I am much better again. My cold went off without a violent illness and I
was only weak and nervous. I am very comfortable here, anchored off
Boulak, with my Reis and one sailor who cleans and washes my clothes
which Omar irons, as at Luxor, as he found the washerwomen here charged
five francs a dozen for all small things and more for dresses. A bad
_hashash_ boy turned Achmet's head, who ran away for two days and spent a
dollar in riotous living; he returned penitent, and got no fatted calf,
but dry bread and a confiscation of his new clothes.
The heat, when I left Luxor, was prodigious. I was detained three days
by the death of Sheykh Yussuf's poor little wife and baby (in childbirth)
so I was forced to stay and eat the funeral feast, and be present at the
_Khatmeh_ (reading of the Koran on the third night), or it would not have
seemed kind. The Kadee gave me a very curious prayer-book, the Guide of
the Faithful, written in Darfour! in beautiful characters, and with very
singular decorations, and in splendid binding. It contains the names of
all the prophets and of the hundred appellations of Mohammed, and is
therefore a powerful _hegab_ or talisman. He requested me never to give
it away and always to keep it with me. Such books cannot be bought with
money at all. I also bought a most beautiful _hegab_ of cornelian set in
enamel, the verse of the throne splendidly engraved, and dated 250 years
ago. I sent over by Palgrave to Alick M. Brune's lovely drawings of
Luxor and Karnac, and to Maurice a gold coin which I received as a fee
from an old Bedawee.
It was so hot that I could not face the ride up to Keneh, when all my
friends there came to fetch me, nor could I go to Siout. I never felt
such heat. At Benisouef I went to see our Maohn's daughter married to
another Maohn there; it was a pleasant visit. The master of the house
was out, and his mother and wife received me like one of the family; such
a pretty woman and such darling children!--a pale, little slight girl of
five, a sturdy boy of four, and a baby of one year old. The eager
hospitality of the little creatures was quite touching. The little girl
asked to have on her best frock, and then she stood before me and fanned
me seriously and diligently, and asked every now and then, 'Shall I make
thee a sherbet?' 'Shall I bring thee a coffee?' and then questions about
grandpapa and grand mamma, and Abd el-Hameed and Abd el-Fattah; while the
boy sat on his heels before me and asked questions about my family in his
baby talk, and assured me it was a good day to him, and wanted me to stay
three days, and to sleep with them. Their father came in and gave each
an ashara (10 foddahs, 0.5 piastre) which, after consulting together,
they tied in the corner of my handkerchief; 'to spend on my journey.'
The little girl took such care of my hat and gloves and shoes, all very
strange garments to her, but politeness was stronger than curiosity with
the little things. I breakfasted with them all next day, and found much
cookery going on for me. I took a doll for my little friend Ayoosheh,
and some sugar-plums for Mohammed, but they laid them aside in order to
devote themselves to the stranger, and all quietly, and with no sort of
show-off or obtrusiveness. Even the baby seemed to have the instinct of
hospitality, and was full of smiles. It was all of a piece with the good
old lady, their grandmother at Luxor, who wanted to wash my clothes for
me herself, because I said the black slave of Mohammed washed badly.
Remember that to do 'menial offices' for a guest is an honour and
pleasure, and not derogatory at all here. The ladies cook for you, and
say, 'I will cook my best for thee.' The worst is that they stuff one
so. Little Ayoosheh asked after my children, and said, 'May God preserve
them for thee! Tell thy little girl that Mohammed and I love her from
afar off.' Whereupon Mohammed declared that in a few years, please God,
when he should be _balal_ (marriageable) he would marry her and live with
me. When I went back to the boat the Effendi was ill with asthma, and I
would not let him go with me in the heat (a polite man accompanies an
honoured guest back to his house or boat, or tent). So the little boy
volunteered, and we rode off on the Effendi's donkey, which I had to
bestride, with Mohammed on the hump of the saddle before me. He was
delighted with the boat, of course, and romped and played about till we
sailed, when his slave took him home. Those children gave me a happy day
with their earnest, gracious hospitality.
_July_ 14_th_.--Since I wrote this, I have had the boat topsy-turvy, with
a carpenter and a _menegget_ (cushion-stuffer), and had not a corner even
to write in. I am better, but still cough every morning. I am, however,
much better, and have quite got over the nervous depression which made me
feel unable and ashamed to write. My young carpenter--a Christian--half
Syrian, half Copt, of the Greek rite, and altogether a Cairene--would
have pleased you. He would not work on Sunday, but instead, came mounted
on a splendid tall black donkey, and handsomely dressed, to pay me a
visit, and go out with me for a ride. So he, I, and Omar went up to the
Sittee (Lady) Zeyneb's mosque, to inquire for Mustapha Bey Soubky, the
Hakeem Pasha, whom I had known at Luxor. I was told by the porter of the
mosque to seek him at the shop of a certain grocer, his particular
friend, where he sits every evening. On going there we found the shop
with its lid shut down (a shop is like a box laid on its side with the
lid pulled up when open and dropped when shut; as big as a cobbler's
stall in Europe). The young grocer was being married, and Mustapha Bey
was ill. So I went to his house in the quarter--such narrow
streets!--and was shown up by a young eunuch into the hareem, and found
my old friend very poorly, but spent a pleasant evening with him, his
young wife--a Georgian slave whom he had married,--his daughter by a
former wife--whom he had married when he was fourteen, and the female
dwarf buffoon of the Valideh Pasha (Ismail's mother) whose heart I won by
rising to her, because she was so old and deformed. The other women
laughed, but the little old dwarf liked it. She was a Circassian, and
seemed clever. You see how the 'Thousand and One Nights' are quite true
and real; how great Beys sit with grocers, and carpenters have no
hesitation in offering civility to _naas omra_ (noble people). This is
what makes Arab society quite unintelligible and impossible to most
Europeans.
My carpenter's boy was the son of a _moonsheed_ (singer in the Mosque),
and at night he used to sit and warble to us, with his little baby-voice,
and little round, innocent face, the most violent love-songs. He was
about eight years old, and sang with wonderful finish and precision, but
no expression, until I asked him for a sacred song, which begins, 'I
cannot sleep for longing for thee, O Full Moon' (the Prophet), and then
the little chap warmed to his work, and the feeling came out.
Palgrave has left in my charge a little black boy of his, now at Luxor,
where he left him very ill, with Mustapha A'gha. The child told me he
was a _nyan-nyan_ (cannibal), but he did not look ogreish. I have
written to Mustapha to send him me by the first opportunity. Achmet has
quite recovered his temper, and I do so much better without a maid that I
shall remain so. The difference in expense is enormous, and the peace
and quiet a still greater gain; no more grumbling and 'exigencies' and
worry; Omar irons very fairly, and the sailor washes well enough, and I
don't want toilette--anyhow, I would rather wear a sack than try the
experiment again. An uneducated, coarse-minded European is too
disturbing an element in the family life of Easterns; the sort of filial
relation, at once familiar and reverential of servants to a master they
like, is odious to English and still more to French servants. If I fall
in with an Arab or Abyssinian woman to suit me I will take her; but of
course it is rare; a raw slave can do nothing, nor can a fellaha, and a
Cairo woman is bored to death up in the Saeed. As to care and attention,
I want for nothing. Omar does everything well and with pride and
pleasure, and is delighted at the saving of expense in wine, beer, meat,
etc. etc. One feeds six or eight Arabs well with the money for one
European.
While the carpenter, his boy, and two _meneggets_ were here, a very
moderate dish of vegetables, stewed with a pound of meat, was put before
me, followed by a chicken or a pigeon for me alone. The stew was then
set on the ground to all the men, and two loaves of a piastre each, to
every one, a jar of water, and, _Alhamdulillah_, four men and two boys
had dined handsomely. At breakfast a water-melon and another
loaf-a-piece, and a cup of coffee all round; and I pass for a true Arab
in hospitality. Of course no European can live so, and they despise the
Arabs for doing it, while the Arab servant is not flattered at seeing the
European get all sorts of costly luxuries which he thinks unnecessary;
besides he has to stand on the defensive, in order not to be made a
drudge by his European fellow-servant, and despised for being one; and so
he leaves undone all sorts of things which he does with alacrity when it
is for 'the master' only. What Omar does now seems wonderful, but he
says he feels like the Sultan now he has only me to please.
_July_ 15_th_.--Last night came the two _meneggets_ to pay a friendly
visit, and sat and told stories; so I ordered coffee, and one took his
sugar out of his pocket to put in his cup, which made me laugh inwardly.
He told a fisherman, who stopped his boat alongside for a little
conversation, the story of two fishermen, the one a Jew, the other a
Muslim, who were partners in the time of the Arab Prophet (upon whom be
blessing and peace!). The Jew, when he flung his nets called on the
Prophet of the Jews, and hauled it up full of fish every time; then the
Muslim called on our Master Mohammed etc., etc., and hauled up each time
only stones, until the Jew said, 'Depart, O man, thou bringest us
misfortune; shall I continue to take half thy stones, and give thee half
my fish? Not so.' So the Muslim went to our Master Mohammed and said,
'Behold, I mention thy name when I cast my net, and I catch only stones
and calamity. How is this?' But the blessed Prophet said to him,
'Because thy stomach is black inwardly, and thou thoughtest to sell thy
fish at an unfair price, and to defraud thy partner and the people, while
the Jew's heart was clean towards thee and the people, and therefore God
listened to him rather than to thee.' I hope our fisherman was edified
by this fine moral. I also had good stories from the chief diver of
Cairo, who came to examine the bottom of my boat, and told me, in a
whisper, a long tale of his grandfather's descent below the waters of the
Nile, into the land of the people who lived there, and keep tame
crocodiles to hunt fish for them. They gave him a sleeve-full of fishes'
scales, and told him never to return, and not to tell about them: and
when he got home the scales had turned to money. But most wonderful of
all was Haggi Hannah's story of her own life, and the journey of Omar's
mother carrying her old mother in a basket on her head from Damietta to
Alexandria, and dragging Omar then a very little boy, by the hand. The
energy of many women here is amazing.
The Nile is rising fast, and the _Bisheer_ is come (the messenger who
precedes the Hajj, and brings letters). _Bisheer_ is 'good tidings,' to
coin a word. Many hearts are lightened and many half-broken to-day. I
shall go up to the Abassia to meet the Mahmal and see the Hajjees arrive.
Next Friday I must take my boat out of the water, or at least heel her
over, to repair the bad places made at Alexandria. It seems I once cured
a Reis of the Pasha's of dysentery at Minieh, and he has not forgotten
it, though I had; so Reis Awad will give me a good place on the Pasha's
bank, and lend ropes and levers which will save a deal of expense and
trouble. I shall move out all the things and myself into a boat of
Zubeydeh's for four or five days, and stay alongside to superintend my
caulkers.
Miss Berry _is_ dull no doubt, but few books seem dull to me now, I can
tell you, and I was much delighted with such a _piece de resistance_.
Miss Eden I don't wish for--that sort of theatre burlesque view of the
customs of a strange country is inexpressibly tedious to one who is
familiar with one akin to it. There is plenty of _real_ fun to be had
here, but that sort is only funny to cockneys. I want to read Baker's
book very much. I am much pleased with Abd el-Kader's book which Dozon
sent me, and want the original dreadfully for Sheykh Yussuf, to show him
that he and I are supported by such an authority as the great Ameer in
our notions about the real unity of the Faith. The book is a curious
mixture of good sense and credulity--quite 'Arab of the Arabs.' I will
write a paper on the popular beliefs of Egypt; it will be curious, I
think. By the way, I see in the papers and reviews speculations as to
some imaginary Mohammedan conspiracy, because of the very great number of
pilgrims last year from all parts to Mecca. _C'est chercher midi a
quatorze heures_. Last year the day of Abraham's sacrifice,--and
therefore _the_ day of the pilgrimage--(the sermon on Mount Arafat) fell
on a Friday, and when that happens there is always a rush, owing to the
popular notion that the _Hajj el-Gumma_ (pilgrimage of the Friday) is
seven times blessed, or even equivalent to making it seven times in
ordinary years. As any beggar in the street could tell a man this, it
may give you some notion of how absurdly people make theories out of
nothing for want of a little commonsense.
The _Moolid en-Nebbee_ (Festival of the Prophet) has just begun. I am to
have a place in the great Derweesh's tent to see the Doseh.
The Nile is rising fast; we shall kill the poor little Luxor black lamb
on the day of the opening of the canal, and have a _fantasia_ at night;
only I grieve for my little white pussy, who sleeps every night on
Ablook's (the lamb's) woolly neck, and loves him dearly. Pussy ('Bish'
is Arabic for puss) was the gift of a Coptic boy at Luxor, and is
wondrous funny, and as much more active and lissom than a European cat as
an Arab is than an Englishman. She and Achmet and Ablook have fine games
of romps. Omar has set his heart on an English signet ring with an oval
stone to engrave his name on, here you know they sign papers with a
signet, not with a pen. It must be _solid_ to stand hard work.
Well, I must finish this endless letter. Here comes _such_ a bouquet
from the Pasha's garden (somebody's sister's son is servant to the chief
eunuch and brings it to me), a great round of scarlet, surrounded with
white and green and with tall reeds, on which are threaded single
tube-rose flowers, rising out of it so as to figure a huge flower with
white pistils. Arab gardeners beat French flower-girls in bouquets.