have to go to Hami to shelter, and its buildings
are now falling into ruins, since the Kattiri were driven away. Why
anyone should choose such a place for a town, and continue to live in it,
is mysterious. It is a place so unpleasant with flies and fleas, that the
inhabitants often go to sleep on the seashore. The doors of the houses
are very prettily carved all over, also the cupboards, and lintels to
doors; we tried to buy some but could not. They have texts from the Koran
carved on them. We were not allowed to buy them for fear we should work
magic with them.
There is a very picturesque mosque with a sloping minaret, white domes,
palm-trees, and a well, and hard by a house we saw a miniature mosque--a
sort of doll's house--built for children who play at prayers. They can
just crawl into it. It is hung with lamps, and the children make mud pies
of various shapes, which they put in it. Especially during Ramadan they
are encouraged to play at mosque, and the lamps are lit up every evening.
It is 3 feet high and 3 feet square, and has its little dome, minaret,
and parapet like other mosques.
There is an imposing gateway to the town--but built in a kind of
Romanesque style which does not suit Arabia--with long guard-houses on
each side, and various quaint weapons and powder-flasks hung upon it.
Ghalib, the eldest son and heir of the chief of the Al Kaiti family,
ruled here as the vicegerent of his father, who is in India as _jemadar_
or general of the Arab troops, nearly all Hadhrami, in the service of the
Nizam of Hyderabad. Ghalib was quite an oriental dandy, who lived a life
of some rapidity when in India, so that his father thought it as well to
send him to rule in Sheher, where the opportunities for mischief are not
so many as at Bombay. He dressed very well in various damask silk coats
and faultless trousers of Indian cut, his swords and daggers sparkled
with jewels, in his hand he flourished a golden-headed cane, and as the
water is hard at Sheher, he sends his dirty linen in dhows to Bombay to
be washed. He was exceedingly good to us, and as we wanted to go along
the coast for about eighty miles, to get a sight of the mouth of the
Hadhramout valley near Saihut, where it empties itself into the Indian
Ocean, he arranged that the chief of the dreaded Hamoumi tribe should
personally escort us, so that there might be no further doubt about our
safety.
Sultan Hussein had married a daughter of Sultan Salàh two years before,
when she was eleven years old.
The Al Kaiti family have bought up property all round the town, and
talked of laying out streets and bringing water to Sheher. We heard that
one brother had to have all his share in money, and had twenty-two lacs
of rupees, about 150,000_l_.
We became very tired of Sheher before we finally left, having to stay a
week, while arrangements were made for our onward way, and on account of
Ramadan no communications could be held with anyone, or business be done
till sunset. We seemed all day to be the only people alive, and then at
night we could hardly sleep for the noise.
Our only pleasures were walks at sunset along the sand, picking up lovely
shells and watching the crabs, and we used to sneak out as quietly as we
could for fear of being pursued by soldiers. Our little walks were very
much shortened when we had an armed escort dogging our steps. Once we got
a mile away but were fetched back for fear of the Hamoumi, Sheher being
quite on the frontier. There is a round, black basaltic mountain which
they call the Hamoumi mountain. The Hamoumi tribe occupy nearly all the
mountainous district east of Sheher, between the Hadhramout valley and
the sea, and they are reported to be very powerful. Next to them come the
tribe of Mahra.
Even Sultan Ghalib himself cannot ride far out of his capital
unprotected, because the Hamoumi are his foes.
We tried to get leave to go to Saihut in the Mahri country, but that was
impossible, and at last it really was settled that we should go to Bir
Borhut and Kabr Houd. We were highly delighted, and fear broke out badly
again among the servants, who dreaded the very name of those places. They
gladly took permission to remain behind. All arrangements about _siyara_
were made, and we were never to stop more than one night anywhere, and to
return by a different way, and the day of departure was settled; but the
day before that fixed, it became apparent that we Christians could by no
means be permitted to go near Kabr Houd, and that the time occupied for
the journey would now be thirty-one days, and we must wait till after
Ramadan. It was to be a mere journey without our seeing anything that we
wanted to see, and it was getting very late and hot, and we did not feel
we could spend so long a time for so little; therefore we gave up all
idea of seeing Bir Borhut and Kabr Houd that year. It was to have cost
us 670 dollars, at seven to the pound sterling.
By the way, Maria Theresa dollars are always spoken of as _reals_. You
have to buy them dear, two rupees and a varying amount of annas, and are
told they are very hard to get. They are tied up in bags, and you may
very well trust the banker for the number of coins; but if you are wise
you will examine them all, for any dirty ones, or any that are the least
worn or obliterated, or that have any cut or mark on them, will be
rejected and considered bad in the interior. When you return to
civilisation you hasten to the banker to change these dollars, and you
sell them cheap, for you are told that there is now little demand for
dollars, they are quite going out of use and rupees only are used--quite
a fable. No matter how many extra annas you may have paid, the dollar
only passes for two rupees in the interior. We lost 1,100 rupees on this
one journey between our departure from Aden and our return to Aden.
We next settled to go to Mosaina along the coast, and still to start on
the appointed day. Therefore we were up betimes (what little baggage we
were to take being bound in bundles the day before), packed our beds, and
then we waited; it was not certain till four o'clock that no camels were
coming. No one could do anything, as the sultan had no power beyond his
own dominions, and the camel-men were all foreigners.
However, next morning seven camels came and we were quickly on the road,
causing great terror to the crabs. When I say the road I mean the sand at
low tide.
We had the chief of all the Hamoumi with us, a very old, rich, and dirty
man, but most precious to us as a safeguard. Two of his sons were kept as
hostages in Sheher till we should return in peace.
We also had the governor of Kosseir with us, as well as men of the
various little tribes whose country we were to traverse, as _siyara_. The
camels and _siyara_ cost twelve dollars. The camels were hired by the
job, twelve days, so it would not pay them to dawdle.
We had told the sultans how Saleh had behaved and asked them to keep him
under their eyes till our return, and this is how we managed without him
as interpreter. We talked English to Imam Sharif, he talked Hindustani to
his Afghan servant Majid, Majid talked his own tongue to an Afghan whom
we annexed at Sheher, and he could speak Arabic. We got on very well, but
as such a party had to be assembled to say important things, we had to
struggle to express simple things ourselves.