_Alhamdulillah_--now I am at rest. I have got all the boat in order. My
captain, Reis Mohammed, is very satisfactory, and to-day we sail as soon
as Omar comes back with the meat, etc. from market.
I received Meadow's review; I wish he had not said so much about me in
it.
Mohammed Gazowee begs to give his best Salaam to Sheykh Stanley whom he
longs to see again. He says that all the people said he was not a
Christian, for he was not proud ever towards them as Christians are, but
a real Sheykh, and that the Bedaween still talk of Sheykh Stanley and of
his piety. The old half-witted jester of Luxor has found me out--he has
wandered down here to see his eldest son who is serving in the army. He
had brought a little boy with him, but is 'afraid for him' here, I don't
know why, and has begged me to take the child up to his mother. These
licensed _possenreisser_ are like our fools in old times--but less witty
than we fancy them to have been--thanks to Shakespeare, I suppose. Each
district has one who attends all _moolids_ and other gatherings of the
people, and picks up a living. He tells me that the Turkish Nazir of
Zeneea has begun some business against our Kadee, Sheykh Ibraheem, and
Sheykh Yussuf, accused them of something--he does not know what--_perhaps
of being friends of Hajjee Sultan, or of stealing wood_!! If all the
friends of Hajjee Sultan are to be prosecuted that will include the whole
Saeed.
Of course I am anxious about my friends. All Haleem Pasha Oghdee's
villages have been confiscated (those tributary to him for work) _sous
pretexte_ that he ill-used the people, _n.b._ he alone paid them--a bad
example. Pharoah is indeed laying intolerable burthens--not on the
Israelites--but on the fellaheen.
Omar said of the great dinner to-day, 'I think all the food will taste of
blood, it is the blood of the poor, and more _haram_ than any pork or
wine or blood of beasts.' Of course such sentiments are not to be
repeated--but they are general. The _meneggets_ who picked and made ten
mattrasses and fourteen cushions for me in half a day, were laughing and
saying, 'for the Pasha's boat we work also, at so much a day and we
should have done it in four days.' 'And for me if I paid by the day
instead of by the piece, how long?' 'One day instead of half, O Lady,
for fear thou shouldest say to us, you have finished in half a day and
half the wages is enough for you.' That is the way in which all the work
is done for _Effendeena_--no wonder his steamers don't pay.
I saw Ross yesterday--he tells me the Shereef of Mecca has sent him a
horse.