News from the world of men reached the harîm like voices from the
street without. From time to time some item, interesting them, was
cried in tones of censure or approval; but always in a manner of
abstraction. This apathy arose from centuries of strict seclusion,
in which, through change of dynasties and strife of factions, the
privilege of the harîm had been respected. The women felt that politics
could not come near them; the government which ruled the men was none
of theirs. A realm within the realm, they had their own excitements,
their own concerns of life and death and amorous crime. Events the most
important failed to move them, while trifling breaches of religion or
old custom caused a vast commotion in that nursery of fanaticism.
One day, when Barakah was out driving in her carriage, she was stopped
near Abdîn palace by the pressure of excited crowds and heard the
sounds of angry tumult. The driver backed the horses and then turned.
On reaching home she asked the eunuch of the matter.
He shrugged: “It is the soldiers, O my lady. They are angry at the
coming of the Frank commissioners.”
It was then that she presumed to question Yûsuf, and learnt that two
commissioners, one French, one English, had come to take control of
the finances of the country. The Khedive, that jovial libertine and
spendthrift, was now bankrupt. The Europeans, as his creditors, assumed
the reins.
“But why the English?” questioned Barakah with irritation, for up to
then the French alone had been a power in Egypt.
“Wallahi, just because their men are clever,” was the answer. “They
bought up all our Sovereign’s shares in the canal. Their guile is
great, but greater Allah’s mercy, for the arrival of these Franks is
good for me. Knowing both their languages I am put forward to receive
them, and so rise in honour.”
In fact, a few days later he was made a Pasha.
But Barakah could not regard the case thus philosophically. The
intrusion of the English frightened her. If they should ever come
to lord it in the country her degradation would be unendurable. She
confided her displeasure to Muhammad, who took an interest in politics
as schoolboys will. He bade her have no fear; the Muslims would destroy
them presently. The women told her God would intervene. But things went
rapidly from bad to worse.
Since a French force under Bonaparte had entered Cairo, before the era
of Muhammad Ali, no such fury had possessed the world of women as that
which seized them on the deposition of the Khedive Ismaîl. Whatever
touched the majesty of El Islâm excited them; vile infidels had here
contrived the downfall of a Muslim ruler. And there ensued a host of
innovations, in which the hand of unbelief was plainly visible.
The slave-trade had been formally abolished under Ismaîl, to please
the Franks, but with the customary wink of that facetious monarch. The
trade continued gaily with his sly connivance. Now, in his son’s reign,
it began to be suppressed in earnest. The slaves themselves were loud
in lamentation. When it was known that slavery itself was menaced, the
harîm chattered like ten thousand angry parrots.
“The Lord have mercy on us! It is gross impiety,” screamed Fitnah
Khânum. “Does not the august Corân lay down strict rules for the
control of slaves? Is it not therefore Allah’s will that they exist?”
“The trade in slaves is holy,” cried Gulbeyzah; “bringing every year
a thousand converts out of heathendom. If some are slain, it is no
matter, since the death of heathens is uncounted, like the death of
beasts. Without the cruel raids, the bloodshed, the survivors had not
known salvation. Praise be to Allah, they cannot suppress the trade in
us white people, since a father’s right to sell his child resides in
nature. Only since the English meddle do we hear such wickedness.”
Besides the slave-trade, good old customs were abolished--one ceremony
called the trampling, in particular, in which a sheykh, renowned for
piety, was wont to ride on horseback over strewn believers. Some people
thought the world was coming to an end, and looked for the appearance
of the final prophet. The times were full of omens, portents, monstrous
births. The French and English, in collusion, gave command in Egypt;
the monarch was a puppet in their hands. The apathy of men amazed
the women looking on. The good Khedive appeared a devil to those hot
non-combatants; rebellion a plain duty upon all believers. They prayed
for a deliverer to be raised up; and in the absence of the prophet whom
they half expected, applauded the exertions of a simple soldier, who
ventured to oppose the wicked rulers.
With the exception of some Turks, who sneered from pride of race, the
whole harîm acclaimed Arâbi from his first appearance as a champion.
The women viewed the question very simply. Here, on one hand, was a
man who wished to free the land from foreign interference, whose cry
of Egypt for the Egyptians, must mean Egypt for the Muslims, since the
Copts were nobody; on the other, an infirm, if not a wicked, ruler who
was letting all the privilege of El Islâm be torn away. In vain their
men assured them the Khedive was a good Muslim, and only deferential
to the Franks from sheer expediency; that Arâbi’s faction was the work
of clever rascals, and boasted not one man of solid parts. They took
religious ground and would not listen. They taught their children to
admire Arâbi. Muhammad, now a student in the school of war, assisted by
his faithful Ali, fought five boys who dared to ridicule the peasant
soldier. Though beaten many times the two did not give way, though
Ali, for his own part, would have fled thrice over. But Muhammad was
indomitable. Bruised and bleeding, he returned with fury to the charge,
till his opponents fled in pure religious terror of such dauntless
rage. A few weeks later the whole land was cringing before Arâbi’s
power. And then excitements followed thick and fast. Muhammad brought
his mother all the latest rumours. One day it was:
“Great tidings, O my mother! All the Franks are flying! Ali and I have
been to watch them at the railway station. Such a crowd! The faithful,
past all patience, have risen up at Tantah and Iskenderîyeh and slain
thousands of them.”
A number of the loyal Turks were also flying. Amînah Khânum and
Bedr-ul-Budûr came to take leave of Barakah. They were bound for
Alexandria, in the train of the Khedive, and thence would take ship for
Constantinople if things grew no better. Muhammad, when informed of
their departure, rendered praise to Allah.
“They are vanquished,” he remarked. “But would to Allah that we had
more Turks on our side. These fellâhîn, though braggarts, are great
cowards. They need the whip to urge them into battle. I, who am half
a Turk and half an Englishman, cannot endure the sluggishness of this
Nile mud.”
The boy forgot the portion of his blood which was derived from Fitnah
Khânum, his paternal grandmother. It was Nile mud of the thickest,
but it did not show in him. All hot and noble counsels moved him to
enthusiasm; the lukewarm and the philosophical enraged his soul.
Stupidity or insolence in an inferior he could not brook. If his
commands were not obeyed at once and with intelligence, he struck hard
with the first instrument that came to hand, and called down Allah’s
wrath on the offender. The old Pasha was delighted by those outbursts,
as showing the commanding spirit of his Turkish race.
“When all these low-born troubles have passed over, we must procure
him some small government,” he said to Yûsuf, who acquiesced with a
pathetic smile. He had not that supreme contempt for the Egyptian
rebels which kept his aged father calm amid the storm. He held a good
position, and he feared to lose it; whereas his father had retired from
public life.
Barakah delighted in her son’s account of the disorders. His excitement
and the animation of each glance and gesture provided her with
pictures upon which she brooded in the vacancy of summer days. The air
which drifted through her lattice was oppressive, the sunlight like a
furnace fire without; the voices of the street complained of dust and
heat; the ceaseless buzz of flies benumbed the brain; the call for
water rang incessantly through all the house, and even Umm ed-Dahak
felt too weak to talk. But Barakah was happy, since Muhammad spent much
time with her, finding her conversation more congenial to his patriotic
mood than that of Yûsuf. In his absence she lay still and smoked, and
quenched her thirst at frequent intervals, taking scant notice of her
little daughter--the only other of her many children who had managed
to survive the second year. Umm ed-Dahak loved the child and schooled
her privately, telling her stories of man’s love and woman’s duty, and
teaching her to pose and ogle in the proper way. But for the rest she
was of no importance; Muhammad’s known affection for her was her only
merit.
One afternoon Muhammad came in with a mien of wild excitement and,
having kissed his mother’s hand, cried out:
“Most dreadful news! O horror! O revenge! The English have destroyed
Iskenderîyeh with their cruel guns! The English only, since the French,
more honourable, fled from the hateful sight with tears of shame.
Simply because the forts were being mended, and work was not relaxed
at their command. But, praise to Allah, we have hurt them also. Quite
half their fleet has been destroyed by our brave fire. After this,
we give no quarter--no, by Allah! It is holy war. Muhammad Tewfik
is proclaimed a scoundrel. Our Arâbi is Dictator. The army is to be
augmented fourfold by forced levies. I met a boy, no older than myself,
who goes to fight. I go this minute to implore my father to let me
likewise join the army in the field.”
“Thy age is but fifteen. O Lord, he must not go!” cried out his mother
in an agony of apprehension.
“I am a man full-grown, proficient in all exercises that belong to
war. As young as I are going. Think, it is against the English, O my
mother--thy vile enemies!”
Embracing her without a thought for her despair, he left her in great
haste to find his father.