THE SPIRIT OF OLYMPIA
Mount Lebanon looks to-day upon such a contest as it has never seen
before. Yet Syria has witnessed many struggles. From the time men first
began to fight, this land has hardly had opportunity to learn what peace
and quiet mean. There are people on the campus of the American College
this afternoon who can remember when the slopes of the mountain ran with
blood; some of the best sprinters know what it is to flee for their
lives, and even this week there has been killing on the streets of Beirut.
The contest to-day, however, is a new thing under the Syrian sun. It
is not the first time that athletic games have been held—there was a
field-day as far back as 1898—but this time the preparations have been of
an unusual character. During the whole week, men have been busy rolling
and marking the track and removing every stick and pebble from the
football field. The classrooms have been emptied of all their chairs and
benches, and the faculty committee has erected four grand stands, seating
over a thousand people. These will not begin to accommodate all the
spectators, however, and students living in dormitories that front on the
athletic field find that they have suddenly become very popular among the
ladies of the city.
The football teams have ordered sweaters and shin-guards from England,
and the Beirut tailors have been puzzling their brains over queerly
shaped garments for the sprinters. The medals on exhibition in the
college library were struck in Boston especially for this occasion, and
bear on their faces the college emblem, a cedar of Lebanon. Besides the
prizes for each event, the American consul will give a gold medal to the
champion all-round athlete. Best of all, the governor of Lebanon has
promised to attend and has sent his famous military band to provide the
afternoon’s music. When to these various good things is added the glory
of a Syrian springtime, and a campus set high on a bluff overlooking the
blue Mediterranean, with Mount Lebanon raising its snow-capped summits
high in the background, it is an occasion and a setting to quicken the
slowest pulse.
To-day is so full of excitement, however, that nobody thinks very much
of anything outside the athletic field. The governor’s band has come
early, with all kinds of instruments, especially those which make a
very loud noise. A tent has been erected for them in the center of the
field, and over the tent is a little American flag. The East is always
so incomprehensible and contradictory that it occasions no particular
surprise that a Syrian military band should be playing Sousa marches
under the American colors.
But it looks as if we had at last succeeded in making the East hustle a
little. All Beirut seems to be crowding into the campus. It is almost a
part of his religion for an Oriental never to do anything on time; yet
the grand stands are already full, and the soldiers stationed at the
gate-house can hardly hold the crowds back long enough for the porter
to collect their tickets. The scene is dazzling, dizzying, bewildering,
like Coney Island and the Derby and the Yale-Princeton game all jumbled
together.
There must be at least five thousand strangers on the college grounds,
and every color of the spectrum is here, especially the very brilliant
ones. The military band, with their blue uniforms and red fezes, seem
almost shabby and dull in comparison with the more garish coloring all
around them. The seats are mostly filled with women, whose showy dresses
are hideous individually and beautiful as part of the general color
scheme. Moslem harems are here with their weird veils, and there are many
pretty Levantines in rich, inappropriate silks and satins. In Syria,
however, the ladies do not monopolize the bright garments. Handsome
young Turkish officers swagger along under yards of gold lace, merchants
from the city are wearing their best and baggiest satin trousers and
embroidered waistcoats and broad silk sashes, while the sons of Egyptian
millionaires sport the elegantly fitting coats and tinted vests which
now form the favorite costume of the streets of Cairo. The color spreads
over the field and up the grand stands, with bright splashes along the
sides of the dormitories. Long strips of red and white bunting flaunt
the college colors; American and British and Greek and Turkish flags
wave above, and the students’ windows are decorated with their national
emblems or class banners.
Early in the afternoon an American tutor, while ushering the women of
a Moslem harem across the campus, suggested, in rather labored Arabic,
that they pass around the back of one of the dormitories so as to avoid
the crowd. Imagine his surprise and consternation when one of the ladies
replied, “No, thank you; I’d rather go around in front”—and said it in
perfect English, with just a suspicion of a Yankee twang! Who was hidden
behind that black veil? What foolish, tragic venture had brought it about
that an American girl should dwell behind the latticed windows of a
Moslem seraglio?
But the students have no intention of being obscured by their guests.
They are out a thousand strong, with their best clothes and their loudest
voices. They represent every race and tongue and faith of the Near East,
with here and there a stranger from Europe or South America. At first
thought, it seems as though they could never be amalgamated, even for
an afternoon. Here, for example, are a dozen names, representing as many
nationalities; Hafiz Abd-ul-Malik, Neshan Hamyartsumian, Ahmed Zeki,
Basileios Theodoropolous, Tahir Huseini, Carlos d’Oliveira, Aldo Villa,
Mordecai Elstein, Emmanuel Mattsson, Joseph Miklasievicz, Eugène Faure,
Emile Kirchner. As to religion, they are Moslems, Jews, Druses, Babites,
and Christians of every sect. Some of the languages they speak are
Arabic, Turkish, Armenian, Chaldean, Persian, Greek, Yiddish, English,
Swedish, Bulgarian, Abyssinian, Italian, German, French, Portuguese,
Spanish, Polish and Russian. As to geographical distribution, they come
from the Balkans in the north and from Baghdad, forty days’ journey to
the east; from a thousand miles up the Nile, and from New York and Brazil
in the west.
Probably no other institution in the world includes such a mixture of
antagonistic peoples and religions, and, until quite recently, the
members of each of the more largely represented races kept closely
together. It used to be seldom that a Jew, for instance, associated with
an Armenian outside of class hours. In the evenings the Greek students
would gather in one another’s rooms, or march around the campus arm in
arm, singing their national songs. The Egyptians, most of whom were of
very wealthy families, promenaded together, discussing the fleshpots of
Cairo. Even among the Syrians, who have always formed the majority of the
student body, there were lines of division between the men from Tripoli
in the north and from Sidon or Jedeideh in the south. If these groups
are considered as being separated by latitudinal lines, there were also
the longitudinal divisions between Christian and Moslem and Jew; and
sometimes long-cherished feuds broke into flame and pitched battles took
place on the campus.
[Illustration: Students of the American College celebrating an athletic
victory]
[Illustration: The Cape of Beirut viewed from Mount Lebanon]
Not the least benefit arising from the introduction of American athletic
sports has been a weakening of these ancient racial and religious
barriers. The antagonisms still exist, strong and danger-breeding; but
there has been a large advance made toward a more catholic college
spirit. It would not be true to say that athletics has been the only
cause, or even the chief cause of this change; for by precept and
example, by religious instruction and social intercourse, the faculty are
continually molding the characters of these young men. Yet it is true
that in the case of more than one recalcitrant student whom no other
influence seemed able to touch, the latent manliness has been brought out
through his newly awakened interest in sports.
Most Orientals are very averse to physical exercise. Their traditional
idea of enjoyment is to sit under an awning, drinking coffee and playing
backgammon. That a man should go out and run around a track in shameless
nakedness, and this with no hope of gain, only strengthens their
conclusion that all Franks are mad. The Syrians are an imitative people,
however, and some years ago the influence of the younger instructors
tempted a few of the preparatory boys out for foot-races. But you cannot
run a hundred-yard dash with long, baggy trousers and a silk robe which
flops about your ankles. Even if you “gird up the loins” by tucking your
skirts into your sash, the effect is more startling than speedy. Soon,
one by one, the students ordered trousers from the city tailors. At first
these garments were poorly cut and viewed with suspicion; but to-day
there are hardly three men in the academic and graduate departments who
wear the native costume outside of their rooms, and many of the students
dress with an elegance that their professors cannot afford to emulate.
It was football, however, that did the most toward unification of the
heterogeneous student body. The value of team-work is a comparatively new
idea to western Asia and eastern Europe. Since the days of Alcibiades
and Absalom the old ideal has been that of “every man for himself.” If
it had not been so, the history of the world might have been different.
It was comparatively easy to understand the joy of winning a foot-race
or a tennis tournament; but to play an untheatrical part in a match,
obeying the captain and working for the good of the team—that was a very
different thing. The students always play the association game, and it
used to be the ambition of every youth to get the ball, and carry it down
the field all by himself, while the audience cheered, “Bravo, bravo!” So
the faculty arranged matches with the crews of visiting British warships,
and from sad experience the college learned the value of side plays and
frequent passes, and began to see dimly that good football is played, not
with the legs and mouth alone, but with the head, and that hard team-work
is better than grand stand exploits.[9] That lesson may some day change
the map of Asia.
The physical director of the college now has under his charge no fewer
than eighteen football teams, besides twelve basketball teams, six hockey
teams, four baseball teams and a cross-country running club; thirty men
play at cricket regularly, forty-seven hold certificates or medals of
the (British) Royal Life Saving Society, and there are a hundred and
thirty-five entries for to-day’s field and track events.[10]
It makes one homesick to hear the cheers. With the exception of an
occasional “meet” with some mission school, like those at Jerusalem and
Sidon, there is no opportunity to compete with rival institutions.
Indeed, there is no other college in the Near East which would have any
chance of winning in competition with the “S. P. C.” So the enthusiasm
finds a vent in cheering for the various schools of the university and
for the class champions. Three of the departments—the preparatory,
academic and medical—are each as large as many an American college. The
competition among these runs very high, and to-day a banner is to be
given to the one whose members shall score most points. Now the various
department “yells” have stopped for a moment, and an upper classman
starts the college cheer, just as inane to read and just as soul-stirring
to hear as are those of Harvard or Yale or Princeton. There is a good
deal of singing, too. The college song, like that of Cornell, is set to
the tune of “Annie Lisle,” but the words are full of local allusions—
“Far, far above the waters
Of the deep blue sea,
Lies the campus of the college
Where we love to be.
“Far away, behold Keneiseh!
Far beyond, Sunnin!
Rising hoary to the heavens,
Clad in glorious sheen.”
Suddenly an usher comes running from the gate-house with the news that
the governor’s carriage is in sight. It can hardly be true, however; for
it still lacks a few minutes of two o’clock, and it would be contrary to
Syrian custom for an official of such exalted rank to arrive at the same
time with ordinary people. Probably he will come at about three o’clock,
and stay a half hour or so, just to assure the college of his good-will.
Indeed, this will be the first time that a governor has even put in an
appearance at the annual games. But, after all, the usher is right. The
pasha is coming—three minutes ahead of time! There is hardly a consul
on the dignitaries’ platform; even the American representative has not
arrived yet, and there would be no one properly to welcome the governor,
if the president of the college did not throw dignity to the winds and
sprint across the campus to meet him.
The escort rides in at a slow canter, with sabers glistening and
accouterments clattering. First come young officers, handsome and
foppish, their bosoms heavy with gold lace and medals, and their Arab
stallions snorting and prancing; then follows the guard of grizzled,
sunburned Lebanon soldiers, clothed in blue Zouave uniforms and holding
repeating-rifles across the pommels of their saddles. Behind the soldiers
are carriages containing the members of the staff and their ladies; and
last of all, attended by outriders, the carriage of his excellency. The
pasha is a thin little old man with a gray beard and shrewd, tired eyes;
and, in striking contrast to his gayly caparisoned escort, he is quietly
dressed in a dark business suit. He is a Pole by birth, a Roman Catholic
by religion, a Turkish soldier by profession, and a gentleman by instinct
and breeding. A son of the governor is also here. He is an attaché of
the Turkish embassy at Paris, and one would take him for a cultured
Frenchman. The wife of the attaché is a young American woman, a member of
one of our best-known and wealthiest New York families.
Among the other guests in the seats of honor are a Greek priest, a
Moslem _mollah_ and a Druse emir. The senior missionary is telling the
professor of philosophy how Yale used to play football back in the
fifties, while the lady of the German consul is talking babies to the
senior missionary’s wife. The Welsh doctor, who used to live in Brazil,
is talking French to the Italian professor from Cairo. The exporter of
Damascus rugs is swapping Dakota stories with the Syrian editor who took
the Arab troupe to the Chicago Exposition.
And in the middle of the field the official announcer is lifting up a
megaphone to shout across the babel of tongues—
“Winner of the dromedary race, Saladin; second, Haroun al Raschid; third,
Sinbad. The next event will be the high jump on enchanted carpets!”
At least, that is what one would expect to hear amid this brilliant
theatrical setting. But instead the call comes in faultless English—
“All out for the hundred-yard dash!”
In the finals of this race there are four men; a Greek, an Egyptian
and two Syrians. Khalil Meshaqah, of the medical school, wins in ten
and two-fifth seconds, without spikes, and on a dirt track[11] without
guiding ropes. The college is not ashamed of its athletic records. Among
its prize winners this afternoon are the best jumper of the Island of
Cyprus, the champion swimmer of Alexandria, and the Greek who won the
hundred-meter race in the recent Pan-Hellenic Games at Athens. On the
first few field-days the Greeks carried everything before them; indeed,
on one occasion three Greeks from Cyprus made more points than all
the other students combined. Now, however, after only a few years of
training, some splendid athletes are being developed among the Syrians,
Armenians and Egyptians. Of the six men who win most points to-day, four
are Syrians, one is a Greek and one is a Scotchman.
The announcer comes out again into the center of the field and shouts
through his megaphone, first in English and then in Arabic—
“The discus has just been thrown one hundred and ten feet, breaking the
college record!”
So the campus bursts into a new uproar of shouting and singing, and the
students make quite unnecessary inquiries as to “What’s the matter with
McLaughlan?” while somebody tries to explain what it is all about to
the Turkish governor, who understands neither English nor Arabic, and
the governor’s daughter-in-law looks as if she were thinking of Travers
Island.
It would take too long to describe all the events of the day: how Nedrah
Meshaqah wins the thousand-yard “campus race,” how Iatrou keeps the
shot-put in the Greek ranks, or how Bedr breaks the record for the high
jump. The real significance of the occasion is that it is all so like the
field-meets of our American colleges at home.
The only typically Syrian event is the jareed-throw—and the javelin has
since been included among American field-events. The jareed is a blunt
dart about four feet long and an inch in diameter, and it is always
thrown underhand. The Arabs use it in various games, somewhat as the old
Greeks employed the javelin. At the college it is thrown for distance;
and this is one of the most interesting contests, as it requires not only
strength and quickness but a peculiar knack which it is almost impossible
for a foreigner to learn. It looks very easy to one who has tossed
baseballs all his life; yet when the American first attempts to throw
the short, light stick, he sends it whirling around like a windmill. But
watch that young Druse sheikh, as he carefully balances the jareed upon
his finger, and then grasps it gently but firmly at the approved spot.
A few slow swings of the arm to get the direction, a lean backward
until the stick nearly touches the ground behind, then a jump forward
and a throw so long that his hand moves fully nine feet in a straight
line before it lets the missile go with a furious rifling motion—and the
jareed darts up and off with a queer little nervous twist like an angry
snake, and drops nearly two hundred feet away, with a force that would
have broken a man’s skull.
It is a proud moment for thirty Eastern athletes when they step up to the
platform where the governor and his staff are sitting, and receive their
medals from the Norwegian wife of the American consul and the American
daughter-in-law of the Turkish pasha. Everything is over now except the
football game, and the governor has stayed through it all, thus giving a
most signal mark of his interest and approval. He indicates his wish to
retire, and the crowd gives way for his escort. The carriages drive up
to the grand stand with much snapping of whips, and the outriders prance
gayly around on their restive Arabs. But just then the football teams run
out into the field, resplendent in their new uniforms; and the governor
repents of his decision to leave, sinks back into his seat and motions
the carriages to drive away.
The captain of the medical team is a great, bearded Syrian, six feet
tall. The captain of the collegiate eleven is two inches taller, also a
Syrian in name and very proud of his country and race, but with a sense
of humor and a knowledge of team-work which he probably inherited from
his American mother. One of the full-backs is a very sturdy fellow who
was born in Cyprus of a French mother and speaks Greek as his native
tongue; but there is a canny twinkle in his eye and a burr in his speech
which make it seem quite natural that his name should begin with “Mac.”
Many brilliant plays are made by the son of an Egyptian millionaire, the
Druse sheikh who won the jareed throw, and an American from Jerusalem.
The collegiate eleven is composed of four Syrians, three Egyptians,
an Armenian, a Scotchman, an American and an Austrian; but racial and
religious differences are forgotten as they play together for the honor
of their side. It is a hard game, yet a very fair one, and when the
“Medics” win by a score of two goals to one, even the college men lustily
cheer the victors.
As the gay-colored crowd breaks over the field, his fellow-students seize
the captain of the winning team and carry him around on their shoulders,
singing and shouting all the while. Medical banners wave, medical hats
and fezes are thrown into the air and medical men cheer until they can
cheer no more. Soon the other students join in, and department rivalries
are forgotten in a loud enthusiasm for _alma mater_. At the dinner
hour the usual rules of decorum are for once relaxed, and the happy
pandemonium continues until bedtime. Then at last, tired and sleepy
and voiceless, the college settles down to a long rest, after the best
field-day that has ever been held in the Turkish Empire.