THE ASS.—THE HORSE.
The asses be for the king’s household.—_II. Samuel._
The camel is, of course, the most characteristic feature of the animal
life of the East. The ass comes next. The camel has no known history,
except in connexion with man; for there is not sufficient evidence to
justify the belief, that he has ever been seen, in a state of nature,
on the elevated deserts of Central Asia; where one cannot but suppose
that it would be impossible for him to exist, during the winter, in the
open. But the ass once was free, and some tribes to this day retain the
primæval freedom in their aboriginal Eastern home. All, however, of the
race the ordinary traveller now sees are the slaves of man. Though in the
order both of utility and picturesqueness the ass comes after the camel,
still he deserves prominent notice, for he is everywhere—in the field,
in the village, in the city. In Egypt ubiquity is one of his attributes.
Universal adaptation, out of which his ubiquity grows, is another. He is
the mount of the rich, and of the poor, of man, woman, and child. His
lot varies, as does the lot of those he serves. The rich man’s ass is a
lordly beast. In size, he is far ahead of anything of his kind we see
here at home. His coat is as smooth and glossy as a horse’s—the face, of
course, having been put on by the scissors as well as by grooming. His
livery is shiny black, satiny white, or sleek mouse-colour. I never saw
one of the dingy red of his Poitou brethren. He carries a grand saddle,
resplendent with many-coloured fringes, and with a wondrous stuffed
pommel of red morocco, eight or more inches high, like a bolster laid
before you. The head and reins are decorated. It is a magnificent get-up,
and the animal himself is worthy of it all. Many of this sort cost more
than a hundred pounds. His hide has never been chafed, nor his spirit
broken by ill-usage. He is always left as nature made him, and is not
vicious withal. I saw one, at a rich man’s door at Alexandria, so like an
unusually fine cob pony, that it took the friend, who happened to be with
me, and myself a second look to assure ourselves that he was an ass. He
might, however, not have been an Egyptian, for I never saw another at all
like him in form or colour. He was of a dark rusty dun.
Such are high caste donkeys. There are, however, low caste donkeys—very
low, indeed, and these are far the most numerous. Whatever is good in
the appearance, and happy in the lot, of their well-placed brothers is
reversed in theirs. They are poor men’s slaves—a proverbially miserable
condition even, as Homer tells us, in the heroic days of Hellas. Puny,
unkempt, ill-fed, overloaded, overworked, with shocking raws on their
flanks and backs, which never cease through life to wring and rack, till
they can be burdened and beaten no more, what a blessed consummation
must it be for them, when they are pushed off the path, or driven out of
the gate, to feed the dogs and vultures—a feast, indeed, which would,
to these guests, be a grievous disappointment, had not long experience
taught them to be, on such occasions, very moderate in their expectations.
The thought of the life-long sufferings of these _âmes damnées_ of the
humble fellow-workers of man troubles my recollections of the East.
I used to flinch from the sight of one of them—a sight as common as
disturbing. I feel now, as I then knew that I should feel always, that
either in this world, though its currents are so corrupt, or in that
which is to come, where the offence will stand in its true light,
retribution must overtake me for having used poor beasts of this kind,
though not yet fallen into quite the lowest depths. That it was up the
country, where nothing else could be got, much as I wish for something to
palliate the act, cannot, I know, be admitted as a justification. While
my heart was bleeding at the sight of these sufferings, I could find no
anodyne but the old Egyptian belief in the transmigration of souls. The
poor wretches must, I tried to think, be expiating the crimes of a former
life. They once were rich Legrees, or devout bankers, who had robbed
widows and orphans, or holy fathers, who had kept eunuchs to sing the
praises of the Creator.
What a benefactor would he be who could satisfy us on this point—who
could demonstrate the thing to us. We should then no longer be maddened
at the thought of the iniquities of man, nor harrowed at the sight of the
sufferings of the brute. The one would cancel the other.
THE HORSE.
Little need be said of the horse in Egypt. He is not remarkable there
for size or beauty, nor does he obtrude himself much on the traveller’s
notice. Out of Cairo and Alexandria he is not frequently seen, and in
those cities he generally appears in harness, drawing, always in pairs,
the multiform public vehicles which have been culled, one would suppose,
from all parts of Europe. He is seldom seen in good condition, unless
he comes from the stable of the Viceroy, or of some grandee, a governor
or pasha, or of some rich European resident. Taking the whole country,
the number of them in good case would thus not be great. He suffers from
his double competition with the ass and the camel; and from the absence,
except in a few towns, of the use of wheeled vehicles. He is also
affected injuriously by the dearness of his keep, compared with that of
his competitors for man’s favour; barley and clover being indispensable
for him. All this reduces him to the degrading position of selling for
less than, at present not half as much as, a good donkey. A fair horse
might have been purchased last spring for twenty, or even fifteen pounds.
He is seldom more than fourteen hands high. With a tall Arab on his back,
he looks too small for a cavalry horse. It is his great merit to be
better than he looks. He is very docile, very hardy, and can go through a
great deal of work. Trotting is not one of his paces. Egypt used to have
a celebrated breed of horses of its own, but that is now nearly extinct.