PICTURES OF CAIRO.
Entrance—The Ezbekiyeh—Saracenic Houses—Donkeys—The Bazaars—The
Streets—Processions—View from the Citadel—Mosque of Mohammed
Ali—The Road to Suez—The Island of Rhoda.
Our approach to and entrance into Cairo was the illuminated frontispiece
to the volume of my Eastern life. From the Nile we had already seen the
mosque of Sultan Hassan, the white domes, and long, pencil-like minarets
of the new mosque of Mohammed Ali, and the massive masonry of the
Citadel, crowning a projecting spur of the Mokattam Hills, which touches
the city on the eastern side. But when, mounted on ambling donkeys, we
followed the laden baggage-horses through the streets of Boulak, and
entered the broad, shaded highway leading through gardens, grain-fields
and groves of palm and banana, to the gate of the _Ezbekiyeh_—the great
square of Cairo—the scene, which, at a distance, had been dimmed and
softened by the filmy screen of the Egyptian air, now became so gay,
picturesque and animated, so full of life and motion and color, that
my dreams of the East were at once displaced by the vivid reality. The
donkey-riding multitudes who passed continually to and fro, were wholly
unlike the crowds of Smyrna and Alexandria, where the growing influence
of European dress and customs is already visible. Here, every thing still
exhaled the rich aroma of the Orient as it had been wafted to me from
the Thousand and One Nights, the Persian poets and the Arab chroniclers.
I forgot that I still wore a Frank dress, and found myself wondering at
the temerity of the few Europeans we met. I looked without surprise on
the long processions of donkeys carrying water-skins, the heavily-laden
camels, the women with white masks on their faces and black bags around
their bodies, the stolid Nubian slaves, the grave Abyssinians, and all
the other various characters that passed and repassed us. But because
they were so familiar, they were none the less interesting, for all had
been acquaintances, when, like Tennyson, “true Mussulman was I, and
sworn,” under the reign of the good Haroun Al-Raschid.
We entered the Ezbekiyeh, which is wholly overgrown with majestic acacias
and plane-trees, and thickets of aromatic flowering shrubs. It is in the
Frank quarter of the city, and was first laid out and planted by order of
Mohammed Ali. All the principal hotels front upon it, and light, thatched
cafés fill the space under the plane-trees, where the beau monde of Cairo
promenade every Sunday evening. Nothing of the old City of the Caliphs,
except a few tall minarets, can be seen from this quarter, but the
bowery luxuriance of the foliage is all that the eye demands, and over
the plain white walls, on every side, the palms—single, or in friendly
groups—lift their feathery crowns. After installing our household gods in
the chambers of the quiet and comfortable Hotel d’Europe, we went out to
enjoy the sweet evening air in front of one of the cafés. I tried for
the first time the narghileh, or Persian water-pipe. The soft, velvety
leaves of the tobacco of Shiraz are burned in a small cup, the tube of
which enters a glass vase, half filled with rose-scented water. From the
top of this vase issues a flexible tube, several feet in length, with a
mouth-piece of wood or amber. At each inspiration, the smoke is drawn
downward and rises through the water with a pleasant bubbling sound. It
is deprived of all the essential oil of the weed, and is exceedingly
mild, cool and fragrant. But instead of being puffed out of the mouth
in whiffs, it is breathed full into the lungs and out again, like the
common air. This is not so difficult a matter as might be supposed; the
sensation is pleasant and slightly exhilarating, and is not injurious to
the lungs when moderately indulged in.
The Turkish quarter of Cairo still retains the picturesque Saracenic
architecture of the times of the Caliphs. The houses are mostly three
stories in height, each story projecting over the other, and the plain
stone walls are either whitewashed or striped with horizontal red bars,
in a manner which would be absurd under a northern sky, but which is
here singularly harmonious and agreeable. The only signs of sculpture
are occasional doorways with richly carved arches, or the light marble
gallery surrounding a fountained court. I saw a few of these in
retired parts of the city. The traveller, however, has an exhaustless
source of delight in the wooden balconies inclosing the upper windows.
The extraordinary lightness, grace and delicate fragility of their
workmanship, rendered still more striking by contrast with the naked
solidity of the walls to which they cling, gave me a new idea of the
skill and fancy of the Saracenic architects. The wood seems rather woven
in the loom, than cut with the saw and chisel. Through these lattices of
fine net-work, with borders worked in lace-like patterns, and sometimes
topped with slender turrets and pinnacles, the wives of the Cairene
merchants sit and watch the crowds passing softly to and fro in the
twilight of the bazaars, themselves unseen. It needed no effort of the
imagination to people the fairy watch-towers under which we rode daily,
with forms as beautiful as those which live in the voluptuous melodies of
Hafiz.
To see Cairo thoroughly, one must first accustom himself to the ways of
those long-eared cabs, without the use of which I would advise no one
to trust himself in the bazaars. Donkey-riding is universal, and no one
thinks of going beyond the Frank quarter on foot. If he does, he must
submit to be followed by not less than six donkeys with their drivers.
A friend of mine, who was attended by such a cavalcade for two hours,
was obliged to yield at last, and made no second attempt. When we first
appeared in the gateway of our hotel, equipped for an excursion, the
rush of men and animals was so great, that we were forced to retreat
until our servant and the porter whipped us a path through the yelling
and braying mob. After one or two trials, I found an intelligent Arab
boy, named Kish, who, for five piastres a day, furnished strong and
ambitious donkeys, which he kept ready at the door from morning till
night. The other drivers respected Kish’s privilege, and thenceforth I
had no trouble. The donkeys are so small that my feet nearly touched
the ground, but there is no end to their strength and endurance. Their
gait, whether a pace or a gallop, is so easy and light that fatigue is
impossible. The drivers take great pride in having high-cushioned red
saddles, and in hanging bits of jingling brass to the bridles. They
keep their donkeys close shorn, and frequently beautify them by painting
them various colors. The first animal I rode had legs barred like a
zebra’s, and my friend’s rejoiced in purple flanks and a yellow belly.
The drivers run behind them with a short stick, punching them from time
to time, or giving them a sharp pinch on the rump. Very few of them own
their donkeys, and I understood their pertinacity when I learned that
they frequently received a beating on returning home in the evening
empty-handed.
The passage of the bazaars seems at first quite as hazardous on
donkey-back as on foot, but it is the difference between knocking
somebody down and being knocked down yourself, and one naturally prefers
the former alternative. There is no use in attempting to guide the
donkey, for he won’t be guided. The driver shouts behind, and you are
dashed at full speed into a confusion of other donkeys, camels, horses,
carts, water-carriers and footmen. In vain you cry out: “_Bess!_”
(enough!) “_Piano!_” and other desperate adjurations; the driver’s
only reply is: “Let the bridle hang loose!” You dodge your head under
a camel-load of planks; your leg brushes the wheel of a dust-cart; you
strike a fat Turk plump in the back; you miraculously escape upsetting a
fruit-stand; you scatter a company of spectral, white-masked women, and
at last reach some more quiet street, with the sensation of a man who has
stormed a battery. At first this sort of riding made me very nervous,
but finally I let the donkey go his own way, and took a curious interest
in seeing how near a chance I ran of striking or being struck. Sometimes
there seemed no hope of avoiding a violent collision, but by a series of
the most remarkable dodges he generally carried me through in safety.
The cries of the driver, running behind, gave me no little amusement:
“The Howadji comes! Take care on the right hand! take care on the left
hand! O man, take care! O maiden, take care! O boy, get out of the way!
The Howadji comes!” Kish had strong lungs and his donkey would let
nothing pass him, and so, wherever we went, we contributed our full share
to the universal noise and confusion.
Cairo is the cleanest of all oriental cities. The regulations established
by Mohammed Ali are strictly carried out. Each man is obliged to sweep
before his own door, and the dirt is carried away in carts every morning.
Besides this, the streets are watered several times a day, and are
nearly always cool and free from dust. The constant evaporation of the
water, however, is said to be injurious to the eyes of the inhabitants,
though in other respects the city is healthy. The quantity of sore-eyed,
cross-eyed, one-eyed, and totally blind persons one meets every where,
is surprising. There are some beggars, mostly old or deformed, but by
no means so abundant or impertinent as in the Italian cities. A number
of shabby policemen, in blue frock-coats and white pantaloons, parade
the principal thoroughfares, but I never saw their services called into
requisition. The soldiers, who wear a European dress of white cotton,
are by far the most awkward and unpicturesque class. Even the Fellah,
whose single brown garment hangs loose from his shoulders to his knees,
has an air of dignity compared with these Frankish caricatures. The
genuine Egyptian costume, which bears considerable resemblance to the
Greek, and especially the Hydriote, is simple and graceful. The colors
are dark—principally brown, blue, green and violet—relieved by a heavy
silk sash of some gay pattern, and by the red slippers and tarboosh.
But, as in Turkey, the Pashas and Beys, and many of the minor officers
of the civil departments have adopted the Frank dress, retaining only
the tarboosh,—a change which is by no means becoming to them. I went
into an Egyptian barber-shop one day, to have my hair shorn, and enjoyed
the preparatory pipe and coffee in company with two individuals, whom I
supposed to be French or Italians of the vulgar order, until the barber
combed out the long locks on the top of their head, by which Mussulmen
expect to be lifted up into Paradise. When they had gone, the man
informed me that one was Khalim Pasha, one of the grandsons of Mohammed
Ali, and the other a Bey, of considerable notoriety. The Egyptians
certainly do not gain any thing by adopting a costume which, in this
climate, is neither so convenient nor so agreeable as their own.
Besides the animated life of the bazaars, which I had an opportunity of
seeing, in making my outfit for the winter’s journey, I rarely went out
without witnessing some incident or ceremony illustrative of Egyptian
character and customs. One morning I encountered a stately procession,
with music and banners, accompanying a venerable personage, with a green
turban on his head and a long white beard flowing over his breast. This,
as Kish assured me, was the Shereef of Mecca. He was attended by officers
in the richest Turkish and Egyptian costumes, mounted on splendid Arabian
steeds, who were almost hidden under their broad housings of green and
crimson velvet, embroidered with gold. The people on all sides, as
he passed, laid their hands on their breasts and bowed low, which he
answered by slowly lifting his hand. It was a simple motion, but nothing
could have been more calm and majestic.
On another occasion, I met a bridal procession in the streets of Boulak.
Three musicians, playing on piercing flutes, headed the march, followed
by the parents of the bride, who, surrounded by her maids, walked under
a crimson canopy. She was shrouded from head to foot in a red robe, over
which a gilded diadem was fastened around her head. A large crowd of
friends and relatives closed the procession, close behind which followed
another, of very different character. The chief actors were four boys,
of five or six years old, on their way to be circumcised. Each was
mounted on a handsome horse, and wore the gala garments of a full-grown
man, in which their little bodies were entirely lost. The proud parents
marched by their sides, supporting them, and occasionally holding to
their lips bottles of milk and sherbet. One was a jet black Nubian, who
seemed particularly delighted with his situation, and grinned on all
sides as he passed along. This procession was headed by a buffoon, who
carried a laugh with him which opened a ready passage through the crowd.
A man followed balancing on his chin a long pole crowned with a bunch
of flowers. He came to me for backsheesh. His success brought me two
swordsmen out of the procession, who cut at each other with scimitars and
caught the blows on their shields. The coolness, swiftness and skill with
which they parried the strokes was really admirable, and the concluding
flourish was a masterpiece. One of them, striking with the full sweep of
his arm, aimed directly at the face of the other, as if to divide his
head into two parts; but without making a pause, the glittering weapon
turned, and sliced the air within half an inch of his eyes. The man
neither winked nor moved a muscle of his face, but after the scimitar
had passed, dashed it up with his shield, which he then reversed, and
dropping on one knee, held to me for backsheesh. After these came a
camel, with a tuft of ostrich feathers on his head and a boy on his
back, who pounded vigorously on two wooden drums with one hand, while
he stretched the other down to me for backsheesh. Luckily the little
candidates for circumcision were too busily engaged with their milk
bottles and sugar-plums, to join in the universal cry.
I had little time to devote to the sights of Cairo, and was obliged
to omit the excursions to the Petrified Forest, to Heliopolis and Old
Cairo, until my return. Besides the city itself, which was always full
of interest, I saw little else except the Citadel and the Island of
Rhoda. We took the early morning for our ride to the former place, and
were fortunate enough to find our view of the Nile-plain unobscured by
the mists customary at this season. The morning light is most favorable
to the landscape, which lies wholly to the westward. The shadows of the
Citadel and the crests of the Mokattam Hills then lie broad and cool over
the city, but do not touch its minarets, which glitter in the air like
shafts of white and rosy flame. The populace is up and stirring, and
you can hear the cries of the donkeymen and water-carriers from under
the sycamores and acacias that shade the road to Boulak. Over the rich
palm-gardens, the blue streak of the river and the plain beyond, you
see the phantoms of two pyramids in the haze which still curtains the
Libyan Desert. Northward, beyond the parks and palaces of Shoobra, the
Nile stretches his two great arms toward the sea, dotted, far into the
distance, with sails that flash in the sun. From no other point, and at
no other time, is Cairo so grand and beautiful.
Within the walls of the Citadel is the _Bir Youssef_—Joseph’s Well—as
it is called by the Arabs, not from the virtuous Hebrew, but from Sultan
Saladin, who dug it out and put it in operation. The well itself dates
from the old Egyptian time, but was filled with sand and entirely lost
for many centuries. It consists of an upper and lower shaft, cut through
the solid rock, to the depth of two hundred and sixty feet. A winding
gallery, lighted from the shaft, extends to the bottom of the first
division, where, in a chamber cut in the rock, a mule turns the large
wheel which brings up a continual string of buckets from the fountain
below. The water is poured into a spacious basin, and carried thence
to the top by another string of buckets set in motion at the surface.
Attended by two Arabs with torches, we made the descent of the first
shaft and took a drink of the fresh, cool fluid. This well, and the spot
where the Mameluke Emin Bey jumped his horse over the wall and escaped
the massacre of his comrades, are the only interesting historical points
about the Citadel; and the new mosque of Mohammed Ali, which overlooks
the city from the most projecting platform of the fortifications, is
the only part which has any claim to architectural beauty. Although
it has been in process of erection for many years, this mosque is not
nearly completed internally. The exterior is finished, and its large,
white, depressed dome, flanked by minarets so tall and reed-like that
they seem ready to bend with every breeze, is the first signal of Cairo
to travellers coming up or down the Nile. The interior walls are lined
throughout with oriental alabaster, stained with the orange flush of
Egyptian sunsets, and the three domes blaze with elaborate arabesques
of green, blue, crimson and gold. In a temporary chamber, fitted up in
one corner, rests the coffin of Mohammed Ali, covered with a heavy
velvet pall, and under the marble arches before it, a company of priests,
squatted on the green carpet covering the floor, bow their heads
continually and recite prayers or fragments of the Koran.
Before descending into the city, I rode a little way into the Desert to
the tombs of the Caliphs, on the road to Suez. They consist mostly of
stone canopies raised on pillars, with mosques or oratories attached
to them, exhibiting considerable variety in their design, but are more
curious than impressive. The track in the sand made by the pilgrims to
Mecca and the overland passengers to Suez, had far more real interest in
my eyes. The pilgrims are fewer, and the passengers more numerous, with
each successive year. English-built omnibuses, whirled along by galloping
post-horses, scatter the sand, and in the midst of the herbless Desert,
the travellers regale themselves with beef-steak and ale, and growl if
the accustomed Cheshire is found wanting. At this rate, how long will
it be before there is a telegraph-station in Mecca, and the operator
explodes with his wire a cannon on the Citadel of Cairo, to announce that
the prayers on Mount Arafat have commenced?
The Island of Rhoda, which I visited on a soft, golden afternoon, is but
a reminiscence of what it was a few years ago. Since Ibrahim Pasha’s
death it has been wholly neglected, and though we found a few gardeners
at work, digging up the sodden flower-beds and clipping the rank myrtle
hedges, they only served to make the neglect more palpable. During the
recent inundation, the Nile had risen to within a few inches of covering
the whole island, and the soil was still soft and clammy. Nearly all the
growths of the tropics are nurtured here; the coffee, the Indian fig,
the mango, and other trees alternate with the palm, orange, acacia, and
the yellow mimosa, whose blossoms make the isle fragrant. I gathered a
bunch of roses and jasmine-flowers from the unpruned vines. In the centre
of the garden is an artificial grotto lined with shells, many of which
have been broken off and carried away by ridiculous tourists. There is
no limit to human silliness, as I have wisely concluded, after seeing
Pompey’s Pillar disfigured by “Isaac Jones” (or some equally classic
name), in capitals of black paint, a yard long, and finding “Jenny Lind”
equally prominent on the topmost stone of the great Pyramid (Of course,
the enthusiastic artist chiselled his own name beside hers.) A mallet
and chisel are often to be found in the outfits of English and American
travellers, and to judge from the frequency of certain names, and the
pains bestowed upon their inscription, the owners must have spent the
most of their time in Upper Egypt, in leaving records of their vulgar
vanity.