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diff --git a/old/50700-0.txt b/old/50700-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..9b49a00 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/50700-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,14780 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Story Teller of the +Desert--“Backsheesh!”, by Thomas W. Knox + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most +other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions +whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of +the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at +www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you’ll have +to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this ebook. + + + +Title: The Story Teller of the Desert--“Backsheesh!” + or, Life and Adventures in the Orient + +Author: Thomas W. Knox + +Illustrator: Anonymous + +Release Date: December 15, 2015 [EBook #50700] +Last Updated: November 8, 2016 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: UTF-8 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK STORY TELLER OF THE DESERT *** + + + + +Produced by David Widger from page images generously +provided by the Internet Archive + + + + + + + + + +THE STORY TELLER OF THE DESERT--BACKSHEESH! + +or, Life and Adventures in the Orient + +By Thomas W. Knox + +With Descriptive And Humorous Sketches Of Sights And Scenes Over The Atlantic, Down The Danube, Through The Crimea J In Turkey, +Greece, Asia-Minor, Syria, Palestine, And Egypt; Up The Nile, In Nubia, And Equatorial Africa, Etc., Etc. + +Embellished with nearly Two Hundred and Fifty Illustrations, including Forty-Eight full page Engravings, principally executed in +London, Paris, and New York, from Photographs and original Sketches. + +With fine Steel-Plate Portrait of the Author. + +Author of “Camp-Fire and Cotton Field,” + +“Overland through Asia,” + +“Underground,” etc. + +Hartford, Conn. + +A. D. Worthington & Co., Publishers + +1885 + +[Illustration: 0008] + +[Illustration: 0009] + +[Illustration: 0011] + + + + +AUTHOR’S PREFACE. + + +The following pages are the result of a peaceful crusade to the East, undertaken for purposes of pleasure and profit. The author +has endeavored to combine the humorous features of the journey with the store of useful knowledge that should be the result of a +tour through the Orient. He trusts that he has so combined them that both will be satisfactory, and that the reader will be amused +while seeking instruction and instructed while seeking amusement. + +There is a story of an honest old Quaker resident of Philadelphia, who sent his son to make the tour of Europe. The young man +determined to see all that could be seen, and gave his whole mind to the search for enjoyment. When he returned from his travels his +father said: + +“John, thou hast been absent a twelvemonth and past, and thou hast drawn on me for eighteen thousand dollars. John, that is a great +deal of money for thee to spend in one year.” + +“I know it, father,” was the young man’s response, “but I have had lots of fun for that money.” + +In return for the labor and fatigue incident to Oriental travel, the author believes that he found an ample reward in the +entertainment and information which the journey afforded. + +The author is glad to avail himself of this opportunity to express the gratification he feels at seeing his book so profusely and +artistically illustrated. In this department of the work the publishers have displayed their enterprise and liberality in such a +creditable manner, as to justly entitle them, not only to the author’s grateful acknowledgments, but to the hearty thanks of all who +may read his book. + +He would also return his thanks to the artists and engravers, who have so skilfully designed and executed the illustrations, many of +which were drawn and engraved in London and Paris, expressly for this volume. + +Finally he would thank most cordially the many gentlemen in the various countries he visited who gave him the benefit of their +personal experience and observation. Their names are too numerous to be included in this preface, and their nationalities comprise +nearly all the civilized countries of the globe. T. W. K. + +Principally designed, or reproduced from photographs, by Karl Giradet, Faguet, Frank Beard, James C. Beard, Arthur Lumley, L. +Hopkins, and eminent artists, and mostly engraved by Messrs. Holier, Pannemaker, Laptante, Gusmand, Gauchard, and other noted +engravers of Paris; by W. J. Palmer, and the London Illustration Company, of London; and by Charles Speigle, of New York. + + + + +ILLUSTRATIONS + + Page. + + 1. Steel-Plate Portrait of the Author.............Frontispiece + + 2. The Story-Teller of the Desert.........To face Frontispiece + + 3. Head Piece................................................v + + 4. Head Piece...............................................ix + + 5. Tail Piece.............................................xxxi + + 6. Head Piece..............................................032 + + 7. Steamer Day.............................................034 + + 8. The Judge’s First Day at Sea............................035 + + 9. The Judge’s Second Day at Sea...........................036 + + 10. The Race...............................................039 + + 11. The Judge..............................................040 + + 12. A Practical Joke.......................................044 + + 13. Head Piece.............................................048 + + 14. Fraternizing...........................................050 + + 15. Eternal Friendship.....................................051 + + 16. Proof of the Affray....................................052 + + 17. Avenging an Insult.....................................054 + + 18. “I must have a Duel”...................................055 + + 19. An Imperial Wine Cellar................................060 + + 20. Head Piece.............................................063 + + 21. “Salt by Yer”..........................................068 + + 22. The Snoring Match......................................069 + + 23. The Doubter............................................071 + + 24. A Turkish “Hamal”......................................072 + + 25. Tail Piece.............................................077 + + 26. Head Piece.............................................078 + + 27. Among the Fleas........................................079 + + 28. A Toilet in Public.....................................082 + + 29. “Natives of the Country”...............................085 + + 30. Precautionary Measures.................................086 + + 31. “She is a Jewess”......................................089 + + 32. The Palace Tshiragan...................................091 + + 33. Head Piece.............................................093 + + 34. Shirking the Cemetery..................................097 + + 35. “Fresh Paint”..........................................100 + + 36. Driving a Bargain......................................104 + + 37. A Night at Baidar......................................106 + + 38. Caught in the Act......................................108 + + 39. Tail Piece.............................................109 + + 40. Head Piece.............................................110 + + 41. Putting in his “Best Licks”............................112 + + 42. “Backsheesh”...........................................113 + + 43. An Impressive Scene....................................116 + + 44. Constantinople from the Tower of Golata--Full.........116 + + 45. Head Piece.............................................123 + + 46. A Street in Constantinople.............................124 + + 47. Strategy...............................................126 + + 48. The Reconnoitre........................................129 + + 49. The Retreat............................................130 + + 50. A Damas-cussed Dog.....................................131 + + 51. Stowing the Sandwiches.................................132 + + 52. Admiring the Mosque....................................132 + + 53. A Sudden Attack........................................132 + + 54. The Pursuit............................................133 + + 55. A Hopeless Chase.......................................133 + + 56. “Retrospection”........................................134 + + 57. Tail Piece.............................................135 + + 58. Headpiece..............................................135 + + 59. A Sedan Chair..........................................136 + + 60. A Turkish Beauty.......................................137 + + 61. An Importunate Moslem..................................143 + + 62. Extorting “Backsheesh”.................................144 + + 63. Head Piece.............................................145 + + 64. End of the Fast and Beginning of the Feast............146 + + 65. “Good-Bye, my Friend, Good-Bye”........................148 + + 66. A Turkish “Cavass”.....................................149 + + 67. Head Piece.............................................153 + + 68. Moslems at Prayer......................................154 + + 69. “Bismillah”...........................................155 + + 70. The “Duplicate”........................................157 + + 71. Muezzin announcing the Hour of Prayer..................158 + + 72. An Oriental Boot Jack..................................160 + + 73. Fartha, or Opening Chapter of the Koran................163 + + 74. Tail Piece.............................................165 + + 75. Head Piece.............................................166 + + 76. A Whirling Dervish.....................................170 + + 77. Effect of too much Whirling............................171 + + 78. Howling as a Profession................................173 + + 79. Homopathic Treatment...................................175 + + 80. Head Piece.............................................177 + + 81. Some of the Brothers of Far-Away Moses.................178 + + 82. Interviewing a Purser..................................184 + + 83. Head Piece.............................................187 + + 84. Head Piece.............................................197 + + 85. View of Athens and the Acropolis.......................199 + + 86. The Decline of Greece..................................201 + + 87. Greek Priest of Modern Times...........................204 + + 88. “Doing” the Ruins......................................206 + + 89. Tail Piece............................................212 + + 90. Head Piece.............................................213 + + 91. Sending Up the Ear of a Victim.........................217 + + 92. Head Piece............................................225 + + 93. Pickling the “Doubter”.................................229 + + 94. “Backsheesh!” “Backsheesh!”............................231 + + 95. Head Piece.............................................236 + + 96. Inspecting the Crew....................................241 + + 97. Bad “Backsheesh.”--“It was Counterfeit”................243 + + 98. St. Jean D’Acre--Full Paye.............................249 + + 99. A Tricky Beast.........................................254 + + 100. Beyrout and the Mountains of Lebanon--Full Page.......257 + + 101. “Mou Dieu! Is this the Party for Damascus?”...........262 + + 102. Head Piece............................................264 + + 103. The Cedars of Lebanon--Full Page......................265 + + 104. Cedar of Lebanon......................................270 + + 105. Great Stone at Baalbek................................272 + + 106. Portal of the Temple of the Sun at Baalbek............275 + + 107. Court of a House in Damascus..........................279 + + 108. Moslem Women Weeping at a Tomb........................282 + + 109. Syrian Jew with Phylactery............................285 + + 110. A Money Changer in the Bazaar.........................288 + + 111. Flat Roofed Houses--Damascus..........................291 + + 112. Abd-el-Kader..........................................293 + + 113. We “Strip to ze buff”.................................296 + + 114. “You will have all ze luxuries”.......................296 + + 115. We Enter “Ze Bain Beautiful”..........................297 + + 116. One of the Luxuries...................................297 + + 117. Softening the Asperities..............................298 + + 118. A Not One.............................................298 + + 119. “What is Curlew?”.....................................305 + + 120. A Bedouin Encampment..................................308 + + 121. A Bedouin of the Desert...............................309 + + 122. The Terror of the Desert on his Arabian Charger.......311 + + 123. Enins of Palmyra--Full Page...........................315 + + 124. Hebron--Full Page.....................................319 + + 125. Mount Carmel--Full Page...............................323 + + 126. An Inhabited Boot,....................................325 + + 127. Ploughing in Syria,...................................332 + + 128. All that remains of Capernaum,........................334 + + 129. “Backsheesh! O Howadji!”..............................335 + + 130. The Sea of Tibenas--Full Page.........................337 + + 131. Magdala,..............................................339 + + 132. Unhorsing the “Doubter,”..............................342 + + 133. Nazareth--Full Page...................................345 + + 134. Jeivs of Nazareth--Full Page..........................349 + + 135. A Syrian Water Bearer,................................353 + + 136. Jerusalem and Surrounding Country--Full Page..........359 + + 137. Sidon--Full Page......................................365 + + 138. Tyre,.................................................368 + + 139. Tail Piece,...........................................369 + + 140. Jaffa--Full Page......................................371 + + 141. Our Dragoman, Ali Soloman,...........................374 + + 141. “Backsheesh,”.........................................376 + + 143. Jerusalem from the Mount of Olives--Full Page.........377 + + 144. Ancient Arch; Portion of the Haram Wall,..............380 + + 145. A Street in Jerusalem,...............................381 + + 146. Arched Street and Fountain, Jerusalem,................382 + + 147. Jdrindpal Street of Jerusalem--Full Page..............383 + + 148. The Golden Gate, Jerusalem,..........................386 + + 149. Interior of the Golden Gate,..........................387 + + 150. Site of the Temple, Jerusalem,........................388 + + 151. Ancient Signet Ring,..................................389 + + 152. Ancient Signet Ring,..................................389 + + 153. Exploring the Substructions,..........................390 + + *154. Underground--Beneath the City of Jerusalem............391 + + *155. The Valley of Jehoshapliat,...........................393 + + 156. Wailing Place of the Jews, Jerusalem,.................394 + + 157. Walls of the Church of the Presentation--Full Page....395 + + 158. Bethlehem--Full Page.................................399 + + 159. Chinch of the Nativity, Bethlehem--Full Page..........405 + + 160. Monastery of Mar Saba--Full Page......................409 + + 161. A Formidable Escort,..................................414 + + 162. Bathing Place of the Pilgrims on the Jordan...........417 + + 163. The “Doubter’s” Mishap,...............................420 + + 164. The Mount of Olives--Full Page........................423 + + 165. Pool of Hezekiah,.....................................426 + + 166. West Door, Church of the Holy Sepulchre...............427 + + 167. Church of the Holy Sepulchre--Full Page...............429 + + *168. The Fountain of the Virgin,...........................431 + + 169. Doubter’--Sixpence,”..................................436 + + 170. Jaffa Orange Seller,..................................438 + + 171. Tail Piece,...........................................439 + + 172. Water Bearers at the Railway Station, Cairo,..........447 + + 173. Praying in the Streets of Cairo,......................448 + + 174. Cairo--Full Page......................................449 + + 175. Massacre of the Mamalukes--Full Page..................455 + + 176. Ismail Pasha, Khedive of Egypt,.......................458 + + 177. A Tough One,..........................................459 + + 178. Head Piece............................................468 + + 179. Tombs of the Sultans--Cairo--Full Page................469 + + *180. “O Ye Thirsty,”.......................................470 + + 181. Children Bread Sellers in the Streets of Cairo,......473 + + 182. Mosque of the Sultan Hassan, at Cairo--Full Page......475 + + 183. Young Street Arabs of Cairo,..........................477 + + 184. Shoe Peddler in the Bazaar,...........................479 + + 185. Latticed Windows--Cairo,..............................480 + + 186. An Auctioneer in the Bazaars,.........................485 + + 187. A Syce,..............................................489 + + 188. Donkey Drivers of Cairo--Full Page....................491 + + 189. Not up to the Dodge,..................................494 + + 190. An Egyptian Eunuch,...................................496 + + *191. An Arab School--Full Page.............................503 + + 192. Ceremony of the Doseh,................................510 + + 193. A Shadoof for Drawing Water from the Nile............515 + + 194. Climbing the Pyramid,.................................518 + + 195. The Ascent of the Judge,..............................520 + + *196. An Arab Feat,........................................ + + 197. The Sphinx and the Great Pyramid of Gizeh.............523 + + 198. A Nile Boat...........................................530 + + 199. The Serapeum--Memphis--Full Page......................537 + + 200. Landing Place at Beni-Soef--Full Page................545 + + *201. Sugar Cane Seller at Minieh,.........................550 + + 202. An Inconvenient Position,.............................552 + + 203. Siout--Upper Egypt--Full Page.........................555 + + 204. “Nargeeleh,”..........................................557 + + 205. Siout Egg Merchant,...................................558 + + 206. Egyptian Gamblers,....................................559 + + 207. “Aoz, Eh?”............................................663 + + 208. “Dusting” for “Backsheesh,”...........................566 + + 209. An Egyptian Ghawazee,.................................569 + + *210. Ghawazee and Musicians,...............................570 + + 211. An Egyptian Musician,.................................574 + + 212. Egyptian Water Carriers Filling their Jars............575 + + 213. Ruins of the Temple of Denderah, Upper Egypt..........579 + + 214. Entrance to the Temple of Luxor.......................587 + + 215. The Memnonlum and the Ruined Statue...................593 + + 216. Sitting Colossi,......................................595 + + 217. A Fresh One...........................................599 + + 218. Interior of a Harem...................................601 + + 219. A Murderous Assault,..................................607 + + 220. A Nubian Belle,.......................................609 + + 221. A Nubian Lady.........................................610 + + 222. An Egyptian Sakfdeh, Drawing Water from the Nile......611 + + *213. All Affectionate Beast................................614 + + 214. Luxuries of Camel Riding..............................615 + + 225. Egyptian God Osiris...................................617 + + 226. Egyptian Goddess Isis.................................618 + + 227. Island of Phike, or Sacred Island--Full Page..........619 + + 218. Sacred Lotus of the Egyptians--Full Page..............627 + + 219. Modern Egyptian Gristmill.............................630 + + 230. A Nubian Warrior......................................632 + + 231. Papyrus of the Egyptians--Full Page...................633 + + 231. Biting the Dust.......................................641 + + 233. Women of Cairo--Full Page.............................655 + + 234. Bread Seller in the Streets of Cairo..................659 + + 235. A Lady of the Harem...................................662 + + 236. An Egyptian Barber....................................665 + + 237. Alexandria--Full Page.................................671 + + 238. Court of a House in Egypt,............................673 + + 239. A Bedouin Encampment near Cairo,......................675 + + 240. The Madonna Tree,.....................................676 + + 241. Boot Blacks of Cairo,.................................679 + + 242. Mosque of Sultan Berkook, and Fountain of Ismail......682 + + 243. Modern Egyptian Oven,.................................683 + + 244. Palace of the Viceroy, near Alexandria--Full Page.....689 + + + + +CHAP I--STEAMER LIFE ON THE ATLANTIC. + +Leaving Home--Our Pilgrimage Begun--Sights and Scenes on Deck--“Life on the Ocean Wave”--Out at Sea--The Traveller’s Little +World--Feeling Queer Inside!--Delights of Sea-Sickness--Reminiscences of a Jolly Old Boy--What Became of the Judge--Bringing up his +Liver!--Too Big for his Berth--Sleeping in a Second-Hand Coffin--A Race with a Lemon--The Leg of Mutton Dance--Eccentric Conduct of +a Boiled Turkey--Too Much Sauce!--“Dressing” the Judge’s Trowsers--Alone at Sea--A Funny Conspiracy--Fate of a Timid Man--Confidence +Betrayed--The Young Man from the Country--His Wisdom and his Woes--Drinking Petroleum--The Judge Turns Joker--Who Owns the Ocean +Steamers.........033 + + +CHAP II--SCENES IN VIENNA.--DOWN THE DANUBE. + +On English Ground--The Road to the East--Life in the Austrian Capital--Fun and Festivity--Visit to the Big Beer-Garden--Effects +of Champagne--Animated Conversation--How Twenty Thousand Dollars were Spent--The Man with the Torn Vest--Headaches at a +Discount--Yankees in a Row--A Pugnacious Russian--“Quits,” but not Satisfied--Challenging an American--The Fashionable World--Down +the Danube--Scenes on the River--I low Austrian Cigars are Made--An Imperial Tobacco Dealer--The Rattle of Wagram--Castle of +l’resburg--We Enter Hungary--An Evening in a Wine Cellar--Want of a Little Soap--Night Scene on the Danube,..........048 + + +CHAP III--LIFE AMONG THE MAGYARS. + +A City of Renown--Overwhelmed by the Moods--Lying in Clover--What I Saw in the Hungarian Capital--“The Poor Folks’ Bath”--Rather +Warm Quarters--Life Among the Magyars--The “Miffs” of an Imperial Couple--Her Majesty’s Choice--A Model Captain--Charles Matthews +and the Row-cry Roy--Facts and Fancies of a Snoring Match--The “Judge” and the “Doubter”--The Man who Wouldn’t Relieve--Who were the +“Hamals,” and What They Did--People in Strange Garments--Raggy Breeches versus glop--The Fortress of Belgrade--Servin, and What I +Saw of Its People-- The Assassination of Prince Milochi--Rather Bad for Poetry,..........063 + + +CHAP IV--NEARING THE ORIENT.--“BACKSHEESH!” + +Among the Fleas--The Mystery of the Redclothes--A Cool Explanation-- Under the Spray--What Became of the Dragon--A Queer Story +about Flics--What Is an “Araba?”--Conversation without Words--Changing Shirts in Public--The Iron Gate--Scene at the +Custom-House--Official Obstinacy--The “Sick Man”--Scenes in the Orient--The Mysteries of the Quarantine--How we Dodged the +Turks--The Turk and his Rosary--Pity the Poor Israelite!--Why an Unlucky Jewess was Whipped--The Secret of the Turkish Loan--How the +Money is Spent--Ten Million Dollars Gone!--What is “Backsheesh?”..........078 + + +CHAP V--THROUGH THE CRIMEA.--IN AND AROUND SEVASTOPOL. + +A Visit to the Crimea--The Porter with the Big Books--The Danger of Siberia--Our Entry into Sevastopol--Terrible Reminiscences +of the Crimean War--How we Shirked the Cemetery--The Great Dock Yard of Sevastopol--We Visit a Remarkable Gunboat--What we Saw +Below-Deck--The Story that our landlord Told--An Enterprising Tartar--The “Doubter” Offers an Opinion--How the “Judge” Stole a +Newspaper--Adventures by the Way--The “Doubter” gets into Trouble--We Fly to the Rescue--Eccentricities of a Selfish Man--We Rise +and Depart,..........093 + + +CHAP VI--ACROSS THE BLACK SEA. + +A Visit to a Russian Police Office--Smith, and What he Did--A Bad Lot of Passports--A Race after a Governor in a Drosky---More +“Backsheesh”--Delicate Administration of a Bribe--An Obliging Subordinate--Attempt at a Swindle--Scraping an Acquaintance--High Life +on the Black Sea--Muscovite Ladies--Sunrise on the Euxine--Worshipping the Sun--Stamboul--Passing Quarantine--On the +Bosphorus--A Magnificent Spectacle--The Castle of Europe--Palaces and Villas--Domes and Minarets--The Golden Horn--In Front of +Constantinople--Rapacity of Boatmen--Turkish Thieves--Streets of the City,..........110 + + +CHAP VII--CONSTANTINOPLE.--THE CITY OF DOGS. + +Human Camels--Canine Colors--The Dogs of Istamboul--Their Appearance and Moral Character--How the Turks Regard +Them--“Inshallah”--Constantinopolitan Dogsologies--An Oriental Dog-Fight--Sagacious Brutes--Cultivating Canine Society--“Standing +Treat” among the Curs--Four-Footed Campaigns--Dog-Districts--The Hostile Armies--A Brilliant Strategic Move---Charge of the Light +(Dog) Brigade--Advance of the Chef de garbage--The “Army of the West” in Retreat--The “Doubter’s” Misha--Full Details of a Coat’s +Detailing--An Israelite in whom there _was_ Guile--No More Sandwiches for Me, Sir-r-r,..........123 + + +CHAP VIII--TURKISH CURIOSITY SHOPS.--SIGHTS AND SCENES IN THE BAZAARS. + +Locomotion in Constantinople--Horses, Donkeys, Shanks’ Mare and Sedan Chairs--Turkish Street Cars--Women in Public--The Veiled +Queens of Seraglios--The Drugs of the Orient--Henna and its Uses--Ottar of Roses, Musk and Bergamot--Shawls and Silks of Price--The +Treasures of Ormus and of Ind--The Workers in Precious Metals--Vases of Gold and Platters of Silver--An Aureole of Gems--Loot for +Soldiers and Swag for Burglars--The Weapons of Ancient Islam--Blades of Damascus and Swords of Mecca--A Wonderful Collection--Old +Clothes and New Truck--A Seedy Moslem Swindler--An Exorbitant “Backsheesh”--What Happened to the Judge--A Dispenser of Justice in +the Lockup,.........135 + + +CHAP IX--LIFE IN THE HAREM.--MYSTERIES OF THE SERAGLIO. + +The Great Moslem Fast--Nights of Feasting and Days of Fasting--The Injunction of Mahomet--The Ravenous Mussulman--An Hotel +Swindle--A Stranger and they Took Him In--“Too Thin, Too Thin”--Greek Wine--Going Out in a Blaze of Glory--Thunder, Smoke, and +Flame--The Approach of the Sultan--How he Looked--A Peep at the Ladies of the Harem--The Veiled Queens--The Sultan’s Mother--The +Empress Eugenie at the Seraglio--Insult Offered to Eugenie--A Queen in Tears--A Question of Court Etiquette--Murdering +Christians,..........145 + + +CHAP X--THE MOSQUES.--FAITH AND SUPERSTITIONS OF THE MUSSULMANS. + +Among the Mosques--Their Special Uses--Greek Burglars, their Capture and Execution--A “Firman,” What Is It--A Turkish Dragoman--A +Relic of Ancient Byzantium--Its Name and Origin--Taking a Portrait--Turkish Superstitions--Worshipping in St. Sophia--Moslem +Fanatics--Counting The Minarets--What Came of a Wet Pair of Boots--The Judge in a Tight Place--The “Doubter” Commits +Sacrilege--Uncovering a Sarcophagus--Attacked by the Priests--Barefooted Worshippers--Teachings of the Koran--Cleanliness and +Temperance--Why Turkish Women Do Not Go to the Mosques--Why Good Mussulmans Never Get Drunk,..........153 + + +CHAP XI--WHIRLING AND HOWLING DERVISHES.--WHO AND WHAT THEY ARE. + +The Dervishes of Constantinople, What Are They?--How they Live and What they Do--Unclean and Devout Beggars--Where they Bury their +Dead--Opening their Circus--Removing the “Doubter’s” Boots--An Amusing Situation--Clearing the Floor--Human Top-Spinning--Dropping +into Jelly-Bags--A Pliable Lot of Living Corpses--The Howling Dervishes--Where and How they Live--A House Full of Madmen--A +Shrieking Chant--“La Hah il Allah”--Stirring Up the Wild Beasts--Spectators Joining in the Chorus--Horrible Superstitious +Rites--Treading on Sick Children--Reaching Paradise by Bodily Tortures--A Sad Disappointment--The Founder of the Sect, and who he +Was--Pulling Teeth as a Proof of Sanctity,..........166 + + +CHAP XII--GOOD-BYE, CONSTANTINOPLE!--ADVENTURES BY THE WAY. + +Far-Away Moses, the Famous Guide--His Numerous Brothers--His Shop in the Great Bazaar--An Evening at the “Foreign Club”--Dreaming of +Polyglots and the Tower of Babel--More “Backsheesh”--Passing the Custom House--How they Protect Home Manufactures--Standing Up for +One’s Own Country--“Honesty ish te Besht Bolicy”--Borrowing Money at Twenty per Cent.--The Start from Constantinople--A Hint +to Travellers--Sleeping in Public on the Stage--Interviewing the Purser--A Satisfactory Arrangement--Baron Bruck and his +Career--Unwelcome Intruders--Classic Ground--One Trifling Peculiarity,.......*** + + +CHAP XIII--SYRA, THE MARBLE ISLAND.--LIFE IN AN ATHENIAN HOTEL. + +In sight of Syra--Active Trade in one Fish--A town all Built of Marble--The “Doubter” Expresses his Sentiments--Gustave’s +Adventure--Walking on One’s Ear--“A little more beer, boy!”--The Pirates’ Retreat--Extraordinary Politeness in a Cafe--A lesson +for American Barkeepers--In the Stamboul’s Cabin--“Blowing great guns”--A Tale of a Tub--Honey and Marble--Standing in the City +of Demosthenes--The Battle of the Rival Hotels--Profanity in an Unknown Tongue--Out-generaling Inn-keepers--Tricks on +Travellers--Useful Knowledge for Foreign Travel,..........187 + + +CHAP XIV--ATHENS, ANCIENT AND MODERN.--SIGHTS AND SCENES IN THE GRECIAN CAPITAL. + +First Impressions of Athens--Opinion of the “Doubter”--“Not Worth Damming”--The Oldest Inhabitant of Athens--Celebrated +Ruins--Reminiscences of Greek Grammar--A “Big Injun” on Greek--Drinking Beer on Sacred Soil--A Toper-graphical Survey--The +Acropolis--What Is It?--The Temple of Jupiter Olympus--Seven Hundred Years in Building--A Young Englishman in a Scrape--Sunset +from the Acropolis--Byron’s Glorious Lines--The Parthenon and its Surroundings--Foundations of the Ancient Citadel--Excavations of +Antiquarians--Greek Art--An Important Discovery--The Line of Beauty,..........197 + + +CHAP XV--ROUND ABOUT ATHENS.--THE COUNTRY OF THE BRIGANDS. + +Mars’ Hill, the Place where St. Paul Preached on the Unknown God--The Prison of Socrates--The Country of the Brigands--Escorted +by Greek Soldiers--Captures by the Brigands--How they Treat Captives--Extorting Ransoms--Buying Coins and Relics--Swindling +Travellers--Among the Ruins--Strange Contrasts--“Chaffing” the Guide--Position of the Persian and Grecian Hosts--Xerxes’ +Throne--“The King Sate on the Rocky Brow”--Making the Ascent by Proxy--“I No Go ze Mountain”--The Battle of Marathon--A Survivor of +the Battle--How the Victory was Won,..........213 + + +CHAP XVI--THE GLORY OF ATHENS.--ITS SIGHTS, SCENES, RUINS, AND RELICS. + +The Opera at Athens--Handsome Greeks--The King and Queen--A Lovely Trio--Losing a Heart--Byron’s “Maid of Athens”--How She +Looked--Her House and History--The Acropolis by Moonlight--Waking the Guard--A Sham Permit--“Backsheesh”--The Parthenon by +Night--Greek Gypsies--Among the Curiosity Shops--Dr. Schliemann and his Trojan Discoveries--The Gold and Silver Vases of King +Priam--Where they were Found--Relics of the Sack of Troy--Curious Workmanship--Some Account of the Excavations--We Leave Athens--A +Queer Steamer--“Pay or Go to Prison”--End of Our Steamship Adventure,..........225 + + +CHAP XVII--ADVENTURES IN QUARANTINE.--RHODES AND ITS MARVELS. + +Missing our Steamer--A Serious Dilemma--A Study of Faces--Making a Row and What Came of It--Under the Yellow Flag--Adventures of a +Quarantined Traveller--Escaping the Plague--_Mal-de-Mer_--A Laughable Incident--Getting on our Sea-Legs--Custom-House Troubles--The +Potency of “Backsheesh”--Oriental Fashions in New York--“Doing” a Custom-House Inspector--A Curious Tradition--The “Lamb” as a +Trade Mark--The Temple of Diana--One of the “Seven Wonders”--Singular Discoveries--A Horde of Scoundrels--The Island of Rhodes--The +Colossus--A Wonderful City--The Knights of St. John--Their Exploits--Surrendering to the Turks,..........236 + + +CHAP XVIII--SYRIA, THE LAND OF THE SUN.--DRAGOMEN, GUIDES, AND COURIERS. + +A Rough Night on Shipboard--A Sea-Sick Turk--What he Said--Rum and Petroleum--Meditations on Turkish Hash--The Camel, his Tricks +and Uses--A Knowing Brute--How he Shirks a Burden--George Smith, the Assyrian Savan--Beyrout--Its Antiquities and Wonders--Going on +Shore--The Dragoman and his Office--Eastern Guides and their Character--Travelling on Horseback in Syria--The Road to Damascus--An +Unexpected Trouble--Paying Fare by Weight--Disadvantages of a Heavy “Party”--A Trial of Wits--Waking up the Judge--Telling White +Lies--The “Doubter’s” Predicament,..........252 + + +CHAP XIX--THE GROVES OF LEBANON.--A NIGHT AMONG THE ARABS. + +“The Sights” of Beyrout--Excursion to Dog River--An Obstinate Carriage-Owner--How he was “Euchred”--Moral of this Incident--Off for +Damascus--Ascending Mt. Lebanon--An Arab Driver--Cultivating “Kalil”, our Jehu--The Cedars of Lebanon--A Grove as Old as +Solomon’s Temple--A Wonderful Old City--The Temple of the Sun--Mystery of Tadmor--Cyclopean Masonry--Monstrous Monoliths--Their +Dimensions--The “Doubter’s” Doubts and their Solution--Sleeping in an Arab House--What we Saw There--Divans as Couches--A Dangerous +Valley--The Robber’s Haunt,..........264 + + +CHAP XX--DAMASCUS.--THE GARDEN CITY OF THE EAST. + +Dimitri and his Hotel--Court-Yards and Fountain--How People Live in Damascus--Parlors, Bed-Rooms and Boudoirs--A Bet and its +Decision--The “Doubter and his Donkey”--The Street called “Straight”--Bab-Shurky--Spots Famous in History--Shaking Hands across a +Street--Scene of St. raid’s Conversion--The Window of Escape--Tombs of Mohammed’s Wives--The “Doubter” Figuring on Probabilities--An +Unexpected Upset--Visiting the Leper’s Hospital--A Frightful Spectacle--The Great Mosque--View from the Minaret--The Bazaars and +Curiosity Shops--Making a Trade--A Case of Fraud,..........278 + + +CHAP XXI--SYRIAN LIFE.--DEALERS IN HUMAN FLESH.--WE TRY “ZE LUXURIES OF ZE BATH.” + +In the Slave-Market--A Dealer in Human Flesh--A Stealthy Trade--Examining Female Slaves--Serfdom in Syria--Inside Views of a Syrian +Household--Jewish Houses--An Oriental Song--Smoking with the Ladies--Syrian Customs--A Famous Arab Chief--Visiting +Abd-el-Kader’s House--The City of the Caliphs--Taking a Bath--Mohammed and his Trowsers--A New Species of Cushion--The +Bath-House--Disrobing--Securing our Valuables--Muslem Honesty--Sitting Down in a Hot Place--Gustave’s Misadventure--Undergoing a +Shampoo--Rubbed to a Jelly--The Couch of Repose--A Delicious Sensation--“All ze Luxuries,”..........290 + + +CHAP XXII--TRAVELLING IN A CARAVAN.--SIGHTS ON THE WAY. + +Turning our Faces Eastward--The Land of the Sun--Palmyra, Bagdad, and Babylon--The Desert in Summer and Winter--A Dangerous +Road--The Robbers of the Wilderness--Ruins in the Desert--A City of Wonders--The Haunts of the Bedouins--Engaging an Escort--The +Start for Palmyra--On a Dromedary’s Back--The Environs of Damascus--A Bed on the Sand--“Every One to his Taste”--A Knavish +Governor--Winking at Robbery--In the Desert--On the great Caravan Track--Caravansaries, What Are they?--The High Road to India--An +Arab Fountain,..........300 + + +CHAP XXIII--TENT-LIFE AMONG THE BEDOUINS--THE WARRIORS OF THE DESERT. + +Among the Bedouins--A Genuine Son of the Desert--High-Toned Robbers--A Sample of Bedouin Hospitality--Etiquette in an Arab +Encampment--A Case of Insult--Tent-Life and its Freedom--A Nation of Cavalry-Warriors--Bedouin Dress, Manners and Customs--Their +Horses and Weapons--A Singular Custom--A Caricature Steed and his Rider--Arab Scare-Crows--On the Road to Palmyra--A Mountain of +Ruins--The Grand Colonnade--The Temple of the Sun--A Building Half a Mile in Circumference--An Earthquake, and What It Did--The City +of the Caliphs,..........307 + + +CHAP XXIV--ADVENTURES IN THE MOUNTAINS OF SYRIA. + +“Doing” Syria--The “Short” and the “Long” Route--How to Choose Them--Engaging a Dragoman--Farewell to Damascus--Preying on +Travellers--The Wonderful Rivers of Syria--Crossing the Desert--A Picture of Desolation--Scene of St. Paul’s Conversion--A Striking +Contrast--Ancient Ruins and Modern Hovels--A Night with the Bedouins--A Hard Road to Travel--A Glorious View--The “Doubter’s” + Mischance--The Lizard in the Boot--A Ludicrous Scene--Gustave’s New Joke--Mollifying a Native--The Massacre at Hasbeiya--Treachery +of a Turkish Colonel--Scene of Christ’s Labors--In the Holy Land,..........318 + + +CHAP XXV.--“FROM DAN TO BEERSHEBA”--JOURNEYING THROUGH THE HOLY LAND. + +Our First Morning in Palestine--Breaking Camp at Banias--“From Dan to Beersheba”--Explanation of the Phrase--The Cup of the +Hills--The Golden Calf of Jeroboam--Story of Vishnu and his Idol--An Incident and its Moral--The Battle-fields of Joshua--A Singular +Species of Plough--The “Doubter” in a Quandary--Joseph’s Pit--The Sea of Galilee--Fishing with Poisoned Bait--Capernaum and +its Ruins--Scene of Christ’s Miracles--The Birthplace of Mary Magdalen--A Horde of Beggars--A Pitiful Spectacle--The Robber’s +Cave--Herod and his Strategy--The Jews of Tiberias--A Seedy Crowd--Ruins of the Ancient City--The Spot where Christ Fed the +Multitude,..........329 + + +CHAP XXVI--IN THE HEART OF PALESTINE. + +Bathing in the Sea of Galilee--Standing on Holy Ground--How the “Doubter” was Unhorsed--A Second Absalom--Lunching on the Summit +of Tabor--Saracenic Vengeance--A Reminiscence of the Crusades--A Magnificent Sight--Discussing “Backsheesh” with the Natives--The +“Doubter” as a Cashier--The Grotto of the Holy Family--Mary’s House--The House of Loretto--The Story of the Miracle--The Monk +and the “Doubter”--Dean Stanley’s Explanation--Joseph’s Tool Chest--The “Doubter’s” Demand--The Witch of Endor “At +Home”--Blood-Revenge--A Pertinacious Feud--Saul and the Witch,..........341 + + +CHAP XXVII--THE LAND OF THE PHILISTINES.--SAMARIA AND ITS PEOPLE. + +The City of Nain--“Spoiling the Egyptians”--Ruins of an old Philistine City--Curious Strategy--The Torches in Pitchers--Kleber and +the Turks--Ahab’s Palace--Tropical Picture--A Crusader’s Church--More “Backsheesh”--The Samaritans of To-day--The Mount of Blessings +and the Mount of Cursings--A Despised People--A Strange Religious Belief--A Parchment Thirty-five Centuries Old--Jacob’s Well--Its +Present Appearance--The Tomb of Joseph--The Scene of Jacob’s Dream--The Philistines’ Raid,..........355 + + +CHAP XXVIII--FROM DAMASCUS TO JAFFA.--INCIDENTS OF THE TRIP. + +Once More in Damascus--Taking the “Short Route”--Starting for Bcyrout--The Fountains of Damascus--Rain-Storm in the +Anti-Lebanon--Stora and its Model Hotel--Poetical Fancies--A Compliment to Mine Host--The “Doubter” as a Rhymist--Climbing Mount +Lebanon--Tropic Suns and Arctic Snows--View from the Summit--A Vision of Fairy-Land--Coming Down on the Double-Quick--In Sight of +the Mediterranean--Taking Ship for Jaffa--Sidon to a Modern Tourist--Tyre--Jaffa--A Dangerous Roadstead,..........362 + + +CHAP XXIX--ENGAGING A DRAGOMAN.--OUR START FOR JERUSALEM. + +Views of Jaffa--A Queer-Looking City--The Oldest Inhabited Town in the World--The Massacre of Jaffa--A Stain upon the Memory of +Napoleon--A Contract with a Dragoman--A Close Margin--The Value of Credentials An Honest Arab--Getting into Saddle--An American +Colony--Their German Successors--The Fruits of the Country--Generous Conduct of the “Doubter”--On the Road to Jerusalem--A Night at +Ramleh--In a Russian Convent--The Gauntlet of Beggars--The Pest of the Road--Begging as a Fine Art--The “Gate of the Glen”--Among +the Mountain Passes--In Sight of the Holy City,..........370 + + +CHAP XXX--THE LIONS OF JERUSALEM.--THE TEMPLE, THE SEPULCHRE, AND THE HOLY OF HOLIES. + +First Sights in Jerusalem--Appearance of the Streets--What the “Doubter” Thought--A Change of Opinion--The Tower of David--The +Street of David--Church of the Holy Sepulchre--Scenes Around It--Palace of the Knights of St. John--Via Dolorosa--Damascus +Gate--Walls of the Holy City--Visiting the Temple--The Ilarem and Mosque of Omar--Visiting the Substructions--A Triple +Veneration--Place of Wailing--The Quarries--Remains of an Ancient Bridge,..........381 + + +CHAP XXXI--AMONG THE MONKS. + +From the Gates of Jerusalem to Bethlehem--A Touching Incident--Tent-Life at Bethlehem--The Milk Grotto--Its Miraculous +Character--The “Doubter” Expresses Himself--The Oldest Christian Church in the World--Quarrelsome Monks--A Deadly Fight--Remarkable +Conduct of the “Doubter”--Pious Pilgrims--A Christmas Festival--A Corpulent and Hospitable Monk--A Wearisome Ceremony--The Monks in +Costume--The Women of Bethlehem--A Bevy of Beauties--Under Guard--Armenian Soldiers--Travelling to Saba--Among the Monks--A Curious +Convent--Armed against the Bedouins,..........398 + + +CHAP XXXII--AMONG THE BEDOUINS.--TRAVELLING UNDER ESCORT, AND LIVING IN TENTS. + +Sleeping under Tents--A Bedouin Encampment--A howl for “Backsheesh” --A Queer Crowd--An Illusion Dispelled--An Eccentric +“Rooster”--Our Guard--A Little bit of Humbug--“Going for” the “Doubter”--A Case of Blackmail--On Guard against Robbers--A Protection +from the Sheik--Thievery as a Profession--Waters without Life--A Curious Bath--A Flood of Gold--The “Doubter” in a Rain Storm--A +Dangerous Ford--A Nocturnal Mishap--An Atrocious Robbery--The “Doubter” once more in Trouble--A Turkish Escort--Falling among +Thieves--The Judge’s Opinion on Shrinkage--The “Doubter” in the Role of a Mummy,..........413 + + +CHAP XXXIII--THE HOLY SEPULCHRE, AND SHRINE OF THE CITY OF DAVID. + +A Snow-storm in Jerusalem--The “Doubter’s” Opinion of Gum-Shoes--Kicked by a Vicious Horse--An Obliging Moslem--A Guard of +Turks--Bloodthirsty Christians--An Extraordinary Shrine--The Angel’s Seat--The Quarrels of the Greek and Latin Monks--A Spot of +Marvels--The Soil Pressed by the Feet of Christ--Strange Traditions--The Discovery of the True Cross--The Spot where Peter Denied +his Lord--The Scene of the Last Supper--What a Wealthy Jew Did--The Man who was his own Father--The “Good Thief”--Extracting +Sixpence from the “Doubter”--A Pertinacious Guide--Trying to Elude Pursuit--A Claim for Damages--Loading Up with Oranges--Talking in +Four Languages,..........425 + + +CHAP XXXIV--THE LAND OF PHARAOH.--THROUGH THE EGYPTIAN DESERT. + +In Sight of Egypt--A Light-house looming through the Fog--On the Soil of the Pharaohs--An Invasion of Boatmen--Scenes in the +Streets of Port Said--Encore de “Backsheesh”--The Great Suez Canal--Negotiations with a Cobbler--A Ludicrous Situation--A Bootless +Customer--Egyptian Jugglers--Going through the Market--A Disagreeable Spectacle--A Pocket Steamer--Drinking to Absent +Friends--On the “Raging Canawl”--Sleeping on Deck--A Sunrise in the Desert--On the Summit of the Isthmus--An Onslaught by Arab +Baggage-smashers,..........440 + + +CHAP XXXV--IN AND AROUND THE CITY OF THE CALIPHS. + +A Costly Breakfast--Ismailia--The Palace of the Khedive--On an Egyptian Railroad Train--Rolling Through the Desert--The Delta of +the Nile, What Is It?--The Garden of Egypt--Cairo--The Mighty Pyramids--Life at an Egyptian Hotel--Sights of the Capital--Cairo +of To-Day--Occidental Progress and Oriental Conservatism--Burglaries and Other Modern Improvements--Cosmopolitan Costumes--A +Harem Taking an Airing--A Daring Robbery--The Battle-Field of the Pyramids--Slaughter of the Mamelukes--Singular Escape of Emir +Bey,..........446 + + +CHAP XXXVI--AN INTERVIEW WITH THE KHEDIVE.--LIFE IN THE CITY OF THE NILE. + +The Khedive, who is he?--A Hard-worked Pasha--His Personal Habits--My Interview with Him--Adventures of an Old Hat--Arranging +Ourselves for a Royal Reception--An Eastern Monarch in a European Dress--An Unimpeachable Costume--A Fluent Talker--Bedouin +Reporters--A Carriage from the Harem--Two Pair of Bright Eyes--Unveiling the Women--A Talk with a Couple of Pigmies--A Nation of +Dwarf-Warriors--My Impressions of the Khedive,...........457 + + +CHAP XXXVII--STREET LIFE IN CAIRO. + +Cairo, Old and New--A Visit to the Ancient City--The Nilometer, what is it? Measuring the Rise of the Nile--Moses in the +Bulrushes--Tombs of the Caliphs--An Egyptian Funeral--Curious Customs--“Crowding the Mourners”--Water-carriers and their Ways--A +Noisy Tobacco-vender--Glimpses of the Arabian Nights--Among the Bazaars--Street Scenes in Cairo--A Cavalcade of Donkeys--Hoaxing a +Donkey-boy--Amusing Spectacle--Putting Up a Ride at Auction--An Arab Story--A Nation of Liars, and why?--Mosques of Cairo--Stones +from the Great Pyramid,..........468 + + +CHAP XXXVIII--THE BAZAARS OF CAIRO.--EGYPTIAN CURIOSITY SHOPS. + +More about the Bazaars--how they Sell Goods in Cairo--Furniture, Fleas, and Filth--Trading in Pipe-stems and Coffee-pots--A +Queer Collection of Bric-a-Brac--Driving Close Bargains--A Specimen of Yankee Shrewdness--A Miniature Blacksmith Shop--A Cloud of +Perfumes--Gems, Guns, and Damascus Blades--An Arabian Auction--At the Egyptian Opera--The Dancing Girls of Cairo--The Ladies from +the Harem--A Scanty Costume--The Ballet of the “Prodigal Son”--The Ladies of the Opera and their Life,..........478 + + +CHAP XXXIX--ADVENTURES WITH A DONKEY.--A DAY AT THE RACES. + +A “Syce” what is he?--A Man with a Queer Dress and Large Calves--A Gorgeous Turnout--An Escort of Eunuchs--Veiled Beauties--A +Flirtation and it Consequences--The Tale of a Dropped Handkerchief--The Donkey as a National Beast--A Tricky Brute and an Agile +Driver--An Upset in the Mud--Astonishing the Natives--A Specimen of Arabic Wit--Going to the Races--The Grand Stand--A Dromedary +Race--An Aristocratic Camel--The Arrival of the Khedive--Starting Up the Dromedaries--Cutting an Empress,..........488 + + +CHAP XL--THE PASHA AND HIS PRIESTS--EGYPTIAN LANGUAGE--SCHOOLS AND RELIGIOUS CEREMONIES. + +Egypt and her Relations with Turkey--The Army and Navy--Egyptian History Boiled Down--The Reigning Family--Wonderful +Relics--Mohammed Ali as a Ruler--The Pasha and the Priests--Ordering a Wedding--Married on Short Notice--Gratifying the Empress +Eugenie--An Arab School-room--A College with Nine Thousand Students--A Jaw-Breaking Language--How to Indite an Epistle +in Arabic--The Caravan to Mecca--Going on a Pilgrimage--A Horrible Ceremony--Trampling on Dervishes--The “Bride of the +Nile”--Extraordinary Customs,..........499 + + +CHAP XLI--THE GREAT PYRAMIDS--IN THE KINGS’ BURIAL CHAMBERS. + +A Visit to the great Pyramids--A Fellah not a Fellow--Sakkiehs and Shadoofs--A File of Camels and Donkeys--A Striking Spectacle--A +Horde of Arabs--Troublesome Customers--The great Pyramid--How we Climbed It--A Giant Stairway--Dimensions Extraordinary--The Lost +Arts--Standing on the Summit--The Judge’s Predicament--Arab Cormorants--What we Saw from the Top of the great Pyramid--Wonderful +Contrasts--Performance of an Arabian Acrobat--A Race down the Pyramid Stairs--A Perilous Descent--Penetrating the Interior--The +King’s Chamber--A Dusty Receptacle of Coffins--The Sphinx--A Mysterious Statue,..........513 + + +CHAP XLII--A VOYAGE UP THE NILE.--THE MYSTERIES OF EGYPTIAN ART AND WORSHIP. + +Up the Nile in a Sail-Boat--Starting for the Cataracts--Advantages of a Dragoman--A Tricky Lot--Frauds on Travellers--Our +Party--Rather Cosmopolitan--Getting Ahead of Mr. Cook--Our Little Game, and How it Worked--A Bath with Spectators--Decidedly +Cool--Getting Aground--A Picturesque Landscape--Last Glimpse of the Pyramids--Spending Night on Shore--Among the Ruins of +Memphis--The Wonders of Egyptian Art--What Marrielte Bey Discovered--Laying Bare a Mysterious Sepulchre--Ancient Egyptian +Worship--Sacred Bulls and Beetles--A History Written in Stone--Bricks Made by the Israelites,..........529 + + +CHAP XLIII--LIFE ON THE BANKS OF THE NILE.--COPTS, JUGGLERS, AND THIEVES.--AMUSING EXPERIENCES. + +Through an Arab Village--Creating a Sensation--The “Doubter” Alarmed--The Professor Perpetrates a Hoax--The Egyptian +Saratoga--An Oriental Post-office--A Queer Town--Specimens of Ancient Art--A Wooden Statue Three Thousand Years Old--A Coptic +Convent--“Backsheesh, Howadji!”--Carrying Money in their Mouths--Sturdy Beggars--An Expert Swimmer--The Copts, who are they? Skilful +Swindlers--Sugar Mills on the Banks of the Nile--Egyptian Jugglers--A Snake-Charmer--Adroit Thieves--A Melancholy Experience in +Donkey-riding,.........542 + + +CHAP XLIV--ADVENTURES IN UPPER EGYPT.--FUN AND FROLIC WITH THE NATIVES. + +Siout, the Capital of Upper Egypt--The Pasha’s Palace--An Egyptian Market Day--A Swift Boat--Going the rounds on a Donkey--Town +Scenes--The Bazaars--Buying a Donkey--Tinkers, Peddlers, and Cobblers at work--A Curiosity Shop--Three Card Monte in the Land of the +Pharaohs--Fighting the Tiger--The Professor takes a Hand--An Ignominious Defeat--A Doleful Tale--A River where the Wind is always +Fair--The Temple and Tablet of Abydos--“Backsheesh” as a Medicine--Arab Villages in an Inundation--The Garden of the Valley--Fun +with the Natives--A constant resource for a Practical Joker--Scrambling for Money--A Severe Joke,...........554 + + +CHAP XLV--THE DANCING GIRLS OF KENEH.--THE TREASURES OF DENDERAH. + +The Dates and Dancing Girls of Keneh--The Alma and the Ghawazee--The Dalilahs of Cairo--Going to the Dance Hall--An Outlandish +Orchestra--The Drapery of the Dancers--The Cairo Wriggle--Curious Posturing--A Weird Scene-Dress and Undress--Miracles of Motion--A +Fête at the German Consulate--Models for Painters and Sculptors--Arab and Nubian Nymphs--The Temple of Denderah--History Hewn in +Stone--Cleopatra and her Portrait--The Fatal Asp--A Bit of Doggerel--The Coins of Old Egypt--The Professor’s Bargain--Digging for +Treasure--Arrival at Luxor--Taking in Strangers,...........568 + + +CHAP XLVI--LUXOR, THE CITY OF GIANTS--AMONG THE MUMMIES OF ANCIENT THEBES. + +Luxor on the Site of Ancient Thebes--A City with a Hundred Gates--Enjoying a Consul’s Hospitality--An American Citizen of African +Descent--A Dignified Rhinoceros--Karnak--A City of Wonders--Promenading in an Avenue of Sphinxes--A Gigantic Temple--Monster +Obelisks--A Story in Stone--A Statue Weighing Nine Hundred Tons--The Sitting Colossi--A Singing Statue--Mysteries of +Priestcraft--Lunching in the Tomb of Rameses--A Wonderful Treasure--How They Made Mummies--A Curious Process--The “Doubter” and the +Mummy Sellers--The Judge Comes to Grief,..........585 + + +CHAP XLVII--A VISIT TO A HAREM IN UPPER EGYPT.--LIFE AMONG THE NUBIANS. + +A Visit to a Harem--Among the Daughters of the Nile--How they Looked and What was Done--Painted Eyelids--The Use of Henna--A Minute +Inspection of Garments--Mustapha Agar “At Home”--Arab Astonishment--A Dinner _a l’Arabe_--Fingers vs. Forks--An Array of Queer +Dishes--Novel Refreshment--Dancing Girls--Truck and Decker at Luxor--More “Ghawazee,” Pipes and Coffee--“A Love of a Donkey”--Song +of Arabs--Arab Cruelty--A Nation of Stoics--Endurance of Pain--Among the Nubians--Ostriches, Arrows and Battle-Axes--A Nubian +Dress--A Very Small Dressmaker’s Bill--A Scanty Wardrobe,..........600 + + +CHAP XLVIII--CAMEL-RIDING.--ADVENTURES AMONG THE NUBIANS. + +How they made the Royal Coffins--Splitting Blocks of Stones with Wooden Wedges--An Ingenious Device--A Ride on a Camel--A Beast +indulging in Familiarities--Lunching on Trowsers--Mounting in the Saddle--Curious Sensation--An Interesting Brute--A Camel +Solo--Sitting in a Dish--Camel-Riding in a Gymnastic Point of View--Secondary Effects--Nubian Ferry-Boats--P. T. and his +Paint-Pot--Labors of an Enthusiastic American--Mr. Tucker on his Travels--“A Human Donkey”--Visiting the Cataract--Paying Toll to a +Sheik--The Professor and his Camel--Crocodiles of the Nile--Starting Back to Cairo,.........612 + + +CHAP XLIX--IN THE SLAVE COUNTRY--SIR SAMUEL W. BAKER’S EXPEDITION. + +The Egyptian Slave Trade--How carried on--An Army of Kidnappers--A Slave King--Frightful Scenes--Sir Samuel Baker’s Expedition--A +Shrewd Move--Breech-loaders as Civilizing Agents--A Missionary Outfit--Starting for the Slave Country--Reluctant Allies--The “Forty +Thieves”--Running against a Snag--The Sacred Egyptian Flower--The Lotos-Eaters, Who were They?--The New York Lotophagi--The Papyrus +or Vegetable Paper--Capturing a Cargo of Slaves--The Plague of Flies--A few more “likely Niggers”--Marrying by Wholesale--A Fight +with the Natives--The Result of the Expedition,..........623 + + +CHAP L--SUNSET IN THE ORIENT.--VOYAGING DOWN THE NILE. + +An Egyptian Sunset--A Gorgeous Spectacle--The Sky that bends above the Nile--Singular Atmospheric Phenomena--A Picture for an +Artist--Shadows from History--Napoleon and the Pyramids--Our Voyage Back to Cairo--Scenes by the Way--“Cook’s Tourists”--An +Amusing Sight--Night-Fall on the Nile--A Flame of Rockets--“What does it Mean?”--The Marriage of the Khedive’s Son--Feminine +Disappointment--Jumping Ashore--Aboard of Donkeys--Gustave’s Somersault--Practical Sympathy--In the Pasha’s Garden--A Magnificent +Sight--The Wedding Pageant--Elbowing an Arab Crowd--A Pyrotechnic Shower,.........637 + + +CHAP LI--THE WEDDING OF THE KHEDIVE’S SON.--ENJOYING A MONARCH’S HOSPITALITY. + +High Jinks in the Egyptian Capital--Dancing Horses--Arabian Blooded Steeds--Treading the “Light Fantastic Toe”--Bedouin Riders--The +Mysterious Cage--Egyptian Prima Donnas--A Spice of the Arabian Nights--A Silken Palace--Headquarters of the Khedive--Thoughtless +Intruders upon Royalty--A Glimpse of the Princes Royal--The Heir of the Throne of Egypt--His Appearance, Dress, and Character--A +Cordial Invitation--Partaking of the Khedive’s Hospitality--A Turkish Comedy--A Free Lunch--End of the Festival,..........*** + + +CHAP LII--WOMEN AMONG THE MOHAMMEDANS.--LIFE IN THE HAREM. + +Polygamy Among the Turks and Arabs--A Full-Stocked Harem--Unveiling the Women--Romantic Adventure--A Brief Flirtation--The “Light of +the Harem”--Love at First Sight--how Egyptian Women Dress--Some Hints to the Ladies--Wearing Trowsers--Robes, _Caftans_, and +Peaked Shoes--Rainbow Colors--How they Dress their Hair--Crowned with Coins--A Walking Jewelry Shop--The Pretty Egyptienne Orange +Girl--Street Costume--Paris Fashions in the Khedive’s Harem--Beauties Riding Donkeys Man Fashion--How they Go Shopping--Animated +Bales of Dry Goods--Black Eyes in a Bundle of Silks--Marriage Brokers--How they Dispose of their Daughters in the East--A Turkish +Courtship--A Donkey Driver Gives an Opinion--The Wedding and the Honeymoon--Divorces in Egypt--An Easy Process--Many-Wived +Men,..........650 + + +CHAP LIII--WINTER ON THE NILE.--THE KHAMSEEN AND ITS EFFECTS.--BEDOUIN LIFE. + +Winter in Egypt--A soft and balmy air--A Rainstorm on the Nile--An Asylum for Invalids--The Month of Flowers--The “Khamseen,” + What is it?--A blast as from a Furnace--Singular effects of the South Wind--A Sun like Copper and a Sky like Brass--A cloud of +Sand--Eating Dirt--Fleeing from the Khamseen--How the Laboring Classes Live--Hungry but not Cold--Oriental Houses--An Excursion to +Heliopolis--Habits of the Bedouins--A Fastidious People--Life in a Bedouin Encampment--Among the Obelisks--How they were brought +Five Hundred Miles--The Madonna-Tree,...........667 + + +CHAP LIV--LAST DAYS IN EGYPT. + +The Last Stroll around the Mooskee--Talking to the Donkey-Boys and Dragomen--A Queer Lot--A Pertinacious Customer--The Judge’s +Expedient--A Little Humbug--Rich American Tourists “in a Horn”--The Dragoman’s Salutation “Sing Sing!”--Getting Rid of a +Nuisance--Buying Keepsakes--Out of the Desert into a Garden--Curiosities for Farmers--A Mohammedan Festival--Curious Sights--Snake +Charmers--How they do it--Music-Loving Reptiles--On an Egyptian Railroad--Pompey’s Pillar--A Ludicrous Accident--Alexandria, +its Sights and Scenes--Climbing Pompey’s Pillar--A Daring Sailor--An Arab Swindle--Going on Board the Steamer--Farewell to +Egypt,...........678 + + +[Illustration: 5041] + + +BACKSHEESH. + + +{033} + +[Illustration: 0043] + + +“B A C K S H E E S H.” + + + + +CHAPTER I--STEAMER-LIFE ON THE ATLANTIC. + +_Leaving Home--Our Pilgrimage Begun--Sights and Scenes on Deck--“Life on the Ocean Wave”--Out at Sea--The Traveller’s Little +World--Feeling Queer Inside!--Delights of Sea-sickness--Reminiscences of a Jolly Old Boy--What became of the Judge--Bringing up his +Liver!--Too Big for his Berth--Sleeping in a Second-hand Coffin--A Race with a Lemon--The Leg of Mutton Dance--Eccentric Conduct of +a Boiled Turkey--Too Much Sauce!--“Dressing” the Judge’s Trowsers--Alone at Sea--A Funny Conspiracy--Fate of a Timid Man--Confidence +Betrayed--The Young Man from the Country--His Wisdom and his Woes--Drinking Petroleum--The Judge Turns Joker--Who Owns the Ocean +Steamers._ + +NEVER have I sailed out of New-York harbor on a finer day than when, in the spring of 1873, I started on that pilgrimage of which +this book is to be the record. + +It was late in April, the sky was clear, and the atmosphere had that balmy softness which we find in the tropics much oftener than +in more northern latitudes. Looking up the Hudson and down the widening estuary toward Staten Island, one could see a delicate haze +that skirted the horizon and faintly mellowed the lines that otherwise might have presented a suggestion of harsh{034}ness. The +picturesque life of the harbor was at its fullest activity; ocean and river steamers were moving here and there, and white-winged +ships coming home from long voyages or going out to battle with the winds and waves, were in the grasp of powerful tugs that fumed +and fretted as they ploughed the waters with their helpless charges. Thousands of smaller craft dotted and stippled the beautiful +bay which is the pride and glory of the commercial metropolis of America; and the forest of masts hanging over the wharves at the +city’s edge spread its leafless limbs in liberal profusion. + +[Illustration: 0044] + +There was the usual crowd of friends to bid farewell to our passengers; and the parting cheer, as we steamed out from our dock, +rang in our ears long after the spire of Trinity had disappeared, and the protruding front of Castle Garden had been lost in the +distance. There was only the gentlest breeze to ruffle the water as we pushed oceanward and caught sight of the blue line of sea and +sky that formed the eastern horizon. We watched the sun declining in the west, bringing the Highlands of Neversink into bold relief; +our steady progress left the land each moment more and more indistinct, till, at last, day and land faded {035}away together. We +were out on the ocean, and the world was become to us small indeed. + +An Atlantic trip is not considered in these days a very serious affair. There are persons who persist in speaking of the ocean as +a ferry, with no more terror than the North or East River. It may be a good joke to call it a ferry, but it is rather a solemn joke +when you have been at sea a couple of weeks and have experienced a few gales. + +The day we sailed the water was as smooth as a mill-pond, and it remained so for about thirty-six hours. In the room next to me +there was a judge from New Jersey; a jolly, good-natured old boy, whose face was a pleasure to contemplate. The first day out, he +told me he was agreeably surprised with the ocean, and that he should have brought his wife along if he had supposed it would be so +comfortable. + +[Illustration: 8045] + +“People do exaggerate so,” said he, “that you never know what to believe. They have told me that the ocean was terribly rough, +and that I should be very sick; but I see it was all a mistake Why, I have seen it worse than this going from New York to Staten +Island.” + +I assured the Judge that some of the passengers might have been lying to him, and that the ocean was very much slandered. Next +day it came on to blow, and by midnight we were tossing as if a lot of giants had put the ship in a blanket and were having some +first-class fun. She rocked and pitched magnificently, and a liberal portion of the passengers were laid out with _mal-du-mer_. + +And the Judge! I paid him a visit when the storm was at its worst, and his condition was such as to rouse in my breast mingled +sentiments of pleasure and sorrow. He was lying on the sofa, and his right hand convulsively clutched a basin into which he was +pouring the contents of his stomach. + +{036} “What a fool a man is to come to sea,” he gasped in the intervals of his wretchedness. “I was an idiot not to have gone +travelling in Pennsylvania, instead of coming out here. I would give a thousand dollars to be safe back in New York.” + +I endeavored to console him, but he would not be comforted. While I poured soothing words into his ear, and brandy down his throat, +the ship gave an extra lurch that brought a fresh discharge from the Judge’s mouth. Something dark and solid fell into the basin, +and as the Judge contemplated it, his face assumed an expression of horror. + +“I will be hanged,” said he, “if I have not thrown up a piece of my liver; just look at it; everything inside of me will be up next. +In fifteen minutes you can look for my toe-nails.” + +He sank back fainting, but brightened up a little when I told him that what he supposed to be his liver was nothing more than a +piece of corned beef which he swallowed at dinner and his stomach had failed to digest. + +[Illustration: 9046] + +He grew better next day, but persisted in declaring the ocean a humbug, and said that when he once got back, nothing should tempt +him to come abroad again. + +People are differently affected by the ocean. Some are never sea-sick, while others can never go on the water without being laid +up. I have known persons who kept their rooms an entire voyage; they went below when leaving land on one side, and did not come out +again till it was sighted on the other. Women are the weaker vessels, when it comes to an ocean experience, however strong they may +be in domestic griefs and family jars. In sea-sickness, they fall much sooner than men, and are slower to recover their appetites. +Children recover more quickly than adults, and sometimes they are well and running about long be{037}fore their parents are able to +get away with a cup of tea or a cracker. + +To those who contemplate going to sea, I have a piece of advice to offer that may save them the pangs of the marine malady. + +The night before you are to sail, take a blue pill--ten grains--just before going to bed, and when you get up in the morning take, +the first thing, a dose of citrate of magnesia. Then eat your breakfast and go on board, and I will wager four to one, that you will +not be sea-sick a moment, though the water may be as rough as an Arkansas traveller’s manners. + +The above prescription was given to me several years ago, and I have rigidly followed it every time I have gone to sea since I +received it. It has saved me from sea-sickness, and it has been of equal value to many others, to whom I have given it. I have +published it several times for the benefit of the human race, and I think it worth giving again. + +Sea-sickness is a dreadful feeling, and anything that can be expected to prevent it is worth trying. I remember the first time I +was sea-sick, I wanted to be thrown overboard, and didn’t care what became of me. If the ship had sunk beneath me I should have been +glad instead of sorry; and if the captain had threatened to tie me up and give me forty lashes, I should not have made the slightest +opposition to the execution of his threat. If the Koh-i-noor diamond had been lying ten yards from me, and had been offered me on +condition that I should pick it up, I couldn’t have stirred an inch to get it. The death of a maiden aunt, from whom I had great +expectations, would have failed to elate me, and the refusal of my hand by an heiress to a million would have caused me no regret. +Nothing can bring perfect despair so readily as sea-sickness, and make its victim ready and willing to die. Somebody has said that +in the first hour of his sea-sickness he feared he should die; but in the second hour he was afraid he should not; and that is +pretty nearly the experience of every sufferer. + +You have heard of the man who wanted to thrash the fellow who wrote “A Life on the Ocean Wave.” I think there were several on board +our ship who agreed with him, and would bear a hand to assist him. Somebody has written--and his head was not unlevel--{038} + + “The praises of the Ocean grand, + + ‘Tis very well to sing on land; + + ‘Tis very fine to hear them carolled + + By Thomas Campbell or Childe Harold-- + + But sad indeed to see that Ocean, + + From east to west, in wild commotion.” + +Though I did not suffer from sea-sickness, I did not escape considerable annoyance and discomfort. Anybody who knows me can testify +that I am not a dwarf, that I stand over six feet, and have a proportionate breadth of beam. My berth was about an inch shorter than +its occupant, and when I tried to lie flat on my back I took up all the width of it. I couldn’t straighten out, because the berth +was too short; I couldn’t lie on my side through fear of being rocked out; and I couldn’t lie face down, for the same reason that I +couldn’t lie face up. Taken for all in all, the room was the most uncomfortable I ever slept in on board ship. When I went into +my “little bed,” I felt as though I was in a second-hand coffin, originally made for a smaller man, and I dreamed of this state of +things so often that I considered the night had gone wrong without such a slumbering fancy. The rolling of the ship made it awkward +to put on my clothes and perform other toilet duties; and if I went through preparations for breakfast without a tumble or two, I +considered myself lucky. + +One morning the steward brought me a lemon. It is a very good practice at sea to swallow the juice of a lemon half an hour before +breakfast, in order to clear the stomach and remove any tendencies to biliousness. He put the lemon on my sofa, and I crawled out of +bed just as he retreated and closed the door. + +Well; the ship made a lurch and sent me head foremost upon the sofa, as though I had been shot from a mortar. With some difficulty +I picked myself up, and braced long enough to get a tumbler and make ready to squeeze the lemon. Just as I reached for it the ship +went the other way, and the lemon rolled from the sofa and under the berth. I went on hands and knees in a humble attitude to reach +for it; over went the ship just as I extended my arm under the berth; my body followed my arm, and my legs followed my body, and +it was no easy matter to get up again. While I was getting to rights, the old craft lurched the other {039}way, and my lemon shot +across the floor like a rat pursued by a terrier, and took up a hiding-place again under the sofa. + +Then I went for it with the same result as before. Just as I put my hand upon it there was a movement in the lemon-market, and the +article I was pursuing traversed the floor and sought the farthest corner under the berth once more. + +About five minutes we kept up that circus; sometimes I was ahead, and sometimes the lemon, and both were pretty well exhausted by +the time the race was over. + +[Illustration: 8049] + +At last I took him on the fly, and made a short stop; lost my balance and went down in a corner among my clothes. Then I gathered +myself together and managed to cut the lemon open and to squeeze it. I lost half the juice in a lurch of the ship, just as I raised +the glass to my lips; and in my hurry to save what was left I swallowed seeds enough to start a respectable lemon orchard. I think +an artist could have made a series of interesting sketches had he witnessed the race between the lemon and me. + +Dinner has a good deal of fear in it if the ship happens to be rolling nicely. Racks are put on the tables to keep things from +falling off, and sometimes the rocking is so bad that even the racks are not altogether satisfactory. In front of you is a rack just +wide enough to hold your plate, and, when you are taking soup, the edge of it is just even with the rack. If the ship makes up her +mind she can tip your plate so that the soup will flow out into your lap, and after doing that she will tilt the other way and leave +the side next to you quite dry. Your tumbler will assert the correctness of its name in more ways than one, unless it is very firmly +placed and wedged in where it cannot fetch away. + +The best way at such times is to hold your soup-plate in your hand and fasten your tumbler in the rack where the glasses are kept. +Sometimes a joint of meat or a boiled turkey will leap {040}from its plate and go off the table as easily as a live turkey could +make the same movement. My friend, the Judge, caught a turkey in his lap one day, and his trowsers were so covered with oyster sauce +that they might have been served up without serious trouble. + +[Illustration: 9050] + +A New York matron was likewise honored with a visit of a leg of mutton, and I narrowly escaped from a dish of _blanc mange_ that +seemed determined to pay me a complimentary call. The desk where I used to write had a remarkable tendency to change its angle at +every moment, and if my old desk in New York were to conduct itself thus, I should ask what it had been drinking. + +Day after day we steamed along, sometimes getting a little assistance from our sails, but more frequently depending upon steam +alone. Out of New York we were accompanied by a German steamer, but we soon lost sight of her in consequence of a divergence in our +courses. Almost every day we saw steamers and sailing-ships, and sometimes we had three or four of them in sight. We were directly +ports of England and America, and the wonder is, not that we saw so many vessels, but that so few of them came in sight. Our engines +were not stopped after we left New York till we arrived at Queenstown, where our mails and some of our passengers were landed. + +Time hangs heavily on one’s hands at sea. The first day out you are uneasy, if you are not sea-sick; you try to read and you can’t; +you sit in one place awhile, then in another, then in another; and then you go somewhere else. You get over a page at a time; you +shut and open your book a dozen times in an hour, and are as discontented as a weaning calf. You sit down to games of cards, but +don’t feel like playing; you go forward and aft, and aft and forward, and really don’t know what to do on the track between the +great {041}with yourself. If the weather is fair you go on deck, and then you go below; and then on deck again. You wish yourself on +shore, and you fall to counting the hours that must elapse before the voyage will end. You don’t feel like making the acquaintance +of anybody, and nobody wants to make yours; and so the day goes on till you turn into your bunk and try to sleep. In the morning you +rise feeling about as amiable as a bear with a sore head, though your nerves are more quiet than they were. Then you begin to +make acquaintances, and in a couple of days the passengers know each other pretty fairly; enough, at any rate, for all practical +purposes. + +By the fourth day you have the peculiarities of everybody down to a dot; and about this time the spirit of mischief prevails. There +are sure to be some waggish passengers ready for any kind of fun, and sometimes they are rather merciless in it. If there is a timid +man on board they talk accident to him, and if there is a credulous man on board they fill him with yarns of the most frightful +character. There was a youth on board from one of the eastern states, and he was constantly in fear lest the ship should sink. Two +of the wags talked of accident till his hair stood on end and he dared not go to bed at night. At the table where the Judge and I +were seated, there were two superannuated Englishmen who had been to New-York to visit some friends, and were going home without +seeing anything in America outside Manhattan Island. I fear they had strange opinions of our country before they got back. + +They listened to the talk, and were evidently taking notes of what they heard. Their information may be known by the following +sample. + +While we were at lunch one day the conversation happened to turn on petroleum. The Judge addressing one of the jokers who was known +as “the Major,” said very gravely: “That was a singular practice during the war, giving each man a pint of crude petroleum to drink +before going into battle.” + +“Yes;” the Major replied, “but it paid very well at first, as the men fought like tigers in consequence. But we had to abandon it +before the end of the war.” + +“Really now, you don’t mean that your soldiers drank that abominable stuff?” said one of the astonished Britons. {042} “Oh, yes,” + said the Judge, his solemnity increasing, “they grew very fond of it, and many of them deserted when they were deprived of it.” + +“Why was it given up?” asked Briton number two. + +“It was found’,” the Major explained, “that many of the men died of spontaneous combustion in consequence of drinking this stuff. +In the case of smokers it was specially dangerous, as a man’s breath might take fire while he was lighting his pipe. One of our best +regiments--the 49th Buffaloes--was almost annihilated by petroleum. It was during the ‘Seven Days’ Fight’ near Richmond. They +had been in action continuously, and, for more than a week, quadruple rations of petroleum were served to them, so that they were +saturated with it. On the last day of the battle, as they were drawn up in line for inspection, one of the men struck a match just +for fun. His breath caught, and so did that of the man on each side of him. In half a minute the flame ran along the line, and in +less time than it takes me to tell it, half the regiment were on fire. Some had presence of mind to fall on their faces when they +saw the flash, and these were the only ones that were saved.” + +“Dear me! how strange!” + +“Yes;” the Major added, “and sometimes prisoners in the hands of the enemy were set on fire by the inhuman officers who wished to +witness their terrible sufferings. We found the use of petroleum as a beverage was in various ways an injury to the army, so we gave +it up.” + +This wonderful story was heard with apparent confidence by our fellow travellers, and I have no doubt that it was told round British +firesides in perfect good faith. The Judge and his friends talked of snow-storms a hundred feet deep, of potatoes in South Carolina +as large as flour-barrels, of oysters in Texas that sing and play the piano, and of a horse in Cincinnati that could swear and chew +tobacco. Wonderful adventures in all parts of the land were minutely described, and if the voyage had lasted a week longer, and +the stories could all be collected and published, they could give Baron Munchausen several points and beat him. The wags described +bloody encounters of men in the West, and left the impression that anywhere beyond the Hudson River a {043}person who by accident +brushes against the elbow of another is shot down immediately. + +In the same spirit of mischief they tortured the timid youth till he did not know what he was about. He was not so good a subject +as one with whom I crossed the Atlantic some years before; but he did very well. The principal joke played upon him was to talk of +accidents when he was at hand. + +The other man of whom I speak--the one of several years ago--was the victim of a regular conspiracy. Some of the passengers arranged +to talk in his presence of nothing but accidents; no matter what topic they were discussing, when he came near they shifted to +accidents at once. When they ran out of true stories they resorted to fiction, and the fiction was worse by far than the fact. + +He--the victim--used to remain up until sent down below by the officers, and he generally slept with a life preserver beside him. +One day when some boxes and cans were being thrown overboard, his tormentors got up a story that the barometer had been falling +about an inch an hour, and that a terrible gale was expected. The Captain feared that we could not live through it, and had thrown +out these sealed boxes, containing duplicates of the government dispatches and other important papers, in the hope that some more +fortunate vessel might find them, in case we were destroyed. + +Jack, as we called him, was in the greatest terror. He went below, and remained shut in his cabin for the rest of the day and +evening. As no gale came, it was explained that we passed it and just avoided its track, and they pointed out a line of dark clouds +on the horizon as the probable course of the gale. He was satisfied and became more cheerful, though his general terror did not +cease. + +When we approached the end of our voyage it was night, and it became necessary to throw up a rocket. The officer then in charge of +the deck said to the jokers: + +“If you want some fun with your friend, get him forward near the smoke-stack, and as close as possible to the steam-pipe. When +the engine stops they will instantly let off steam, and just as it starts I will send up a couple of rockets.” {044}They got Jack +forward and engaged him in conversation. His back was about two feet from the pipe, and the same distance from the rockets. The +steam was shut off from the engine and turned into the pipe with a tremendous roar. At the same instant the rockets let go with a +tremendous crash that anybody who has stood near a flying rocket can appreciate, and the crowd gave a yell that would have excited +the envy of a band of Indians. + +Jack made one bound aft, and his friends had to run after him lest he would jump overboard. + +[Illustration: 9054] + +He went into his cabin and did not come out for an hour or more. But when he did reappear, he was freshly alarmed. The steamer had +been stopped for a sounding, and that noisy piece of machinery--the donkey engine--was put in operation to haul in the lead-line. +All was still, until suddenly the donkey engine started with its clatter. Jack was dozing at the time, and the noise roused him. He +knew that something was wrong, and with nothing on but his shirt he darted to the deck. It took some time to quiet him and persuade +him to go where his scanty costume would be more appropriate. Necessarily the space on an ocean-steamer is very much restricted. The +ordinary sleeping-rooms are about six feet square, or at most six feet by seven; and in this space two, or sometimes three or four, +persons are expected to spend their nights and keep their superfluous garments and light baggage. + +When {045}there are few passengers each can have a room to himself; but when there is anything like a “rush,” there must be more +or less doubling up. Steamship agents will give you a room to yourself on payment of half an extra fare, and many persons avail +themselves of the opportunity. Others who desire seclusion, but suffer from shallowness of purse, prefer to make friends with the +purser or chief steward, and thereby secure what they wish for. No general rule can be laid down for this, and I leave each man to +act for himself. + +Once, when I crossed the Atlantic, I exulted in finding myself alone in a room well situated in the middle of the ship. While I was +rejoicing about the matter, I was thrown into consternation by the steward, who entered and said: + +“There is a young man in the room close by the screw, and he doesn’t like it, and is going to ask the captain to put him in with +you.” + +“William,” said I solemnly--for his name was William--“William, you know how delighted I should be to have him here. But, William, +do you know that I have fits, nightmare, delirium tremens, small-pox and several other maladies, and that I am the most ill-natured +man on board the ship? And do you know, William, that I have half a sovereign for _you_ if that adolescent gentleman stays away?” + +William smiled, said nothing, stuck his tongue in his cheek and departed. Ten minutes later he returned, bringing a broad grin on +his face as a prefix to the information: + +“The young feller will stay where he is, sir, and I hope you’ll remember the half-sov’ at the end of the voyage.” + +What William said about me to the occupant of the room near the screw, I am unable to say; but I observed that the youth shunned my +society, and consequently fear that he had formed an unfavorable opinion. But I gave the promised money to the steward “_sans peur +et sans reproche_.” + +The dangers of the Atlantic voyage are of little moment, and no more to be dreaded than those of a journey by rail from New York to +San Francisco. I refer to the unavoidable dangers, such as gales, collisions with wrecks and similar accidents that human foresight +cannot prevent. Accidents like the loss of the _Atlantic_ {046}and the _Schiller_, and similar disasters, are to be attributed to +the bad management, either of the company, or of the ship’s officers, or of both, and do not come under the head of unavoidable +calamities. With good management on all sides, and proper inspection of ships, a journey across the ocean is as safe as a rail +journey of the same length, and in some respects more so. I have been assured by men familiar with the history of steam navigation +that the casualties are not more numerous in proportion to the numbers travelling, than on American railways. + +The reason why an accident on the water is more dreadful than on land is twofold. In the first place, the number of persons killed +or wounded in a railway accident is always a small percentage of those on the train. Take Carr’s Rock, Angola, Richmond Switch, or +any other terrible disaster by rail, and the number killed was a great deal smaller than the number of those who escaped unhurt. +But a marine accident may destroy the life of every one on board the ship. This has been the case on several occasions. The steamers +_President, City of Glasgow, Pacific, City of Boston, Tempest, United Kingdom, Ismailia, and Trojan_ were lost at sea, and never +heard from. Two steamers on the American, and one, I believe, on the English coast, were wrecked with all on board; and one steamer +was wrecked near Moville, from which only a single man escaped. Most of these steamers were lost on their eastward trips, when their +passenger lists were much smaller than if they had been going westward. + +Another thing that makes an ocean accident terrible, is the difficulty of escape. If you are overturned in a railway car, you fall +upon solid earth, but in an accident on the ocean, you have nothing but water to stand upon--a very poor support indeed. The boats +of a steamship are not sufficient to hold her passengers and crew, as a general thing, and in case of an accident on a westward +trip, when the steerage is crowded with emigrants, the loss of life may be enormous. On board the steamer which carried me over +the Atlantic there were eight boats, with a capacity altogether of not more than four hundred persons, under the most favorable +circumstances, supposing all of them launched and the weather fine. On her westward trips she frequently carries twelve hundred +steerage passengers, and her crew and {047}cabin passenger list would probably bring the complement up to very nearly fourteen +hundred. In case the steamer sinks at sea, there would be a thousand persons who could not possibly find places in the boats! There +is not a ship carrying emigrants that has boat room enough for half her passengers on a westward trip, and I doubt if any of them +could even carry away a fourth of their complement. When your ship goes down at sea you may consider yourself fortunate if you do +not go down with her. + +It is a burning shame that nearly all the steam lines crossing the Atlantic, are in the hands of other nationalities than ours. It +is not generally known that two of the English lines are mainly owned in New York, only enough of the stock being held abroad to +enable the ships to sail under the British flag. The reason of this is that our laws discriminate against our own people, and in +favor of other nations; the taxes and other restrictions are such, that an American line cannot be run so as to compete successfully +with a foreign one, and consequently, American capital seeking investment in steamships for the Atlantic service, is very likely to +go under a foreign flag! Isn’t this pitiful? + +There are occasional spasmodic efforts for the establishment of an American line between New York and Liverpool, but they have never +lasted long. As I write these pages there is an American line from Philadelphia that seems to promise well. It has good ships and +is said to be well equipped and managed. I sincerely hope it will have a long and successful career, but if it does it will be +different from any of the numerous “lines” that have had their headquarters in New York. {048} + +[Illustration: 0058] + + + + +CHAPTER II--SCENES IN VIENNA--DOWN THE DANUBE. + + +_On English Ground--The Road to the East--Life in the Austrian Capital--Fun and Festivity--Visit to the Big Beer-Garden--Effects +of Champagne--Animated Conversation--How Twenty Thousand Dollars were Spent--The Man with the Torn Vest--Headaches at a +Discount--Yankees in a Row--A Pugnacious Russian--“Quits” but not Satisfied--Challenging an American--The Fashionable World--Down +the Danube--Scenes on the River--How Austrian Cigars are made--An Imperial Tobacco Dealer--The Battle of Wagram--Castle of +Presburg--We Enter Hungary--An Evening in a Wine Cellar--Want of a Little Soap--Night Scene on the Danube._ + + +AS this book is intended to describe a journey in the Orient, we will leave our steamer at Liverpool, and with one bound plant our +feet in Vienna. + +This is the last great city on the road to the East; she has twice enjoyed the honors of a Turkish siege, and is the capital of +a country which fronts upon the land of the Moslem. So much has been written about Vienna that I shall refrain from giving a +description of the city and its people, and shall content myself with remarking that I found it, next to Paris, the most attractive +place on the Continent. + +I have been several times in Vienna, and at different seasons of the year, but have never found it otherwise than gay and +attractive. My longest visit there was in the memorable year of the Exposition, when Vienna was crowded with people from all parts +of the globe, and the mingling of nationalities made many curious scenes. {049}The city government of Vienna endeavored to make +the place as attractive as possible, and did a great many things to make the time pass pleasantly. There were balls and parties +innumerable; music and beer halls were open by the hundred; and every few days there was a special entertainment to the strangers +connected with the Exposition. The first of these affairs that I attended was given one evening in the Stadt Park. The Stadt Park +would be in English the City Park, Public Gardens, or any thing else you might choose to call a large park or garden belonging to +the city, and used for festivals on a grand scale, and for a general place of recreation for the public. Near the entrance is a +large building somewhat resembling a palace on a small scale; when I first saw it I asked a friend what it was, and was greatly +disappointed at his answer. I supposed it was an art gallery, imperial pavilion, or department bureau, and was naturally somewhat +surprised to learn that it was a beer saloon and restaurant. You can understand that a festival which illuminated these grounds, +and wound up the illumination with a display of fireworks, was a thing not to be sneezed at. It cost the city of Vienna about twenty +thousand dollars to give this “blowout,” and they had the worth of the money. I do not think any of it went to the Aldermen and +Burgomaster, as is sometimes the case in America, when cities get up grand displays in honor of distinguished guests. + +Not only did the city furnish lights, fireworks, and music, but it furnished an excellent supper washed down with champagne, white +and red wines, beer, tea, coffee, and--in a few instances--with water. The effect of these things was interesting to behold. The +international juries contained representatives from nearly all the civilized nations of the globe, and when the champagne had +warmed their tongues there was a chattering that would have done honor to the cage of monkeys that used to ornament the _Jardin Des +Plantes_ in Paris before the war sent the friends of Dr. Darwin to the cooking pot. In the beginning of the festival all were +trying to talk in German or in French, but as the champagne did its work and heads began to whirl, the language of the country was +forgotten, and everybody was rattling away in his own tongue. Here would be a group in which were half a dozen {050}men, of as many +nationalities, and each would be talking in his own language as though his salvation depended on his getting through as many words +as possible in a given time. All would be jabbering away for dear life, and all at once; and close by them, and all around them, +would be groups of the same sort, fraternizing in the same way. + +[Illustration: 0060] + +At every step you might find an Englishman, a Frenchman, or a German endeavoring to explain to an Italian, a Spaniard, or a Chinese, +the relations between the solar plexus, and the atomic theory as applied to the construction of cart wheels. The amount of science +evolved on that evening was frightful to contemplate, as nearly every man was science-sharp in some way or other, and your +genuine man of genius is pretty certain to become more and more talkative the more he gets drunk. There was an immense amount of +international fraternizing; and if all the good words and wishes uttered on that occasion and moistened with champagne could have +effect, there would never be any more wars among nations, and the various governments of the earth might disband their armies and +convert their artillery into {051}locomotives and dirt-carts. Not only were the international jurors there, but a good many other +loafers, such as city officials, attaches of the government bureaus, newspaper men, and diplomates. The Emperor was not there, but +some of the Archdukes were, and there were lots of Austrians, with any number of decorations hanging on the front of their coats. + +[Illustration: 8061] + +You couldn’t move without hitting a dignitary in official costume, or a fellow so full of dignity in plain clothes that you would +recognize him at once as a heavy swell; and the mingling of the nationalities as the evening wore on was funny to behold. + +Germans and Russians, and others of the continental people were hugging each other, and you had the spectacle--curious and novel to +an American--of bearded men kissing and re-kissing like couples of school-girls. + +They swore eternal friendship, and pledged each other till their hearts and heads were too full and their tongues too thick for +utterance. The waiters got drunk, owing to the numbers of “heel-taps” and the general abundance and freedom of the champagne. They +got into rows among themselves and with some of the guests, and altogether there were half a dozen scrimmages of greater or less +magnitude. Most of them were fortunately confined to words, and were soon quelled, but there were two rows in which there was some +pushing, but no actual blows. + +One American had his vest torn in a scuffle with a waiter. He went next morning to the consulate, bearing the torn garment as +proof of the affray; but as he could not tell how the affair occurred, and could not remember the name and face of the waiter who +assaulted him, the Consul declined to make the quarrel a national one. + +[Illustration: 9062] + +It was long after midnight when the last of the _convives_ {052}went home; and when the sun rose next morning, Vienna contained an +unwonted number of heads swollen to unusual size and bursting with the pain of too much drink the night before. + +The words “West Portal” in very large letters. Man proposes and the police dispose. The police turned us off at one of the bridges, +and would not allow us to go anywhere near the western entrance, but sent us away in the direction of the south portal. Then another +lot of police stopped us a quarter of a mile from the gate, so that my ride to the Exposition was more in theory than in practice. + +Vehicles of every description were depositing people at the gates, and thousands were going thither on foot. Many had come expecting +to spend an hour in the building before the beginning of the _fête_, but in this they were disappointed, as the doors were closed +at six o’clock, instead of seven, the usual hour. The crowd kept coming, and coming; you couldn’t find a vacant chair at any of the +restaurants and beer halls, and you found it no easy matter to walk about. I think that by eight o’clock there were not less than a +hundred thousand people in the grounds, and they kept coming as late as nine o’clock. As a _fête_, strictly speaking, the affair did +not amount to much. Half a dozen bands of music were playing in various parts of the grounds, and at the spot known as the Mozart +Platz, there was an Austrian singing-society. + +That Sommerfest will be remembered by all who were there, and sadly by more than one respectable head of a family. + +Another night there was a festival in the grounds around the Exposition building. I started for that place leisurely about five +o’clock, under agreement to meet a friend near the west portal, and mounted to the deck of an omnibus which bore {053}numbering +about five hundred voices. Then there were electric lights, nearly a dozen of them, that made the spot brilliant, and when all their +rays were thrown on the great dome they brought it out into bold relief. + +“How magnificent that dome appears,” said an American near me to his friend; “you can see every part of it distinctly.” + +“That may be,” said the other; “but you could see it a great deal better in the daytime without paying a cent.” + +Bless his practical mind! I never thought of that! + +The light had a strange appearance when thrown on the trees and buildings and fountains, and the scene reminded me of +representations of fairyland, such as we sec in the Black Crook, or in the panorama of the Pilgrim’s Progress. If some of my +theatrical friends could have been there, I think they would have found some new hints for stage effects. The jewels in the great +crown that surmounts the dome were sparkling very brilliantly, and I imagine that more than one individual in the crowd thought that +the crown would be a nice thing to plunder. The effect of the lights when turned from you was very pleasing, but when you had to +look one of them in the face it became a nuisance. They had a way of changing the colors of the lights that reflected upon the +fountains so that they became by turns red, blue, green, yellow, and white, eliciting a great many murmurs of applause. + +By half past nine the people began to move away, and there was a jam on all the streets that led through the Prater up to the +Praterstern. Vehicles could only proceed at a walk, and even that pace could not always be maintained. I was on the top of an +omnibus, and rarely have I seen so large a crowd as the one I looked upon from my post of observation. The streets from the +Praterstern spread out like the arms of a fan, or more like the spokes of a wheel, and on all these streets people were about as +much crowded as they could be, and there was a much larger sprinkling of women than you see in a crowd in America. Vehicles were +moving as best they could, and despite the rush and the jam everybody was good natured. + +Nearly up to midnight the crowd surged along from the Prater, and evidently people were in no hurry to go to bed. All Vienna seemed +to be out of doors, and the beer-halls were doing an enormous business. I would not ask for a better fortune than to have {054}a +dollar for each glass of beer drank in Vienna in the twenty-four hours ending the next morning at sunrise. There were probably half +a million people drinking beer on that festive day, at an average of ten glasses each. + +As an illustration of European customs, I will relate an incident of my stay in Vienna: + +One day, three American ladies were in the Exposition building, and attracted the attention of a couple of strangers, one an +Austrian officer, and the other a Russian of considerable distinction in his own home. The freedom of their manners, so natural to +American women, was misinterpreted, and the gentlemen made themselves obnoxious by following them wherever they went, and, finally, +by speaking to them, and offering to be their escort. + +Though repulsed, they followed; and, finally, near the Rotunda, the ladies met a gentleman who was husband to one of them and +brother to the other. They told him the story, and pointed out their troublesome followers, who were standing a little distance +away. The American walked to where the pair stood, and after a few words he coolly knocked the Russian down. + +[Illustration: 0064] + +The latter made no resistance, but pulled out his card{055}case and demanded the address of his assailant, which was given. + +Next day there came a challenge to fight; the Russian wanted satisfaction for the insult he had suffered, and was determined upon +a duel. The American was inclined to accommodate him, but his friends interfered, and one of them went to the Russian, with the +assurance that the American would have nothing to do with him. + +“But I must have satisfaction,” demanded the Russian. “I have been grossly insulted, and must have satisfaction.” + +“I don’t see it,” was the American’s reply. “You are even with him and can cry quits. You insulted his wife and he knocked you down. +Can anything be more equal than that?” + +“But a blow! a blow, is a terrible insult to me, the Count ----------, and I must have a duel. + +[Illustration: 8065] + +Speaking to a man’s wife is nothing. He had no business to strike me; he could challenge me to fight, but strike me, never!” + +“Well, anyhow, it seems he _did_, and if you were to insult my wife as you did his, I would knock you down too. We do that way in +America, and when you insult an American woman you must be treated in American style. My friend shall not fight a duel, and if you +go near him you will get knocked down again, or possibly get a revolver-shot through you. Good-day.” + +The Russian would not let the matter rest there. He tried to bring it before the Russian Ambassador, and through him, before the +United States Minister; and there was a prospect that the affair would cause some trouble. But the American’s friends refused +{056}to let him receive a challenge or take any part in the discussion, so that the Russian was forced to the alternative of having +his adversary arrested for striking him, or of letting him alone. As arresting him would not heal his wounded honor, he did not +do it, and the affair has now, I think, blown over. It is a dangerous business to strike a man in Vienna, and, had the authorities +chosen, they could have made things lively for our pugilistic friend. Only physical assaults are held to be an excuse for a blow. + +There is a good deal of nonsense afloat about the beauty of the Viennese women. I looked for it, but could not find it. I do not +mean to say that there are no handsome women here, as I saw a goodly number of pretty faces, but they are not more numerous than in +other cities. I have read about the great beauty of the women, and know several men who have raved about Vienna as the centre of +the earth in this respect, but I cannot understand it. Among the women that are seen in public places, such as the music gardens, +restaurants, and _cafés_, there are no more pretty faces than you would see in Berlin or Paris, and the chances are more than even +that those you do see are not Viennese. + +One evening I was sitting with a newly-arrived friend in the Volks-Garten listening to the music of Strauss’s band. Hundreds of +people were walking up and down the gravel promenade, enjoying the cool and delicious air, the bright lights, and above all, the +sparkling music of Vienna’s most celebrated composer. Two women passed near us; they were beautiful beyond question, and my friend, +who had not yet learned that it is unsafe to say anything in a mixed assemblage, on the supposition that those around will not +understand you, remarked audibly: “Those are the prettiest girls I have yet seen in Vienna.” + +“Thank you, sir,” said one of them, as the twain passed on and sat down in another part of the garden. + +Half an hour later, we were strolling about, and went unnoticed near their table. They were talking English in an accent that showed +they were from London, or, at all events, from some part of the Queen’s dominions. Not far from them were two other handsome women, +who were talking French with a pure Parisian {057}accent; and near these, again, there were others talking Hungarian. + +There is one part of the Volks-Garden where--on Tuesday and Friday evenings--you will find an assemblage of the fashionable men and +women of Vienna, the members of the old and wealthy families, who are received at court, and sometimes belong to it, and without +whose sanction nobody can be admitted into that charmed circle known as “Society.” I took particular pains to look at this +assemblage in a search for beauty, and am obliged to say that I found very little of it. There were some pretty women, but not a +conspicuous number; nearly all of them were richly dressed, but in a “louder” style than you expect to find among really fashionable +people. New York or Washington society would present a better appearance than would that portion of Viennese society that I saw. And +people who lived there told me that I had seen a very good sample of it. + +One pleasant afternoon in October, when the sun shed its mellow rays on the grey walls of Vienna, tinging the lofty spire of St. +Stephen’s Cathedral with golden light, and burnishing the faded foliage of the venerable trees in the delightful park of Austria’s +capital, I hurried to the banks of the beautiful blue Danube, which Strauss has made famous through the music loving world by the +dedication of one of his most charming waltzes. My prosaic object, amid so many poetical surroundings, was to take the evening boat +to Presburg. After the customary wrangle with the hackman, I passed the gang-plank and stood among plump “fraus” and “frauleins” + with keen black eyes, set above rosy cheeks, beneath an abundance of luxuriant hair of raven hue. Austrian peasants were there +with coats of coarse cloth like our once famous “butternut” and Hungarian peasants were there with coats of sheep-skin. Languages +mingled, as did the speakers, but the Austrian voices were in the majority, quite as much as were the owners thereof. The Austrian +is more loquacious than the Hungarian; the latter has a calm dignity about him, reminding one of the Orient, and he is more +economic in his use of words--possibly for the reason that it is no easy matter to speak his language even when one is born to it. +{058}Immediately below Vienna the Danube runs through a broad plain that offers nothing of special interest, unless it be the spot +where in 1809 Napoleon built a bridge by which his army crossed the river on the night of the fourth of July, to fight on the fifth +the battle of Wagram, which cost the Austrians twenty-six thousand men and led to the treaty of Vienna in October of the same year. +As we look towards the east the horizon is everywhere limited by mountains; and as we approach them we discover a change in +the character of the country. The plain disappears and is succeeded by hills. On the first of these, on the right bank, is the +picturesque town of Hainburg, with its ruined chateau dating from the middle ages, and also a well built one of more modern days. + +If we are smokers we should take a second look at Hainburg, for here is the imperial factory employing two thousand persons in the +manufacture of cigars. Tobacco in Austria is a government monopoly; cigars are made by the government and sold to the retail dealers +at a discount of five per cent., and this is the only profit allowed. Whether you, as a smoker, buy one cigar, five cigars, five +hundred or five thousand, you pay the same price per _stuck_, and there is no choice as to shops, so far as quality is concerned. +Whether you buy in the Graben or the Taberstrasse of Vienna, or in an obscure shop in an obscure village a hundred miles from the +capitol, you get the same quality of cigar for five, seven, nine, ten, or twelve kreutzers, in the one place as in the other. All +come from one factory, and their goodness or badness never varies. + +A little below Hainburg we pass the mouth of the river March, which separates Austria from Hungary. It is not a large stream, barely +wide enough at this season of the year to be called a brook, but it is not always thus. The March is sometimes very deep and strong, +and it has puzzled many a military commander how to cross it. During the various wars between Austria and Hungary several +battles were fought on the banks of this river, some of them of a very sanguinary character. But all is quiet now, and the only +demonstration witnessed during our voyage was that some of the Hungarian passengers raised their hats as the boat passed the March, +and one of them took the trouble to inform {059}me of the political importance of the locality, saying that he had served in the +last war between the kingdom and the empire. + +We wind among hills, some of them steep and rugged, and one crowned by a ruined fortress which once guarded the frontier and kept +watch over the river. We see the old castle of Presburg, standing out against the evening sky; and it is dusk when we pass the +bridge of boats which has been opened for our descent, and the boat swings round to the landing place at the ancient capital +of Hungary. No wonder Austria and Hungary were always at each other’s ears when their capitals were only forty miles apart.’Tis +distance lends enchantment and preserves peace and harmony. + +Our indefatigable consul at Vienna, General Post, had given me a letter of introduction to the prince of wine-growers at Presburg, +Herr Palaguay; and as the Herr kept a hotel in addition to his wine business, the pair of us--an American naval captain and +myself--sought that establishment without delay. We ordered dinner as it was late and we were hungry; the excellence of the +pheasant, venison, beef, and other good things that were set before us, caused us to eat abundantly and to entertain a good opinion +of the edible resources of Hungary. If we lived thus at the gateway what should we not find in traversing the kingdom? If it were +only to secure a supply of Hungarian pheasants, Austria would be justified, in the mind of a _gourmet,_ in the subjugation and +appropriation of the entire land of Kossuth. What are national rights against a well-supplied dinner table? + +We devoted the evening to a visit to the spacious wine cellars of our host. Very spacious they were; and we wandered about for +two hours among huge casks, some of them containing three thousand five hundred gallons each, and worthy of being converted into +tenement houses. We tasted of Tokay Imperial and Tokay Royal, of Chateau Presburg, Blood of Hungary, and I don’t know what else; and +finally we grew weary of tasting and went home. It was from these cellars that the imperial cellar of Maximilian I., the ill-fated +Emperor of Mexico, was stocked, and we were shown through the place by the younger Palaguay, who went to Mexico with Maximilian and +arranged his wine vaults in {060}the city of the Aztecs. Father and son were warm admirers of the adventurous scion of the House of +Hapsburg, and the old gentleman never wearied of telling us about Kaiser Max and his good qualities. + +[Illustration: 0070] + +Next day we climbed to the old chateau that overlooks Pres-burg, and from the esplanade in front had a beautiful view of the city +and its surroundings. Beneath us lay Presburg, venerable and grey, with its cathedral, six centuries old, and its _Hotel de Ville_, +dating from the fourteenth century. Directly at our feet was the Jews-quarter. There are seven thousand Jews here in a population of +less than fifty thousand; and there is more dirt and general uncleanliness in their quarter than in all the rest of Presburg. West +of us the hills shut out the view of Vienna. North were the vine-clad ridges whence come the wines of Presburg. And to the south and +east were plain, field and forest; and showing a broad, winding belt of silver, the course of the Danube. + +Immediately opposite, and connected with the city by the bridge of boats, was an island where is the Prater of Presburg with shaded +seats, with _restaurants_ and open-air theatres and other places of amusements, to which the wearied citizen goes to recreate in the +fresh air. We went there in the afternoon and found the Presburg adult of both sexes; we went there in the {061}morning and found +the Presburg nursery-maid and infant in goodly numbers. In the evening we went to the theatre; the best box in the house costs two +dollars; and a seat in the parquette forty cents. We had an Italian opera, William Tell. The singing was fair, considering the price +of tickets, and the size of the house, and the son of William Tell was represented by a young woman so pretty that my friend, the +captain, was near falling in love with her, despite his venerable years and his three months in Vienna. The grand chorus consisted +of twelve persons, the orchestra of nine, and the scenery was of a miscellaneous nature that enabled it to do duty in all the operas +of any ordinary _répertoire_. + +From Presburg to Pesth by the river is a run of about ten hours. Bidding good-bye to the Captain, who was to return to Vienna, I +went to the landing one morning to take the boat down the river. She was due at half-past nine o’clock, and I was there ten minutes +before the time. The hour came, but no boat. Then ten, ten and a half, eleven, eleven and a half; and still no boat. I tried to be +patient, but that was not easy; I interrogated everybody, but to no purpose. Everybody was polite, but couldn’t give any reason for +the delay. + +Finally, the boat appeared, and it turned out that she had been aground in a fog near Vienna. Perfectly simple explanation when you +know it! But there had been no fog at Presburg, and hence the inability to comprehend the cause of the delay. + +Below Presburg, the river runs through a level country that offers few objects of interest. It divides into several branches, and +becomes wide, and in some places so shallow that navigation is rather difficult. We wound about considerably in some places, in +search of the channel, and not infrequently the bottom of the boat and the bottom of the river came in contact. The erratic course +of the Danube can be best understood by a knowledge of the fact, that two of the islands formed by its diversion into different +channels, are, the one sixty, and the other forty miles long. One is twenty, and the other ten miles wide; and both are so fertile +that they are called the Golden Gardens. Their surfaces are diversified with forest, field, and pasture; herds of cattle and horses +are numerous upon them, and now and then villages peep out from the rich foliage. {062}Back from the river there are extensive wheat +fields, and along the line of railway, just before the harvest, one can ride for many miles through almost unbroken fields of waving +grain. + +We pass the fortress of Komoru, and peer into the casemates, whence the black-mouthed cannon look frowningly upon us. Komoru has a +bloody and eventful history; she has played an important part in all the wars between Austria and Hungary, and in the insurrection +of 1848-9 was twice captured and re-captured. The deeds of valor of which Komoru was the scene, would fill a volume; some of them +have found a place in the histories of that war, and some live only in the memories of the men who bore a part in the insurrection, +or in the effort to suppress it. + +Below Komoru, the Danube became more interesting, and we entered a mountain region that would have been picturesque could we +have seen it by daylight. It was dark when we passed this portion, and it was darker when we reached the upper extremity of Isle +Marguerite, with its gardens and summer resorts, where the people of Pesth seek recreation and pure air in the hot days of summer. + +Along the channel that leads by the pretty island, we steamed at full speed; and as we swept beyond its groves, the twinkling lamps +of Pesth suddenly came into view, fringing the bank of the river with a lace-work of artificial light. The boat swung round in +mid-stream, and brought us to the bank, where a stone quay, with warehouses and piles of merchandise, gave evidence of a prosperous +city. The quay has a modern and substantial appearance, and is overlooked by a street, on one side of which is an iron railing, and +the other side of which can boast many fine structures, equalling in beauty and solidity most of the marble or iron fronts of +New York. Pesth has accomplished much in the last few years, in the way of building, and one is rather taken aback to find such a +prosperous and rapidly-growing city so far in the East. {063} + +[Illustration: 0073] + + + + +CHAPTER III--LIFE AMONG THE MAGYARS. + + +_A City of renown--Overwhelmed by the Floods--Lying in Clover--What I Saw in the Hungarian Capital--“The Poor Folk’s Bath”--Rather +Warm Quarters--Life Among the Magyars--The “Miffs,” of an Imperial Couple--Her Majesty’s Choice--A Model Captain--Charles Matthews +and the Bowery Boy--Facts and Fancies of a Snoring Match--The “Judge” and the “Doubter”--The Man Who Wouldn’t Believe--Who were the +“Hamals,” and What They Did--People in Strange Garments--Baggy Breeches versus Slop--The Fortress of Belgrade--Servia, and What I +Saw of Its People--The Assassination of Prince Miloch--Rather Bad for Poetry._ + + +PESTH was founded by the Romans, who were attracted by the mineral springs in the vicinity. They built a fort and established a +sort of water-cure, though not on a large scale. + +The city has had a rough time, and a hard struggle for existence. It has been captured and pillaged more than a dozen--some say +eighteen--times, and for nearly a century and a half it was in the hands of the Turks, who were not particularly gentle in their +treatment of the inhabitants. It has been burned, and it has been overflowed; the last great inundation was in 1838, when two +thousand houses were destroyed in Pesth, and six hundred in Buda, on the opposite bank. + +Query.--Isn’t there a chance that the “Beautiful Blue Danube” will get high again some time, and sweep away all the fine warehouses +along the quay, together with a few million dollars’ worth of the merchandise stored there? + +I couldn’t help thinking of that as I contemplated this busy, energetic Chicago of Austro-Hungary, and resolved that I would +{064}not leave my trunk over night at the steamboat landing. I entrusted it to a Hungarian _trager_, who strapped it on his back and +motioned me to follow, like a downcast and silent mourner, as he led the way to the hotel I named. I know of but one hotel in all +Europe--the Grand Hotel at Paris--which can surpass in extent, completeness, and magnificence, the Grand Hotel Hun-garia at Pesth. + +I passed four days very pleasantly at Pesth, visiting its Museum of Antiquities, its Gallery of Paintings, and going to the races, +where I saw some fine horses of Hungarian stock, and also some fine ones of Hungarian stock crossed with English. I went to one of +the famous baths of Buda, where I bathed and then breakfasted at the _restaurant_ attached to the establishment. Buda, by the way, +is directly opposite to Pesth; the two cities were long distinct, but they are now united into a single municipality under the name +of Buda-Pesth, and the union is strengthened by a beautiful bridge on the suspension principle. This bridge was completed in 1848, +and, though a work of peace, its early uses were singularly warlike. It was inaugurated on the 5th of January, 1849, by the passage +of the Hungarian army under Kossuth, pursued by the Austrians. Four months later, the Austrian army retreated over the same bridge, +pursued by the Hungarians. Turn about is fair play. + +Buda has a more picturesque site than Pesth, as it stands partly on a hill, and is dominated by the Blocksberg, a mountain that +overlooks the river, and is crowned by a fortress. There are several baths in Buda, some of them of great extent, and all having +hot water from natural springs. You can bathe in a public room, or you can have a bath to yourself; and you have the advantages of +a _restaurant_ in the building, so that you may command your breakfast or dinner, and have it brought to your room if you choose, +along with anything liquid you wish to select from a wine-card. Then there are gardens attached to the baths, where bands of music +entertain the ear, and groups of the youths and maidens and adults of Buda-Pesth sit in the shade and regale themselves after the +manner of the German in his sommer-garten. + +In one of your promenades you may visit the _bain des pauvres_, where both sexes bathe together with only the scantiest apparel. + +{065}The place is hot and steamy, and the odors anything but charming. A single glance satisfied me, and I was glad to seek the +open air and sit at one of the tables in the beer garden, until the perspiration had dried from my forehead and the steam from my +clothing. This bath-house is a dome-like structure, lighted by a single window in the top. It was built by the Turks, and was used +by them as a convent of dervishes. + +Hungary is now as thoroughly Austrian as any part of the Monarchy. The Hungarians have all they ever asked for, and some of them +say they have more. They have their own parliament; their finances are kept separate from those of Austria, and they run their own +affairs pretty much as they please. The Emperor was crowned King of Hungary, and his prime minister, Count Andrassy, is a Hungarian; +the Emperor is well disposed towards the country of the Magyars--one of my friends persists in calling them the Maguires--and as for +the Empress, it is well known that she likes the Hungarians much better than the Austrians, and prefers Pesth to Vienna. The gossips +whisper that the august couple have their “miffs” occasionally, and one cause of these matrimonial jars is the decided preference +which Her Majesty shows for the Hungarians. All things considered, Hungary has reason to be content. She can let alone wars and +insurrections, and attend to the development of her resources, which are by no means small, and that is what she is doing, and +evidently intends to do. + +From Pesth to Belgrade the Danube has a general southerly course, and flows for the most part through a broad plain, extremely +fertile but rather sparsely inhabited. There is little animation on the river; the principal objects to catch the eye are the +numerous water-mills, but they are an old story to one who has descended the Danube from Lintz to Vienna, and from Vienna to Pesth. + +These mills are very simple, inexpensive, and effective, and they utilize a power which would otherwise run to waste. Two barges, +or flat boats, one larger than the other, are anchored in the river, and held about twenty feet apart by means of a couple of wooden +beams. A rude wheel with the floats at right angles to the current, is built between the two boats; an end of {066}the shaft is +supported by each, and in the larger of the boats the shaft turns the machinery of a flour mill. A house is built over the mill, and +sometimes the miller lives there with his family. Communication with the shore is maintained by means of a plank or a small boat. +The mill costs but little at the outset, and the power that turns it is always ready as long as water runs in the river. + +I wonder why these mills are not introduced in America. On our western rivers where the current is strong, they could be used to +great advantage, and many thousands of them could be run without interfering with navigation. + +The navigation of the great river of Austria is managed by two companies--one Austrian and the other Hungarian. The latter is +confined to Hungarian waters, but the other--The Danube Steam Navigation Company--extends its operations along the whole line of the +river from Lintz to its mouth, and it even runs a line of sea-going boats between Galatz and Odessa. On the lower Danube below Pesth +it has two kinds of boats, the one local and the other express, or, as they call them, “accelerated.” The local boats stop at all +the landings, and do not travel much at night. The “accelerated boats” only touch at a few points; and travel day and night, weather +permitting. On the local boats your ticket includes nothing but your passage; meals and berths are extras. On the “accelerated +boats” you pay for everything in a lump, and have no trouble about settling at each meal or piecemeal. + +I took passage on the “accelerated” steamer _Franz Josef_ and found her very comfortable; her cabins were clean, her table was good +and well supplied, and her captain was designed by nature to charm the heart of traveling man or woman--especially the latter--and +the design of nature had been further developed by art and education. He spoke French like a Parisian, was as handsome as his own +picture (it is not always thus); wore such a lovely mustache, and was as polite as a courtier of the days of Louis Quatorze. He had +a mixed party to entertain, but he was fully equal to the task. + +There were four Russians, two men and two women; all were polite and well bred, and the women were sociable and dignified, +{067}without being pert or bashful. There were Servians and Roumanians of both sexes; there were Austrians and Hungarians likewise; +there were two Frenchmen--engineers connected with the location of the Roumanian railways; there were two English women of +the independent class that travels about the world unprotected by man, and perfectly capable of protecting itself under all +circumstances; and there were three Americans. + +At dinner I made a comparison of the manners of the table with those of steamboat tables in America, and the comparison was not +favorable to my own country. There you generally see men eating in silence and rapidity, and with very little regard for the comfort +of their neighbors. Here the meal was eaten leisurely; everybody was civil to everybody else; conversation was general, and instead +of fifteen minutes for refreshments, we had an hour and a half, and seasoned the meal with pleasant exchanges of information upon a +variety of topics. There was no distinction of age or sex in the conversation, but every one seemed determined to _faire son mieux_ +to enable the rest to pass the time agreeably. + +The incident described by Charles Matthews on one of the Sound steamers, would have created a first-class sensation here: “Will you +have the goodness to pass the salt?” said the English comedian to a Bowery boy, who was shovelling meat and potatoes down his throat +with the speed of the most effective kind of dredging machine. “Salt by yer,” said the patriot, without deigning to do more than +raise his eyes, and continuing his feeding without so much as an instant’s interruption. “O, I beg your pardon,” said Matthews, +looking down and espying the saltcellar close to his plate, “I did’nt see it.” + +“Who the ------ said you did?” was the gruff reply. “I said ‘salt by yer.’” + +[Illustration: 0078] + +On board the Franz Josef, I had intended to take a private cabin, but when I learned the price of it I changed my mind. The price +of passage was eighteen florins (a florin is equal to fifty cents of our money); a private cabin costs twenty-three florins, so +that the whole bill would have been forty-one florins! I didn’t relish paying eleven dollars and a half for privacy when there was +a good, comfortable berth at my disposal for nothing. The sleeping cabin is under the main saloon, and is divided into {068}cabins +holding four persons each--that is if a green curtain let down in front can be called a division. I saw there were many advantages +in sleeping there that you would not have in a private cabin. + +You could have, for instance, a sample of the snoring of each of the nationalities on board, a thing you do not get every day; if +one of the number should happen to indulge in delirium tremens or fits you could see the effect on him without any extra charge. + +So I kept my twenty-three florins, and by paying a few kreutzers to one of the servants, our party of three managed to get a cabin +all to ourselves. The extra berth we used for stowage purposes, and very convenient we found it. We took our tea and retired early, +as we expected to be in Belgrade by daybreak. + +And such snoring! I had been told that the English and Americans are the only people who indulge in this amusement, but I found that +my information was incorrect. Of those who slept in that cabin at least half did themselves credit by the extent and originality +of their nasal music. There was one fat old Russian who struck a chromatic scale with the regularity and accuracy of a country +singing-school. He would start with a light snort, then run up to the eighth note, which would be a {069}cross between the report +of a rifle and the murmur of a brook under the ice, and then he came down the eight-rounded ladder to a sound exactly like his +preliminary snort. + +[Illustration: 0079] + +There was a heavy-sided Austrian who kept him company in such a fashion that I thought our boat had turned in to a high pressure +one; and there was a Roumanian who had a fashion of dropping his jaw and biting off his snore every five minutes or so. In the +first part of the night it was impossible to sleep, and our party turned to betting as to which of the performers would hold out +the longest on a single spurt. We kept it up an hour or more, but the men we backed were so unreliable that we all lost money, and +finally growing sleepy we gave up the game. Whether we added to the music when we fell asleep, I am unable to say, but I fancy that +we did not diminish it. In the morning we heard that the boat was badly shaken at the stern, and the captain said she would have to +lie up after the present trip. I will lay a wager that it was the old Servian that did the business. + +We were aground in the night and detained by a fog, but the loss of time was a gain in sight-seeing. Without detention we should +have passed Peterwarde in in the early morning; as it was {070}we saw it after we had taken breakfast and were in a good mood for +contemplation. + +It is a picturesque fortress dominating the river and covering an escarped hill that shows a double façade pierced with portholes, +with a complex arrangement of bastions, salient and reentering angles, casemates, and sheltered barracks. It can contain ten +thousand men without serious crowding; its permanent garrison consists of about one-fourth that number. Here it was that Peter the +Hermit assembled his soldiers for the first crusade, and it was from that religious enthusiast that the fortress received its modern +name. + +We saw here on this part of the Danube, as we had seen above, boats towed by horses, seven or eight in line, against the current; +we saw droves of white cattle and we rarely saw any other color than white; we saw women working in the fields, and at Mohacs we saw +them wheeling coal in barrows or carrying it in baskets. A little past noon we were looking ahead and saw a city perched on a hill +above a fortress, and near it, and nearer to us, was another city on a low tongue of land. + +The nearer city was Semlin--the more distant was Belgrade--they pronounce it with the accent on the last syllable and make it rhyme +with “hard,” or very nearly so. + +The river Save (rhymes with “halve”) here joins the Danube from the East and forms the boundary between Austro-Hungary on the one +hand and Servia on the other. Semlin is on one side of the mouth of the Save and Belgrade on the other. Semlin is flat and low and +offers nothing picturesque; Belgrade is elevated and pretty and merits the admiration which has been bestowed upon it. + +The boat stopped a few moments at Semlin and then moved on to Belgrade, and the two Americans whose acquaintance I had made at Pesth +determined to travel with me or I with them as we had a common object in view--to reach Constantinople. They were both reasonably +well along in years; one was called “the Judge” for his fair round belly which he was accustomed to line with good capon or anything +else that possessed the proper lining qualities. The other was called “the Doctor,” which we soon exchanged to “Doubter” for the +reason that he doubted {071}everything that he had not seen, and even after seeing it his doubts generally continued. + +“I have known,” said the Judge one day, “a man that could lift a thousand pounds of lead at once.” + +“I doubt it,” said the “Doubter.” + +The Judge reduced the figure to eight hundred, then to six hundred, and so on down to fifty pounds, but still the doubt was +maintained. + +I remarked that it was once told of a man in Islip, Long Island, the steward of the Olympic Club, who, in the summer of 1872; had a +tame oyster that could sing “The Star Spangled Banner” and fire a gun. + +Particularity as to time, place, and circumstance generally carries conviction, but it failed in this instance. + +[Illustration: 8081] + +The Judge laughed and made no response, but the “Doubter” shook his head incredulously. + +We went ashore; a Servian official examined our passports and another took a hasty survey of our baggage, and then the twain +released us. We gave over our baggage to a couple of porters or _Hamals_ as they call them--possibly a corruption of the word camel; +the name of the animal whose proclivities to bear burdens are well known. + +In most parts of the Orient, particularly in Constantinople, the “Harnals” are a guild or labor-union, and are governed by rules +like labor-unions in England or America. And they carry enormous burdens--iron, wood, stone, boxes, and bales, casks of wine, +anything and everything goes on their backs, and is carried uphill or down hill to its destination. Remember that few streets of +Oriental cities are practicable for wheeled vehicles but that everything to be moved must be moved by hand. + +The dress of the hamal is peculiar, and he has a hard cushion slung by straps over his shoulder and resting just above the hips. +{72}I have seen one of these fellows carry a load that would be sufficient for a one horse dray in New-York; I have seen another +carry a bale of goods said to weigh three hundred and fifty pounds; and I have seen another carry my trunk, my friend’s trunk, and +another friend’s trunk, all at once, from a hotel to a steamboat landing, where the respective weights ascertained on the company’s +scales were seventy pounds, one hundred and fifty pounds, and one hundred and forty-five pounds, or three hundred and sixty-five +pounds in all! + +[Illustration: 9082] + +The harnals walk at a dignified pace--you could hardly expect them to run--they look healthy, but either the work is not salubrious +or the gods love them, as they die young. + +We followed the porters up the hill to the Hotel de Paris, and as soon as we had settled into our rooms and looked through the house +we sauntered out to see the city. + +In front of the hotel is a public square with a fountain, where people fill water jars or idle away a sunny afternoon. Belgrade is +a sort of meeting-place of the Occident and the Orient; the costumes of the lower classes are Oriental, and those of the richer +inhabitants were likewise Oriental until within the past ten or twenty years. In the strides which Servia has made towards an +existence independent of Turkey, she has looked leaningly and lovingly toward the West and put on some of its customs and habits. +Thus you see the lower classes wearing the baggy breeches, the loose jacket, and the red cap of Turkey, while the well-to-do citizen +dresses in coats, and vests, and trowsers from the slop{073}shops of Vienna and Paris. He is proud to be thus appareled, though +his clothes fit him like ready-made garments everywhere, only a little more so, and he feels not altogether comfortable in them +and sometimes sighs for the garments of his youth. There is a good deal of dignity about the Servians of all classes, and you might +explode a fire-cracker in the ear of one of them without getting him to move with any rapidity. + +We took a short walk to the fortress of Belgrade--a fortress that has made a great deal of noise in the world and has been a bony +bone of contention for several centuries. In the fifteenth century it was accounted one of the first citadels in Europe, and in 1521 +it was taken by the Turks. Since then it has been captured no less than eight times, and it has been twice transferred by reason +of treaties. It is a powerful fortress, even against the artillery of to-day, and occupies a commanding position on a promontory +jutting out between the Danube and the Save. + +The view from the esplanade is one of the finest on the Danube, and embraces a wide range. Northward stretches the broad plain of +Hungary; to the West is the Save and its fertile valleys; in the south there is a landscape of river, plain, and mountain; and at +our feet lies the flowing Danube rolling away towards the Draw Gate and the dark waters of the Euxine. The fort encloses a pretty +garden and miniature park, and a house where once lived the Turkish pasha. By the side of the house there is a mosque rapidly going +to ruin, as also are many parts of the fortress. A crowd of _forçats_ in chains and guarded by half a dozen soldiers, are at work on +the bridge which leads across the moat; they make way for us to pass, and the soldiers of the guard honor us with a salute. + +From the fortress we drove through the town and out upon a macadamized road to Topchidere, or Valley of the Artillerists. It is +nearly two miles from Belgrade to Topchidere, but the view is well worth the journey. There is a pretty park and garden covering +quite an extent of ground; trees are arranged in rows, in circles, and in other ways, according to the fancy of the gardener; there +are fountains and shaded walks, carriage and bridle paths, and there are numerous and easy seats where one may rest when he is +weary. In the centre of the park is the house {074}inhabited by Miloch Obrenovitch, Prince of Servia, who died in 1860, and was +deeply and justly mourned. + +The house, and particularly the room where he died, is in the same condition as when he left it. He preferred the rude furniture +to the most costly palace of modern times, and he set an example of frugality that has been of no small benefit to his people. +They showed us the room where he died, with his cane, his shoes, his fez and other articles, just as they were when his physicians +declared that Miloch was no more. + +In the same building is the room where his son Michael died in 1868, mortally wounded by the shots of assassins in the park where +he was riding. The blood-stains remain upon the floor, the bed and bedding, and also upon the table where he was laid when the +physicians examined the wound. The place of the assassination is half a mile or more from the house and is marked by a plain +monument. + +The story is the old, old tale of princely and kingly murders; an intrigue was set on foot by an aspirant to the throne of Servia, +Alexander Karageorgevitch, and was assisted by a scandal which had a woman in the case. Karageorgevitch had ruled in Servia, not +once, but twice, and naturally he wanted to be there again. He had many friends in Servia, and up to the time of the assassination +his return was not impossible. After the murder of Michael there was a judicial inquiry which declared Karageorgevitch instigator of +the assassination, and condemned him to perpetual banishment. + +The Prince of Servia at the time I write is Milan Obrenovitch IV., a young man who attained his majority in 1872, and consequently +has had little opportunity to make his name famous. He is said to be intelligent, and willing to listen to advice; as his country +has a constitution and a Congress--called in Servian _Skoupchina_--he could not take it far on the road to ruin, supposing he wished +to do so. He has made journeys to Paris and Vienna, where he was warmly received, and it was his reception at Vienna that made +trouble between Turkey and Austria in 1873, and came near plunging the two nations into war. Turkey wanted to know, you know, why +Austria had made so much fuss over the Prince of Servia; Austria said it was none of Turkey’s {075}business; Turkey said it was an +unfriendly action; Austria said “you’re another;” Turkey pouted, and Austria actually fished out from the pigeon-holes the passports +of the Sultan’s representative at Vienna, and was on the point of sending them to that functionary with a first-class ticket (meals +and cabin included, wines extra) to Constantinople, when the affair was smoothed over and war was prevented. + +Servia lies between Turkey and Austria, and contains about a thousand geographical square miles. It has a population of about a +million and a quarter, and of this population all are Christians, with the exception of less than twenty thousand. The country +is agreeably diversified with plain and mountain, and the soil is fertile, though far less productive than it should be. The +inhabitants are not very enterprising, and have given little attention to public works; the roads in the interior are not generally +good, and up to the present time there are no railways. A change is about to come over Servia’s dream in this respect, as she +has determined upon the construction of a line of railway southeasterly from Belgrade to connect with the Turkish railway at the +frontier, to form the connecting link between the Austrian and Turkish network of railways. When this is completed there will be +a through _route_ from London to Constantinople, and the present long but picturesque line of travel will become unpopular. The +practical spirit of the age is playing sad havoc with the poetry of the olden time. There is a story that an old sailor exclaimed as +he looked at an ocean steamer, “There’s an end of seamanship.” And he wasn’t so far out of the way. The romance and charm of the sea +are knocked on the head by our new-fangled inventions. + +Servia adopted a new constitution in 1869, and is now a constitutional, hereditary monarchy. The person of the prince is +inviolable, but his ministers are not let off so easily. There are two kinds of legislatures, or _skaupchinas_, the ordinary and the +extraordinary; the former meeting once a year, and the latter summoned under extraordinary circumstances. The members are elected +by the people, and the constitution guarantees equality before the law, civil and religious liberty, freedom of the press, and the +abolition of confiscation. The religion is princi{076}pally Greek orthodoxy. Roman Catholics abound, but are not numerous, and +there are a few Jews--less than two thousand--who are compelled to live in Belgrade, as the law will not permit them to dwell in the +interior. Here is religious liberty with a vengeance! There are a few Mohammedans, but the number is steadily diminishing. Belgrade, +at the time of my visit, contained twelve Mohammedans and nineteen mosques, some of the latter in ruins and the rest getting that +way--a great deal of bread to a little sack! Giving each mosque a single worshipper there would still be seven mosques like the +little lions in the boy’s picture of the prophet Daniel--they wouldn’t get any! + +The army contains about five thousand regulars and one hundred thousand militia. The finances are in excellent condition; there is +no public debt, and the taxes, light in comparison with those of some European countries, generally bring a revenue in excess of the +disbursements. Three cheers for Servia. Hip, hip, hooray!! + +All this time I have kept you standing waiting in the Topchidere + +Park, while I have been droning along about Servia and her government, for which you don’t care any more than a cat does for +existence. Well, let us get out of the park and return to the city, where we will dine comfortably and drink the wine of the +country, and the less said about it the better. Wine culture in Servia is in its infancy, and there is no occasion to go into +ecstacies about the native products. + +While we are at dinner a gentleman tells us of the old style of executions and their contrast with the present. When the Turks ruled +here, a man sentenced to execution was thrown down a bank about ten feet high, upon half a dozen spikes that stood upright. If one +of the spikes entered a vital part and killed him instantly, or in a few minutes, his friends had reason to thank fortune. Sometimes +a victim would be caught in the fleshy part of the arm or leg, and in this case he might be days in dying. No food nor drink could +be given to him, but he must lie there and perish of hunger and thirst and the inflammation of the wound caused by the pitiless +iron. My informant said that less than ten years ago a victim of the law lay thus for five days before death came to his relief, and +for the first forty-eight hours his {077}screams were so loud that they could be heard, especially in the stillness of the night, +half over the city of Belgrade. + +Since the Turks went away a more humane method has been adopted. The criminal condemned to death is fed on the best that the city +contains for a month previous to the execution of the sentence of the law. On the fatal day he is allowed as much spirit as he +chooses to drink, and in this condition he is taken to a valley outside of the town. There the death warrant is read, and as its +last words are pronounced there is a report of a couple of pistols and the man falls dead, shot through the heart. Just before my +visit two men were thus executed; they went to their death in a hilarious condition, and were singing and shouting as they marched +through the town. + +[Illustration: 5087] + + +{078} + +[Illustration: 0088] + + + + +CHAPTER IV--NEARING THE ORIENT--“BACKSHEESH!” + + +_Among the Fleas--The Mystery of the Bedclothes--A Cool Explanation--Under the Spray--What became of the Dragon--A Queer Story +about Flies--What is an “Araba?”--Conversation without Words--Changing Shirts in Public--The Iron Gate--Scene at the Custom +House--Official Obstinacy--The “Sick Man”--Scenes in the Orient--The Mysteries of the Quarantine--How We Dodged the Turks--The +Turk and his Rosary--Pity the Poor Israelite!--Why an Unlucky Jewess was Whipped--The Secret of the Turkish Loan--How the Money is +Spent--Ten Million Dollars Gone!--What is “Backsheesh?”_ + + +THEN continuing our journey down the river, we took passage on board a local boat, which proved to be far less cleanly than the +“accelerated steamer.” + +The table was not good, and the cots had each but a single sheet; the deficiency in bedding, and its inability to keep one warm, +were met by a large and assorted lot of fleas that made things lively through the night, and brought our bodies into a condition +resembling that of a lobster recovering from a case of measles. + +The Judge snored happily through all surrounding troubles, and the “Doubter” was inclined to disbelieve the existence of the +industrious insects until, when morning came, he looked at himself in the glass. Even then he continued sceptical, and attributed +the red spots on his skin to the claret at Belgrade, and possibly to a bad cigar which he smoked the day before. + +As a general thing, you cannot induce a hotel or steamboat servant to admit the existence of anything disagreeable about the scene +of his labors; but we found it different on board the Basiasch has nothing attractive; it consists of a railway station, a hotel, +and a heap of coal. Before we tied up to the wharf, its population was much larger than five minutes later, when the passengers from +the railway had come on board. + +We steamed on from Basiasch to Moldowa, where we lay through the night. I took an evening ramble through the town, which possesses +nothing remarkable except its population, which is half military and half peasant in character; a sort of Russian Cossack that +performs military duty a part of the time, and works in the field when not engaged in the service of the state. Next morning, we +were to be called bright and early to continue {079}_Ferdinand Max_. We interrogated the cabin steward on the deficiency of bedding, +and he replied that they had enough when the season began, but the fleas had eaten it up! The explanation was so reasonable, that +even the “Doubter” accepted it! + +[Illustration: 0089] + +From Belgrade to Basiasch, the scenery of the Danube is much like that above the mouth of the Save. At Basiasch, the railway from +Pesth and Vienna reaches the river, and we took on board several passengers who had come by rail from those cities. The quick route +from Vienna to Constantinople is by this railway, but it is a dreary ride, and, unless one is in a hurry, he had better stick to the +river. {080}our journey at daybreak, but I was up before the call, and out on deck. + +We were to be transferred, and were transferred, to another boat, an odd-looking affair with powerful machinery, and with two wheels +on each side. Her steering-wheel was astern, directly over the rudder, and though she was small she required all the strength of two +men to control her. + +On such a boat we left Moldowa, just as day broke in the east, and steamed down the river with the rapidity of a railway train. +The banks seemed to be flying past us, or we flying past them, and the spray was dashed quite over the boat, drenching the deck +passengers who were huddled forward and by no means leaving dry the _erste classe_ astern. The blush on the eastern horizon +extended, and as daylight became clear and full we entered the mountains, and were among the boiling rapids which mark this part of +the Danube in the season of low water. + +On the right bank appeared the wonderful fortress of Galumbutz, built by Maria Theresa. Out of the river rises a pyramid of rocks, +and from base to summit this pyramid is covered with towers and walls, and pierced with windows and port-holes. The foundations of +the fortress were Roman, and the tradition is that Trojan Helen was once imprisoned there. Almost in face of this fortress is the +famous cave known as the Muckenhole, whence came a species of mosquitoes that annually kill thousands of cattle along this portion +of the Danube valley. There is a legend that they arise from the putrefaction of the dragon killed by St. George; they issue from +the cave in clouds, and extend their ravages more than a hundred miles in every direction. The government walled up the entrance of +the cave in the hope of destroying the pest, but without success; the probability is that the insect inhabits the entire country, +and only goes to the cave in bad weather. + +The river makes many bends and zig-zags, and at times we went unpleasantly near the rocks. The scenery in this part is wild, and the +land generally too rough for cultivation. Along the left bank there is an excellent road, which extends from Moldowa to Orsona, the +frontier town of Austro-Hungary, and keeps constantly on the river bank. On the opposite shore there are {081}traces of a Roman road +cut into the mountain side, but evidently never completed. + +Two hours on this four-wheeled steamer brought us to Drenkova, where we landed and were consigned to carriages and carts. The +first-class passengers had carriages that were reasonably comfortable, as they had stuffed seats, and backs to lean against, but the +others were thrust into _arabas_ or common carts, some of them having straw to sit upon, some rough seats without backs, and some +neither straw nor seats. Sometimes the “araba” is drawn by horses, and sometimes by oxen; in Turkey it is generally drawn by oxen, +with an arrangement swinging over their backs to keep away the flies, and the cart has in hot or wet weather an awning over it to +protect the travelers. In the present instance we had horses and a driver, the latter a native of the country, and black enough to +be half Indian and half negro. He was amiable and anxious to please us, and we got up quite a conversation of signs, as we had not +a single word in common. I tried him in English, French, German, Russian, and Italian, and he tried me in Moldavian, all to no +purpose. What an inconvenience you find in this thing of languages. Wouldn’t I like to twist the neck of the fellow who proposed to +build the Tower of Babel? + +The Danube was at its lowest, otherwise we should have saved this land travel, and could have passed the upper Iron Gate by +water. As it was, we looked upon the rapids and whirlpools, and on the rocks scattered here and there in the channel, and were not +altogether sorry to be on land. At one place the channel for boats is only seventy feet wide at low water, and the current is very +swift. The name Iron Gate comes from the Turkish, Demi-Kapour, and is intended to mean a hindrance to navigation, rather than a +narrow passage barred with a formidable door. The right bank in this locality is simply magnificent. The mountains are steep and +rugged, their summits covered with trees, and their sides presenting enormous masses of grey rocks, capriciously veined with red +porphyry, and here and there showing deep crevices that appear to be the mouths of caverns. + +After three hours of this sort of travel we were transferred to a small steamer where we managed to get an apology for din{082}ner, +and where, when the little cabin was full of men and women, a Hungarian passenger with an enormous mustache and a loud voice opened +his valise, removed his coat and vest, and coolly proceeded to change his shirt. + +He was not at all abashed to display his back and shoulders to the party, but went on with his toilet very much as if in a room by +himself. + +[Illustration: 9092] + +Nobody interfered with him, and after he had finished his change he was the best dressed man on the boat, as he could boast a clean +shirt while the rest of us were dusty with our ride from Drenkova. + +From time to time the Danube in this part of its course expands into large basins like mountain lakes. One of these is particularly +beautiful as it seems to be completely enclosed and reveals no passage for the river. By and by, as the steamer moves along, an +opening is discovered and we enter a deep gorge with steep mountain walls two thousand feet high on either; hand and with a width +to the river from wall to wall in one place of only two hundred yards. The noise of the wheels is echoed and re-echoed from side to +side, and the scene forcibly recalled to me the prettiest and wildest portion of the Saguenay in Canada, the Rhine near the Seven +Mountains, and the Amoor in the Hingan defile. We are in the defile of the Cazan (Turkish for Caldron) the grandest part of the +whole Danube from Ratisbon to Galatz. Everybody is moved to expressions of admiration, all save the “Doubter,” who declares that the +Danube disappoints him and is a wearisome and uninteresting stream. + +We land at Orsova (pronounced Orehova) to pass once more into carriages and go beyond the Lower Iron Gate. Picturesque Wallachians +surround us, with their immense hats of wool and {083}their boots of red leather. We halt a moment at a little brook which has the +Austrian custom-house on one side and the Roumanian on the other; a Roumanian official examines our tickets, and allows us to pass +without examination. + +Speaking of the custom house reminds me of a funny incident. + +When I entered Servia at Belgrade I had in my trunk a box of Austrian cigars which I bought in Pesth. Coming out of Belgrade and +going on board the steamer I had the same cigars; the Austrian customs-official insisted that all cigars _brought into_ Austria must +pay duty, and he demanded a tax on mine in spite of the fact that the cigars came originally from Austria and were only going again +into the country of their manufacture. Luckily their weight was less than the quantity allowed to each traveler, otherwise he would +have compelled me to pay the tariff. He would listen to nothing except the letter of the law. + +The Lower Iron Gate is less picturesque than the Upper. The mountains fall away from the river, and the stream spreads out over a +rocky bed about fourteen hundred yards wide and a mile in length. The river falls about twelve feet in a mile and a half, and is +filled with whirlpools and rapids, with everywhere a swift current broken into waves that dash over the deck of the steamer in the +season when the high waters prevent the passage of boats. Below the rapids the river becomes practicable, and there is no other +natural obstacle to navigation below this point and the sea. + +At a little distance below the Iron Gate we found the steamer that was to carry us down the Danube, and we were speedily installed +in her comfortable cabin, once more and much to our delight we found ourselves on an “accelerated” boat, though it proved less +agreeable than the _Franz Josef_. + +Before we leave the Iron Gate let us have a little gossip on the question of the Danube. + +From the days of the Romans there has been talk of a canal around the Lower Iron Gate; and on the right bank of the river and near +the Servian village of Sip, there were traces of the work begun by the Emperor Trajan to this end. In modern times the subject has +been discussed, surveys have been made and estimates completed for a series of canals that should carry {084}boats around both the +Iron Gates and render the Danube navigable for its entire length. The money could be raised without difficulty, but there is an +obstacle to the work in the shape of the political objections of Turkey. No matter on what basis the enterprise is proposed, Turkey +has always set her face against it; the “Sick Man” is fearful that a canal round these falls would still further impair his +health and therefore he says “No,” and repeats it with emphasis. Time and again the subject has been discussed at Vienna and +Constantinople, and always with the same results--Turkey’s opposition. + +On one occasion Austria announced that _nolens volens_ the canal would be made, and thereupon Turkey stood up on her ear--she cannot +stand easily on her feet--and threatened to go to war when the first spade full of dirt was lifted, and on more than one occasion +Turkey has proposed to close the Danube to commerce by sealing up its mouth and permitting nothing but fish and water to pass either +way. I am not sure that she did not want to prevent the ascent or descent of the fish through fear that they would carry something +contraband. Turkey is a goose and doesn’t know the necessities of the nineteenth century. She ought to close business as a nation +and sell out to somebody of decent intelligence. + +It was near sunset when we went on board the steamer below the second Iron Gate. We had made five changes in the day; large boat to +four-wheeled one, four wheeler to carriages, carriages to boat, boat to carriages at Orsova, and carriages to boat again. We steamed +on during the night, and in the morning when I went on deck I had my first view of Turkey. As there were no houses in sight at my +first glimpse I did not think it very different from any other country, but as soon as we sighted a town, and the domes and minarets +of the mosques came into view, the scene was changed. Northward lay the great plain of Bulgaria, while to the south was Bosnia, +a province of the Ottoman empire. The southern bank was more hilly and broken than the northern, and villages were more numerous +there. They looked pretty at a distance, but when you approached them nearly, the beauty vanished. + +The first Turkish town I saw was the reverse of attractive, and the picture grew no better very fast, as we descended the river. +{085}The streets, as I saw them from the boat, were dirty, and there were piles of rubbish just above the landing. The people on +shore were as dirty as the streets, and I speedily made up my mind not to ask for a consular appointment to any of the Turkish towns +on the Lower Danube. + +[Illustration: 0095] + +We didn’t want to go ashore very much, and we couldn’t have gone very much if we had wanted to. There had been some cholera in +Austria in the summer, and the Turkish government had established a quarantine against the Upper Danube. Had we chosen to land at +Widin or any of the Turkish towns where the boat stopped we should have been taken with a pair of tongs and led into the quarantine +station. We should have been smoked, and scorched, and physicked, and poulticed, and dosed for eleven days in a shed with a flimsy +roof and flimsier sides, and with no floor, and with no companions beyond natives of the country, fleas, rats, and stray dogs. If we +had survived it, we should have been let off at the end of that time to see the next poor wretch put through, and if we had fallen +sick under the treatment we should have been sent to the hospital, which is about three times as bad as the quarantine. Altogether +the quarantine was not seductive from an aesthetic point of view, and I determined to keep out of it. If any reader of this volume +ever has the choice between a kettle of boiling oil and a Turkish quarantine I advise him to take the oil. + +At all the landings where we stopped the officials made a great fuss to keep the loafers back, for fear they would take the +chol{086}era. We had no passengers for these landings, but we generally had letters, papers, and merchandise. Letters and papers +were received with a stick or a pair of tongs and thrown into a tin box, which a boy instantly carried off to a sulphur fire, where +its contents could be disinfected. + +[Illustration: 0096] + +Then, and not till then, could they be safely handled. Merchandise was piled on the dock, but what disposition was made of it I +could not learn. I bought a paper of cigarette tobacco from a boy on shore. He tossed the package on board and I then threw him half +a franc. Before touching it he pushed it into a puddle of water, and after working it about for a while, ventured to grasp it with +his dirty fingers. + +Cholera couldn’t get through the encrusted skins of these fellows much quicker than a mouse could go through the side of a teapot, +and as for the passengers and crew of the steamer, we were anything but a sickly lot. Yet they were fearful that we should do them +harm, as much as though they were chickens and we were hawks and eagles. + +We kept on our way without many incidents of importance, or rather without any, or I should record them. We met a steamboat flying +the Turkish flag and steering clear of us; and we passed a {087}Turkish gunboat tied up to one of the banks, but with steam up. At +every Turkish landing we went through the farce of the tongs, but at the northern landings we had none of it. Piles of wheat were +lying on the northern bank, and generally there were groups of picturesque Wallachians around them. We met Greek brigs and schooners +ascending the river to bring away this wheat, and at a few places we saw these vessels lying at the shore. Their crews were a +brigandish-looking lot with red caps, baggy trow-sers, and a general resemblance to the stage robbers in _Fra Diavolo_. + +Further down the Danube we met more of these vessels I counted over sixty in sight at one time, and there were three or four times +that number at Braila or near there. A large part of the commerce of the Black Sea is in the hands of Greek merchants, and they are +said to be very enterprising. At Galatz and Braila there are many Greek houses and agencies. Some of the older establishments are +accounted very wealthy. So nearly do they monopolize business that the language of commerce at Galatz is said to be Greek with a +mixture of Italian. + +It was the month of Ramadan, or time of fasting, with the Moslems. No good and faithful follower of the prophet is allowed to eat or +drink between the rising and the setting of the sun. A gun is fired at sunrise and another at sunset, and between those discharges +of artillery the fast is strictly observed. We had a priest or “Iman” on board our steamer, a fellow with a white turban and a long +cloak or “caftan,” and with a pleasing face fringed with a dark beard. He observed the fast strictly and neither ate nor drank from +sunrise to sunset, but he made up for his abstinence to some extent by a free use of his narghileh or water pipe. + +He occupied a seat in the smoking room, a sort of divan where he could double one foot beneath him and rest almost motionless for +hours. He carried in his left hand a string of beads, which he slowly told off with the fingers, a habit somewhat analogous to the +Roman Catholic custom of counting the beads while saying prayers. With the Moslems this bead business has no religious significance, +but is merely a pastime. Once I found him on deck saying his prayers, which he did with many genu{088}flexions, bows, and +prostrations. He was required to keep his face turned towards Mecca while praying, and as the boat was just then taking a somewhat +tortuous course, I am afraid he did not make a strict compliance with the law. + +At night during Ramadan the mosques are lighted and present a brilliant appearance. There is a double row of lights on each minaret, +round the railing of the platform where the muezzin stands when he calls the people to prayer, and the effect is quite pretty. + +It was nine o’clock at night when we reached Bucharest, the capital of Roumania, so that there was not much to be seen _en +route_. But I was able to collect some information about the country, and as it is one of the Danubian principalities and forms an +interrogation point of the “Eastern Question,” we will make a brief examination of its condition. + +The principality of Roumania is formed by the union of the ancient provinces of Moldavia and Wallachia. It contains about six +thousand square leagues of territory, and five million inhabitants. Four millions of the latter belong to the Greek Church, and the +rest are Armenians, Roman Catholics, Protestants, Jews, Gentiles, Moslems, and a hundred thousand or so don’t know what they are +nor what they belong to. Then there are inhabitants who belong somewhere else, such as Germans, Hungarians, Greeks, English, French, +Russians, and some who are ashamed to own the nations of their birth, for reasons best known to themselves. + +The various sects and nationalities get along quite well together, with the exception of the Jews, who have a very hard time. They +have been whipped and otherwise tortured on account of their opinions or as a cloak to robbery, and until quite recently it was not +unusual to hear of the banishment or massacre of all the Jewish inhabitants of a village, town, or district. A better sentiment, or +rather a less barbarous one, seems to prevail within the last year or two, and it is to be hoped that the persecutions are at an end +or soon will be. + +As an illustration of the treatment of the Jews, a gentleman told me that one day in Bucharest he heard screams issuing from a +yard at the back of the hotel where he was lodged. He went to the window and saw a girl of eighteen or twenty tied to a stake. Her +clothing was stripped from her shoulders and a strong man was whipping her while two others stood by. The gentleman asked what she +had done, and was told “She is a Jewess!” No other cause was alleged, and the men appeared surprised when the stranger wished to +know what crime she had committed. + +[Illustration: 0099] + +The government of Roumania is very much like that of Servia, a constitutional principality which is independent, except that it pays +a yearly tribute to Turkey. Servia pays twenty-five thousand pounds, and Roumania twice that amount. A member of the Hohenzollern +family, under the title of Prince Charles of Roumania, occupies the throne, and his hereditary right is guaranteed by the Sultan, +while the independence of Roumania is guaranteed by the seven powers that signed the treaty of Paris--Austria, France, England, +Italy, Prussia, Russia, and Turkey. The constitutional rights of the people are like those of Servia, but the finances are not in +as good condition, for the reason that the government has created debts in order to construct railways, and make other internal +improvements. The network of railways already finished and now constructing is very good, and when {090}united with the Austrian +system, the resources of Roumania will be rapidly developed. The standing army has about twenty-five thousand men, and the militia +includes every able bodied citizen. + +In case of war one hundred thousand men could be put in the field in a very short time. + +It must be a great consolation to Servia and Roumania that they are able to make so much trouble as they do, or rather that so +much trouble is made about them. They are the bases of the “Eastern Question,” and if it were not for these two principalities, the +ministers of foreign affairs in Turkey, Russia, and Austria would have their labor reduced one half, if not more. The correspondence +that has passed between those governments concerning the principalities, is nearly as voluminous as that about the Alabama claims; +in the past five centuries the principalities have been the cause or the object of about a dozen wars, and very likely will be the +cause of fresh wars in time to come. + +It is generally believed that Prussia and Italy don’t care a pin what Austria and Russia do with the East, and I fancy that if +England and France could only get their money back, they wouldn’t care so much as they did at the time of the Crimean war. I suspect +they have found out they made a mistake in backing up Turkey, and would like to get out of it gracefully. + +I once championed a fellow who had been badly treated by his; neighbor--at least that was _his_ story--and was in need of pecuniary +and other aid. I defended him morally and physically, and more especially I loaned him money to buy a set of tools, and to clothe +himself and family until he could earn money enough to repay me. + +Well, what did he do? He bought a gold watch and chain with the money, when all the time he had a good silver watch, and then came +round for more cash. + +Turkey has been borrowing money in Europe, and some of her loans have been guaranteed by France and England. Nearly all the money +has been wasted; a very little has gone for the construction of railways, but most of it has been put into palaces, diamonds for +the women of the seraglio, ships of war, mosques, and the like, and every day there are thousands of pounds wasted on senseless +displays. {091}Here is a specimen case. They built an imperial palace known as the Palace Tshiragan, when they had already palaces +enough for a dozen of Sultans. The Sultan moved into the building when it was finished--it cost two million pounds sterling, or +about ten million dollars in gold--and he lived there just two days! Then he moved out because he had an unpleasant dream, and the +palace will never again be occupied. It stands idle, empty, and beautiful on the banks of the Bosphorus, and will stand thus till +destroyed. + +[Illustration: 0101] + +A couple of years ago the Sultan commanded that a conservatory should be erected in his garden. Glass and other materials were +ordered from Europe, and hundreds of men were set at work. It was finished at a cost of over a million of dollars, and His Majesty +went to see it. The old idiot--I wish to be respectful as he is a Sultan--was not in a good temper for some reason, and determined +not be pleased. He raised his languid eyes to the roof of the building and then turned away. + +“I don’t like it,” he said; “destroy it!” + +And before night every piece of glass was broken, and the beautiful conservatory was leveled. {092}This is the way the Sultan and +his government have been using the money borrowed at a high rate of interest; and they are now borrowing money at high interest to +pay _that_ interest. This thing will go on until Turkey can borrow no more money, and then the whole concern will collapse. When she +can’t borrow any more, the probabilities are, she will stop the interest on her present debt and give herself no trouble about the +principal. Turkey, as a nation, is very much like a great many of her subjects. Every traveller in the East will tell you that he is +constantly appealed to to give “backsheesh”--i. e. a gratuity--not only by those who have served him, but by those who have rendered +no service whatever, and do not expect to. From the time you enter the Orient till the time you leave it, that word is dinned into +your ears so continually that it seems like one prolonged echo. + +As the natives, young or old, masculine, feminine, or neuter (the latter are the guardians of the harems), appeal thus to +the individual foreigner, so Turkey as a nation squats or stands before other nations, and takes up the perpetual demand for +“backsheesh.” The foreigner, when first entering the Orient, generally submits to the appeal, and gives of his abundance; but he +soon finds that begging is universal, and that the purse of Fortunatus would soon touch bottom. So he becomes prudent, especially +as the Oriental is never satisfied. Whether you give copper, silver, or gold, by the piece or by the handful, is all the same, the +begging or rather the demanding continues. + +The nations and moneyed men of Europe are learning the habits of the Turk, and emulating the example of prudent travellers. Turkey +is about at the end of her borrowing, and the collapse of the Ottoman Empire is one of the near possibilities. Russia is patiently +waiting; Austria is waiting; Prussia is waiting; and the other nations are waiting for the dissolving view which will enable them +to reconstruct the map of Europe. None of them are likely to take any measures to hurry “the sick man” to his end, as he is going in +that direction with a rapidity that ought to be satisfactory to the on-lookers. + +Through fleets of ships and steamers we threaded our way from Galatz and along a tortuous channel through a forest of reeds, till we +passed Selino, and were tossing on the waters of the Black sea, with the prow of our steamer towards Odessa. + +{093} + +[Illustration: 0103] + + + + +CHAPTER V--THROUGH THE CRIMEA--IN AND AROUND SEVASTOPOL. + + +_A Visit to the Crimea--The Porter with the Big Books--The Danger of Siberia--Our Entry into Sevastopol--Terrible Reminiscences +of the Crimean War--How we shirked the Cemetery--The Great Dock-Yard of Sevastopol--We Visit a Remarkable Gunboat--What we saw +Below-Deck--The Story that our Landlord Told--An Enterprising Tartar--The “Doubter” offers an opinion--How the “Judge” stole a +Newspaper--Adventures by the Way--The “Doubter” gets into Trouble--We Fly to the Rescue--Eccentricities of a Selfish Man--We Rise +and Depart._ + + +WE went to Odessa, as I said, solely to escape the quarantine on entering Turkey. Being there--less than two hundred miles from +Sevastopol--we could not resist the temptation to pay a flying visit to the Crimea. + +We reached Odessa in the morning, and found that a steamer left at two o’clock in the afternoon for the ports of the Crimea, and as +soon as we had passed the formalities of the Custom-House and the police--no trifling matters--we went to the steamer in question. +And, by the way, they put us through very cautiously, and also very politely, when we entered the empire. + +Three officers of the police, followed by a porter with an armful of big books, came on board the Metternich, the steamer from +Galatz, as soon as she entered the port. They took seats at the cabin table, spread out the passports which had been collected by +the purser of the steamer, and then began work. + +They disposed of two or three persons, and then came to my case. + +“Have you ever been in Russia before?” said one of the officials in French. {094} “Yes,” I answered. + +“When was the last time?” + +“In 1867.” + +“Where were you?” and he looked at me very attentively. + +“In a great many places,” I answered. “In Moscow, Petersburg, Warsaw, Kazan, and in Eastern and Western Siberia. + +“Ah, you have been in Siberia!” said the official, and he and the others pricked up their ears. + +“_Nous verrons_,” he continued, and he picked up one of the big books and turned to the initial of my name. “Possibly I may have to +report your arrival at once,” he remarked, as he scanned page after page of the volume. + +When he had finished that, he went for another, and altogether he looked through four or five books. + +“There is nothing against you,” he said, as he finished the examination, and, with a smile worthy of a diplomate of the highest +rank, he signed my passport and handed it over, with the wish that I might enjoy my trip to the Crimea, and have _bon voyage +partout_, and he was kind enough to attend next to the passports of my companions, as we had no time to spare in getting to the +Crimean steamer. + +“The Russian Company of Navigation and Commerce,” to which I entrusted myself for the journey to Sevastopol--they call it +Sev-as-to-pol there--is a big concern. It has eighty-four steamers, varying all the way from one hundred to thirty-six hundred tons +each; nine of them are of the largest class of ocean steamers, and two-thirds of the rest are none of them less than nine hundred +tuns. The large steamers run from Odessa to London, to the eastern shores of the Mediterranean, to the Red Sea, and the ports of the +Indian Ocean. The other steamers navigate the Black Sea and the adjacent waters, including several rivers that flow into that sea +and the sea of Azof. I expected to find their boats dirty and badly managed; on the contrary, I found them clean and comfortable, +with good service in the cabin and good management on deck. + +The advertised time of the Crimea boat to leave Odessa is two o’clock in the afternoon, and it was not more than five minutes past +two when our lines were cast off. I am told that the time {095}table of the company is strictly kept, except of course, in case of +unforseen accident. + +The company was organized after the Crimean war, and has developed a great business. The repair-shops are at Sevastopol, but very +little building is done there. All or nearly all the large steamers were built in England. The officers are generally appointed from +the navy, and their pay is higher than in the regular service. On one of the steamers I encountered an officer, whose acquaintance +I had made in the Okhotsk Sea several years before. “I am out of the government employ,” he said, “having served my full term. I +am commanding one of this company’s largest steamers now; the service is harder, but I get much better pay than my rank in the navy +would bring me.” + +The steamer carried us along toward Eupatoria, and I was up when we steamed into the bay, where the English made their first descent +upon the Crimea. There are no docks or piers; nothing but a semi-circular beach, like a bit of yellow lace on the end of a sleeve +to a lady’s dress, and an irregular double fringe of houses beyond it. Ships anchor in the bay, and are unloaded by lighters. Our +passengers were taken ashore in boats, and the freight and baggage were unceremoniously dumped into a huge launch. Heavy boxes and +barrels were placed atop of trunks and valises, and there was a general mess of things. + +It was at Eupatoria, on Thursday, September 14th, 1854, that the allied army landed in the Crimea. The place, the day, and the +occasion will remain for ever memorable in French, English, and Russian history. Fifty thousand soldiers of the allied army were +that day landed on Russian soil; of that fifty thousand nearly all are now in their last sleep. They perished in the battles of +the Alma, the Tchernaya, and Inkermann; they fell in the trenches during the siege of Sevastopol; or worn out with privation +and exposure, or suffering from wounds and disease, crept on board the transports at Balaklava and were borne away to die in the +hospitals of Scutari or in their own native lands. In one year from that memorable landing at Eupatoria the fifty thousand had +become ten thousand; and when the bugles sang truce and the flag of peace fluttered over the shattered walls and smoking ruins of +Sevastopol, there was scarce a vestige remain{096}ing of the Grand Army of the Orient, that had sailed so proudly from the shores +of France and England and assembled on Turkish soil to prepare for the descent into the Crimea. Death spared neither rank nor +condition. Of all the officers and soldiers whose hearts beat high on that day as they saw the tri-color and the red cross waving +over the gravelly beach at Eupatoria, very few are now alive. + +There had been a fog in the morning, and occasional spittings and spatterings of rain, but it cleared up soon after we left +Eupatoria, and the coast of the Crimea, with serrated mountains cutting the sky, and with steppes of sand and white rock here and +there, came out clear and distinct beyond the dark waters of the Euxine Sea. Gloriously bright was the sun when a Russian officer +pointed to a distant promontory and told me that there was Sevastopol; and deep blue was the sky, with not a patch of cloud to mar +it, when we headed our prow toward Fort Constantine, and pushed steadily and fearlessly into the port which so long resisted the +assaults of the allied armies of England and France. Away to the left lay the valley of the Alma, and also on our left, but nearer +to us, the Inkermann pyramid was visible to mark the field of Inkermann’s battle. White specks of marble near the pyramid marked the +resting-place of England’s gallant dead, and not far distant was the cemetery where lay the soldiers who fell there for the glory of +France. In front, beyond the harbor, was the tawny mound of the Malakoff, with ugly seams and ridges over all its surface; beyond it +were the Redan and the Mamelon Vert, and away to the right was the famous Bastion du Mat. The white walls of the marine barracks and +arsenal filled much of the centre of the picture, far too much for Russian eyes, when it is remembered that they were the walls of +ruins. + +Forts Constantine and Nicholas are passed; no gun speaks from their walls, and not a soldier is visible to note our entrance. The +shattered and ruined walls of these forts have disappeared; the present fortresses are new, or at any rate they have undergone a +vast amount of repairing since the day the allies left Sevastopol after their work of destruction was finished. + +We steamed up to the stone pier, where a dense crowd was gathered to meet us--in the foreground the officials of the port, +{097}behind them the well-dressed part of the community, and further away the wide-mouthed and sheepskin-coated peasantry of Russia. +Our guide-book had told us of a good hotel a couple of hundred yards from the landing, and as soon as we could get ashore we went +to it at a respectable pace. A crowd of hack-men sought to entrap us into riding, but we disdained their offers. We found the hotel, +and after selecting rooms and fixing the price, we proceeded to “do” Sevastopol. + +“Get us a guide at once and a carriage for three,” I said to the German-Russian landlord, who spoke English, French, or any other +language that you might choose to try him in. + +He sent a messenger to bring what we wanted and then asked where we wished to go. + +I told him we wished to see all that we could that afternoon, and leave in the morning for Yalta. He mentioned the Malakoff, Redan, +Inkermann, and other points, including the cemetery, and I interrupted him with: + +“Never mind the cemetery; send us somewhere else.” + +[Illustration: 8107] + +“Oh, then you are Americans,” he exclaimed; “every Englishman goes at once to the cemetery, and it is the first thing he asks for; +but an American always says: ‘D----n the cemetery; take me somewhere else.’” + +A moment later he apologized for his intimation that my countrymen were universally profane; but reiterated his assertion that +every Englishman visiting Sevastopol goes at once to the cemetery, while every American prefers to do something else. I can well +understand this. So many English were buried there, that every British visitor is sure to have occasion to look {098}after the grave +of a relative or friend; or, at all events, he has been requested to look out the burial-place of somebody and report its condition. +Few Americans are likely to have anything more than ordinary curiosity to attract them to the cemetery at Sevastopol. + +In a little while the carriage and guide were ready, and we started. The guide was a Greek--he may have been a Greek brigand--who +had not been long in Sevastopol, and didn’t know enough about the place to hurt himself to any alarming extent. He spoke English +fairly, but not over elegantly, and was, on the whole, satisfactory. + +We drove off along the street leading upward from the hotel, and in the direction of the Malakoff and other fortresses of the days +of the war. We were soon on the edge of the bluff overlooking the southern harbor, and could gaze down almost perpendicularly on the +ships at anchor there. As we looked toward the end of the harbor, we discovered just beyond it a new building, and I asked what it +was. + +“That is the railway station,” was the guide’s reply. “The government is building a railway from Sevastopol to connect with the +line from the Sea of Azof to Moscow and St. Petersburg. They have surveyed all the line, and a good deal of it is finished. They are +going to lay the track all round this harbor, so that ships can be loaded right from the trains and the trains from the ships.” + +I looked and saw the grading ready for the rails on both sides of the harbor and sweeping round the hill-side toward Inkermann. + +Had this railway existed twenty years ago the allies would have failed to capture Sevastopol. It was their primitive mode of +transportation more than anything else that caused Russia’s defeat. She learned then the importance of railways, and has since been +putting her knowledge into practice. + +We climbed to the top of the Malakoff, where a single Russian soldier holds peaceful possession of what thousands were once unable +to defend. From the summit of the casemate we looked over the field, traced the lines of the contending armies, and then turned +toward Inkermann and the defenses in that direction. The ground all round is cut and torn with rifle-pits, {099}trenches, +approaches, and defenses, and is a picture of desolation. Sevastopol is a mass of ruins; its inhabited dwellings are not a tenth the +number of the fallen or falling walls, and you can ride or walk through whole squares of what were once rows of handsome edifices, +but are now nothing but heaps of stones. It is more like Pompeii than any modern city I have ever seen. + +Sevastopol must have been beautiful twenty years ago; she is the reverse of beautiful now, and I do not wonder that the Russian +who walks through her half silent and almost deserted streets vows with compressed lips and lowering brow that Sevastopol must be +avenged. She is majestic in her ruins. One feels her greatness, or what it must have been, at every step he takes; and no one can +call Russia a barbarous nation when he looks at the remains of her dockyards, which were her pride and glory. To destroy these docks +required months of labor on the part of French and English engineers. What must have been the labor to create them! + +There had been much talk about a new kind of gunboat then at Sevastopol, and by the kindness of Admiral Popoff, the inventor of the +system, I was permitted to visit and examine the _Novgorod_, as the pioneer vessel is called. She was built at Nicolayeff, on the +River Bug, and was brought to Sevastopol to be finished. Another boat of the same class, but larger, to be called the _Popofka_ +was under construction, and intended to be followed by several others. The _Novgorod_ is something like our monitors, though with +a difference. When the original _Monitor_ came out we were told to imagine a cheese-box on a raft; in the present instance you may +imagine a cheese-box without any raft. The _Novgorod_ is circular, and about a hundred feet in diameter; her sides where they rise +above the water are perpendicular, but they do not rise very high--not more than a couple of feet. From the edge toward the centre +there is a gentle incline, and this incline is covered with small cleats of wood to enable one to preserve his foothold. About +twenty-five feet from the edge there is a circular wall of iron, fifteen inches thick, forming a turret like that of one of our +monitors. This turret is fixed and made as firm as possible; inside of it is a movable turret, containing the guns, and pierced with +two holes, through which the {100}guns are to be discharged. The turret is firmly fastened to the platform which sustains the guns, +and it can be raised or lowered at will by means of machinery. The guns are eleven-inch breech-loaders, and are very well finished; +the carriages are of an improved pattern, and altogether the turret and its contents are highly creditable to their designers and +makers. + +Workmen were busy both in and out of the boat, and there was an unsatisfactory lot of fresh paint on nearly everything, so that it +was necessary to be cautious in one’s movements. + +[Illustration: 9110] + +In spite of all my attention I found myself somewhat soiled at the end of my journey, and on returning to the hotel I underwent a +vigorous application of turpentine. Like our monitors, the _Novgorod_ is not abundantly supplied with internal space for machinery, +coal, ammunition, stores, and crew, though there is more of it than one might at first suppose. Her circular shape gives her an +advantage in this respect, and it is really surprising how much room you find where you expect so little. + +As you descend into the engine room--her engines were made by Bird of St. Petersburg--you find the machinery stowed so compactly +and everywhere around you, that you begin to think she is all machinery inside like a watch, but when you are taken thence into the +places where coal and provisions are stored, you change your mind. The quarters for the crew are cramped, as; in all ships of war, +and occupy about the same space relative to the officers’ quarters as on our monitors. The captain’s room is quite spacious and +neatly finished and furnished, and the other officers have nothing to complain of. In the captain’s room was a model of the boat, +and I studied it attentively to ascertain the shape of the craft below the water line. The boat does not pre{101}serve its circular +form all the way down, or rather I should say that the circular form is maintained above the water and an elongated one below. + +Take an apple and cut the lower two-thirds of it so as to give it the general shape of a ship below the water line, and you have +the idea of the general external shape of the _Novgorod_. She has a bow and stern like any other ship, but neither of them is very +sharp. If you look for fine lines like those of a clipper sailer or of a fast steamship, you will be disappointed, as the _Novgorod_ +is not designed for speed, nor as a general thing, for attack. They claim that she can steam nine knots an hour, but her steaming +qualities have never been fairly tested. She is intended for coast and harbor defence, and is made of light draft, ten or twelve +feet, so that she can lie out of the reach of deep-draft ships. She has six screws, three on each side of her rudder, and by working +the triplets in opposite directions she can be turned in her own length, or rather in her own diameter. The space below deck is +lighted by means of a grated flooring inside the turret, by openings in the deck. Hatchways at several points permit of ingress and +egress, and are so arranged that they can be closed whenever necessary. + +So much for the general description of the boat. Now we come to the fighting business. When her coal and stores are all on board, +she will be sunk within a couple of feet of the water--that is to say, the perpendicular side of the boat will rise about two feet +above the surface. In this condition she can steam to her destination under about the same conditions of safety as those attending +our monitors. Looked at from a distance she will appear like a tea-saucer, on an enormous scale, turned bottom upward, and having +an old fashioned pill-box in the centre. In ordinary times she has a pair of smoke-stacks, one on each side of her turret, but these +are made telescopic and will be lowered out of sight when she goes into action. Then she has ventilators which also disappear, and +she has a temporary steering house on deck that disappears likewise. In action she is steered from the inside in accordance with +signals given by an officer in a reasonably secure little lookout box in front of the turret. In fact, all the deck apparatus except +the turret, is made {102}to disappear entirely in time of battle, and the gunboat is as plain as the wardrobe of a country clergyman +on a small salary which is not promptly paid. + +Nothing is visible when the boat goes into battle but the sloping deck and the turret above it. Indeed there is not much of the deck +visible, as the boat takes in water enough to sink her down, so that all the perpendicular side and some of her sloping portion is +below the surface. The fixed turret stands up in the centre, and inside of it is the movable turret containing the guns. This is +kept lowered until the moment for firing; then the machinery turns it round in the required direction, and raises it so that the +holes for the muzzles of the guns come above the edge of the fixed turret. The guns are run out till their muzzles are even with the +outside of the port-holes, and when the proper aim is obtained, they are fired and instantly lowered, or they may be kept in place +and reloaded, according to the will of the commander. They are handled, so to speak, by machinery, a couple of rods in the hands of +their captain performing all the work of aiming, one rod serving to raise and depress their muzzles, and another to move the turret +horizontally. + +Steam has been brought into satisfactory subjection in the _Novgorod_. The turret is controlled and the guns are operated by steam; +steam propels the boat, and may be made to steer it. Very little hand labor is required, and the boat may carry fewer men than other +war-ships of her capacity. She is built throughout in the strongest manner, and her constructors are very proud of her. + +For harbor and coast defence they claim great advantages over the old style of war ships, and I was told that it was the intention +of the government to build a considerable number of ships of the _Novgorod_ pattern. They were to be stationed at the ports of the +Black Sea, and along the Baltic, and it was thought they could made things lively for a blockading squadron. The _Novgorod_ was of +a hundred and the _Popofka_ a hundred and twenty-five feet diameter; whether the others would be of greater or less size I am unable +to say. Other ships of war are to be constructed on the Black sea, and in course of time the Russians hope to bring their Black Sea +fleet up to something {103}like its old standard. The arsenal at Sevastopol is theoretically the property of the Russian Company of +Navigation and Commerce, and contains their repair shops, but practically it is the property of the government, and will be more and +more so as time rolls on. + +We spent the evening in the hotel and on the cliff overlooking the harbor, and tried to imagine the scenes of twenty years ago. + +“The rocket’s red glare and bombs bursting in air” have ceased over Sevastopol--let us hope for ever--and all was calm as though +the spot had never known the horrors of war. The loquacious landlord told us many stories of the siege, and of the fortunes of +Sevastopol before and since the war. “Now we are to have better times,” he said; “the railway will be completed next year, and we +shall then have a line of steamers direct to Constantinople. Capitalists are coming here to start business, and we shall hope for +commercial activity. The government has determined that Sevastopol shall rise again, and we feel sure that it _will_ rise.” + +Before the war the city had little short of thirty thousand inhabitants. Now it has about five thousand, but the number is slowly +increasing. With a revival of business and a restoration of the naval dockyard, Sevastopol will resume its old activity and +importance and become again the mistress of the Euxine. Her harbor is one of the finest in the world, and her geographical position +renders it of great value. + +The landlord escorted me to my room, and as he set the dripping and guttering candle on a rickety table, his loquacity continued: + +“This,” said he, “is the room that was occupied by Kinglake, when he came here to study the siege of Sevastopol. He was a good +fellow, and, when he left, he gave my daughter a new sovereign and she has kept it ever since. Of course you have read his history +of the war? Many officers who come here say he has made some mistakes, but no man can be expected to get everything right.” + +I went to sleep and dreamed of assaults on the Malakoff and Redan, and of the morning when the grey regiments which were Russia’s +pride and glory burst through the pall of fog, and fell upon the unexpecting allies in their camp at Inkermann. Clash {104}of steel, +roll of musketry, and the diapason of artillery resounded through the night and made my slumber unrefreshing. I recalled the time +when the whole civilized world turned its eyes upon the Crimea, and with what an electric thrill was received the announcement +“Sevastopol has fallen!” And here in the city, where for many months the sounds of war were heard almost without cessation, all was +now the stillness of a long peace. Waking, I could hardly realize that I was in Sevastopol. Sleeping, I lived again in the midst of +the strife, and participated in the exciting events that have found a place in history. + +In the morning we set out for Yalta in a carriage which we hired of an enterprising Tartar who demanded his pay in advance. He +demanded and we refused, and the more he wanted his money on the spot the more he didn’t get it. + +[Illustration: 0114] + +In a discussion between Capital and Labor the former generally has the best of it, and the result of our discussion proved no +exception to the rule. Labor was compelled to accept our terms and receive its pay when the work was done, but it required a good +half-hour to bring Labor to terms. We were entrusted to the care of a good natured but rather stupid driver, and to three horses +harnessed abreast and full of energy. We trotted out of the ruin-lined streets, and soon left out of sight the most famous city of +southern Russia. + +The day was beautiful--a sort of a hazy Indian-summer sky--and if we had ordered the weather to suit us it could not have {105}been +more delightful. We drove through the field of Balaklava. How few there are now living of those who made Balaklava famous? + +We made a brief halt at the edge of the plain where the immortal Light Brigade rode to glory and the grave, and pressed +unflinchingly forward as the pitiless iron from Russian batteries tore through their ranks, and covered the ground with dead and +dying heroes. One of our party recited Tennyson’s well-known poem on this event, and I think we all felt, down to the depths of our +hearts, the full force of the closing lines: + + “Honor the brave and bold; + + Long shall the tale be told, + + Yea, when our babes are old, + + How they rode onward. + + + When can their glory fade? + + O! the wild charge they made, + + Honor the Light Brigade, + + Noble Six Hundred!” + +We visited the little village of Balaklava, and in a Russian rowboat paddled in the miniature land-locked harbor and out to its +entrance, where we danced on the waves that rolled inward from the sea. Then we drove to Baidar, a miserable village, where we +supped on tea, eggs, and bread, and breakfasted on eggs, bread, and tea--nothing else--and slept on beds of the most impromptu +character. I covered myself with my overcoat and travelling shawl, the Judge solaced himself with a table-cloth and a fish-net, +while the “Doubter” was kept warm by a late copy of the London Times in addition to his overcoat. It was a rough night, and we were +off early in the morning, as, indeed, anybody would be with such accommodations. If you want to get a man up in good season, put him +to sleep on a pile of rocks, or a bed that dates from the Silurian period, with the chief qualities of roughness and solidity. + +The “Doubter” averred his belief that there was not so bad a hotel in all Russia as the one he occupied in Baidar; and ever +afterwards when we wished to get him into a regular cast-iron passion we had only to refer to his night’s lodging in the interior +of the Crimea. And I really think that he was unfairly treated, as the Judge afterward made confession of having taken away {106}the +full sheet of the Times soon after they retired, thus leaving the “Doubter” nothing but “the supplement.” + +[Illustration: 0116] + +An hour after leaving Baidar we passed through a stone gateway, and came out upon the sea. Or, rather, we came out upon the edge of +a mountain, and looked down more than a thousand feet upon the waters kissed by the rising sun, and broken into little billows just +touched with crests of foam by a gentle breeze from the east. Away on the horizon and below our line of sight lay a stratum of white +clouds, and in the far distance to the left the wind and sun were chasing away the remains of the darkness of the November night, +and near at hand on the right and left lay the mountains with great, rugged tops, round which half a dozen eagles were whirling and +occasionally disappearing in the floating masses of light clouds. Down below, toward the upper; part of the peninsula, the mountains +sloped away but so slightly as to make us wonder how we would find a passage among them. + +I have become familiar with a good deal of scenery in the past twenty years, but I know few things that can surpass this first +view of the sea on the road from Sevastopol to Yalta. The scene bursts suddenly upon you. At one minute you are among the hills +and forests and sparsely scattered fields, where you have been travelling ever since you left Balaklava, and you are voting the +{107}whole thing a trifle monotonous. You pass through the gateway, which is arched and bastioned like a small fortress, and what +a change in the picture! You are in a narrow road, with scarcely sufficient standing place for the carriage and horses; the crag at +your left seems ready to topple over and cover you, and as you look up a thousand or twelve hundred feet along its gray sides, you +perceive deep and irregular fissures in which, here and there, trees are clinging quite safe from the woodman’s axe, and forming a +secure resting for the eagles that circle about them. Their prevailing grey color is diversified by the tints peculiar to volcanic +rocks everywhere, and they cut the sky with a sharp and jagged outline whose every angle is rendered more distinct by the great +elevation to which the mountains rise above you. This mountain-chain stretches about thirty miles along the coast; it stands bold +and upright from the sea above Balaklava, but gradually trends away from the water until, at Yalta, it is more than five miles +distant. + +Here, at the Baidar-gate, the strip of land is nearly a mile wide, but as you look down the dizzy distance you could solemnly aver +that the width is not more than a hundred yards. The strip of land shelves rapidly, and is dotted with patches of forest, rough +boulders, and the general _debris_ of the mountain-chain, and stippled and streaked with little rivulets that trickle onward +toward the sea. There are sharp ridges and deep ravines, barren patches and woody dells; the whole forming a favorite resort of the +game-birds and the beasts that make this region an attractive one for the hunter. + +Here and there you see a house nestling and crouching in a lovely valley, and as you proceed on your way you find the houses and +villas becoming every hour more and more numerous. The high cliffs shelter the land from northerly winds, and as the sun pours full +and strong over the sea, a climate of peculiar warmth is developed that gives this part of the Crimea a fertility of almost tropical +luxuriance. The productions of this region are of wonderful variety and excellence. + +We whirled down and along the front of the mountains, hour after hour, and with new combinations of land and ocean constantly +presented to our eyes. We halted at Alupka, where is the palace of Prince Woronzoff, and at the hotel we had a com{108}fortable +meal, which our morning ride had prepared us to enjoy. We washed it down with the excellent wine of the Crimea, bearing the +Woronzoff brand, and grown in the vineyards that dot all the hill-sides in the last dozen miles of our drive. After a two hours’ +halt we were on the road again, and passing the palace of Livadia, the summer residence of the Emperor, and one of the prettiest +spots in the world, we reached Yalta an hour before sunset, having made one of the most delightful rides that can fall to the lot of +the traveller. + +Yalta is the Long Branch or Newport of Southern Russia, and many persons go there to spend the summer and autumn. The situation is +charming and the climate delicious; the Emperor has a palace close at hand, and as he spends every autumn there, it is no wonder +that Yalta has become fashionable. The principal street along the sea-shore has a fringe of hotels, and so great was the rush at the +time of our visit, that there was a difficulty in obtaining rooms. Prices were high, and from a contemplation of the bill of fare, I +should think the hotel-keepers were anxious to make a fortune in a short time and retire from business. + +Picturesque Russians and Crim-Tartars wander through the streets, making a marked contrast to the fashionables from Odessa and +Moscow. In the market the “Doubter” got into trouble by handling and tasting some fruit, and was compelled to buy it in order to get +out of the scrape. + +[Illustration: 9118] + +He had an inordinate passion for handling everything (except his own money when bills were to be paid) and this propensity served +sometimes to increase our annoyances, and occasionally our expenses. At a church in Odessa he broke a part of the fixtures on +{109}the altar because he insisted upon picking them up, and he only escaped trouble by pretending not to understand what was said +to him. He didn’t rely much on his senses of hearing and seeing, but when it came to smelling, tasting, and feeling--particularly +the latter--he was on hand. He wasn’t satisfied with seeing a picture but he must feel it and smell it, and not till then did he +believe in its existence. The same was the case with nearly everything else that could be touched; and when he saw things in a +show-case he wanted them opened for his amusement and manipulation. During his journey in the East he felt nearly everything within +his reach, except an impulse of generosity, and with that he had no desire to become acquainted. + +We rose early in Yalta, and were off for Odessa, where we arrived without accident or delay. + +[Illustration: 5119] + +{110} + +[Illustration: 0120] + + + + +CHAPTER VI--ACROSS THE BLACK SEA. + + +_A Visit to a Russian Police Office--Smith, and what he did--A bad lot of passports--A race after a Governor in a Drosky--More +Backsheesh--Delicate administration of a bribe--An obliging subordinate--Attempt at a swindle--Scraping an acquaintance--High life +on the Black Sea--Muscovite ladies--Sunrise on the Euxine--Worshipping the Sun--Stamboul--Passing Quarantine--On the +Bosphorus--A magnificent spectacle--The Castle of Europe--Palaces and Villas--Domes and Minarets--The Golden Horn--In front of +Constantinople--Rapacity of Boatmen--Turkish Thieves--Streets of the City._ + + +THERE is nothing very interesting about Odessa, for the reason that it is a place of no antiquity. + +At the end of the last century it was a Tartar village bearing the name of Hadji Bey, and containing a dozen houses and a small +fortress of Turkish construction. Now it is a grand city with one-hundred and fifty thousand inhabitants, and having an extensive +commerce. Ships of all nations lie at its wharves, and you see English, French, American, and nearly all other foreign names among +the merchants established there. Its greatest export-commerce is in wheat, which goes from Odessa to all parts of the Mediterranean +and also to England. + +The Black Sea wheat formerly found a market in America, but we have changed all that with our immense grain production in the West +and California. + +It was no small matter to get out of Russia. I sent the passports of our party to the police-bureau on Thursday--two days before the +time set for our departure--and was told that they were _en règle_ for the journey to Constantinople. Saturday morn{111}ing I paid a +visit of politeness to the American consul, Mr. Smith, and just as I was leaving him he asked if he could be of any service. + +“Thank you,” I replied, “I know of nothing you can do for me except to follow me with your good wishes. I don’t want to borrow any +money nor obtain an introduction to any official.” + +“Have you arranged your passports?” + +“O, yes,” I answered with a confident smile. “I have travelled too much to neglect any of the formalities. The clerk of the hotel +sent our passports to the police and had the proper _visas_ attached.” + +As I spoke I took my passport from my pocket, and handed it over with an air of triumph. He unfolded the document and examined it. +His turn was to smile now, and he “smole.” + +“All wrong, my dear sir,” he said, “there is no _visa_ for departure; nothing but the _visa pour entrer_ and the _visa de séjour_.” + +Here was a pretty caldron of piscatorial products. It was one o’clock, and the steamer was to sail at four; it was Saturday +afternoon, and the police-bureau closed at twelve o’clock on the last day of the week. + +“I will endeavor to get you out of your trouble,” said the kind hearted Smith--I wish all Smiths were like him and the world +would then be much better off than it is--“we will jump into a drosky and do some fast driving; and as I know the Governor and the +Police-Master I think the matter can be fixed.” + +We hired a drosky and told the driver to put in his best licks and he might expect something to get drunk on. This appeal to the +noble sentiments of an isvoshchik’s heart roused his ambition and he put in the “licks” aforesaid, with a whip weighing about three +pounds in the handle and two in the lash. + +[Illustration: 0122] + +We went forward as if impelled by the boot of His Brimstonic Majesty, and as the narrow drosky bounded from side to side the two +passengers had hard work to hold on. + +We were soon at the Governor’s, and entered a room filled with a crowd of all sorts of people, some dirty, some dirtier, and some +dirtiest, and a few looking clean and respectable. The Consul gave his name and rank to a soldier who disappeared {112}through a +narrow doorway and soon returned to escort us into the gubernatorial presence. + +The governor was a well-proportioned man of fifty-five or sixty years, with white hair, a clean-shaven face, and regular, pleasing +features. He was in civilian dress, and his manners were easy and unaffected like those of the higher class of Russians generally. +In his presence one might easily forget the official in the kind and courteous gentleman. If he had an iron hand, it was most +skillfully covered with velvet. Napoleon said, “Scratch a Russian and you will find a Tartar.” That may be so, but it is unnecessary +to indulge in scratching when the Russian is as amiable as we generally find him. It is like removing the paint from a beautiful +picture to get at the rough canvas. + +The case was stated to His Excellency, and we obtained a note requesting the police to attend to the matter and put the passports in +order, if there was no objection. “I shall be at the steamer,” said the Governor, “as my sister is to be one of the passengers, and +should there be any trouble, please tell me.” We bowed ourselves out and were off. + +The Turkish consulate was close at hand, and so we halted there and obtained the _visa_ to enter the Ottoman Empire, not +{113}necessary, but a good thing to have. It might be compared to some of the quack medicines of the present day--warranted not to +harm the patient even if they do not benefit him. + +At the police-bureau the chief was absent, but his second in command happened to be in. He spoke French fluently, and when I had +told him that it was no fault of mine, but the carelessness or downright dishonesty of the hotel-clerk that had brought us into +trouble, he said he would see what could be done. The office was technically “closed,” but the Consul had influence enough to gain +admission, and I had faith that blarney and “backsheesh,” especially the latter, would do the rest. + +We were referred to a subordinate, a seedy and decayed party who looked as if he had a large family and proportionately small pay. I +thought here was a case of putting something where it would do the most good, and intimated as much to the Consul. + +“Yes, that will be right,” replied Smith; “do as you please, but I must not know about it.” + +While the subordinate was intimating that office hours were over and he could do nothing, I handed him the three passports and with +them as many roubles. + +[Illustration: 8123] + +As his fingers closed on them he smiled sweetly, and no doubt thought of his family and the comforts this honestly earned money +would procure for them. + +He opened one of the passports, and with an exclamation that amounted to “Really I did not understand how it was,” sat down at his +desk. + +In a quarter of an hour the passports were all _en regle_; I was {114}happy, Smith was happy, and the subordinate was happy. We went +to the hotel, where the Consul took a parting glass of wine with us, received our thanks and we his blessing. Then we paid our bill +and went to the steamer. + +I am unable to say whether the clerk of the hotel was grossly careless or dishonest. Had we gone on board with our passports as he +returned them to us, we should have been liable to detention until the next steamer, three days later. In that case the hotel might +have profited by our enforced delay, and I have a strong suspicion that the fellow had an eye to business and deliberately deceived +us. I expressed my opinion of the whole affair, and we did not part friends. + +The steamer sailed exactly thirty-five seconds after her advertised time, an example of promptness worthy of imitation. She was an +English-built ship, belonging to the Russian Company of Navigation and Commerce, and rejoiced in the name of Elborus. Officers and +crew were Russian, with the possible exception of the chief engineer. + +We had a motley crowd of passengers in the cabin. We were three Americans, and there was a fourth--a native of the land of the +free--a woman whose talkative power was sufficient to bore a tunnel through Mount Washington, and whose mission was literature and +matrimony. She was en route to Constantinople to marry a Turk, but I afterwards learned that she changed her mind and married a +Greek. Then there were two or three Englishmen travelling for pleasure, several Swiss, German, and French merchants and commercial +travellers, all of them chatty and most of them agreeable, and there were half a dozen Russians, mostly of the gentler sex. + +We had not been many hours at sea before a majority of the passengers were on speaking terms, and even endeavoring to make the time +pass pleasantly. There was no distinction of age or sex in conversation; everybody was polite, and nobody took offence at being +addressed without the formality of an introduction. Nowhere in the world will you find travellers more civil to each other than on +the steamers which plough the waters of the Orient. + +Among the Russian passengers were three ladies (mother and daughters) from St. Petersburgh, sister and nieces of the Governor +{115}of Odessa. The younger of the daughters was a Lady of Honor at the court of the Empress, and the family evidently belonged to +the _haute noblesse_ of Russia. + +If anybody fancies that the high society of Russia is at all “stuck up,” like some of our American aristocrats, he would have been +enlightened very materially had he made the voyage with that party. There was no forwardness or pertness on the part of the young +ladies, neither was there any frigid reserve or _mauvaise honte_. They conversed easily and with perfect selfpossession, and when +one of the passengers produced a variety of mechanical puzzles for the amusement of the party, they readily joined in the sport. If +they were brought up at boarding and finishing schools I must admit that the Russian educational establishments are more successful +in their work than the majority of their American and English rivals. + +The deck was crowded with third-class passengers, the majority of them being Russian pilgrims on their way to Jerusalem. Two priests +were with them, and they held frequent service, in which all the members of their flock joined. One of these services, which I +happened to witness, was peculiarly impressive. + +The after saloon was on a level with the main deck, and consequently its roof, which formed our promenade, looked down upon +the humbler part of the ship. The first morning out, I rose with the dawn and went above. The sea was calm and smooth almost to +glassiness; there was not a breath of wind nor the least feather of cloud or fog. Most of the stars had been paled by the light of +the coming day; only a few were twinkling here and there as if struggling to maintain their existence as long as it were possible. +They slowly faded and disappeared as the gleam of gold on the eastern horizon spread outward and upward, and betokened the approach +of the sun. By-and-by a rim of fire appeared, and each moment grew larger till at last the full circle of light and heat was +revealed above the sea. It was sunrise on the water, duller and tamer perhaps than in the midst of high waves, fierce winds, and +fleecy clouds, but still a sunrise of great beauty. + +A few minutes after I went on deck the pilgrims assembled for service. The priests read the prayers in full, sonorous tones, and the +people bowed or knelt in unison, in accordance with the {116}formula of the Græco-Russian Church. With their faces towards the +east, they seemed to be saluting the rising sun, and it would have needed little play of imagination to picture them as pagan +fire-worshippers instead of devout followers of Christ. The sun slowly rose while the service was in progress, and when the prayers +were concluded his entire disk was above the horizon. A scene of worship more impressive than this it has rarely been my fortune to +witness. + +[Illustration: 0126] + +In good weather a steamer of ordinary speed can make the run from Odessa to Constantinople in about forty hours. At daylight on the +second morning we were at the entrance of the Bosphorus, but it was still so dark that we could see little more than the lighthouses +and a very dim outline of the forts that command the passage. + +Just inside the entrance we cast anchor and waited for the visit of the health officer. Until this was obtained we could go no +farther, and hold no communication with the shore. The quarantine regulations in the Orient are very rigid, and the least violation +of them subjects the offender to severe penalties. + +The health officer came at six o’clock, and after a brief inspection granted us a clean bill of health. Then we might have gone +{117}on, but a tantalizing fog made its appearance and delayed us an hour or more. Then it lifted a little and soon shut down, and +it kept lifting and shutting alternately, so that we anchored twice afterwards; drifted some of the time, and moved very slowly for +the rest of our way. + +It was a disappointment to nearly all of us, for we had great anxiety to see the shores of the Bosphorus, about whose beauty we had +heard so much. We had now and then a slight glimpse--all the more aggravating--but did not get a fair view of the shores until we +were in sight of the great city. + +Some days later, when the sky was clear and the air soft, I made a journey on the Bosphorus, as I was determined not to miss it. + +The length of the Bosphorus from the Black Sea to the Sea of Marmora is a little more than twenty miles, as a ship runs through; the +shores are longer owing to their sinuosity. The strait is supposed to have been formed by an earthquake, as there is a similarity in +the rocks of the two shores, and furthermore, there are on each side seven promontories corresponding to as many bays opposite. Its +width at the narrowest point is about six hundred yards, and it enlarges in places to eight hundred, a thousand, fifteen hundred, +two thousand, and twenty-five hundred yards. In the Gulfs of Bey-Kos and Buyuk-Dere it is more than three thousand yards wide. + +The pen may give the figures that indicate the distances and heights, and depths, but no pen can give an adequate description of the +pictures presented by the shores of the Bosphorus. + +As we enter from the Black Sea we pass between the two castles, the one of Europe and the other of Asia. The hills are steep and +rugged, and appear capable of easy defence; as we move along we have a succession of crags and rocks and forests; of villages, +chateaux, and palaces in such profusion that we should be wearied were it not for the great beauty of the scene. For several +miles the Asiatic side is but thinly inhabited, and the shore appears almost in its primitive condition. There is little else than +mountains and gorges, lonely valleys, deep set and secluded, forests of varying colors fringing the cliffs and climbing the sloping +sides of the hills, and below them the dark water in which the whole picture is at times reflected. {118}On the European side the +tableau is much the same for only a mile or so. Then begins a succession of edifices that show how much the progress of settlement +has clung to the northern shore. Village after village, palace after palace, follow in such rapid succession that it is difficult to +imagine them little else than a continuous line, which they indeed become, long before the towers and domes and minarets of the city +come into sight. The irregularity of the shores adds to the picturesque effect; were they straight like the banks of an artificial +canal, much of their beauty would be lost. + +The real luxury of architecture on the Bosphorus, as we approach from the Black Sea, begins at Buyuk-Dere. This place has been +called the most charming pleasure resort in the world. I am hardly prepared to endorse that opinion, but am willing to say it is one +of the prettiest I have ever seen. Several of the foreign embassies have their summer residences here, and their palaces are quite +prominent; the rich merchants of Constantinople dwell there in considerable numbers, and have fitted up their houses with very +little regard for expense. The houses skirt the shore, and some of them climb the hills in terraces; there are groves of trees and +a fine promenade near the water, so that the combined effect is very pretty. From here, as we go on, there is an uninterrupted +succession of villages and palaces, whose names would be almost meaningless, but whose beauty as we view them from the water can +never be forgotten. + +{119} + +[Illustration: 0129] + +By-and-by the fringe of villages becomes larger and deeper, and we are told that Constantinople is in sight. Its hills rise steeply +so that the houses seem tost and in terraces; their varying colors appear as numerous as those of the kaleidoscope, and the domes +and minarets that crown many of the elevations give the picture an emphatically oriental tinge. We are in front of the entrance to +the Golden Horn with Pera and Golata on our right, and Stamboul, with its Seraglio Point, crowned with the dome of Santa Sophia +on our left. Beyond are the waves of the Sea of Marmora, and as we look over them the Isles of the Princes rise between us and the +horizon. + +The harbor is dotted with shipping, and scores of restless steamers dart to and fro with their cargoes of passengers. Hun{121}dreds +of caiques and other row boats are visible, and as our steamer drops her anchor, they throng around her in great numbers. The +boatmen shout and gesticulate and push and fight, until they give us a fair indication of what the tower of Babel might have been +just before the suspension of work on that edifice. Occasionally one of them falls into the water, but he is soon out again and +shouting as wildly as ever. Evidently we shall not lack conveyance to the shore. The boatmen are a heterogeneous lot. They are +Turks, Arabs, Maltese, Greeks, Italians, French, and Syrians, and there are many who would be unable, and others unwilling, to state +their nationality. They are a picturesque crowd of thieves, most of them wearing the oriental dress, speaking a jargon of Italian +and Greek and Turkish, with now and then one who has picked up a little English. They are difficult to manage, and not unfrequently, +when they are out of sight of the police, indulge in robbing solitary passengers who engage them for journeys up and down the shores +of the Bosphorus. + +After running the gauntlet of the custom-house at Constantinople, we are at liberty to make our way to the hotels. All hotels are +in the Pera quarter, on the east side of the Golden Horn, and there are always several runners for each establishment that board the +steamer as soon as her anchor is down, and are ready to carry passengers and their baggage to the hostel-ries. No matter what hotel +you intend to patronize, you are conducted up the steep hill, on whose elongated top the Grand Rue de Pera is situated. + +You find that the street is very narrow and very dirty, even though a prolonged residence in New York may have given you modified +notions about the ordinary condition of metropolitan highways and byways. There are pools and patches of mud that would have a slimy +consistency if it were not frequently stirred by the feet of men and horses; and there are frequent heaps of filth that have waited +so long for the scavenger that they have ceased to hope for his coming, and have settled down into the calm resignation of deep +despair. The pavement is uneven and in very bad condition; it appears to have been wholly neglected since it was first laid down, +and will probably continue to be neglected for years to come. {122}The Moslem rarely repairs anything, as he believes that he is +interfering with the work of God if he attempts to stop the progress of decay. He builds a house, a mosque, or a bridge--he erects +a monument to the memory of his father or brother--he plants a tree and fences a field, and then rests content. The edifice may +crumble, the monument may fall, or the tree may wither; he rolls his eyes to heaven and exclaims: “Inshallah”--as God wills it--his +duty is ended. + +Of course there are exceptions to the rule. Self-interest sometimes overcomes religious scruples in the East as well as elsewhere, +and the Moslem will shrewdly conclude that the will of God requires him to preserve the gifts that Heaven has bestowed. + +[Illustration: 5132] + +{123} + +[Illustration: 0133] + + + + +CHAPTER VII--CONSTANTINOPLE--THE CITY OF DOGS. + + +_Human Camels--Canine Colors--The Dogs of Istamboul--Their Appearance and Moral Character--How the Turks regard +them--“Inshallah”--Constantinopoli-tan Dogsologies--An Oriental Dog-fight--Sagacious Brutes--Cultivating Canine Society--“Standing +Treat” among the Curs--Four-footed Campaigns--Dog-Districts--The Hostile Armies--A Brilliant Strategic Move--Charge of the Light +(Dog) Brigade--Advance of the Chef de Garbage--The “Army of the West” in Retreat--The “Doubter’s” Mishap--Full Details of a Coat’s +Detailing--An Israelite in whom there was Guile--No More Sandwiches for Me, Sir-r-r!_ + + +OUR baggage is on the backs of hamals or porters, and we follow it and them like mourners at a funeral. + +The first objects to attract our attention are some ill-conditioned curs of low degree, full-blooded curs, with not a particle of +respectability about them except in very rare cases. They are nearly all of the nondescript sort which the ruralist designates as +“yaller dog,” without reference to his color. Yellow is the prevailing hue; but there are black, brown, white, and spotted dogs +among them, and one of my friends avers that he has seen green, red, blue, and pink dogs over in Stamboul. But I fear he had tarried +too long in a certain _café_ there, and partaken of the cup which necessarily inebriates while it cheers. + +There is a good deal of wolfishness about these dogs both in habits and appearance. They have no home, they live in the streets, and +hunt for their living wherever there is a chance to find anything. You see them lying in the open street, on the pavement where men +and horses are passing, or on the narrow strip of sidewalk, as if the place belonged to them. Under very favorable circumstances +they crouch in doorways, but in so doing {124}they render themselves liable to be kicked soundly whenever an occupant of the +premises happens along. When they lie in the street men and horses generally step over or around them; I say generally, as neither +men nor horses are very particular, and you not unfrequently hear a prolonged yelp or howl from some unfortunate cur whose leg, +tail, or body, has received the impress of a human or equine foot. You see dogs with frightful wounds received from horse shoes, and +others with huge scars where such wounds have been healed. In the Grand Rue de Pera and other streets where carriages can circulate, +the sleeping dogs are occasionally run over and either wounded or killed. + +[Illustration: 0134] + +I was one day an unwilling witness of one of these occurrences. Within a yard of where I stood a carriage-wheel passed over a dog, +lacerating him in such a way that he died in a few minutes. But while he lived his howling was fearful to hear, and it rang in my +ears long after the poor brute had ceased to breathe. + +The Turks in general care little about the sufferings of the dogs, or in fact of any living thing. Now and then, one of them shows +a little kindness to the animals, allows them to sleep in his doorway, and sometimes feeds them with any refuse food he has at hand. +The Christian inhabitants of the place are more amiably disposed towards the brutes, and frequently kill them in order to end their +misery. {125}There have been several raids upon the dogs in the Pera quarter, but the animals are so numerous and the opposition of +the Turks is so great, that the numbers are not much diminished. Though the Turks consider the dog an unclean beast and have no love +for him, they have a great aversion to taking life on the principle I have before mentioned of non-interference with the will of +God. + +“If God wished the dogs to die,” said a Turk one day, in discussing the question, “he would sweep them off by a pestilence. +Inshallah! they shall live.” + +A practical reason for maintaining these dogs in Constantinople is that they are excellent scavengers. In this respect they are +regarded exactly as are the buzzards that abound in some of our southern cities. + +Wherever you see a fresh garbage heap in Constantinople there you will see a group of dogs. They are engaged in making a living, and +they turn over all parts of the heap in search of something edible. Nothing comes amiss. A crust of bread, a bit of meat, a bone, +fleshless or otherwise, is immediately seized and appropriated. + +I used to watch the dogs when thus foraging, and was surprised to observe their apparent friendliness. When one found anything he +ate it without being disturbed by his companions; but he never lingered long over it. Sometimes one would seize hold of a large bone +and another would attach himself at the same moment to the opposite end. Then began a discussion of growls, snorts, and bites, and +very often the whole party would go in and there would be a general scrimmage, in which the dogs would be in a struggling heap, +doggedly clinging to the bone of contention. + +One afternoon I happened to witness a fight of this sort in which half a dozen dogs were engaged. There was one little fellow in the +lot, and while his big friends were quarreling at a lively rate he slipped in beneath the belly of the largest and came out in the +same way, bringing the bone and making off with it. + +[Illustration: 9136] + +So intent were they upon their unpleasantness that they did not observe the abstraction until little dog and big bone were out +of sight around the corner. They looked around an instant with their noses in the air and then struck up another chorus of growls +{126}interrupted with bites and tussles. Then they appeared content and returned to their scientific investigations in the heap of +garbage, pawing, scratching, and turning it over industriously for everything capable of mastication. To my mind a whole bundle of +morals was bound up in the incident, but I forbear to thrust them upon my readers. + +These dogs know and remember their friends as readily as do the members of the canine race in other parts of the globe, and +numberless are the anecdotes of their sagacity related by old residents at Constantinople. A stranger walking the Grand Rue de Pera +will frequently be accompanied a block or so by a stray dog who will wag his tail and look pleadingly in the stranger’s face as if +to say “Please give me something to eat.” These demonstrations will be liveliest in the vicinity of an open-front cook-shop, such as +are so common throughout the “city of dogs,” and if you stop and buy something for the poor brute he will manifest his gratitude in +the various doggish ways with which we are all familiar. He will remember you and the next time you walk that street and block, he +will be on hand to welcome you. + +One day a couple of dogs thus pleaded for me to stand treat and I obliged them by stopping at a cook-shop and buying a few pennies +worth of the pancaky productions of which the lower class of Turks are so fond. That evening I was calling on some friends at the +Hotel de France and returned rather late to my quarters in the Hotel de Byzance. Two or three hundred yards from my destination +two dogs came to my side and after a few demonstrations of welcome traveled along with a dignified air and did not leave me until +I entered the doorway of the hotel. {127}At that hour the cook-shops had long been closed and the manner of the brutes did not +indicate that they expected to be paid for taking me home. Next day they met me again and were prompt to recognize me, and I +returned their recognition by again standing treat at the cook shop. That night they were again on hand to escort me, and when a +third dog approached they drove him away. In the day time they were suppliants but at night they were guardians, and I was told that +if any man had ventured to attack me there was little doubt that they would have done good service with their teeth. + +We kept up our acquaintance--the dogs and I--as long as I remained in Constantinople. I have always entertained great respect for +the dog, and this experience increased rather than diminished it. + +Have any of us ever lived, when we were boys, in a large city, and have we ever been “licked” by the boys of a neighboring street +for the terrible crime of venturing out of our own territory? And furthermore have we ever joined in “licking” some other boy who +had the audacity to venture from his street into ours. + +Well, what boys do in American cities, the dogs do in Turkey. They divide Constantinople into districts, and they know their own +districts as well as “the gal knew her dad.” Each group of dogs has its own territory and they are also on good terms with each +other. But let a cur from the next dogship venture over the boundary he is in trouble at once. The whole crowd, Tray, Blanche, and +Sweetheart and all the other big and little dogs go for him, and give it to him tooth and nail. He is rolled over in the mud and +bitten and bruised, and if he gets back to his own ground with a whole skin he may thank his dog-stars. + +I have frequently seen these discussions and observed how carefully the boundary is defined, and how common cause is made against +the intruder. He is driven back to and over the frontier, and there the pursuit is supposed to end. But if the pursuers in the +excess of their zeal venture across the line they are attacked by the combined forces of the district they have invaded, and a grand +battle is occasionally the result. The vigor with which the dogs of the district assert their common rights, the patriotic zeal of +even the most insignificant and contemptible {128}curs when called upon to defend the common weal, and the aptitude which the dogs +display for the discussion of diplomatic niceties and fine distinctions, call for the respectful consideration and study of the +diplomats and scientists of the Western world. + +One day I was sitting with a friend in front of a _café_ which was situated on a street corner. The small street intersecting the +larger one happened to be the boundary of two of the dog principalities, and we observed that the four-footed inhabitants of each +realm frequently came down to the street, but did not venture into it, as it was a sort of neutral zone, which neither might occupy. + +Let us call the principalities East and West for convenience in telling what happened. + +Both armies had been gathered at the boundary and separated only by the narrow street. They snarled and growled and made +_reconnaissances_ in force, but neither ventured across. + +The army of the East was the more numerous and contained larger and more healthy soldiers than that of the West; there was mischief +in their eyes and mud on their feet, and they felt that they could “chaw up” the dogs of the West if they had a chance. + +And how should they do it when it was contrary to their moral principles to invade a country with which they were nominally at +peace? + +The army of the East retired from the frontier and disappeared round the next corner where there was doubtless a camp of +instruction--a sort of Chalons-sur-Marne. The army of the West also retired and moved toward its own interior; it stacked arms in +the vicinity of a swill-box in front of a restaurant, and waited for somebody to overturn the box, on which their hopes and +hunger were centered. Unconscious of danger, they did not preserve good order, and nearly half their forces straggled away where +a baggy-breeched and dirty Turk had just deposited a basketful of kitchen garbage. With tail in air, mouth wide open, and thoughts +intent upon their hurried banquet, for one fateful moment they lost sight of stratagems and only dwelt on spoils. + +This was the military situation at 3.15 p.m. About 3.18 p.m. a cavalry regiment (one dog) debouched from the street leading {129}to +the fortified camp of the Army of the East. + +Halting a moment to observe the situation,--it had only one eye to observe with--and its tail had been detailed to service +elsewhere--it gave the order to advance and--obeyed it. + +With no shout of defiance, without champ of bit or clank of saber, but “all in silence deep, unbroken,” it pressed forward at the +_pas de charge_ and crossed the frontier. Leaping the Rubicon--a narrow mud puddle--it was on the sacred soil of the West. + +This gallant Light Brigade--noble six hundred ounces of dog-flesh--did not slacken speed for an instant, but pushed onward with head +and stump of tail up, to within point blank range of the swill-box. It was not perceived by the Army of the West until it was within +a couple of yards of the commissary depot; there a shot from a picket gave the alarm and the Army of the West fell into line at +once. + +The swill-box division made a bayonet charge at the audacious invader, who turned and with depending caudal stump legged it for his +native land. + +[Illustration: 8139] + +The reserve at the garbage heap advanced in double quick time and things looked rather lively for the invader. + +Swift was the flight and swift the pursuit. + +The pursuers halted not at the frontier, but in the impetuosity of youth and anger at the insolence of the enemy’s cavalry, they +pushed straight on after the flying foe. + +The cavalry sounded its trumpet as it jumped the Rubicon, and just as it reached the corner leading to the fortified camp, the whole +army of the East came to its support. Wasn’t the army of the West up a tree about this time? {130}The battle was short, sharp, +and decisive. The army of the West was “licked” out of its boots, and with shattered battalions and wide gaps in its ranks it came +limping and howling home, leaving the ground covered with a _debris_ of ears and tails. + +[Illustration: 0140] + +They made a brief halt at the frontier whither they were pursued, but only stopped long enough to intimate that they would get even +sometime. + +Whether they have ever done so history does not record. The despatches from our ambassador at the court of His Majesty, the Sultan, +made no mention of the matter, and a similar remissness has been observed in the reports of Sir Henry Elliott to the British +Government. + +The dog in the Orient is considered an unclean and disreputable beast, and one of the worst epithets applicable to living things +is the term “dog.” The Moslem was once accustomed to speak of “Christian dogs” whenever he had occasion to allude to people of +the Occident, just as the Chinese are to this day in the habit of designating-them as “_fankwei_,” “foreign devils.” Sometimes a +delicate allusion is made to the maternal descent from the canine race, where the speaker wishes to lay it on fine, and if he wants +to be especially choice and emphatic, he would denounce an offending Occidental, as “Father of all dogs.” + +Donkey drivers all through the Orient urge their beasts forward by shouting, “_Empchy, ya kelb_,” (go on you dog,) but the donkeys +do not appear to mind it. I was repeatedly impressed with the similarity of Arab and Russian drivers, as the epithet Kelb which the +former apply to their donkeys and camels, has exactly the meaning of “_sabaka_” which the Russian yemshik yells out to his horse. +{131}The dogs of Constantinople are so accustomed to the sight of people in European dress, that they do not pretend to attack them, +for the simple reason that they would have a larger contract on hand than they could conveniently fill. But the case is different in +places less frequented by foreigners. In Damascus, when our party made the tour of the walls, the dogs annoyed us greatly by hanging +around and keeping up a very loud and angry barking. + +[Illustration: 8141] + +They did not bite anybody, though they came very near, and certainly manifested a strong desire for dental practice. + +They were knowing brutes, those Damascus dogs; one of our party afterward called them Damas-cussed dogs; but we reproved him and +threatened expulsion if he ever did so again. The joke might have been allowed in Kit Burns’ dog-pit, but was quite out of place in +a respectable party making the tour of the Holy Land. When they barked and howled around us, we made threatening demonstrations with +our canes and umbrellas, but the animals didn’t scare worth a cent. They were particularly fascinated with the “Doubter,” but they +soon knew the range of his umbrella, and how to keep out of its reach. + +But when our guide picked up a stone and let it fly they fell back. Whenever they came too near, a stone would send them back and +a volley would put their ranks in disorder. Even the motion to pick up a stone would start them; the Arabs around Damascus can hurl +these missiles with great violence and are good shots, and the dogs know it. Several times our guide made splendid shots, taking +the dogs fairly in the sides with stones the size of a respectable fist, or a more respectable piece of chalk, {132}and sending the +offenders off with a chorus of yelps that were a warning to their fellows. + +[Illustration: 9142] + +One morning when we were starting out for a long forenoon’s walk, in Constantinople, the “Doubter” was sceptical about the +possibility of getting anything to eat on the way, and so took the precaution to provide himself with a couple of ham sandwiches, +which he stowed away in the rear pocket of his coat, and thereby hangs a tale. + +In one place we passed a group of dogs that looked up inquiringly, but showed no fight or other ugliness. As we went by them +the largest of the pack, a lank beast about the size of a full grown donkey, sniffed the morning air and the sandwiches in the +“Doubter’s” coat-tails. With hair bristling on his back, and with tail and ears erect the Ponto of the Orient came up behind us, and +I could see what he wanted. As the “Doubter” spoke nothing but English, I passed the word in French to the rest of the party to keep +his attention fixed on something, while I encouraged the dog. They dropped at once to the joke, and became very busy in examining +the dome of a mosque that loomed up before them. + +Ponto or Ishmael, or whatever his canine name was, came bravely and hungrily forward. A ham sandwich was evidently a luxury the +brute had not enjoyed for many a day, and his appetite was now fairly aroused. I pointed to the coat-tails where were enshrined +the savory sandwiches, and intimated by signs {133}that it was all right, and the best dog might win. Ponto’s nose came within two +inches of the prize, and took a fresh and satisfying sniff and then-- + +[Illustration: 8143] + +There was a ripping and tearing of broadcloth; the “Doubter” fell backwards from the effect of the shock, and then--there was more +ripping. + +Ponto was hungry and the Infidel Christian had brought him something to eat. + +A jump, a rip, a fall, an-- + +As the novelists say “all this passed quicker than I can write it.” other rip, and all was over. + +I was so dumb-struck with astonishment that I couldn’t interfere till Ponto had detailed the “Doubter’s” coat. As he fled I raised +a shout and a terrible outcry that made him run all the faster. Away he went like a pirate-ship in a fog, and in two minutes he was +hull down among the sand hills. + +“Stop him! stop him!” yelled the “Doubter,” but the brute couldn’t understand English, and evidently he was not a stop-watch dog. + +“There’s a coat ruined,” continued the “Doubter,” + +“I’ve only had it four years, and gave twenty dollars for it. What shall I do? what shall I do?” + +“Cut off the other tail and make a jacket of it. Come to-morrow with sandwiches in the other pocket and the dog will do it for you.” + +“Hire an Arab to hunt up the tail.” + +“Cut off the dog’s tail and sew it on instead, look any worse than it did before.” {134} “Tell the Consul about it, and have him +demand satisfaction of the government.” + +These and other irreverent remarks were let off in the pauses of our laughter, and I am bound to say that the “Doubter” didn’t enjoy +any part of the joke. He was unhappy all day, and more unhappy when he visited next morning the clothing shop of an Israelite, +in whom there was guile enough to set up a whole Tammany Ring, and have ten per cent, to spare. While he tried on a coat, and was +dubious about the fit, the polite Jew declared: “Ah, mein Gott, zat coat, he fit you like ze skin on a dog; like, shoost like, ze +skin on one big dog!” + +And the “Doubter” again waxed wroth, and took in high dudgeon this apparently personal indignity. + +When he paid his bill at the hotel he was again angry, for among the items was the following: + +“Extra--two sandwiches, two francs.” + +He vowed he would not pay, but we all insisted that the charge was just, and he finally paid, and was cross for a week afterward. +But he never again took ham sandwiches for a lunch in Constantinople. + +[Illustration: 5144] + +{135} + +[Illustration: 0145] + + + + +CHAPTER VIII--TURKISH CURIOSITY SHOPS--SIGHTS AND SCENES IN THE BAZAARS. + + +_Locomotion in Constantinople--Horses, Donkeys, Shank’s Mare and Sedan Chairs Turkish Street Cars--Women in Public--The Veiled +Queens of Seraglios--The Drugs of the Orient--Henna and its Uses--Ottar of Roses, Musk and Bergamot--Shawls and Silks of price--The +Treasures of Ormus and of lad--The Workers in Precious Metals--Vases of Gold and Platters of Silver--An Aureole of Gems--Loot for +Soldiers and Swag for Burglars--The Weapons of Ancient Islam--Blades of Damascus and Swords of Mecca--A Wonderful Collection--Old +Clothes and New Truck--A Seedy Moslem Swindler--An Exorbitant “Backsheesh”--What happened to the Judge--A Dispenser of Justice in +the Lockup._ + + +DOUBTLESS one of the most attractive features of Constantinople in the eyes of a stranger is a visit to the bazaars. + +To reach there from Pera, where all the hotels are situated, it is necessary to descend the steep hill to Golata and cross the +Golden Horn to Stamboul. You can go on foot, on horseback, in a carriage, or in a sedan chair; on foot is the least expensive and is +the method employed by the majority of visitors as it furnishes an opportunity for a leisurely survey of the route which is always +interesting, providing the rain is not falling and the sun is not pouring down an intense heat. + +Saddle horses are to be found all over the city, and you can hire them by the day or hour or by the course from one place to +another. A man accompanies the horses, and no matter how fast you may ride, he will keep close to the animal’s heels without +apparent fatigue. + +Carriages are a comparatively recent feature of Constantinople; they are decidedly expensive, and as they jolt along over {136}the +rough pavements you are shaken up in a way to make Dyspepsia turn pale in the face. + +The sedan chair is borne by two men and is not an uncomfortable mode of locomotion; all things considered it is the most agreeable +if one does not wish to go on foot, and has an aversion to a violent shaking up. + +[Illustration: 9146] + +The sedan chair waiting at the door of the theatres near the conclusion of the performance presents a curious spectacle, and reminds +you of the stories of London two hundred years ago when chairs and link boys were the mode. + +Omnibusses and street cars are in use. The latter are divided into three compartments, first, second, and women’s. The first class +has leather cushions on the seat, and are generally dirty; the second class has no cushions on the seats and are generally dirtier. +In the women’s compartment no man is allowed to enter; the women sit there in silence and seclusion after the Turkish custom, and +each wears the veil. + +The veil of the Turkish women of fashion is of the thinnest gauze; it allows the full outline of the features to be distinctly seen, +and if the wearer is pretty you are sure to know it. And between you and me many who are not altogether pretty are made so by the +veil which softens the hard outlines and tempers any excess of color. + +[Illustration: 0147] + +The street car dropped us at the point indicated by our guide, and we entered the bazaar through a gateway possessing an +architectural feature worthy of notice. The first place we visited was {137}the bazaar of drugs, and as we entered it a thousand +peculiar odors saluted our nostrils; some of them possessing great pungency and power of penetration. For a minute or so the odor +was almost intoxicating; it was much like that which we experience in America on entering a drug and perfumery establishment on a +large scale. + +The street or passage-way is quite narrow and on either side are small shops with open fronts. The floor of the shop is about three +feet above the ground, and is so arranged that the merchant squatted within can use the front part of the floor as a counter for the +display of his wares. + +For storage purposes there were shelves, and the merchant could reach whatever was wanted without rising from his place. On the +projecting platform at either side of the shop, there were {138}sacks of _henna_--used for coloring a great many things, the +eyebrows and finger-nails of women included--and there were other sacks containing dates and various kinds of nuts. Drugs of unknown +names and quantities were exhibited, and in many respects each shop appeared very much like its neighbor. + +Immediately on entering we find ourselves in the place set apart for perfumery, and if we wish to purchase ottar of rose, musk, +essence of bergamot, oil of sandal wood, or any of that kind of goods, now is our chance. The merchants here seem to think that the +chief end of foreign man and especially woman is to buy ottar of rose, and you are offered the article in all sorts of flasks and +bottles They have a curious looking bottle, shaped like one’s finger but longer in proportion to its width, which holds only a few +drops of the precious liquid. + +Each man assures you that his is the only genuine article of the kind in the city, and that you will be cheated if you go elsewhere. +You are allowed to smell of the merchandise, and by way of convincing you of the genuineness of what they offer, they show you a +small bottle of the counterfeit with the assurance that they never sell it and only keep it to show. + +There is more humbug and nonsense in the purchase and sale of ottar of rose than in anything else that is dealt in, in the Orient. +Every guide can take you to the only merchant in the city who sells the genuine article, and no two guides take you to the same +merchant. + +You can buy the stuff anywhere from one to twenty dollars an ounce; the price you pay is only limited by your willingness to pay it, +and the amount of money that your guide and the merchants (who are invariably “in cahoots”) think they can squeeze out of you. You +can just as well buy for five dollars an ounce as for twenty; the genuine article, unadulterated in any way, is worth fifty dollars +an ounce at the place of manufacture, and as the Orient demands large profits, you should expect to pay a hundred dollars for it in +Constantinople. + +You can set it down as a certainty that no stranger can possibly buy the genuine ottar of rose in the bazaars of Constantinople or +Cairo. + +Near these perfume bazaars are the shops where you can buy-all sorts of Oriental luxuries in the shape of shawls and silks, +{139}sandal and rosewood, Persian mirrors framed in fine paintings, articles of ivory, or ebony, or pearl, little odds and ends of +filagree work; in fact, an endless variety of things of more or less value. + +The merchants are not so ready to show their goods as those we have just passed, for the reason that the articles may be damaged by +much handling, and customers are not very easy to obtain. If you show a disposition to trade, they will accommodate you; but they do +not rush to strip their shelves at your approach. + +We did not want to buy drugs, and so we went rather hastily through this bazaar to visit the “Grand Bazaar,” as it is generally +known among foreigners as well as natives. Do not imagine that it is a single house; it is so in one sense, and in another is far +from it. It is a sort of city within a city; it has streets, lanes, alleys, and squares, which are all roofed over, so that you +might walk upon the housetops from one side of the bazaar to the other. Light is admitted through holes in the street roofs, some of +them open and others covered with glass. + +There is not light enough to go around and give a good supply to everybody, and sometimes you have to strain your eyes to see +distinctly, and then you don’t. A good many of the shop-keepers in America are up to the same dodge; if you don’t believe it, just +enter a ready-made clothing store in New York or Boston, and observe in what part of the establishment they endeavor to fit you. + +Further on you find the shops where the silks of Broussa are sold, an article for which Constantinople has long been famous. + +There are two kinds of Broussa goods, one entirely of silk and the other half silk and half linen; the latter is much the cheaper +of the two, and greatly in demand for dresses after the European model. The merchants endeavor to tempt the masculine visitor with +dressing-gown and wrappers of Broussa silks, and then with slippers and other articles which would make a sensation at home. There +is a great supply of ready-made clothing of the Turkish pattern, especially for children; and you could rig out a small boy there in +a very short time with garments that fit him exactly, from slippers up to head dress. + +And so you go on. You can wander for hours in the bazaars, days will not exhaust their treasures, and I think I should be +{140}content to spend my odd moments there for at least half a year. The whole wealth of Ormus and of Ind seems to be stored there; +and the eyes are frequently dazzled by some object of great value, whose existence is almost an enigma, and its uses still more so. +You pass from the centre of one trade to that of another; now you are among the rows of shops where are sold the curiously-shaped +shoes of the Orient. Thousands and thousands of shoes are exposed there, and you think if all Turkey should become by some miracle +barefoot to-morrow morning, it could be newly shod before nightfall from this bazaar alone. + +You enter the bazaar of the workers in gold and silver, and there you see enough of the precious metal to pay the national debt of +any reasonably economical country, or at all events, to go far in that direction. You enter the bazaar of precious stones and see +the light flashing and sparkling from thousands of diamonds of “purest ray serene,” and should you show a desire to purchase, they +will bring forth from dusty and iron-bound coffers tens and hundreds of thousands of other diamonds, larger and more brilliant +than those which hang or lie in the showcases. Collars, ear-drops, rings, and pins of diamonds and other precious stones are on +exhibition, and many of them, in spite of their oriental mounting in semi-barbaric taste, are of great beauty. + +The wealth stored here is something incredible. The loot of the place would make many and many a fortune, and enable the robbers to +live comfortably and honestly for the rest of their days. + +One of the most interesting places is the Arms Bazaar. It is not exactly what its name indicates, as it contains a great many things +besides weapons of war or the chase. In the other bazaars you find an attempt now and then to conform to Occidental taste, but here +everything is Oriental. You can find here every sort of weapon which the Orient has known in the past ten or twenty centuries. +There are swords of Damascus, of a fineness unknown to the best steel of the present day, and which may have flashed in the hands of +Saladin or Haroun-al-Raschid. There are knives and lances that are said to have pierced through coats of mail, and whose handles are +crusted and covered with {141}pearls and precious stones. There are spears, hatchets, lances, sabres, curious old match-locks, with +barrels of immense length--all the weapons of the Islam of the past and going back to the time when Mohammed, at Mecca, believed +himself commissioned from heaven to reform the world. + +Saddles and housings, sparkling with precious stones, are placed where the light falling from the vaulted roof will show them to the +best advantage; and as you look around you see thousands of objects covered with jewels and with barbaric pearl and gold. There are +garments lined with costly furs, or embroidered in the most elaborate manner, and there are articles of furniture of fabulous value. + +So great is the wealth contained in the Arms Bazaar that no fire is allowed there under any circumstances. Smoking is prohibited; +the place where a Turk forbids himself to smoke must be sacred in the highest degree. + +There are bazaars where they sell pipes of all kinds, and where you buy all kinds of tin-ware. There are book bazaars, seed bazaars, +glass bazaars, and so on through a long list. And there is a second-hand bazaar, where you can buy anything from a set of false +teeth to a suit of clothes. It is a wonderful mass of stuff, not altogether inviting; as you walk around, you have suspicions of +plague, cholera, and other diseases of the Orient, and are not altogether sorry to get away. To most visitors to this place, the +request “please not handle” would be quite superfluous, as they have no wish to form a very intimate acquaintance with the articles +exposed for sale. But the Turk never puts up a notice of this sort, and seems quite indifferent on the subject. + +We inquired for the slave bazaar, and were told it no longer existed. + +A few years ago there was such a bazaar near the mosque of Mohammed II, where negro children were sold, and occasionally one could +find an adult, man or woman, to be disposed of. The bazaar for white slaves is also gone, but the commerce is still carried on +clandestinely. The business is conducted by Circassians established in the Pera quarter; they claim that the girls sold by them, +come voluntarily to Constantinople, and the prices they demand is simply to cover the expense of importation. {142}It was the month +of Ramadan, or Ramazan, when I arrived at Constantinople. There may be some ignorant wretch who doesn’t know what Ramadan is. + +Well, the Mohammedan year is divided into twelve months, composed alternately of twenty-nine and thirty days, or three hundred and +fifty-four days in all. Consequently the year begins sometimes in the spring, sometimes in the summer, and so on, with a constant +variation. This may seem absurd to our notions, but on second thought we see that it gives every month a fair show, and is really a +very just system. + +Suppose we had the same kind of year, we could have January begin, once in a while, in August, and March could have a chance to set +up for September. May could not put on airs over November, because they would change places from time to time, and December could be +in haying time, just as often as it is the period for skating. Think of planting potatoes in November and cutting ice in August, of +eating your Christmas dinner and going a Maying in October! Mohammed had a level head after all. + +Ramadan is the most sacred month in the year, and every Moslem is directed to fast every day during that month. From sunrise to +sunset he must abstain from eating, drinking, smoking, and smelling perfumes, and from all indulgence of a worldly character. + +The Prophet neglected to prohibit his followers from taking presents or swindling their customers during this month; at all events, +I found them entertaining the most extraordinary notions of the value of their services, and asking about four times the real worth +of what they had to sell and what I wanted to buy. + +The first afternoon we were in Constantinople we went to the Tower of Golata, which overlooks the city; there were six of us, and we +went without a guide. We climbed the steps until we reached the platform, where the police authorities keep a detachment constantly +on the lookout for fires, and I may here remark, by the way, that their vigilance is well rewarded, as they have more fires, and +very destructive ones they are, in Constantinople than in any other city of its size on the face of the globe. + +When we reached this platform a seedy Turk approached us and asked what we wanted. {143} “Can we go to the top?” I asked in French, +as he was more likely to understand that language than any other with which I was familiar. + +The seedy Moslem extended his hand and uttered, “_backsheesh!_” in a very imperative tone. + +I gave him a franc, and he then counted six on his fingers, and intimated that he wanted six francs for the party. I paid no more +attention to him, and continued up the stairs to the top, calling on the rest to follow. + +[Illustration: 8153] + +We remained there an hour or more studying the beautiful, or as the French would say, _bizarre_ picture which included the whole of +Constantinople, the Golden Horn, Scutari, with much of the Asiatic side and portions of the Bosphorus and Sea of Marmora. We watched +the sun go down, and when his rays had ceased to gild the domes and minarets of Stamboul we were ready to descend. + +The Judge had gone down before the sun, as he was not much on sight-seeing, and had spied a Greek beer-shop near the foot of the +tower, and intimated that he would sit down in front of it and wait for us. When the rest of us went down our seedy Turk was on +the lookout, and demanded more francs; he wanted five and I gave him one, and intimated that I would break his Osmanli skull if he +didn’t shut up. We were more numerous than he, and he didn’t trouble us farther, except by howling “backsheesh” as long as we were +within hearing. + +And what do you suppose the Judge told us when we joined him? + +That scoundrelly Oriental had locked the door on the Judge and refused to let him descend until he paid the five francs, which +{144}he afterward demanded of us, and the good-natured ex-dispenser of justice actually paid the fellow three francs, and then grew +wrathy and threatened to break the door if it was not opened. + +[Illustration: 9154] + +The Turk saw he meant business, and then unlocked the door, not without a final demand, which he repeated while our friend +descended. + +We learned at the hotel that half a franc would have been a sufficient “back sheesh” for the whole party. Had we paid that and no +more when we entered, the fellow would have seen that we knew the price, and would have made no further demand. But my gift of a +franc--double the proper fee--coupled with my question showed him that we were a lot of modest idiots who might be swindled. It was +our first experience with the Moslem, and you can wager that we learned a good lesson from it. + +Now, this happened in the month of Ramadan, and that Turk was keeping the fast with religious exactness. Yet we shouldn’t have been +swindled any more by a Christian hackman in New York or Chicago, unless we had given the hackman an equal chance. + +{145} + +[Illustration: 0155] + + + + +CHAPTER IX--FASTING AND FEASTING--THE SULTAN AND HIS COURT. + + +_The Great Moslem Fast--Nights of Feasting and Days of Fasting--The Injunction of Mahomet--The Ravenous Mussulman--An Hotel +Swindle--A Stranger and They Took Him In--“Too Thin, too Thin”--Greek Wine--Going Out in a Blaze of Glory--Thunder, Smoke, and +Flame--The Approach of the Sultan--How He Looked--A Peep at the Ladies of the Harem--The Veiled Queens--The Sultan’s Mother--The +Empress Eugenie at the Seraglio--Insult Offered to Eugenie--A Queen in Tears--A Question of Court Etiquette--Murdering Christians._ + + +WHEN the month of Ramadan falls in winter, and the days are short and cool, the fast is not very severe, especially for the +wealthier class who are not obliged to work. + +But in summer, with heat and long days, the fast becomes a serious matter for all parties, especially for the poorer class who must +attend to their daily avocations. The rich Moslems lie around their houses in a semi-comatose condition; some of them sit up all +night eating, drinking, and smoking, and devote the day to digestion and sleep; thus they rob the fast of its terrors, and I am told +that many of them do not hesitate to take an occasional bite during the day, but they take it very privately and in the strictest +confidence. + +The fast comes heaviest on the poorer classes, and especially the abstinence from drinking. Think of being at work out of doors in +a July day fourteen hours or so, and not a drop of water or any other liquid passing your lips! Men frequently faint under such +circumstances, and sometimes their health is seriously impaired. {146}Should a Turk faint from fasting and you endeavored to revive +him by pouring coffee or water down his throat, it is an even chance that he would berate you soundly when he came to himself, for +attempting to make him abandon the faith of his childhood, and embrace that of the Christian dog. + +[Illustration: 0156] + +The Prophet enjoined his followers not to crowd this fasting business too much; soldiers in time of war are not required to keep +the fast, nor persons who are sick or on a journey. It is even stated in the Koran that nobody should keep the fast unless perfectly +healthy and able to do so, and that he should not neglect necessary labor to keep it. But if he does not fast during Ramadan, he +must do so an equal number of days in the rest of the year. + +In Constantinople a gun is fired at sunrise and another at sunset, and between these gun-fires the fast is in full force. As evening +approaches every body gets ready for business, and is determined that no time shall be lost. Fires are lighted, food is cooked and +placed on the table, and coffee is poured out. As the sun touches the horizon the dinner party sits (or squats) at the table, and +when the gun booms out there is from one side of the Ottoman capital to the other a simultaneous extension of; right hands to clutch +something edible, and convey it to the {147}gaping Moslem mouths. You can almost hear the rush of wind caused by that synchronous +movement, and if the force employed could be utilized by wheels and belts, it would be found sufficient for the propulsion of a +cotton factory of the largest calibre. + +Things went on this way day after day during Ramadan, and wherever we went among the Turks, near the sunset hour, we witnessed the +same scenes. + +The mosques were brilliantly illuminated both externally and internally; the rows of lamps hung round the upper galleries of the +minarets presented a curious appearance, as the minaret would generally be quite invisible in the darkness, so that the rows of +light would appear to be suspended high up in the air. The people assembled for daily prayers, instead of weekly ones, and there was +a general appearance of piety all around, coupled with an intense desire to make the most out of the “stranger within the gates”. + +Even the Christian residents seemed to have caught the infection--the proprietor of the Hotel d’Angleterre “raised” on us about four +hours after we had settled into our quarters, and we had a row by way of diversion. + +When we went there from the steamer we arranged to have everything, rooms, attendance, lights, and wine at dinner, for twenty francs +per diem; when we were gathered at the table we were told that wine would be extra--the manager was sorry, but they had made a +mistake in telling us wine was included. He would not yield, and next morning we packed our baggage and went to the rival house. + +When he found that we were leaving, he came down. We might have wine free, he would give us the best rooms in the house, he would +eat dirt, any dirt we might select, and in any quantity, if we would only stay. + +But “it was no go,” or rather it _was_ a go on our part, and we patronized the Hotel de Byzance, where, for sixteen francs, we had +everything as good as at the other house, and wine included. The wine proved to be ornamental rather than useful; it was a Greek +article, with the _goût_ of nitric acid and oak bark, and brave must be the man who would drink it. + +Should I visit that hotel a decade hence, I expect to find the same decanter of wine, that stood by my plate during my stay. +{148}The day I left I grasped the decanter affectionately and gave it a farewell kiss. + +“Good bye, my friend, good bye,” I gently murmured, “we shall meet again some time, let us fervently hope. I am a frail mortal and +may not last many years, but you have enduring qualities that should preserve you a century or two Don’t ‘sour on me’ when I am far +away; if anything, you are too sour already.” + +The decanter was too full for utterance. + +[Illustration: 9158] + +A tear stood in its eye, though it may have been a drop remaining from the effort of the waiter to tone the wine down with water, so +that the stuff would be drinkable. + +Ramadan closed in a blaze of glory. The ships of the Turkish squadron were gorgeously dressed in flags, and many English and French +residents hung out their national standards. + +From the ships and the forts all round came the booming of artillery--not in occasional spattering shots, but in a salvo that seemed +to shake the city, and check the flow of the waters through the Bosphorus. + +The fast was over and the Moslem was happy. Next day was the feast of Bairam, and the Sultan was to pray in the mosque of Saint +Sophia. Of course we went to see him arrive at the mosque, and we had to rise disagreeably early in order to be promptly on the +ground. + +From the Stamboul end of the bridge over the Golden Horn, there was a double hedge of infantry and cavalry all the way to the +mosque. We took positions near the entrance to the Seraglio Park, where we could have a front view of the carriages as they +{149}approached, and then a side view as they turned to enter the gate. The aphorism that great minds think alike was well verified +on that occasion, as we found some two or three thousand people holding similar views to ours, and a front place seemed hopeless. + +[Illustration: 0159] + +The police were very civil, and the “cavass,” or police officer on duty in front of our party, kept the population from crowding us +in conveniently close. The “cavass” was arrayed in gorgeous style, and a franc slipped into his hand proved a good investment; where +he had before used words he now used a stick, and soon {150}convinced the multitude that it had no rights which he or we were bound +to respect. We had front places, and the fellow even brought a couple of bricks on which the lady of our party could stand and thus +preserve her feet from the dampness of the earth. + +We were close to the gate and had a good position. On the opposite side of the gate there was a crowd of women, principally Turkish; +we intimated that we would like to stand there, but the force of politeness and “backsheesh” could no farther go. Our lady might +join the feminine group, but as for the rest of us it was out of the question. No man was allowed to intrude there; to Christian and +Moslem, Jew and Pagan, the place was forbidden, and two policemen were there to enforce obedience. + +By and by there was a commotion, and a squadron of cavalry came trotting up the street and into the gate. Close behind them came +carriages containing officers of the Sultan’s cabinet, and, behind them in the most gorgeous carriage of all, was the Sultan +Abdul-Aziz, the head of the Ottoman Empire. + +He rode alone, etiquette forbidding that he should be accompanied by any one, even by a minister of State. He is a stout, in fact +more than stout, individual, with a heavy face, rather devoid of expression. I saw him seven years before in Paris; then his cropped +and full beard was black; but as I looked at it, on that morning of Bairam I found that it was well sprinkled with grey. Unless the +Sultan renews his youth at some Ponce de Leon fount of hair dye he will be a respectable old grey-beard before many years, provided +he is not gathered too soon to his Osmanli Fathers. He was born on the 9th of February, 1830, and so you can easily calculate his +age--just as easily as he can do it. + +He sits erect and with an air of dignity; evidently he knows that people are looking at him, and he ought to be on his good +behavior. He is in a gaudy uniform, which my hasty glance does not allow me to include in detail, and his fez is bright, and has +evidently been sent out that morning and freshly ironed. + +He is evidently proud of his fez and gives his whole mind to it. + +The Sultan is a devout Moslem, and goes to church, or mosque, with exemplary regularity. Every Friday he leaves his palace about +eleven o’clock and goes to one of the mosques, never to {151}the same one twice his mind an hour or so before he sets out. He +generally goes on horseback, and sometimes in a caique, and rarely in a carriage. He never goes back by the way he came, and he +never returns on the horse that brought him, a second horse being sent, for his homeward ride. + +The same plan is followed when he goes in caique or carriage, a second being taken for his return journey. I asked the reason of +this, and was told that it was the custom, and that the Sultan had certain superstitions which those around him found it well to +humor. + +Before the Sultan’s cortege came in sight several carriages containing women were driven rapidly through the gate, and others came +after His Majesty had entered. These were the ladies of the Imperial Harem, all dressed in their best clothes, and all wearing the +_yashmak_, or veil. They were all pretty, or, at any rate, their veils made them appear so, if they were not. + +The Turkish veil is very thin,--so much so that it distinctly reveals the outline of the face and softens any tendency to harshness. +It appears more like a slice cut from a cumulus cloud than like a real tangible substance that costs money. + +The Sultan’s mother was in one of the carriages; a dignified old lady, whose beauty has evidently gone back on her, as she wears a +veil thicker than those of the Sultan’s wives, either full rank or brevet. She is a true believer of the old school; she believes +most emphatically in the impurity of the Christian dogs, though she is open to reason sometimes when her son takes her in hand. + +When Eugenie, Empress of the French, visited Constantinople, she was received by the Sultan with high honor as the representative +of His (then) Majesty, Louis Napoleon. She was presented to the Sultan’s mother, and when the introduction was pronounced Eugenie +stepped gracefully forward and kissed the old lady. + +The O. L. was taken by surprise, and did not know what was coming till the smack of affection had touched her forehead, She was on +her ear instantly, and with a howl of anger and contempt pushed Eugenie from her, and then turned on her heel and stalked out of the +room. + +{152}The situation was an awful one. Eugenie’s Spanish blood rose to about 211° Fahrenheit, and it was a struggle for her to keep it +from passing the boiling point. But as Empress of the French, she had a position to sustain and she managed to keep her temper till +she reached her apartments in the palace assigned to her. It is said that she had a good cry when she got there, and, moreover made +it lively for her attendants. + +Next day there was an attempt to patch up the row; Eugenie was informed of the cause of the strange conduct of the Sultan’s mother, +and assured that it was not at all personal, but a matter of religion. They wanted her to be introduced again, and it was stipulated +that the Turkish lady should kiss the French one, and try in a general way to make herself agreeable. But Eugenie had had enough and +declined another interview. + +The fanaticism of the Moslems concerning the touch or presence of the infidel has largely disappeared in Constantinople. Down to the +Crimean war there was much of it, and many places were forbidden to the Occidental. But the British and French soldiers went where +they pleased, and when the barriers were thus broken they were not likely to be restored. The Janizaries used to consider it rather +meritorious than otherwise to stab Christians, while peaceably walking the streets, and other Moslems followed their example. But +that is a thing of the past, as the Sultan Mahmoud, in the interest of civilization and humanity, butchered the Janizaries and thus +opened the way to progress and reform. There are still some parts of Islam, where the life of an infidel would not be safe, but +their limits are narrowing every year. + +The Bairam festival after Ramadan lasts three days, and is not unlike our Christmas. The master of a house gives each servant a suit +of clothes or some other presents, and the working people generally go round to call on those from whom they may hope to extract +gifts. Everybody goes to the mosque to say his prayers, and friends who meet there indulge in a good deal of embracing and kissing. +They visit each others’ houses and have a good time generally, and altogether the festival of Bairam puts the city in a very +picturesque condition. + +{153} + +[Illustration: 0163] + + + + +CHAPTER X--THE MOSQUES--FAITH AND SUPERSTITIONS OF THE MUSSULMANS. + + +_Among the Mosques--Their Special Uses--Greek Burglars, their Capture and Execution--A “Firman,” What is it--A Turkish Dragoman--A +Relic of Ancient Byzantium--Its Name and Origin--Taking a Portrait--Turkish Superstitions--Worshipping in St. Sophia--Moslem +Fanatics--Counting the Minarets--What came of a Wet Pair of Boots--The Judge in a Tight Place--The “Doubter” commits +Sacrilege--Uncovering a Sarcophagus--Attacked by the Priests--Barefooted Worshippers--Teachings of the Koran--Cleanliness and +Temperance--Why Turkish Women do not go to the Mosques--Why good Mussulmans never get Drunk._ + + +SIGHT-SEEING in the capital of Turkey would be incomplete if it did not include the mosques. Mosques are to the Orient what +churches are to the Occident, and are used for the same purpose--the assemblage of the faithful for religious worship. The +Moslem goes to the mosque to say his prayers, when he can do so conveniently, especially on Friday, which holds the same place in +Mohammedan countries that Sunday does in ours. But the purpose of the mosque goes somewhat beyond that of the church in Christian +lands, and in some respects sets an example worthy of our attention. + +The church in our country is for worship only, and when not used for devotional purposes, its doors are closed or only opened for +the visits of the curious. In the Orient the mosque affords a refuge to the houseless poor, and this is particularly the case in +Damascus and Cairo, where the Moslem faith has been longer at home than in Constantinople. + +Most of the mosques have large court yards attached, and a {154}portion of these yards is roofed over to afford protection against +the sun and rain. + +[Illustration: 0164] + +A visitor nearly always finds groups of people sitting there, many of them at work, with as much ease and comfort as though in their +own homes Tradesmen who have no shops of their own frequently bring their work to the mosque, so that you nearly always find +numbers of them engaged in sewing, spinning, or other light occupations. This is particularly the case in the afternoon; and not +unfrequently the mosque, at such times, or rather the court yard of it, presents a very lively appearance. {155}Groups of children +may be seen playing in the court yard, but they do not play as noisily as do most of the Occidental juveniles, and consequently +their sports are not so annoying as one might be led to expect. In the mosque itself you frequently see bales and boxes piled up as +in a warehouse; these are the property of persons who have gone on a journey--particularly oh a pilgrimage to Mecca--and have sent +their valuables to the safest place they know. Articles sometimes lie there for years, and the owners feel entirely assured against +loss. A Moslem would never steal from a holy edifice, and an infidel thief would run a great risk if he attempted it. + +[Illustration: 0165] + +A few years ago some Greek and Italian scoundrels “put up a job” to plunder one of the mosques at Constantinople. They were weeks at +work, perfecting their plans, and managed to get their plunder safe on board a schooner which was waiting in the sea of Marmora, a +mile or two from shore. They sailed away in triumph, but the electric telegraph, which has brought so many scoundrels to justice, +caused them to be overhauled at the Dardanelles. + +The schooner was captured and brought back to Constantinople; the property was returned to the mosque, and the enterpris{156}ing +gentlemen who removed it without authority received the polite attentions of a Turkish headsman. Not only they, but the entire crew +of the schooner down to the cook and cabin boy--also a cat and two kittens--were decapitated, without fear or favor. + +“Bismillah!” (in the name of God) shouted the executioner each time he swung his sword. “Inshallah!” (God is willing) responded the +attendant, as he gathered up the heads one by one and stowed them away in a sack. + +The mosques of Constantinople are the finest in all Islam; they crown the summits of the hills of Stamboul, and are the most +prominent objects in the picture, as one regards the city from the Bosphorus. To visit them, one must be provided with a “firman” or +passport, and to obtain this document the article of “backsheesh” is required. + +A request must come from the embassy or consulate of the visitor’s nation, and with this request and the payment of a sum equal to +two dollars for each person of the party, there is no further trouble. Our polite Consul-general, Mr. Goodenow, greatly facilitated +our efforts by sending his dragoman with ours to obtain the “firman;” the consular dragoman is a personage of great importance, all +through the East, and often advances the transaction of business with the government bureaux. The passport thus obtained is good, +not for one alone, but for all the principal mosques. + +The most interesting and best known of the mosques is that of Saint Sophia, as it is erroneously called. It was not called so after +any canonized woman named Sophia, but in honor of divine wisdom, _Aya Sofia_. It was thus consecrated by its founder, Constantine, +in the early part of the fourth century, and when the Turks captured it a thousand years later, they retained the title, and call it +_Aya Sofia_ at the present day. + +The Turks have endeavored to remove the evidences of its former Christian character, but have not altogether succeeded. In many +places one can see the cross and other emblems of the western religion, and in some instances the faces of men and angels have not +been entirely obliterated. Mohammedanism forbids the making of any graven or pictorial image, and for this {157}reason, it is very +difficult to induce an orthodox believer, uncorrupted by occidental heresies, to sit for his portrait. + +The belief is that the person who makes a representation of any living thing, will be confronted with it at the day of judgment, and +ordered to endow it with life. Failing to do this, he will be condemned to a locality I need not mention. + +I once endeavored to induce an Arab to stand in a certain position while I made a sketch of him. + +[Illustration: 8167] + +He declined, and explained through an interpreter, that a duplicate of himself would make things rather inconvenient at the day of +judgment, as there might be a difficulty in proving which was which. I tried to convince him that it would be all right, as my lack +of artistic ability would be sure to save him. + +After looking through my sketch-book h e gained confidence, and was willing to take the risk for two francs. We compromised on one +franc, and when I finished the picture he surveyed it and delicately hinted, that he was entirely safe from harm on the score of +_that_ duplicate. + +Most of the Moslem residents of the cities visited by Europeans, have got over any qualms of conscience about pictorial +representations, but they still decorate their mosques after the traditional manner. There are no representations of living things +on the walls; nothing but texts from the Koran and attempts at architectural elegance about the arches and pillars. + +We left our hotel after an early breakfast, as it was necessary to pay our visit before the noon prayers, and we had several mosques +to go through. To describe them all would be tedious; {158}it was a trifle so to go through them, and therefore I will let down +gently. We had a long walk and were elbowed by a great many Turks, especially while crossing the bridge between Pera and Stamboul, +and followed by a goodly number of beggars. + +The Turkish beggar is generally a fanatical Moslem who would not pollute himself by contact with the infidel; he would starve rather +than cat a dinner with a Christian, and as to taking a drink with him, it would be quite out of the question. + +[Illustration: 9168] + +But when it comes to money he makes no distinction, and will receive a Frank franc as readily as a Turkish one. + +The mosques of Suleiman II., Ahmed I. and Mohammed the Conqueror, (by whom Constantinople was captured; in 1453,) are magnificent +edifices, each; with a grand dome in the centre, and a smaller dome at each corner. The arrowy minarets rise around each mosque and +add to the picturesque effect; their practical use is like that of a bell tower, as from the gallery near the summit the Muezzin +chants the call for the people to come to prayer. No bells are allowed in the minarets, nor in fact in all Constantinople, as their +sound is offensive to Moslem ears. + +The mosque of Ahmed has six minarets; up to the time of its construction the mosque of the Kaaba at Mecca was the only {159}one +with six minarets, and as it was the holiest of all places in Islam, it was considered rather “off color” for Ahmed to put an +equal number on his own edifice. He compromised the matter by ordering another minaret for the Kaaba, and paying the bills for its +construction, and thus it happens that this mosque has seven instead of six minarets. + +This same mosque, the Ahmediah, is in the middle of a large yard planted with trees, and affording a very pleasant shade from the +heat of the day. The interior of the mosque is simple, but magnificent; the vast central dome is upheld by four immense pillars, +each more than thirty feet in diameter, and cut on the outside so as to resemble a bundle of columns. There are half domes opening +into the central one, and there are numerous pillars of marble and granite, sustaining arches at the sides and ends of the building. +The absence of any decorations, save the texts from the Koran and the names of God, give an aspect of severity to the interior, +especially when one has become familiar with the profuse adornments of Italian churches. + +The founders of mosques generally, but not always, intend them for their own burial places. What is left of Ahmed I., and I fancy +there isn’t much left now, is laid away, not in the mosque itself, but in a tomb close at hand, and forming a sort of adjunct to the +grand building. + +We had to take off our shoes on entering it, just as we did on entering the mosque, and all the other mosques; we brought along our +slippers to wear in these excursions, and our guide walking ahead with six pairs under his arm, might have been easily taken for a +second-hand dealer in foot gear. The Judge, the heavy man of the party, had wet his feet a little, and as his boots were very tight, +he had hard work to doff and don them at each halting place. + +He sat on the pavement in front of a mosque, while the guide undertook to remove the refractory boots. They stuck faster at each +change, and toward the last it became necessary to hold him, or have him sit astride a post during the operation. Otherwise the +guide pulled him all around the yard as a country doctor does a patient when extracting an obstinate tooth. + +We feared it would be necessary for all of us to sit on him, or {160}pile stones on him while the guide pulled, but happily this did +not become necessary. + +[Illustration: 9170] + +The oft-repeated dragging around on the rough ground was detrimental to the trowsers of the Judge, and he was obliged to have them +half-soled before he again wore them. + +When we were at the tomb of Ahmed, which contained a sarcophagus, covered with magnificent and costly shawls, and was surmounted +with the turban of the defunct Sultan, our sceptical comrade, the “Doubter,” expressed a suspicion that the ruins of Ahmed were not +in the box. + +“These people are all liars,” said he, “and I don’t believe there ever was such a man.” + +We tried to convince him that it was all right, and as he had paid for entering, he was at liberty to believe what he pleased. + +“Tell the man to open the place up,” said the “Doubter” to our guide, “and let us see what there is inside.” + +The guide tried to inform him, that such a proceeding would be contrary to custom, but the “Doubter” was obstinate and determined to +have things his own way. + +“I am bound to find out for myself,” he continued, and suiting the action to the word, he endeavored to lift one of the shawls that +covered the sarcophagus. + +The moment his purpose became evident, the custodians seized his hands, and half a dozen Moslems who had been standing round made a +vigorous forward movement. + +They would have ejected him in a moment, had not our guide interfered, and possibly they would have brained him. + +It is a serious matter to touch things in a mosque, and this experience taught the “Doubter” a lesson which he remembered at least +an hour. {161}We visited the tombs of several Turkish Sultans, and finally reached the mosque of Saint Sophia, a little before noon, +so as to make a hasty survey of the lower part of the edifice before the people assembled for prayer. + +I will not attempt a detailed description, as it would be very long, and interesting only to an architect. + +Suffice it to say, that the church was originally very nearly a square--two hundred and fifty feet by two hundred and +twenty-five--and the height of the cupola is about two hundred feet. Since it was dedicated to the worship of Mohammed, minarets +have been built around it, and some of the external features have been changed. There are numerous columns of porphyry, black and +white marble, Egyptian and other granite, and alabaster, and various colored stones. The abundance of columns, the galleries at the +side, and the richness of the interior generally, form quite a contrast to the plainness of the other mosques, and one would hardly +need be told that he is in an ancient church of Christendom. + +The mosaics which represented biblical subjects, have been covered in part, but to so slight an extent that their richness is fully +perceptible. Thus, for example, the four Cherubim in the base of the cupola are clearly visible, all except the faces, which are +concealed by patches of cloth of gold. The same is the case with other mosaics where figures are delineated. + +All mosques are built so that the _mihrab_ or altar placed against one of the walls shall be nearest to Mecca, and the worshippers, +while looking toward this altar, shall be looking toward the Holy City. Strips of carpet are laid upon the matting which covers +the floor, and on these strips the worshippers kneel, so that they are in rows exactly as if seated in the pews of a church. Saint +Sophia was not properly placed for Mohammedan worship, and consequently the mihrab is at one side and the strips of carpet are +stretched diagonally, so that they materially mar the architectural effect of the building. It is also injured by numerous ostrich +eggs, which are suspended by long wires or cords, and by Moslem chandeliers, which do not harmonize with the walls and pillars of +the edifice. {162}As the hour of prayer approached we mounted the gallery to look at the assembled congregation. By twelve o’clock +the mosque was fairly filled--the worshippers in lines or files on the strip of carpet, reminding one of a regiment of infantry, +in columns of companies. Each man brought his shoes in his left hand with the soles placed against each other, and as he took his +position in one of the lines, he laid his shoes in front of him on the open space between his strip of carpet and the next one. +Rich and poor prayed side by side, and were all considered equal in the sight of God. Occasionally there was a person with a +prayer-carpet of his own, which had been brought and spread by a servant, but these instances were not numerous. + +The prophet is entitled to much consideration for some of his enactments which we find in the Koran. Cleanliness is enjoined upon +the worshipper, and in compliance with this injunction the Moslems wash their hands and arms before prayers; and if water cannot be +had for this purpose, they make use of sand. This is the custom before the daily prayers. + +On Friday (the Moslem Sunday), the true believer takes a bath and becomes so clean that he might be used for a dinner-plate on an +emergency. + +There is always a fountain in the court yard of the mosque, and here, those whose feet and hands are not clean proceed to wash +themselves before entering the sacred building. The floor of the mosque is scrupulously clean, and the removal of shoes or boots is +required, not as a religious observance, as many suppose, but; in order that no dirt may be left on the matting. You can wear your +boots in a mosque, provided you have large slippers to go over them, or if you wear overshoes and remove them at the door. Sometimes +the custodians have large slippers which you can hire, and sometimes they tie your feet in napkins, allowing you to retain your +boots. + +The congregation was a masculine one; the Koran does not prohibit women from entering the mosque or attending prayers there, but +says it is better for them to pray in private. It also hints that the devotional feelings of the men are likely to be reduced, if +women are near them during the public service, and that it is far better that there should be no such distraction. {163}Mohammed +knew what he was about, and understood human weaknesses when he wrote the Koran, and prescribed the formulas of his religion. + +There is an erroneous belief among the Western nations that Mohammed denied women the possession of souls. The Koran, in several +places, promises paradise to all true believers, whether male or female, and enjoins women to be faithful and obedient to the laws +of the Prophet. But as Moslem women are secluded on earth, the natural inference is that they will not occupy a high social position +hereafter. The _houris_, or spiritual wives, which are promised to the believers, render women of no future consequence in the eyes +of a masculine Moslem, and hence it is not likely that he cares a straw whether his wives of this earth go to Paradise or stay away +from it. + +The prayers were recited by an Iman or priest, who stood on the top of the pulpit, in company with other priests. From my position +I was not able to see clearly all that was done at the pulpit, but I could see that the prayers were quite analogous to the mass +of the Catholic church, and included readings, chant-ings and responses, with frequent bowings and genuflections on the part of the +people. The congregation moved as a unit; when one man bowed, all bowed; when he knelt, all knelt; when he prostrated himself, the +rest did likewise. The service was an impressive one in every respect, and the most casual observer could not fail to see that every +worshipper felt the solemnity of the place and occasion. + +The following illustration is an exact _facsimile_ of the opening chapter of the Koran. + +[Illustration: 0173] + +{164}This has been anglicized by Rodwell as follows: + +1 Bismillahi’ rahmani’ rraheem + +2 El-hamdoo lillahi rabi’lalameen + +3 Arrahamani’ raheem + +4 Maliki yowmi-d-deen + +5 Eyaka naboodoo waéyaka nestâeen + +6 Ihdina’ ssirat almostakeem + +7 Sirat alezeena anamta aleihim, gheiri’lmoghdoobi aleihim wala’daleen. Ameen. + + +Burton made a rhyming translation of the same, which I herewith give. + +1 In the Name of Allah, the Merciful the Compassionate! + +2 Praise be to Allah who the three worlds made, + +3 The Merciful the Compassionate. + +4 The King of the day of Fate. + +5 Thee alone do we worship and of thee alone do we ask aid. + +6 Guide us to the path that is straight-- + +7 The path of those to whom thy love is great, + +Not those on whom is hate, + +Nor they that deviate. Amen. + +And now let me say a word to the Infidel, and show him how much he gains or loses by not being a Moslem. + +The first article of faith is: “There is no God but God.” + +In chapter 112 of the Koran, his unity is set forth thus: “Say he is God, one God, God is the Eternal. He begetteth not, nor is he +begotten; and there is none equal unto him.” The Moslems believe that Christ was the Messiah, and brought the gospel upon the +earth; they do not call him the Son of God--but simply a prophet or apostle. They believe he was taken up to Heaven after having +accomplished his mission, and that he will come again on earth to establish the Moslem religion. + +The second article of faith is: “Mohammed is the Prophet of God.” + +The Moslems acknowledge six prophets--Adam, Noah, Abraham, Moses, Christ, and Mohammed--and that each brought a system of revealed +religion. They claim that each system was a true one, but was abrogated by that which followed it. + +Consequently, Christianity was the true faith from the begin{165}ning of our era down to the time of Mohammed, except when it was +corrupted by the belief that Christ was the Son of God. + +They believe in the existence of angels and good and evil genii, in the immortality of the soul, in resurrection and judgment, in +future rewards and punishments, in the balance of good and evil works, and in a bridge formed of the edge of a sword over the centre +of hell. All must cross this bridge; the good pass safely over and enter Paradise, but the wicked fall from its centre. + +The Moslem faith is much weakened in those parts of the Orient that have had familiar intercourse with the Occident. + +Temperance is enjoined by the Koran, but there are thousands of Moslems in Turkey and Egypt who drink wine and spirits without +hesitation. As the Moslem becomes civilized and enlightened, he generally proceeds to get drunk; and the more he is instructed in +the ways of Christianity, the drunker he becomes. Of course, there are many exceptions; but they only prove the correctness of the +rule, and our missionaries in the Orient must deeply lament that the injunction to sobriety is less severe in Christianity than in +the religion it seeks to displace. + +[Illustration: 0175] + +{166} + +[Illustration: 0176] + + + + +CHAPTER XI--WHIRLING AND HOWLING DERVISHES--WHO AND WHAT THEY ARE. + + +_The Dervishes of Constantinople, What are They?--How They Live and What They Do--Unclean and Devout Beggars--Where They Bury their +Dead--Opening their Circus--Removing the “Doubter’s” Boots--An Amusing Situation--Clearing the Floor--Human Top-Spinning--Dropping +into Jelly-bags--A Pliable Lot of Living Corpses--The Howling Dervishes--Where and How they Live--A House Full of Madmen--A +Shrieking Chant--“La Hah il Allah”--Stirring up the Wild Beasts--Spectators Joining in the Chorus--Horrible Superstitious +Rites--Treading on Sick Children--Reaching Paradise by Bodily Tortures--A Sad Disappointment--The Founder of the Sect and Who He +Was--Pulling Teeth as a Proof of Sanctity._ + + +ONE of the stock-sights of Constantinople is the performances of the dervishes, which can be witnessed every Friday throughout the +year. + +The dervishes are to Islam what the bare-footed friars are to Christendom; they are men whose lives are devoted to holiness and +idleness in unequal portions, and they subsist upon charity or from the endowment of their mosques. + +Most of the orders of dervishes in Constantinople, Damascus, and Cairo, have comfortable homes and very little to do; the members +say their prayers daily, and devote an hour to their peculiar worship on Friday, and beyond this they do very little. But there +are many dervishes not as well off, who are obliged to work or beg in order to make an honest living, and they greatly resemble +Christian monks, in preferring beggary to labor. They argue that they have more time to devote to religious observances {167}in the +former case than in the latter, and therefore it is the duty of the less pious public to support them in idleness. But the public +does not always see it in this light, and hence the dervishes sometimes find begging unprofitable, and are forced into respectable +occupations. The dervishes are a lazy and uncleanly set. They profess to live a life of abstinence, but I was told of cases where +they have been known to drink rum with great devotion. + +The most noted of the dervishes are the Whirling and Howling sects; sometimes the former are called Dancers, and the latter Singers, +but it is a libel upon dancing and singing to call them so. The performance of the Whirling Dervishes resembles dancing about as +much as a frog resembles a prairie chicken; the Howling Dervishes could give a pack of wolves seventy-five points in the game and +beat them easily, and their devotional exercises resemble singing as much as the noise of a monster tin-shop resembles the opera of +_Trovatore_, as rendered at the London and Paris opera houses. + +My first visit to these gentry was at the convent of the Whirling Dervishes. It is situated on the hill of Pera, close by the +principal hotels, thus affording an agreeable contrast to our excursions among the mosques and bazaars, which requires a long walk +to Stamboul. The convent covers quite an area, and has a neat garden and several cosy buildings. I was told that the convent +owns several surrounding buildings, and that the income from these furnishes a very good revenue, on which the dervishes live +comfortably. In the garden in front of the building there are the tombs of several “ex-whirlers,” and I was told that it is the +practice of the monks to bury their dead on their own premises, instead of sending them to the Mount Auburn of Constantinople. + +These dervishes are a decent lot of fellows, much less fanatical than the “howlers,” and always, ready to allow strangers to attend +their circus, on condition that they leave their boots at the door and behave themselves, while the curtain is up. + +Our party of half-a-dozen went there rather ahead of time, and was obliged to wait in the front yard for the opening of the hall. +Some of the dervishes were around there and treated us just as they treated the fence or the gate posts. They said nothing {168}to +us nor we to them, except that our guide made a feeble effort to ascertain when the affair would begin. + +By the time the doors were opened the party of spectators numbered thirty or more--all strangers like ourselves. There was the usual +trouble in removing boots, and the “Doubter” was obliged to call a couple of Turkish loafers to assist him in getting his feet in +order, for admission. He caused considerable delay, and it was suggested that for the future he had better leave his boots at home, +and set up for a monk of the bare-footed order. + +When we were properly un-booted we were allowed to pass the doorway and stand in the interior of the convent. + +The building is quite plain; the part that we saw was circular, and consisted of a space in the centre for sacred waltzes, with a +floor carefully polished, and waxed to such an extent that it lacked very little to render it useful as a mirror. Around this arena +there was a low balustrade, and between this balustrade and the walls was the station of the spectators. Our party of foreigners was +allowed about a quarter of the space surrounding the ring, another portion was assigned to the musicians, while the remainder was +devoted to Moslem spectators! Above this floor was a gallery supported by graceful columns; a part of the gallery was assigned to +Moslem women, and there was a _loge_ or box for the Sultan whenever he chooses to honor the dervishes with his presence. At one +corner is a little box for women, furnished with gratings for them to peep through. + +The ornamentation of the ball room was as simple as that of the mosques--no pictures nor statuary, but only texts from the Koran, +some of them highly illuminated. On the left hung a large board, like a table of laws; to what use it could be put was a puzzle. +Lamps are hung all around the building. To the right of the place of worship, under a projecting roof, and of an octagonal form, is +a marble fountain, of fine execution. Here devout Moslems perform their ablutions, before entering the main theatre. + +We waited some time, and it was no easy matter to wait, as we had to rest like the party at a public dinner when somebody proposes +the memory of Washington--standing and in silence. + +After a while a solemn old fellow wearing a hat an inch thick and shaped like a sugar-loaf, entered the ring and squatted on a +{169}small carpet which was spread just opposite the entrance. As soon as he was seated, the rest of the party, to the number of +twenty-five or thirty, made their _entrée_ and bowed very low before the first comer. He was _sheik_, or chief of the lot; the rest +were the rank and file--the common fellows who were obliged to wait his orders. + +They did not come in with a rush, but very slowly, one and two at a time, so that they consumed at least a quarter of an hour in +getting into their places. + +In bowing to the _sheik_ they bent their bodies so that their backs became horizontal, and I longed for a spirit-level that I might +ascertain if these fellows were on the square. Each of them wore a sugar-loaf hat like that of the boss, and like his, made of +coarse felt of a reddish grey color. Each was wrapped in a long cloak of dark blue cloth, and as they stood in their places, they +held these cloaks tightly around them. Later--after the service began, they threw aside these robes and revealed a long skirt of the +same color, and not unlike a hoopless petticoat in its general appearance. The skirt was wide at the base, but gathered closely at +the waist, and the part above the waist was by no means a bad fit. + +The prayers began with the _sheik_ in the centre, and there were many prostrations, bows and genuflections before they were +ended. Then there was a chant, which was taken up by the orchestra, in which the only instruments were flutes and light drums or +_darboukas_. The music was not at all disagreeable, but, like all Oriental melody, had a good deal of monotony mingled with its +plaintiveness. Up to the opening of the music, the dervishes were standing in the arena, and as it began, they closed their eyes, +and seemed to be indulging in a species of intoxication. In a few minutes one of them began to turn mechanically, and at the same +time opened and extended his arms with the palm of his left hand turned upward, while that of the right was downward. + +Scarcely was he under way before another, and then another set his engines in motion, and in a few minutes the whole party was under +a full head of steam. They whirled so rapidly that the centrifugal force caused their skirts to expand and stand out {170}at a sharp +angle to the perpendicular, just as you have seen the dress of a fashionable woman extend itself during an exciting waltz. Sometimes +they reminded me of so many pieces of machinery--their skirts forming a sort of cone. + +These dervishes perform the double feat of whirling round and moving onwards at the same time. + +[Illustration: 9180] + +Occasionally they revolve for awhile with both arms extended, like windmills. + +Half of them appear to have their eyes closed, and to be dancing in a sort of drunken ecstacy, but somehow they did not run against +each other, and the performance went on in good order. The chief whirled a little while with the rest, and then he moved about in +the group urging the slow ones to whirl faster, and occasionally hurrying up the musicians, by beating time with his hands to a +somewhat quicker measure. After a while he halted the music a couple of minutes, and the “whirlers”. slowed down to half speed and +wiped off the perspiration. Several of the “whirlers” now drove back the surrounding crowd with sticks, and for about two minutes I +thought there was a lively prospect of a first-class row. + +The halt did not long continue. The chief gave a signal and the music began again as lively as “St. Patrick’s Day in the Morning,” + for it was in double quick time, and made warm work for the gentlemen engaged. The whirling was now in dead earnest, and made the +skirts expand like those of the première danseuse executing a _pas seul_ when she revolves across the stage {171}in her _finale_ +which is to secure her the thundering plaudits of the audience. + +They whirled. + +And whirled. + +And they kept on whirling. + +And they whirled some more. + +And they kept it up until the brains of the spectators were in a whirl, and some of them (spectators, not brains) had their money’s +worth and went away. + +After a while one of the dervishes threw up the sponge (figuratively), by sinking down on the floor in a state of exhaustion and +perspiration. + +[Illustration: 8181] + +He was as pliable as a jelly-fish, and the attendants who came to his relief handled him with care through an apparent fear that he +would drop to pieces. Soon another fell, and then a third, and then a fourth, and then the chief gave the signal for stopping the +_roulette_. The dervishes had been on the whirl nearly twenty minutes, and were quite ready to finish the game. Towards the end I +noticed that the toes of some of them were terribly cramped, and the veins of their feet swollen like drum cords. + +They gathered up their morning wrappers, and after bowing profoundly to their chief, walked slowly from the room. This was the end +of the affair, and we returned to the outer door where we mounted our boots, paid our “backsheesh” and departed. + +None of these dervishes were corpulent, but whether from accident or design I am unable to say. They were all of a lean and hungry +build, and all were pale in the face except one, who {172}was a negro, and couldn’t have paled however much he wished to. Their +exercise is not calculated to develop obesity, and if one should grow fat he would be obliged to change his profession, as he +couldn’t keep up with the rest without killing himself with overwork. Their faces were not prepossessing as a general thing; some +had a pleasing cast of features, but the majority were of an aspect decidedly forbidding. + +Before we left the place I told our guide that I could give the chief a hint which might be of service to him. + +“Tell the _sheik_ that we have machinery in America which we use for drying clothes in large laundries. The clothes are put into a +cylinder which revolves above five thousand times a minute, and throws the moisture out by the centrifugal force.” + +“Yes, but that no good would be for ze dervish. He dry his clothes just like somebody else, and no have much clothes to dry.” + +“Not for his clothes,” I replied, “but for the service we have just attended. Let them erect such a machine in their ball-room, and +have it large enough to hold all the worshippers. Put them inside and start the engine, and they could do more whirling in, fifteen +minutes than they can do in a week in the old fashioned way.” + +“I think ze Moslem no like such machine, but I speak to ze _sheik_ next time I see him. How much cost one machine?” + +I went on to explain its cost and advantages to the innocent guide, who did not suspect that he was being hoaxed. Whether he spoke +to the dervishes about it or not, I am unable to say, but at all events he never made any report of the matter to me. + +The “Howling Dervishes” are another sort of devotees. Their convent where I visited them was more like a mosque than was that of the +Whirlers, as it was much larger and had a high roof. The walls were bare of ornament, except of inscriptions from the Koran; on the +side, where stood the altar, there was a lot of implements of warfare, including spears, arrows, old matchlocks, swords and various +other odds and ends, all of an ancient appearance. We went through the usual process of leaving our boots at the door, but we were +not obliged to stand during the performance. A polite attendant brought chairs enough for seating all the strangers, and thus made +us comfortable. {173}There were about fifty worshippers, and they stood in a semicircle, with their chief inside. He began a low +chant which included one of the chapters of the Koran, and was joined in the chant by the rest of the party. + +At each verse they threw their heads forward, with a jerk, and immediately threw them backwards. The chant was very soon concluded, +and without any pause the chief started the formula, “la Hah! il Alla!” + +[Illustration: 0183] + +Now we began to understand why these pious individuals were called “howlers.” The sound that they produced was more like the noise +of a menagerie, when the keeper stirs up the beasts, than like the tones of the human voice. It was a rough and rather prolonged +bark and howl, in which the word Allah! was all that could be understood. The movement of the head became an inclination of the +whole body from the hips upward; at one instant the men were bent nearly double, and at the next they had their heads thrown +forward, so that their faces were horizontal, and there seemed a probability that the worshippers would fall backward. + +They had removed their turbans, as no head-dress could stand this wild motion, unless glued or nailed on. Many of them wore their +hair long, and the masses of _chevelure_ swung in the air like {174}so many dirty mops, from which a kitchen-maid is endeavoring to +shake the superfluous water. + +The noise became frightful, and several ladies of the visiting party, as well as some of the gentlemen, had their money’s worth in a +very little while. + +Every minute or two some of the dervishes fell exhausted to the floor; two foamed at the mouth and became wildly insane, so that it +was necessary for others to hold them, or carry them out of the room. + +There were several negroes in the room, and I observed that they howled the worst and were first to become frenzied. They raved +like mad men, and indeed they were for a time furiously mad. I am sure Bedlam would be considered a quiet and well-behaved place, in +comparison with the mosque of the “Howling Dervishes.” + +There were fifty or more Moslem spectators, and some of those on-lookers became so excited that they joined in the service and soon +were as frenzied as the rest. Among them was a soldier--a negro--who had not been five minutes in the charmed circle before he fell +writhing to the floor, and foamed at the mouth, as though he had swallowed an entire soda fountain. + +The spectacle is far more disagreeable than that of the whirling dervishes. You want to go away, and you are held there by a strange +fascination; you cannot imagine how things can be any worse than they are five minutes after the howling has begun, and yet you know +perfectly well that it will be much worse before the end. You feel that you have had enough and you want to go, and then you feel +that you ought to stay, as you will miss some of the fun by leaving. + +I don’t know a place where one is more swayed by conflicting emotions than while assisting at the devotional exercises of +these gentlemen. I think an American or Englishman feels very much as did the tender-hearted Romans (if there were any), at the +gladiatorial combats in the Coliseum, or at the _matinees_, where the Christians “on the half-shell” were served up to tigers that +had been on short rations for a fortnight. + +Civilization in its advance into the Orient has robbed these dervish-entertainments of some of their interesting features. +{175}While the howling was going on, people used to bring sick persons, particularly children, and place them on a sheepskin spread +on the floor inside the semi-circle. The chief stood upon these invalids and danced about on them, and this homoeopathic treatment +was supposed to do the patients much good. If they recovered, it was natural enough that their cure should be considered miraculous; +if they died it was in accordance with the will of God, and the dervishes could not be blamed for an occasional failure. + +Then they used to wrap barbed chains around themselves, or around any person who had an inquiring turn of mind and wished to make an +experiment. + +[Illustration: 8185] + +They took down some of the swords and spears, and stuck the points into their arms and legs without manifesting any pain. In fact, +they practiced a variety of tortures, or what seemed so to the infidel spectator. + +When I went to the show that day, I was expecting a delightful time, as I had been reading a book in which all these entertainments +were described. Soon after we entered the mosque, an officer with a couple of policemen at his side, came into the room and took his +place against the wall, and inside the semi-circle, which was just then forming. + +“What is that officer here for?” I inquired of the guide. + +“He comes to regulate the behavior of the dervishes. To see that they do not tread on sick children, as they used to do, and to +prevent the devotees from lacerating themselves.” + +“And shall we have no tortures to-day?” + +“None at all. The government forbids it.” + +Imagine my disappointment. I had expected to lunch full of horrors, without returning to the hotel, and here I was cut down {176}to +seeing a lot of grown men make temporary maniacs of themselves, and to hear the worst human howling that ever saluted my cars. All +the beautiful pictures that my fancy had painted of seeing sick children trodden under the feet of the priests, and pious devotees +cutting themselves with swords and spears, had quite vanished and would never be realized. + +The age of sentiment is gone. Shall we ever welcome its return? + +The Oriental governments are slow to move, but they do move after all. Moslem fanaticism is every year diminishing, and many of its +cruelties are brought to an end. Occidental civilization in its aggressive course has accomplished much, and will do more as time +rolls on. + +Most of these sects are not held in great esteem by the people, though there are many Moslems who believe that the whirling, +howling, and other performances of these gentry, are caused by divine inspiration, and consequently should be held in reverence. + +The Turkish government has on several occasions contemplated the suppression of some of the orders of dervishes, particularly those +that possess considerable wealth. There are persons uncharitable enough to suppose that this contemplated suppression is induced by +the fact that the property of the dervishes would revert to the government in case the sects were discontinued. + +Some of the sects have a great deal of fasting and prayer, and make their ceremonies interesting by the addition of various bodily +tortures. It is said that a sect was founded in the first century of the Hegira by a holy man named Uvies. Among other farewells to +worldly pleasures, he required his followers to draw all their teeth, in remembrance of the Prophet’s loss of two teeth at a battle +on behalf of Islam. Painless dentistry was not, then in vogue, as nobody had discovered chloroform, ether, or laughing gas. Uvies +did not get very far with his sect, and it expired soon after his death. Another pious Moslem tried to start a sect of dervishes in +which every member should have his eyes put out during the ceremony of initiation. He was obliged to be chief and all hands, as he +never found anybody to join his order. The devout Mohammedans couldn’t see it. + +{177} + +[Illustration: 0187] + + + + +CHAPTER XII--ON THE BOSPHORUS.--AMONG THE ISLES OF GREECE. + + +_Far-Away Moses, the Famous Guide--His Numerous Brothers--His Shop in the Great Bazaar--An Evening at the “Foreign Club”--Dreaming +of Polyglots and the Tower of Babel--More “Backsheesh”--Passing the Custom House--How they Protect Home Manufactures--Standing Up +for One’s Own Country--“Honesty ish te Besht Bolicy”--Borrowing Money at Twenty per cent.--The Start from Constantinople--A hint +to Travelers--Sleeping in Public on the Stage--Interviewing the Purser--A Satisfactory Arrangement--Baron Bruck and his +Career--Unwelcome Intruders--Classic Ground--One Trifling Peculiarity._ + + +I HAD “done” the sights of Constantinople--bazaars, mosques, dogs, dervishes and other things--and was ready to depart. + +I had even “done” and been “done” by Far-Away Moses, the famous guide whom Mark Twain has sent down to posterity, and had bought +several articles in his shop. + +Moses is guide and merchant, and when he is not attending to business in the one branch he is attending to it in the other. + +He is a dignified Oriental with a Jewish cast of features, and he bows in a way that Mr. Turveydrop would envy. He has a shop--one +shop--in the Great Bazaar, but a stranger might suppose that he owned half of Constantinople. + +The guides and runners are on the lookout for Americans and are always ready to take them to the shop of Far-Away Moses. The joke of +the matter is that they take them somewhere else, where they can get a larger commission on purchases, and invariably tell you that +it is the shop of the venerable F. A. M., Esq. If you are familiar with the features of Moses, they tell you he is just out but +you can trade quite as well with his brother who is {178}on hand to accommodate you. But if you have not met the original you are +introduced to some English-speaking Turk, Jew, or Christian who affectionately inquires after Mark Twain and hopes he is well and +happy. + +I think about seven dozen “brothers of Far-Away Moses” were pointed out to me, and they resembled him, each other, and themselves, +about as much as a cup of coffee resembles a row of mixed drinks in an American bar room. + +[Illustration: 9188] + +Moses admits that like the friend of Toodles “he had a brother” but he denies fraternal relations with all the “brothers” that hang +about the bazaars and hotels. + +Moses narrates an experience of his mercantile life such as we sometimes hear of in America. He shipped a lot of goods to Vienna +at the time of the Exposition, and on these goods he figured a handsome profit on his mental slate. They were sent by steamer to +Trieste, and thence by rail to Vienna. On arrival the boxes were found to contain old iron, straw, and pieces of wood, and Moses was +in great grief, for the original lot had cost him about six hundred pounds sterling. + +He tried to recover, but the two companies--steamboat and railway--played “Spenlow and Jorkins” on him most admirably. Each said +that the robbery must have occurred while the boxes were in charge of the other concern, and after much trouble Moses received +nothing by way of indemnity. Neither company would pay a centime until the locality of the robbery had been proved, and as this +could not be shown, there was no payment. And to add to the loss he could not even recover the freight charges, which he had paid in +full before removing the boxes from the railway station and discovering his loss. {179}It rained cats and dogs for two days before I +left, and, as Turkish sight-seeing requires fair weather, I was kept imprisoned most of that time in the hotel. Our Consul-General, +Mr. Good-enow, kindly introduced me to the Foreign Club and enabled me to break the monotony of the evenings with a few hours in +the luxurious house where the association has its home. To judge by the appearance of the club, its cuisine, and other things, the +foreigners in Constantinople know how to live well, and are determined to practice what they know. + +The club includes many nationalities--English, French, American, German, Russian, Italian, Greek, Spanish, Swiss, and others,--in +its membership, and a visit to its rooms gives one an idea of the cosmopolitan character of the population of the Queen City of +the Orient. Turks are not excluded, a Turkish gentleman being just as eligible to membership as any other. Diplomates, merchants, +bankers, government officials, gentlemen of fortune with nothing to do, and the other miscellaneous characters that make up a club +in a large city, were pointed out to me among the members that dined and lounged in the club-house. + +French was the prevailing language, but you would hear enough of other tongues in the course of an evening to make you dream all +night of the Tower of Babel, and the unhappy gentlemen that found it a losing speculation. + +On the morning of our departure the weather cleared up, and we had the satisfaction of bidding farewell to Constantinople under a +bright sky and in the glow of a warm sunshine. Our baggage was piled on the backs of some able-bodied porters, and we followed it +and them down the hill of Pera, in the same solemn procession as we first mounted it. + +The Custom House was lenient in consequence of a “backsheesh” of two francs, and the odds and ends that we had bought in the city +were not disturbed. + +Two of our party had laid in a liberal supply of Broussa silks and other specialties of Constantinople, and consequently they did +not want the officials to be inquisitive. They thought they got off cheap at two francs, and I think they did. + +And here is a good place to say something about the export duty on Turkish manufactures. {180}The English, as we all know, are very +earnest in advancing free trade; they have it, and want everybody else to enjoy its blessings. Whether their theories are right +or wrong I do not propose to discuss, as I am not writing a book on political economy. England believes emphatically in free +trade--free export and free import--and every Englishman would tell you that a tax on manufactured exports would be the very thing +to cripple home industries. + +I have been informed, whether with absolute truth I cannot say, but I believe my authority was good, that the Turkish export tax was +imposed in consequence of the advice of the then British Minister at Constantinople. The Turkish cabinet sought his advice as to the +best means of encouraging manufacture in the Ottoman empire and making them a source of revenue. + +“Nothing simpler,” replied His Excellency the British Minister; “put a tax on your exports; make all your manufactures exported +to foreign countries pay a tax, say, of ten per cent., and you will make a handsome revenue for the treasury, and enable the +manufacturer to realize such, a profit as to stimulate your home industries to a wonderful extent. The protection and encouragement +of home enterprise is the first duty of every government. England keeps a careful watch over her manufacturing interests and does +everything to stimulate them, and you can see the result in the immense prosperity of our island.” + +The embassador was faithful to the land he represented; he wasn’t going to make an ass of himself by telling the Turks anything that +would tend to the injury of British commerce. If manufacturing industry was developed in Turkey, it would very likely interfere, in +some branches, with Birmingham or Manchester, and this is what no true English representative would wish. + +I like to see a man stand up for his country and his friends. + +If you are a lawyer or bootmaker, a doctor or blacksmith, in a country village with just business enough for one, you don’t want a +rival setting up there, and if any young fellow wants to know how to start in your trade and is determined to try, it is necessary +to lie to him and put him on the wrong track, in order to be just to yourself and your family. + +“Honesty ish de best bolicy,” said a clear headed German once upon a time, “but it keeps a man tam poor.” + +{181}When your advice is asked by your neighbor, don’t fly away with the notion that you want to do him any good. + +Remember that charity and all other noble sentiments should begin at home, and be careful not to advise him to anything that will +interfere with yourself. + +Turkish manufactures have been for some time in a languishing condition. In the early part of the present century Turkey had several +important industrial centres; the most noted of them were Bagdad, Aleppo, Dierbeker, Broussa, Smyrna, Scutari, and Tournovo. Aleppo +alone had forty thousand weavers engaged in i making goods of silk or cotton, either mixed or single, and in producing cloth of silk +or gold thread, for which Aleppo was famous. The city now has scarcely a fifth of her former number i of weavers; and in the other +places, where there were extensive manufacturers, the business has fallen off in about equal proportion. Improved machinery in +England and France, and the heavy taxes on manufactures, have caused the decline; and though the government has sought to revive +Turkish industry, it has not yet succeeded. + +The export trade of Turkey consists mainly of raw materials, such as wool, silk, cotton, tobacco, wheat, drugs, dyes, opium, honey, +and sponges. The principal manufactured exports are carpets and red cloths. The value of the imports is about double that of the +exports, and much of the raw stuff sent out of Turkey comes back in the shape of manufactured goods. And this state of affairs is +steadily increasing. + +Turkey has become so far civilized that she has saddled herself with a stupendous debt, borrowing the money in Europe, at enormous +rates of interest, and then borrowing the money to pay that interest with. She has about as much prospect of paying it as the +President of the Fat Men’s Association has of learning to fly and setting up for a carrier pigeon. She has miserable roads all +through the interior of the country, and only within a few years has she given any attention to building railways. She has lots of +palaces, and an immense fleet of iron-clads; and when any luxury is wanted she always finds the money to buy it. + +When I was in Constantinople the further construction of the railway, that is intended to connect with the Austrian system, was +{182}stopped for the want of funds. “The government is very hard pressed just now for money,” said one of the officials, “and our +docks and railways must wait.” + +A week later the same gentleman met me and volunteered this important information: + +“Six hundred sea-coast breech-loading cannon have been ordered from Krupp, the great fabricant of artillery, and the money for them +is to be deposited in Paris within the next two months.” + +Krupp does not make breech-loading cannon for nothing, and he generally has the money down before he makes them. + +Turkey can find money enough when she wants palaces and ships of war, but she can’t afford railways and docks. Remember, there are +no docks at Constantinople where a sea-going ship can lie. They want them, but cannot afford the expense. + +Now that I have had my growl, we will go on as if nothing had happened. + +We were rowed out to the steamer which lay at anchor, with steam up, and was announced to sail at ten o’clock. + +For some reason the departure was delayed until nearly eleven, and in consequence of this detention there was a row between the +captain and chief engineer. The latter was responsible for the consumption of coal; he had been told that the steamer would sail at +ten, and it was not fair to burn up his coal while lying at anchor. + +The captain replied chat he would sail when he got ready. Engineer threatened to report to the management--captain told him to mind +his own business--and there were several other remarks of a lively character. + +As soon as the engineer retired below, the captain hustled some of his friends over the side, and the steamer sailed. The threat to +report to the management had its effect. + +Memorandum for travellers in the Orient: + +When you feel that any imposition has been practised on you by any high _attaché_ of a steamship, don’t make a noisy row about it, +but go quietly to the one who has offended you, and in calm and dignified tones ask him to give you the name and address of his +managing director. Give him a card on which to write it, thank him politely for the address and walk away. In less than {183}ten +minutes you will obtain what you previously wanted, and quite likely more than you expected. The captains do not like to have +complaints going to the management, and will do anything in reason to avoid it. + +To illustrate:--I one day took passage on a steamer, and was on board half an hour before she sailed. I went at once to the purser’s +office, paid my fare, and asked for a room. Purser said I could not have a room, but must sleep on a sofa in the cabin. + +Now, if there is one thing that I dislike more than another, it is to sleep in public on the stage in presence of a crowded +audience. I want a room to myself when it can be had, as I know that while sleeping I appear best alone. And I always secure my +passage early for this very reason. In the present instance, I had visited the office of the company in a vain effort to secure a +place. The agent told me the tickets were sold only by the purser. + +On the back of my ticket was the announcement that no room could be secured until paid for. I waited around the office, and after +the boat left the port, half-a-dozen men, of the same nationality as the purser, came and paid their fare, and were assigned to +rooms. Then I went to the office and complained of unjust treatment; the purser said he could do nothing for me, and unless I was +careful, I wouldn’t have so much as a sofa in the cabin. + +I went to the captain and complained, and the captain referred my case to the purser. + +Then I returned to the purser, and put on a calm exterior, though I felt inside as explosive as an overcharged soda-fountain. + +“Will you be so kind,” I said, “as to give me the address of the managing director of this company?” + +“Why do you want it?” + +“I have occasion to write him a letter on business of the company.” + +“What business?” + +“A mere trifle. Never mind what it is. It will interest him, and be beneficial to the company.” + +“The name of the managing director is ----------” + +“Please write it on the back of this card,” and I gave him my personal card, on which to inscribe the name. {184}The purser turned +red, pale, blue, green, yellow, pink, crimson, ultra-marine, and scarlet; he could have sold his face at a high price just then to +a maker of kaleidoscopes. He began writing, stopped, began again, and altogether was at least two minutes in writing the name and +postal direction. + +When he had finished I took the card, stowed it away in my pocket, and retired to the deck, where I proceeded to solace myself with +a cigar and a study of the receding shores. + +[Illustration: 0194] + +Two minutes after I reached the deck, I saw the purser and captain in deep consultation near the wheel-house. Two minutes later the +purser, cap in hand, came to me, and said to me that one of the reserved rooms had not been claimed, and was at my disposal. Would I +condescend to look at it? + +I condescended, and descended to the cabin. The room was comfortable, and all my fancy had painted it. I was mollified, thanked the +purser for his politeness, ordered the steward to! bring my baggage, and was speedily installed in the apartment. The purser could +not have been more civil to the governor of the Fejee Islands than he was to me during the rest of the voyage. + +We steamed out of the harbor of Constantinople towards the Sea of Marmora. + +First vanished the shipping in the Golden Horn, and the never-ceasing stream of people crossing the bridge of boats. Then the +irregular terraces of many-colored houses in Fera and {185}Golata were lost to sight, though to memory dear; and then our eyes +lingered on Stamboul with its mosque-crowned hills, and the Seraglio palace with its surroundings of groves jutting into the +widening mouth of the Bosphorus. The sunlight played on the roofs, and domes, and minarets of Stamboul, and brightened the hills +that formed the back-ground of the picture. + +Long time the city remained in view, but at last it became a jagged strip of white in the horizon, then a scarcely perceptible +streak like a sandy beach by the sea shore, and then it was lost to sight altogether. + +I repeat what I have said elsewhere, that by far the best approach to Constantinople is by the Black Sea, and not from the Sea of +Marmora; not only as concerns the city itself, but with reference to the charming panorama of the Bosphorus, which becomes more and +more brilliant each mile that we advance, until at last the anchor drops at the entrance of the Golden Horn, and we stand in front +of the Queen of the Orient. + +The steamer that carried us belonged to the Austrian Lloyds (Lloyd Austriaco). + +The company has a fleet of some forty steamers engaged in the navigation of the Mediterranean and adjoining seas, and it has its +headquarters at Trieste. + +In 1833 one Baron Bruck established at Trieste a reading room and marine exchange similar to the celebrated Lloyd’s at London and +from which he took the name. The members of the exchange became a powerful company for commercial and industrial purposes. + +In 1836, it established a newspaper which still exists; in 1837, it started a line of steamers; and in 1849, an institution devoted +to printing and art. It has become a most important association and exerts a powerful influence upon the politics and finance of the +Austrian Empire. Its founder became the Austrian minister of finance, but owing to certain jealousies he was removed in 1860. + +His mortification at his downfall terminated in suicide. + +To travel on the ships of this company costs on the average about twelve dollars a day (gold), inclusive of passage, room, and +meals. Wine is charged extra, and the steward expects a financial remembrance when you bid him farewell. {186}The servant who has +attended you at table is likewise on hand when money is visible, and is generally more civil then than at other times. + +During most of the day the mountains on the coast of the Sea of Marmora were in sight but too far away to be little more than +outlines. We passed the Dardanelles at night, while all of us were in our bunks, which proved to be the happy hunting grounds of +many members of the well-known sporting family, _Cimex lectularius._ + +We were not greatly refreshed by our slumber, and passed a unanimous vote that the next time we were obliged to travel on that line +we would seek passage on another steamer. + +Morning found us running among the islands of the Greek Archipelago, and there was not an hour of the entire day when we did not +have some of them in sight. They had a bleak, barren appearance, as they contained scarcely any trees on the sides visible to us, +and the slopes of the rocky shores were very steep. There were not many indications of inhabitants, but now and then we could see +villages near the water or perched high up the sides of the mountains, where it evidently required a great deal of glue to make them +stick. + +I am somewhat confused as to the names of the islands we passed and cannot attempt to give them all. I will only venture on Lemnos, +Skyros, Andros, Tinos, and Kuthnos, and I won’t be very sure about these. There were Delos and Naxos, Melos and Kimolos, Mykonos and +Paros and there were more ‘oses if anybody wants them. We were not a very large party and there were more islands than enough to go +around. And then there were some other islands that like the lion in the boy’s picture book, couldn’t get any prophet Daniel. + +The Greek Archipelago is scattered around promiscuously; it would have been vastly more convenient if the islands had been set up in +rows like potato-hills, but I suppose they would not have been so picturesque as they are in their present arrangement. + +I observed one geographical peculiarity and made a note of it, that every island, without regard to size or position, was surrounded +by water. + +{187} + +[Illustration: 0197] + + + + +CHAPTER XIII--SYRA, THE MARBLE ISLAND.--LIFE AT AN ATHENIAN HOTEL. + + +_In sight of Syra--Active Trade in one Fish--A town all built of Marble--The “Doubter” expresses his sentiments--Gustave’s +Adventure--Walking on One’s Ear--“A little more beer, boy!”--The Pirates’ Retreat--Extraordinary politeness in a café--A lesson +for American Barkeepers--In the Stamboul’s Cabin--“Blowing great guns”--A tale of a Tub--Honey and Marble--Standing in the city of +Demosthenes--The battle of the rival hotels--Profanity in an unknown tongue--Outgeneraling Inn-keepers--Tricks on Travelers--Useful +knowledge for Foreign Travel._ + + +A LITTLE before sunset we were drenched by a shower, and through the rifts of the heavy clouds, I caught sight of the Island of +Syra, the most important of the insular possessions of Greece. + +We entered the port and dropped anchor, a hundred yards from the _Stamboul_, an old paddle steamer which was to convey us to the +Piraeus. + +Though we had bought tickets through to the latter port we found that we must make the transfer at our own expense, it being the +rule of the company that all landings, embarkations, and transfers are at passenger’s expense. + +We waited till the rain ceased and then bargained with a boatman to take us to the other ship; the transfer was an unpleasant one as +the boat danced uneasily on the water and a fresh shower gave us a very fair drenching while we were en route. The “Doubter” got the +worst of it, and was so thoroughly soaked and {188}frightened that he determined to stay and keep ship, while the rest of us went on +shore to spend the evening in town. + +What befell us there will be told subsequently. + +Syra is not a large island, its greatest length being little over fourteen miles and its width in the broadest part about six. Homer +mentions and describes it as the country of Eumæus, the faithful servant of Ulysses, and the character of the island corresponds +to-day with the account given by the “blind old man of Scio’s rocky isle.” + +The city which bears the name of the island is the most important commercial point in all Greece. Its population is said to be not +far from thirty thousand; they are emphatically a commercial people, and when not employed in legitimate trade with outsiders, they +speculate with each other. While loitering on the quay I saw a man sell a fish to another, the latter sold it to a third and the +trade went on till the fish had changed hands four or five times. Whether the price was increased by each transaction I am unable to +say, but am inclined to think it was not likely to be reduced. + +Later in the day I saw a smaller fish--it may have been the old one worn down by manipulation--passing about with a good deal i of +activity. If he could have taken a commission each time he, changed hands he could have amassed a handsome fortune and set up for a +“_big fish_” before the end of the season. + +As I had come from Constantinople where the streets are in a condition of wretchedness, as regards pavement and dirt, the streets of +Syra seemed to me wonderfully clean. There are immense quarries of marble just back of the town, and marble is one of the articles +of export. Marble is cheaper in Syra than n granite or brick. The houses are built of marble, the streets paved with it, and the +quay and the wall that bound it are made of marble. You see marble everywhere, and after a time you begin to wish they would throw +in some other stone by way of variety. + +The streets are paved with broad blocks and in many places these blocks are so smooth that one is in danger of slipping unless he +treads carefully. The gutters are in the middle of the streets instead of at the sides, and every few yards there is a grated hole +where the water runs into the sewers. {189}I could not see the necessity of having these holes so numerous until I learned by +actual experience how the rain fell. It came down suddenly, as if the clerk of the weather had called all hands and put them to work +upsetting a row of buckets right over Syra. + +It didn’t rain, it poured and more than poured; the heaviest shower I ever saw in New York was the mildest premonitory sprinkle, +compared to the rain at Syra. The sewer-holes had all they could attend to, and it was then that you perceived the wisdom of putting +the gutters in the middle of the streets, and also the wisdom of having no cellar doors on a level with the sidewalk. Under the +present arrangement there might be, (and quite likely such is the case,) a foot or so of water in the street, without doing damage +to anybody, except to the unlucky pedestrian. + +There is a public square in Syra paved with marble and set out with rows of trees and beggars. The latter are less stationary than +the trees, and not half as pretty; I did not see any fruit growing upon either. + +Viewed from the water, Syra has the appearance of half an amphitheatre, as the steepness of the hill causes the houses to rise in +irregular terraces; there is a depression in the hill-side, so that the general effect reminds you of the tier of boxes in an opera +house when you look at them from the stage. + +This is the new town of modern Syra. + +To reach ancient Syra, you have a great deal of climbing to do, as it is a long way up the hill-side, directly above the new town. + +I was satisfied to do it by proxy, as I had a “game foot” that complained when I exercised it vigorously. The judge and I sat in a +_café_, while the rest of our party climbed the hill and came back all red and weary and thirsty. Their calls for beer were like the +howls of a lion in the wilderness. + +The “Doubter” declared that he had his doubts about the island being fourteen miles long, but he was ready to swear that it was not +less than ten miles high. + +This is what Gustave said about old Syra, and I must rely on him, as I know nothing about it myself: + +“You cross a deep ravine, and then you come to a stairway all {190}of marble, and so hot under the sunshine, that it would melt the +lid off a copper tea-kettle in the time you could hold a red hot nail in your ear without feeling it.” + +Then we went through a lot of zig-zag streets, and then more of them, and then some more stairs and zig-zags. The stones were +slippery and dangerous, especially in coming down, and two or three times I felt myself walking on a part of my body which is not +ordinarily employed for pedestrian purposes. + +Well, we got to the top of the hill at last, and were at the church of St. George. I was tired and foot-sore, but I think I was +amply paid for the fatigue and trouble. The view was magnificent, and included the whole panorama of the Cyclades. (_Garçon, encore +de la bier, s’il vous plait_) The guide pointed out Tinos and Mykonos, Nicaria, and Samos, and also Great and Little Delos. Off in +the distance were Naxos, Paros, and Anti-paros, and they tried to point out Siphnos and Milos through a hollow in the mountain to +the south of us. Down in front of us there was a beautiful view--I wouldn’t have missed it for a great deal, and I wouldn’t go up +there again for twice as much as I would have missed it for. (_Garçon, encore de la bier. Comme jai soif!_ ) + +We had landed at the quay in front of the custom house on the evening of our arrival, and as the rain fell by little fits and +starts, we didn’t wander around very much, but made our way to the best _café_ in the place. + +It overlooked the public square, and had rows of seats on the sidewalk, which was protected by a roof impervious to water. While +we sat there, a member of our party discovered an acquaintance among the coffee-drinkers at another table, and speedily there was a +fusilade of congratulations in the accent and language of Northern Germany. Then we were introduced all around, and all around, too, +we had fresh glasses of beer. + +Our new acquaintance was a German, whose business had located him at Syra, and the indications were that he was well satisfied with +it. At all events, he stood treat with a liberality worthy of a Californian, and made us feel that we owned the entire island and +all its contents. The quay of Syra is an animated place, as it contains many shops and stalls, where you can buy anything from a +fish up to a marine engine. {191}The Greek boatmen are a picturesque race, with a costume that seems to be a compromise between the +Occident and the Orient. Their uniform is multiform, and you are puzzled to know which is which. + +Most of the boatmen and sailors wear trowsers with considerable bagginess, and a sort of loose jacket over the shoulders. On their +heads they wear red caps like the Turkish fez, but with the top falling to one side, where it is kept down by a long tassel. + +In character they are not over-trustworthy, and they have the reputation of being ready to turn to piracy whenever it will pay +better than honest work. In times past their reputation was worse than at present, and they were at one period the terror of +Oriental waters. Steam cruisers put an end to their piracy, as it has to that of many enterprising mariners elsewhere. + +In our first evening in Syra we saw a couple of fights, but they possessed no interest, as the disputants were separated before +they had time to disembowel each other. Two of the descendants of Homer and Ulysses were drunk in the _café_; under ordinary +circumstances they would have been allowed to stay there, but the proprietor felt himself honored by our visit, and determined to +eject his friends and regular patrons. He informed them that they had been sent for, and as the night was dark he would allow one of +the waiters to escort them. They fell into the trap, and were quietly taken out, and the waiter returned after walking a couple +of blocks and leaving them in a low drinking shop where they wished to slake their thirst. The whole business was managed very +adroitly, and showed how much better it is for a head bar-keeper to tell a lie than to indulge in brute violence, in which he might +break some of his furniture. + +On this evening we did nothing in the sight-seeing line beyond the visit to the _café_ and the public square, the journey to Old +Syra being made on our return from Greece. We returned about nine o’clock to the quay, and were taken on board the Stamboul, which +had her steam up for departure. Half-a-dozen other steamers were in port, and there were thirty or more sailing ships, so that the +harbor presented a reasonably lively appearance. The terraces of lights in the town and extending to and {192}through Old Syra had +a curious effect, and made the city resemble an illuminated mountain. The light-houses, which mark the entrance of the harbor, were +each sending out a clear flame, the rain had ceased, and the stars were beaming clear and distinct in the sky. + +Although in the harbor, the steamer was pitching and rolling about, and we had experienced a very lively tossing on our way from +shore to ship. A regular _vent du diable_ was blowing outside, and things indicated that we should have all we wanted when we got +into it and were plowing our way towards the Piraeus. + +Half a dozen passengers were sitting at the cabin table and contemplating a bottle of Scotch whisky, which they discussed in a +polyglot of languages. Two who were drunk imagined themselves sober, and two who were sober, imagined themselves drunk, so that +there was a very mixed condition of things. Smoking was forbidden in the cabin, but as there was only one lady passenger, and she +had retired, and moreover belonged to our party, and had a smoking husband, we lighted cigars and made ourselves comfortable before +going to bed. + +Just as I entered my bunk I heard the anchor chain coming in, and soon we were out on the open waters. We went along nicely for a +while, till we had passed the shelter of the Island of Syros and then we caught it. Our course lay between the islands of Thermia +and Zea, in the direction of Cape Sunium, which forms the extremity of the Peninsula of Attica. + +All night long we tossed, and the timbers of the ship creaked so that you couldn’t hear yourself snore. Sometimes we didn’t make +two miles an hour, and I could hear the other passengers, in momentary intervals of creaking, groaning and falling to pieces in the +agonies of _mal-de-mer_. In the morning the captain said it was one of the roughest nights he had ever known in those waters. “Had +I not felt,” said he, “the greatest confidence in my ship, and known that she was perfectly staunch and strong, I should have turned +back after passing the Island of Syra, and learning the strength of the wind.” + +And yet the Stamboul was an old tub, with a quarter of a century on her head, and barnacles on her bottom.. {193}Let no one despise +an old tub hereafter. I would give more now for the one in which Dionysius--no it was Diogenes--used to live, than for the best +modern article of the same sort from the hands of the most skillful cooper that breathes, as I could sell it for more money. + +When I went on deck in the morning Mount Olympus was in sight, and we could see the classic shores of Greece (expression claimed as +original and secured by two patents). They were not over-cheerful in appearance, but the leaden sky, and the cold wind that was +then blowing, had doubtless much to do with their aspect. Mount Olympus was less lofty than I expected to find it, and greatly +disappointed me, but I felt better afterwards, when I learned that the real mountain chain which bears that name, is on the Morean +peninsula and between Thessaly and Macedonia. The mountain which was pointed out to me was a small affair opposite to Mount Keratia; +between the two is a small village called Olympus, and inhabited by a few Greeks, and a great many fleas. + +Next we saw a long mountain with a wooded summit, and were told it was Mount Hymettus of history. This was something like a mountain +and it stretched away in a ridge toward the north, where Pentelicus lay in the dim distance. In a little while we saw a sharp +conical hill that marked the position of Athens, and for a short time we had the Acropolis in sight. The shore of Greece, as we +skirted it, had a rough and rather barren appearance, and seemed to be indented with many small bays. Not a ship, not a fishing boat +even, was in sight, and our steamer appeared to have everything to herself. Certainly our first view of Greece was not calculated to +inspire us with enthusiasm. + +We rounded a promontory and entered the Piraeus, the port of Athens. It is a nice little pocket edition of a harbor well sheltered +and with good anchorage. Ships of war might find a refuge there, but unfortunately it could not hold many of them. The town is quite +modern, and also quite interesting; nobody stops there any longer than he is obliged to, and when travellers are delayed there by +the detention of a steamer, there is generally a great deal of growling. + +A swarm of boats came out to the ship, and as soon as the {194}quarantine officers had examined the health bill, and admitted us to +_pratique_, there was a rush of boatmen, dragomen, guides, hotel runners, and the like, so that the deck was speedily covered. On an +average there must have been six and a half of these gentry to each passenger. + +We passed the Custom House with the usual formalities, (a bribe of two francs,) and turned our attention to the hotel runners, and +standing on the soil where Homer sang and Demosthenes pronounced his orations, we drove the closest bargain which we had yet made. + +Four runners from as many hotels were after us, and we put ourselves up at auction to the lowest bidder, just as they used to sell +out the paupers in that respectable town in New England where I was born and bred, and instructed in the mysteries of orthography +and penny-tossing. They began at fifteen francs per day for each person, including wine, candles, and service. + +The _Hotel d’Angleterre_ would take us for fourteen. + +The _Hotel des Etrangers_ would go one better; we should be taken in at thirteen francs. + +The other two hotels dropped out of the competition and went to the rear, and so we had it out between the pair that I have named. +The runners appeared to be personal enemies, and covered each other with epithets that were delightful to hear, as we didn’t know +what they meant. It is a great pleasure to hear one blackguard abuse another, in a language of which you are entirely ignorant. You +run no risk of being shocked by the coarseness of the phrases, and can quite resign yourself to a contemplation of the gestures and +emphasis with which the terse little speeches are delivered. If I could find the man who offered a reward for the invention of a new +pleasure, I would name the above amusement and humbly ask for the money. + +We whiled away a half hour in this way very pleasantly and profitably; all the Greek profanity that those runners vented on each +other didn’t cost us a cent; in fact we made money by it, as we lowered the prices of the hotels at Athens to a satisfactory figure. +For ten francs per day each person, we were to have rooms only one flight up, and each room should have a balcony. We were to be +roomed, fed, wined, candled, washed, combed, and attended, for that paltry amount, and we were to have all the candies we wanted. +Moreover they were to make no charges for lunches when we went on excursions; this is a point on which hotels in the Orient +generally lay it on thick in the way of extras. We had brought them down to their lowest terms, and almost felt ashamed of ourselves +after we had done it. + +We started for Athens with the question still undecided in the hope that we might get a better offer before arriving there. On the +way up we developed a new dodge. + +“I’ve an idea,” I said to my German friends; “suppose we divide the party.” + +“You go to the _Angleterre_, and we Americans will go to the _Etrangers_. The hotels are close together, so that we can talk across +from the windows, and we will then play the houses against each other.” + +“Very good,” replied Charley, “just the thing. Evidently the competition between them is exceedingly bitter, and they are ready to +cut each other’s throats.” + +So it was agreed that we were to divide. We did not leave the carriages until the proprietors had ratified the agreements made by +their runners, and we did not allow the baggage taken out till we had seen and accepted the rooms. + +At the _Hotel des Etrangers_ they were sorry, very sorry, but they had only one room with a balcony, and that was on the the second +floor. + +“Very well, then,” I said, “we will see what our friends can do at the other hotel,” and I turned to go to the carriage where I had +left the Judge to look after the “Doubter,” and the other baggage. + +“Stop, gentlemen,” said the proprietor; “I give you nice back rooms on first floor.” + +“That will never do,” I replied, as I placed my hand on the carriage door. + +“I just thinks,” said the proprietor, “I have single one balcony room on first floor mit two beds.” + +“Never! we want three rooms with balconies on first floor,” and I opened the carriage door. + +“You sell have two rooms mit three beds.” + +“Never! that will not do,” and I entered the carriage and told the driver to drive on. {196} “Oh, gentlemens, I just thinks; +stop--one gentleman go away zis night and you have ze three rooms as you want. Dat is all right.” + +We entered and took possession, and the landlord was all politeness. + +Our German friends had almost identically the same performance at the _Hotel d’ Angleterre_, and with the same result. + +The rivalry of these two hotels was of a bitterness rarely seen in cities; it resembled the hostility of two country boys when both +are sweet on the same girl. No servant of one establishment was allowed to enter the other, and when we sent messages requiring +answers, the bearer was obliged to wait outside the front door, while the porter of _that_ house took the missive up stairs and +brought the response. The rival proprietors were not on speaking terms, and the guides and runners were constantly at war. + +During the whole of our stay we played upon their jealousies to the best of our abilities. When we wanted to hire carriages for +drives around the city or in its vicinity we put the business in competition and reduced the rates nearly one-half. We thus obtained +carriages for twelve francs where twenty was the regular price, and for fifteen francs where they ordinarily demanded twenty-five. +No matter what we wanted, we always said, “We will see what our friends at the other house can do.” That always brought them to +terms. + +It is not often that a traveller profits by the quarrels of innkeepers. These gentry are much more likely to resemble in their +discords, the operations of the two sides of a pair of shears,--they cut not themselves but what’s between them. + +{197} + +[Illustration: 0207] + + + + +CHAPTER XIV--ATHENS ANCIENT AND MODERN--SIGHTS AND SCENES IN THE GRECIAN CAPITAL. + + +_First Impressions of Athens--Opinion of the “Doubter”--“Not Worth Damming”--The Oldest Inhabitant of Athens--Celebrated +Ruins--Reminiscences of Greek Grammar--A “Big Injun” on Greek--Drinking beer on sacred sol--A toper-graphical survey--The +Acropolis-What is it?--The Temple of Jupiter Olympus--Seven Hundred years in Building--A young Englishman in a scrape--Sunset +from the Acropolis--Byron’s glorious lines--The Parthenon and its surroundings--Foundations of the Ancient Citadel--Excavations of +antiquarians--Greek Art--An important discovery--The line of beauty._ + + +THE first view of Athens gives a stranger a favorable impression; the city stands in a plain, at the foot of Mount Lycabettus and +the Acropolis, and is between the river Cephissus on one side and the Elissus on the other. + +Considered as rivers these streams are of very little consequence and hardly worth mentioning, but regarded as brooks they are +entitled to some respect. The Greeks call them rivers and I suppose they ought to know what they are about. + +It is with some hesitation I venture to suggest that if the Elissus and Cephissus were united, it would take about sixteen mil, lion +of these combined streams to equal the Mississippi. The “Doubter” said he didn’t believe that a man in search of a mill-site would +consider either of these Athenian torrents worth damming. + +The oldest inhabitant of Athens is dead, and his death occurred according to the historians, about thirty-four hundred years ago, or +to be particular about dates, in 1643 before the Chris{198}tian Era. A gentleman named Cecrops came there from Egypt and founded a +city which he called Cecropia. + +I enquired about Cecrops and learned, much to my regret, that he is no longer alive. Had he been in Athens I would have paid him my +respects. + +I will not attempt to write the history of Athens, for a variety of reasons, any one of which would be sufficient, and as two or +three at least will occur to every reader, I refrain from mentioning them. + +At present the city has something less than fifty thousand inhabitants, and possesses very little of the grandeur for which it was +once famous. + +The most attractive features about it are its ruins, and every visitor is much more interested in the Acropolis and other remains of +ancient Greece than in the modern city. But I must admit that Athens has considerable beauty and is well worth a visit, apart from +the historic associations that cluster around it. + +There is a pretty little palace where the royal family resides, and it is surrounded by gardens arranged with considerable taste, +and forming very agreeable promenades. In the square in front of the palace a band plays twice a week on pleasant afternoons and on +these occasions most of the fashionables, and many of the unfashionables, of Athens come out for an airing, and to see and be seen. +The balconies of our rooms overlooked this square, so that we could see the people and hear the music without the necessity of +walking. + +The principal street in Athens is named Hermes, and you are reminded that you are in Greece when you attempt to spell out the names +of the highways and by-ways. The characters are so nearly identical with the Ancient Greek that I found my school-day studies quite +convenient. When in my adolescence I spent considerable time over Anthon’s Greek Grammar, and over the Iliad and Odyssey of a party +by the name of Homer, I used to ask, and sometimes with a good deal of petulance: + +“What is the use of wasting time over this stuff when I might be skating or playing leap-frog?” + +And my good-natured old teacher would explain that it was the most useful employment for a young man that could be advised, and I +would one day see the advantage of it, and rejoice that I {199}had made my head ache over Alpha and Omega. + +[Illustration: 0209] + +I wanted to study French and German but he always told me that the modern languages were abominations, the works of a party of +brimstony memory, and I should bring ruin and disgrace upon myself if I had anything to do with them. So I shunned those paths of +wickedness until I reached the years of--misunderstandings, and devoted my young and happy days to Greek and Latin. {200}For a long +time I have had little to do with those dead languages, and I couldn’t conjugate a Greek or Latin verb to-day, if my life depended +on the result. But I see it all now, and my three or four years of Greek were of immense advantage to me when I was in Athens. + +It never took me more than a minute to spell out the name of a street; the names were painted in Greek letters, and I remembered the +shape of them. + +When the Judge and I were hunting for a beer shop I was the Big Injun of the party. The Judge did not know any more about Greek, +than a cow does about quadratic equations, and he was obliged to ask me to tell him the names of the streets. And the way I rattled +off Hermes, Eolus, Minerva, Adrian, and the like, would have done credit to a deaf and dumb asylum. Didn’t I rejoice that I was +familiar with Greek, and able to save the trouble of asking somebody to direct us to our destination? + +The Judge appreciated the situation and said, “What a splendid thing it is to know something! If I should ever be a husband, and a +father, and the results of my paternity should be boys, I would have them study Greek. They may come to Athens some time and find +it convenient in going about the streets. A good map of the city would cost fifty cents, and they will be able to save all that +expenditure.” + +There were tears in his eyes as he spoke, for we were in front of the beer-shop and found it closed. + +Happily there was another establishment for the sale of malt liquors, and as it was only two blocks away, I was able to get my +friend where he could rest and be comfortable. + +“Alas for the decline of Greece,” he muttered as he brought the glass to his lips, and drew a long breath with beer in it; “Once +she had her Homer, her Demosthenes, her Lycurgus, her Epaminondas; on yonder hill St. Paul preached to the Athenians his famous +discourse on the unknown God; here Socrates taught his philosophy; from Argos the mighty Agamemnon and his company of warriors +sailed for the siege of Troy, and hung like a bull-dog to a coat-tail for ten long and weary years; here Sculpture became the study +of a whole people, and Art {201}reached the highest point of development known to ancient times; here were fought those battles +between Greeks and Persians, that will live and ring through all history, and on yonder bay that shines so placidly in the afternoon +sun, the fleet of Xerxes was destroyed. + +[Illustration: 8211] + +“And what have we to-day? + +“The monuments of Ancient Greece are in ruins has dwindled so that it would hardly form a constituency for a custom-house collector; +and the beer, just taste it; the beer is entirely unfit to drink.” + +The beer was very bad, and it turned out that the bottle had been opened the day before for a customer, who concluded to take a +cigar instead. We had another bottle with better success, but on the whole were not inclined to praise the Athenian beverage. + +The Judge made a topographical survey of the entire city and visited every _brasserie_, but with no better success. Everywhere the +drinks were atrocious, and he ascribed the decayed condition of the country to the bad quality of the national beverage. + +“Somebody has said,” he remarked, when telling me of the result of his inspection, “somebody has said, ‘let me make the ballads of a +nation and I care not who makes the laws.’ + +“Now I will back up the correctness of that man’s theory, {202}provided you substitute beer for ballads. What can you expect of a +nation with such beer as this?” + +The great object of attraction at Athens is the Acropolis, and as soon as we had lunched after our arrival at the hotels, we set out +for that interesting hill. + +From the square where the palace and principal hotels are situated, it is a walk of half a mile or more to the Acropolis. + +A portion of the way is through the new quarter of the city and along a _boulevard_ of recent construction; as we approach the hill +we find ourselves among some older buildings, and scattered in these are some of the tombs and monuments that have been fortunately +preserved. We face the arch of Adrian, which is in a tolerable state of preservation, and halt at the temple of Jupiter Olympus, +the most extensive of all the temples of ancient Athens. History tells us that it was begun five hundred and thirty years before +the Christian era, and that various emperors and kings labored upon it. The work was not completed until nearly seven hundred years +after the first stone of the foundation was laid. It was originally three hundred and thirty feet long, by about half as many wide, +and contained one hundred and twenty marble columns, each nearly seven feet in diameter and sixty feet high! + +Only sixteen of these columns remain; one of them lies where it was thrown by an earthquake in 1852, and enables a visitor to see +with what excellence the Greek architects performed their work. On thirteen of the columns the architrave remains in position and +one is puzzled to know how those immense masses of stone were hoisted into place. + +The effect of these ruins is grand, partly on account of the vastness of the columns, and partly by reason of their isolated +position, in a large open space, where there are no surroundings of other structures to detract from the general effect. A few +soldiers are stationed there to prevent vandalism on the part, of strangers, and an enterprising Greek has established a miserable +café, among the columns. To what base uses may we come at last! + +Continuing our journey toward the Acropolis we passed the ruins of the Theatre of Bacchus; we reserved it for another day, {203}but +I may as well dispose of it here. According to some authorities it could contain thirty thousand spectators, and for a long time +it was the scene of the representations of the principal works of Eschylus, Sophocles, Euripides, and other famous writers of Greek +drama. The stage and auditorium were built of marble and limestone, and decorated in the highest style of magnificence known to that +period. The width of the stage was about eighty feet, and the diameter of the theatre on the upper rows of seats was nearly five +hundred feet. There were twenty-five tiers of seats, and there were twelve passage-ways leading through them, so that an audience +could be quickly assembled or as quickly dispersed. Till within a few years the whole theatre was covered with rubbish; excavations +have been carried on at the expense of the King of Prussia and other crowned heads, and latterly by the Archaeological Society of +Athens, so that the most of this ancient temple of the drama has been exposed to view. + +Statues and fragments lie around in great profusion. In the centre of the stage there is a small hut--the domicile of an old soldier +who has charge of the ruins, and presents an open hand for whatever “backsheesh” the visitor chooses to give him. The seats in the +foremost range were beautifully sculptured in marble, and were evidently very comfortable places to occupy during the performance. +There are fifty of these seats, and the names engraved on them show that they belonged to the priests and other high dignitaries of +Athens. + +The priest of Bacchus had the post of honor in the centre; his seat is larger and more elaborately sculptured than the rest and is +raised a few inches higher. Behind this row there are three rows which were occupied by the magistrates and similar dignitaries, and +behind these were the seats of the general public. + +Between the auditorium and the stage there is an open space which was occupied by the orchestra. Not a single musician was there +at the time of our visit, and not an actor or _danseuse_ could be found anywhere about the place. All! all! were gone, and in +their place a single Greek, _ancient_ but _modern_, soliciting something to keep him from starving. {204}The theatre was on the +southeastern slope of the Acropolis; the stage was at the foot of the hill and the auditorium extended up the slope. From here a +foot path extends along the base of the hill, and rises pretty steeply in places till it reaches a gate by the side of a modern +dwelling occupied by the custodians of the ruins. + +[Illustration: 9214] + +The gate is strong and high, and the lock is sufficiently powerful to defy the assaults of anybody who has not been educated either +as a locksmith or burglar. We passed under the eye of a custodian as we entered, and he followed us at a respectful distance to see +that we did no damage. The instructions to these custodians are the most sensible I have known anywhere in places of this kind. They +do not keep with you and cause annoyance by telling you what to look at, and hurrying you through faster than you want to go. All +that pleasing duty is left to the guide whom you have brought from the hotel. The government knows that he will be a sufficient +nuisance for all practical purposes, and consequently the custodians keep always from five to fifty yards away from you; they +let you wander where you please and do what you please, as long as you do not injure anything. They never speak to you unless you +attempt to play the vandal; we didn’t learn by experience what they, would do in that case, but were told that an offender is likely +to be severely treated. + +A young Englishman, a few years ago, in sheer mischief, broke the nose from one of the finest statues in the collection at {205}the +Acropolis. He was arrested on the spot, and had three months in a Greek prison, in which he made up his mind not to do so anymore. +He hasn’t gone around smashing marble noses since his release. And, in addition to his imprisonment, he had to pay a heavy fine, +which was applied to the fund for keeping the ruins in proper repair. + +We spent the afternoon on the Acropolis, studying it in its general features and listening to the monotonous drawl of our guide, as +he described the various temples and other structures whose remains covered the summit of the hill. From the wall at the southern +extremity we had a fine view of Athens, and looked down on the city, lying like a map beneath our feet. + +We lingered on the Acropolis till the lengthening shadows told us the day was coming to a close. We watched the sun go down, and +as the disc of light touched the horizon, one of our party repeated the lines which Byron is said to have written on this historic +spot: + + “Slow sinks, more lovely, ere his race be run, + + Along Morea’s hills, the setting sun; + + Not, as in Northern climes, obscurely bright, + + But one unclouded blaze of living light; + + O’er the hushed deep his mellow beim he throws, + + Gilds the green wave that trembles as it flows. + + O’er old Egina’s rock and Hydra’s Ile, + + The god of Gladness sheds his parting smile: + + O’er his own regions lingering, loves to shine, + + Though there his altars are no more divine. + + Descending low, the shadows, lingering, kiss + + Thy glorious gulf, unconquered Salamis! + + Their azure arches through the long expanse, + + More deeply purpled, meet his mellowing glance, + + And tenderest tints along their summits driven, + + Mark his gay course and own the hues of heaven, + + Till, darkly shaded by the land and deep, + + Behind his Delphian rock, he sinks to sleep.” + +The Acropolis cannot be seen satisfactorily in a single visit; two or three visits at least are necessary, and an entire week can be +spent there profitably. Our first day was intended only as an outline and preliminary inspection; next morning we went to work upon +the matter in earnest. + +{206}We told our guide we had no more use for him, until we had done with the Acropolis; we could be our own guides, philosophers, +and friends. + +We gathered all the books in our possession--English, French, and German--that had anything to say about the Acropolis, and we +borrowed all that were accessible at the hotels. Equipped with these and a lunch basket well filled, we sallied forth, determined to +“do” the ruins most thoroughly. + +[Illustration: 0216] + +We began at the beginning, and at each ruin or part of a ruin that we visited, one of us read aloud while the others listened. +It was slow work, and we took turns in the reading; we were three days at the Acropolis, and I do not believe any party of +non-professional tourists ever “did” the place more thoroughly. + +At this lapse of time and distance, the Acropolis and its temples and monuments stand clear and distinct before me, and there is +no confusion in the picture. This is more than I can say of many other places that I have visited, where I was obliged to limit to +hours and minutes what should have consumed entire and successive days. + +The Acropolis is an elevated rock, scarped on all sides, and is of an irregular oval form, about nine hundred feet long and four +{207}hundred feet across its greatest width. It is comparatively level on the summit, and its height above the sea is about five +hundred feet. + +The first walls erected there were for purposes of fortification, and are attributed to the Pelasgians; they are said to be more +than three thousand years old, and were evidently built with great care. Portions of them have been revealed by the excavations of +M. Beule, and are still visible; the stones are matched only on their exterior surface and that rather roughly; they consist of the +rock of the Acropolis, and not like the stones in the Greek walls, of material brought from a distance. + +Not much of the Pelasgian wall remains, as it was cut away in several places to make room for the Greek foundations of the Propylæ. +Near this wall there was a Greek pavement in front of the Temple of Victory. In 1853 this pavement was removed, and revealed the +rock of the Acropolis, bearing the traces of chariot wheels which rolled there more than thirty centuries ago. The ancient road is +clearly defined, and at its edges one can see the marks of the rude implements that were employed in smoothing it. + +Walls and fragments of walls, whose erection embraced periods hundreds of years apart, appear here and there. The noblest and +grandest are those of the Greeks, and they are so numerous that the plainest description of them would be tedious. + +The grand staircases which look toward the sea are sufficiently intact to show their extent, though they are much injured by modern +walls erected for military purposes--some by the Venetians, some by the Turks, and some by the Greeks, who were besieged there in +1822, during the war for independence. A few only of the columns of the Propylæ remain; they have excited the admiration of visitors +through all ages since their erection, twenty-three hundred years ago. They were preserved almost intact down to the 14th century, +when portions of them were removed for the construction of a fortress. + +The Turks converted the Propylæ into a powder magazine and a depot of arms, and one day the powder blew up and smashed things +generally. But enough remains to show the ancient grandeur of this portico of the Parthenon. {208}The Acropolis contained several +temples, and not, as many persons suppose, only that world-renowned structure, the Parthenon. But the Parthenon overtops them all, +and that in a double sense, as it stands on the highest part of the rocky plateau. The Parthenon was the work of Phidias, or was +constructed under his direction, and is generally considered the finest of the Greek temples. Though greatly ruined now, it remained +almost intact until 1687, when it was occupied by the Turks, who established a powder magazine in its centre. The Venetians were +besieging them, and a shell from a Venetian gun caused an explosion that blew down a large part of the building and left the walls +and columns in very nearly the condition in which we find them. + +Morosini, the Venetian conqueror, then entered the place; he did not undertake any more explosions, but he tore down and carried +away many of the statues and decorations. + +Subsequent conquerors and antiquarians carried away many other statues and reliefs, so that the most of the fine sculpture of the +Parthenon existing to-day must be sought in the museums of England and France. The British Museum contains the British lion’s share. + +The act of Lord Elgin in carrying away two ship loads of the treasures of the Parthenon has been severely criticised Our party had a +lively discussion on the subject, and the question was argued with a great deal of vehemence. + +At the time the sculptures were removed, Greece was in a very unsettled condition. The Parthenon had been greatly injured during the +wars of the preceding two hundred years, and there was no guarantee of permanent peace. The Turks were quite likely to come again, +and as for that matter there may be a Greco-Turkish war at anytime, that may lead to another Moslem occupation of Athens with its +attendant results. + +In the British Museum, the art-treasures of the Parthenon are far safer than they would be in Athens, and for purposes of art-study +they are accessible to thousands of persons, when they wouldn’t be seen by dozens if in the Greek capital. For those artists who +manage to visit Athens there is quite enough remaining on the Acropolis, and in and around the city, to occupy the {209}whole of a +busy lifetime of study, even if it run beyond threescore and ten years; and I further conclude that the modern Greeks, down to the +time of Lord Elgin’s’ _razzia_, had forfeited all claim to the Parthenon by their utter neglect of it. In the interest of art, any +person who would undertake the preservation of the sculptures was to be regarded as a benefactor of the civilized world. + +I have said my say, and feel better. + +Lord Elgin has been called all manner of hard names by a great many writers from Byron downwards, but I think he did right. If his +relatives and friends wish to send me any testimonial for coming to his defence, they can remit it, post and duty paid, and I will +acknowledge by return mail. + +I wish to say on behalf of the present government in Greece, that it manifests a great interest in preserving the works of art that +remain. And it is constantly making researches to the extent of its financial ability, and every year new treasures are discovered, +and fresh light is thrown upon the art development of Ancient Greece. + +Some of the excavations have been made at the personal expense of the young King, and altogether no one can complain that art +matters are neglected in Athens at the present time. + +An excellent museum has been formed at Athens, and it is under efficient and careful management. Students are flocking to the city +from all parts of Europe, and the numbers bid fair to increase from year to year. + +Enough has been printed on Greek art to satisfy the most exacting; there is little left to say. The fact that I have never studied +the subject does not at all disqualify me from writing about it, if I were to follow the standard set up by some who have gone +before me. Long essays have appeared from the pens of men who could hardly tell the difference between a pediment, and a cornice, or +explain why a segment is not an angle or an angle a segment. It may be that I am over-scrupulous, but I have always been reluctant +to write on any topic about which I was not properly informed. + +In our visit to the Parthenon and in our examination of books relating to it we found something which greatly interested us; {210}as +it was in a French book, and as none of us had ever seen it in an English one I have thought well to say something about it. + +For thousands of years the Greek temples have been admired for the beauty and harmony of their lines, and in modern times several +attempts have been made to copy them. But the modern architects have invariably found that their productions had an appearance of +rigidity and lacked the softness and beauty of the antique. What could be the reason? + +The secret was not discovered until less than forty years ago. + +It had been lost to the world through all the centuries that have elapsed since the temples of Greece began to crumble and decay. + +In 1837 M. Pennethorne, on studying the Parthenon, made the first observation that led to the revelation of the secret; and it +was afterward verified by several architects, among whom were Hofer, Schaubert, Paccard, and Penrose. The last-named gentleman has +treated the subject in an excellent work (_Principes de l’architecture Athénienne_) published in 1851, and it has also been +examined by M. Burnouf in an article in the _Revue des Deux Mondes_. The theories of the investigators were at first received \ with +derision, but repeated measurement not only of the Parthenon, but of other Greek temples, have settled the matter beyond a doubt. + +It has been found that the Greek architects gave curves and inclinations to the principal lines which modern architects have been +accustomed to make perfectly straight measurements of the Parthenon and other temples show that these curves were both horizontal +and perpendicular, and in every investigation they have been found mathematically exact. + +“To the eye as to science,” says M. Burnouf, “the stability of the body increases with the extent of the base. The interior walls +of the _cella_ (or _sanctum_) of the Parthenon were slightly inclined towards each other; the columns of the peristyle were likewise +inclined inward, and the same was the case with the columns at the angles. The whole structure thus received the form of a truncated +pyramid which gave an appearance of great solidity.” + +The inclinations thus mentioned were vertical. A slight curve was given horizontally to the floor or platform on which the +tem{211}ple stands, and it is found to extend outward in all directions from the point which indicates the centre. + +All parts of the temple are made to correspond to this curve which is very slight, only a few half inches in a distance of a hundred +feet--but at the same time sufficient to give a most harmonious and pleasing effect. + +The earliest Greek temples do not have these curves, but they are found in all the later ones, so that the time of their +introduction can be determined with reasonable accuracy. + +It is supposed that the Greek artists arrived at the use of these curves by a careful study of nature. The straight line is a +geometric abstraction which is never found in nature. The horizon is curved in consequence of the spherical form of the earth; the +sea, a mountain range, or a plain, assumes a curve when we look at it from a distance, and a long line of coast will appear arched +like a bow when we approach it. + +Undoubtedly the Greeks gave these horizontal curves to the bases and super-structures of their temples in an effort to imitate +nature. Hogarth in the last century laid down the law that the curve was the line of beauty; he was not aware that the principle had +been discovered ages and ages ago by the Greeks. + +For fear that I have not made my explanation clear enough to everyone let me illustrate: + +We all know the earth is round--I demonstrated that to my own satisfaction by travelling steadily west until I reached home--and so +many persons have done likewise since the days of Sir Francis Drake, the first circumnavigator, that the rotundity of the earth is +everywhere accepted and understood Now if the whole earth is round, it follows naturally that any part of it is curved in proportion +to its extent. + +Is there a pond in your neighborhood a mile in diameter? + +“Yes.” + +Next winter when it is frozen over, go to that pond and stretch a twine from side to side. If you _could_ stretch that line without +any “sag” you would find that it would touch the ice in the centre and be four inches above it at each end. + +Or go there some night in the summer and place a bright light at the water’s edge on one side of the pond. Then go to the {212}other +side, get into the water till your eye is just above the surface and endeavor to see the light. You don’t see it--because the +rotundity of the earth prevents. + +Now if you are building a church or a large hall, apply this principle of the curvature of the earth. Instead of making your floor +perfectly flat make it swell up a little in the centre and sweep from this centre outward, toward the corners and sides. Then make +your roof, pillars, and everything else in the place, and also the broad steps on the outside, curve in the same way and you will be +imitating the Greek artists of the time of Pericles and Phidias. They may be said to have had level heads, those Greeks, when they +abandoned the level and adopted the curve. + +Enough of this. + +[Illustration: 5222] + +{213} + +[Illustration: 223] + + + + +CHAPTER XV--ROUND ABOUT ATHENS.--THE COUNTRY OF THE BRIGANDS. + + +_Mars’ Hill, the place where St. Paul Preached on the Unknown God--The Prison of Socrates--The Country of the Brigands--Escorted +by Greek Soldiers--Captures by the Brigands--How they treat Captives--Extorting Ransoms--Buying Coins and Relics--Swindling +Travellers--Among the Ruins--Strange Contrasts--“Chaffing” the Guide--Position of the Persian and Grecian Hosts--Xerxes’ +Throne--“The King Sate on the Rocky Brow”--Making the Ascent by Proxy--“I no go ze Mountain”--The Battle of Marathon--A Survivor of +the Battle--How the Victory was Won._ + + +WE visited all the places of historic interest in Athens, including the hill where St Paul is said to have preached his sermon on +the unknown God. + +The place is admirably adapted for the delivery of an oration, and it is no wonder that it was a favorite one with the Athenians on +the occasion of any public demonstration. Indications of its ancient uses are still visible. There is a stairway of sixteen steps +hewn in the solid rock leading to a platform where there are three rectangular seats placed in a half circle, and looking toward the +South. + +On each side to the East and West, there is an elevated block of stone; these blocks are supposed to be the seats of accuser and +accused, according to the description of Pausanias and others. The courts of justice were held here, with powers that varied from +time to time, according to the decrees of the ruler. + +It was here that Demosthenes was condemned to death, and not far away is the place where Socrates is said to have died. + +To reach the prison of Socrates we passed through a ploughed field to the perpendicular side of a hill, where a cavity was hewn in +the solid rock. There was nothing of interest in the prison; {214}nothing but four stone walls and a low roof, with a floor that +would have been more presentable had it been swept and washed. The historians say that the authenticity of the prison is extremely +doubtful and rests on very slight foundation. + +We made an excursion to Eleusis, a pleasant ride of little more than two hours, when we informed our hotel-keeper of our intentions, +Boniface shrugged his shoulders, smiled, shook his head, and uttered the magic word “brigands.” + +“What do you mean?” I asked. + +“You must get an escort,” he replied; “an escort of soldiers to protect you, and you must send your application to the chief of +police as soon as possible.” + +“But suppose we don’t want an escort, and are willing to take the risk ourselves?” + +“That would not be permitted,” was his prompt response. + +“The government was censured so much in the Takos affair that it will not allow anybody to go without an escort. They are determined +to be on the safe side, and if you venture out without an escort, you will be liable to imprisonment for violating the regulations.” + +He went on to explain that the escort would cost us nothing; that it would consist of regular soldiers, mounted and armed +with carbines and pistols, and that we would be kept all the time, under the strictest surveillance. We would not have a large +guard--from six to ten soldiers, commanded by a sergeant, and quite possibly we could get a _sous-officier_ who could speak French. +The latter would not be absolutely necessary, as we would be obliged to employ a guide or dragoman, who would speak, or would claim +to speak, all the modern languages, in addition to that of the country. + +We sent our application to the police headquarters, stating where we wished to go, and how long we expected to be absent, and were +informed that the escort would meet us at a little village a couple of miles outside of Athens. + +In order not to attract too much attention and cause needless comment, they always arrange that the escort shall be taken up in this +way. Consequently, our expectation that we should ride through the streets in grand style was ruthlessly disappointed. {215}We left +our hotel in a very modest way, and attracted neither attention nor admiration as we rode along we found our escort waiting for us +and solacing themselves with Greek wine at a wretched _brasserie_ in the edge of the village. The guide suggested that we should try +the wine, and take a few bottles of it along for the general benefit of the party. We acceded to his proposal, and it very naturally +happened that, in paying the bill, the score made by the escort was included. We did not demur, as we wanted to be on good terms +with our guards, and as the wine of the country was very cheap and very bad, we gave orders that the escort should be kept filled up +to the chin, and a little higher if possible. + +During the whole time they were with us, the guard kept a careful watch over their charges; they divided up into advance, rear, +and center, the advance keeping about two hundred yards ahead of the main body, and the rear about half of that distance behind us. +There were seven soldiers and a sergeant, so that when the advance and rear of two men each were in their proper places, there were +only four to form the centre. No elaborate military evolutions were attempted, if I except a little “cavorting” on the part of +the sergeant’s horse, which resulted twice in unseating that hero, and throwing him headlong into the sand to the detriment of his +uniform and temper. + +We had expected to find a picturesque looking guard in Greek dress, and flourishing long lances, such as we see in pictures of the +Phalanx and other celebrated bodies of troops. We found them a very common lot of soldiers in a uniform that looked very Frenchy, +and I learned afterward that the outfit of the Greek army was furnished by French contractors, and made chiefly in Paris. + +The French uniform seems to have invaded the Orient very generally, and half the armies of the countries bordering the Eastern part +of the Mediterranean are now uniformed, with some modifications, after the model of _la grande nation_. + +Shall I describe a sanguinary battle, in which prodigies of valor were displayed by our party, and a hundred brigands were compelled +to bite the dust? + +A great deal of dust was bitten, but we couldn’t help it; the dry earth was stirred up by our horses’ hoofs, and for much of +{216}the time we rode in dense clouds that occasionally threatened to smother us. Our lungs were filled, and we ground in our teeth +more of the classic soil of the land of Homer and Demosthenes than we found to our liking. + +It may be a humiliation to say so, but I confess that the most of us were not very poetical on that occasion, and voted Greece a +bore. + +Candor compels me to say that we had no encounter with the brigands, but returned to Athens with no greater sufferings than the +fatigue and general mussiness consequent upon most journeys of that length. Two or three times we saw some suspicious-looking +vagabonds, and at sight of them our sergeant shook his head ominously, but they evinced no disposition to disturb us. We could have +made a very fair fight, if attacked, as our guards were well armed, and there was a fair supply of revolvers in our own hands. We +had inserted fresh charges before leaving the hotel, and were determined not to surrender without making some resistance at any +rate. Capture at the hands of Greek brigands is no joke, and would have disarranged our plans very seriously. + +The main object of brigandage is a financial one; the robbers are in want of money (many of us are in the same fix), and the best +way for them to turn an honest penny is to steal it. When they capture travellers, they help themselves to watches, money, and +jewels, and anything else that may be of value. But the end is not yet; they take the captives into the mountains, and hold them +for something more, and they are careful to squeeze out as much as possible. If the victim is a wealthy nobleman or some other +purse-proud aristocrat, they think it will be worth about £10,000 to release him, but if he is some ordinary mortal with no +influential friends in Athens, a hundred or two hundred pounds will be sufficient. The foreign residents and travellers; who happen +to be in a Greek or Italian city when ransom is demanded for some unhappy wretch, are frequently compelled to raise money to meet +the demand. + +There is a great deal of complaint at this, and much of it is well founded. + +“Why should I,” said a gentleman to me in Naples, “be compelled to pay something every little while to get one of my coun{217}trymen +out of the hands of the brigands? I wouldn’t venture where the scoundrels could catch me, and I wouldn’t allow any of my friends to +do so if I could prevent it. But along comes some reckless fellow I never saw, goes into danger, and is captured. Then I am appealed +to on the ground of humanity and all that sort of thing, and asked to help release him. It is his own fault if he is captured. If +he had staid away, as I do, he would have been safe, and not compelled to appeal to strangers. If a man meets with an accident, I +am willing to help him, but I think it hard to be asked to contribute for a man who has deliberately and with eyes open walked into +trouble.” + +[Illustration: 0227] + +The brigands generally treat their prisoners well and civilly. Sometimes they parole them not to attempt to escape, and allow them +to do what they please; and at others they put them in charge of watchful guards, who have orders to shoot them if they try to get +away. If pursued, and too much encumbered by their prisoners, they kill them, on the principle that dead men tell no tales, and it +is in cases of pursuit that most of the persons in the hands of the brigands have lost their lives. In several instances prisoners +have been kept three or four months by the brigands, and while negotiations were pending they have been allowed to see their +friends, and even to visit neighboring cities to make personal appeals for raising the ransom demanded; and these instances have +only been where parties of two or more were cap{218}tured. Only one was allowed to go away at a time, the rest being held as +hostages. + +Sometimes when the ransom is not forthcoming in a reasonable time, the brigands cut off the ear of a victim and send it to his +friends with the intimation that the other ear will come soon, unless matters are hurried up. This generally has the desired effect. + +Brigandage has been largely reduced in Italy and Greece, but it still exists in some localities. The Governments of those countries +have made earnest efforts to render rural travelling safe, but they have base populations to deal with, and it will doubtless be a +long time before the business will be entirely stopped. + +Our route to Eleusis, was over the ancient sacred way traversed by the Theorie or procession which used to go from Athens to Eleusis +for the celebration of the mysteries. Soon after leaving Athens we enter a forest of olive trees; it was once very extensive but has +suffered greatly in the recent wars of which the country around Athens has been in great part the theatre. The road is very good, +and as it has been traversed for thousands of years and is under the supervision of goverment, there is no reason why it should be +otherwise. + +The chapel of St. George and the monastery of Daphni are passed on the route, but there is nothing particularly interesting +about them, if we except some very old and badly preserved mosaics. All the time of the Crusades the Daphni was a monastery of +Benedictines, and had some celebrity. It was one of the earliest Christian centres in this part of Greece. + +Occasionally the modern road leaves the ancient one, but the traces of the latter are distinctly visible where it was hewn out of +the rock. During the Turkish occupation there was another road established by the Moslems, but it was so badly made that it was not +considered worth following by the modern engineers. + +Near the shores of the Bay of Eleusis the road leads past a couple of salt lakes which are mentioned in ancient histories. They are +fed by springs and drained by small brooks flowing into the bay; modern and prosaic mills are on these brooks. Our guide explained +that these lakes were anciently dedicated, {219}one to Ceres, and the other to Proserpine; we endeavored to ascertain if the mills +appertained to those parties, and told him to go and ask if Mr. Ceres was at home. Rather than explain to us who and what Ceres was, +he stopped the carriage and pretended to ascertain from a native the information we desired. + +After a short conversation in the language of the country, he gravely informed us that Ceres had gone to Athens, and would not +return till next week. + +How that guide pitied our ignorance. + +Eleusis is to-day a miserable village, whose inhabitants look as if they ought to be grateful to anybody who would drown them in +the adjoining bay. They crowded around us to beg for money and to sell relics of the place; I bought several coins of the time of +Hadrian, paying about a cent apiece for the lot. Somewhat to my surprise they were pronounced genuine by a coin-sharp to whom I +showed them in Athens. I remarked by the way that you can buy any quantity of antique coins in Athens and no end of statuettes +and other articles of terra-cotta. To obtain the genuine you must exercise considerable caution and be careful about trading with +doubtful personages. + +There are several shops that have a good reputation and are said to take great pains to have none but genuine coins. Sometimes they +have large stocks on hand and some of these coins will be very rare; persons interested in making collections for public and private +museums arrive there from time to time and almost exhaust the supplies of the dealers. Consequently you can never tell whether you +are likely to find a large, medium, or small stock of antique coins on hand in the shops at Athens. + +Eleusis was anciently one of the most celebrated cities of Greece, and its foundation dates in the ages of mythology. It was famous +for the temple of Ceres and Proserpine, and for the mysteries which were celebrated there in honor of these two goddesses and +considered the most sacred of all Greece during the time that paganism flourished. + +It was one of the original twelve states of Attica, and was several times at war with Athens. In the last of these wars the +Athenians were victorious and Eleusis became a province of Athens with the condition that its religion was to be respected {220}and +the worship of Ceres and Proserpine continued as before. Once a year the grand procession went to Athens by the sacred way to +celebrate the Eleusinian mysteries, which were maintained for many years. + +The Persians destroyed the temple and the city but they were afterwards reconstructed only to be destroyed again. + +We wandered among the ruins where the immense and carefully hewn blocks of marble contrasted strangely with the rude huts of the +present dwellers on the spot. The destruction was so complete that one sees little more than the outline of one of the temples +enclosing a space covered with masses of hewn stone tumbled together in the most complete confusion. + +The ruins have been only partially excavated, and there was no work in progress at the time of my visit. Judging by the remains that +were visible the temples must have been among the finest of ancient Greece. + +From the hill that formed the Acropolis of Eleusis, we looked over the bay, and saw the locality where was fought the famous battle +of Salamis, between the Greeks and Persians. The site of the silver throne of Xerxes was pointed out, but we were somewhat dubious +about it as we could not see the throne though looking repeatedly and intently. The guide could not tell where it could be found and +seemed rather disgusted when we requested him to ask the natives if they had seen anything of it lying around loose. + +He persisted that the battle was fought more than two thousand years ago; we listened to his explanation and shook our heads as if +we were not convinced. + +I told him that we had had battles in our own country not near so long ago and that the people who were killed there were all dead. + +He could not understand what that had to do with the matter and neither could I. + +The positions of the armies and fleets during the battle are described with sufficient precision by the historians, though there has +been much discussion concerning the movements which gave the victory to the Greeks, and destroyed the Persian fleet. The locality of +the throne of Xerxes is also in dispute, one authority, {221}placing it in the hollow between two low hills, while another has it on +the summit of a hill overlooking the bay. The latter theory is more likely to be the correct one. Byron says of the affair: + + “The King sate on the rocky brow, + + Which looks o’er sea-born Salamis, + + And ships, by thousands lay below + + And men in nations, all were his. + + He counted them at break of day, + + And when the sun set, where were they?” + +The day after this excursion we made a journey to Mount Pentelicus, whence came the most of the marble used in the erection of the +Parthenon, and other temples of Athens. + +Part of the way the road is excellent and on another part it is not so good. + +There is a Greek convent at the foot of the mountain and when we reached it we were told that the carriages could go no further. + +Then we had an animated discussion with the guide. None of us wished to undertake the ascent, which requires about two hours on +foot, and so we decided to let the guide do it for us, and when we stated our plan his eyes opened so wide that they appeared really +to drop out. + +“I not goes up mitout you gentlemens,” he said as soon as he had sufficiently recovered himself to be able to speak. + +“You won’t, eh; well, what have we engaged you for.” + +“For five francs ze day, five francs _par jour_.” + +“Very well, then, we are to pay you five francs a day to be our guide and you are to guide us where we want to go.” + +“Yees! yees, zat is so.” + +“If we wanted to go up that mountain you would go with us.” + +“Certainly, genteelmens, certainly zat is to guide you up ze mountain.” + +“Well, now let’s have no more nonsense about it. Pentelicus would be nowhere by the side of Pike’s Peak or Mount Shasta. And you +say, gentlemen come here and climb this potato-hill. We don’t intend to climb it ourselves, and we came here to do it by proxy. We +have hired you for that purpose, so now go ahead.” {222} “But I have been up ze mountain many times. Why I go now all alone without +ze genteelmens.” + +“That is our affair. We pay you five francs a day for that kind of work, you are to do anything for us that we find disagreeable.” + +The guide was puzzled, and after a thorough examination of our faces to ascertain if we were really lunatics, he started off. + +He went about twenty yards and then returned, declaring that he would not ascend the mountain unless we furnished him with a saddle +horse. + +“Once for all,” said the Judge, “will you go or not? If you don’t we shall be obliged to murder you, and then report your misconduct +to the police.” + +“Veree well,” sulkily replied the descendant of Sophocles, “I no go ze mountain, and I no be guide for you again. Tomorrow you have +one other guide.” + +We took him at his word and that night paid him off and discharged him. He had been a nuisance from the first, bothering us with all +sorts of importunities, and we were glad to be rid of him in such a way that he could have no real or fancied claim upon us. During +the rest of our stay in Athens he did not condescend to speak to us; he had formerly been all obsequiousness, but now he considered +us quite unfit to associate with him. I am afraid our reputations suffered somewhat in his hands. He described us to some gentlemen +who were in Athens the week after we left, as the greatest fools he had ever seen. + +Mount Pentelicus is about thirty-six hundred feet above the level of the sea, and the view from its summit is said to be quite +extensive. + +Looking toward the southwest one sees the plain of Attica with its smaller mountains, and with Athens and the Acropolis occupying a +prominent place on the plain. + +Beyond them are the Piraeus, Salamis, and Egina, and further away the coast and mountains of the Morea, form a background to the +picture. Toward the southeast are Mount Hymettus, all the promontory of Attica to Cape Sunium and beyond this cape, the jagged +summits of the Cyclades are visible. On the northeast the hills fall away in undulations till they sink into the plain {223}of +Marathon, where was fought the battle that resulted in the defeat and partial destruction of the Persian army. The numerous bays of +this part of the coast are distinctly visible, and the combinations of sea, mountain, and plain make a picture of unusual beauty. + +In a clear day nearly all the great islands of the Greek Archipelago can be made out, and sometimes the coast of Asia is visible +away to the east. Altogether the view from Mount Pentelicus is one of the finest in Greece, as it includes nearly the whole of +Athens, and awakens many historical associations. + +The battle of Marathon was fought in the year 450 B. C., between the Persians and Greeks. The former had landed forty thousand men, +but owing to bad generalship, only half that number were engaged. + +The Persian army was drawn up in the Plain of Marathon, with its center directly in front of the Greek position. + +Military critics who have studied the history of the battle on the memorable ground, say that the Persians were lamentably deficient +in strategy, as their line was too much extended, and its right was pushed out between a swamp and the mountain chain. This +arrangement secured them against a flank movement on the right, but it left no line of retreat for the right wing in case the centre +was pierced. + +The Greeks were about eighteen thousand strong, according to the best authorities. They debouched from the mountains in two columns, +one attacking the Persian right, and the other its left, and in both movements they were successful. Then they attacked the Persian +centre, which they defeated and put to flight; the vanquished were pursued into the sea and into the swamps, and it is said that +more of them perished in this way than by the arms of the conquerors. + +Did you ever see a survivor of the battle of Marathon? I have, and instead of being twenty-four hundred years old, as you might +expect, he was not fifty. + +We had in our late civil war a cavalry general who was reputed to be a good soldier, and, at the same time, a tremendous “blower.” + He could tell wonderful stories of his and others’ prowess; and the deeds of daring that he narrated were of the{224}most remarkable +character. Mention any battle in his hearing, especially when he had partaken of the beverage that cheers while it inebriates, and +he would be sure to tell you that he had led the cavalry on the right, the left, or the centre, just as it might occur to his mind. + +One day, somebody mentioned a battle in Virginia, and our general immediately described how he broke the centre that day, with four +regiments of cavalry. + +Then another person spoke of a battle that occurred the same day in Arkansas or Louisiana, and the general told us how he led three +regiments and a battalion of cavalry, against the right wing and broke it without trouble, capturing two batteries and half a dozen +wagon loads of ammunition. + +The attempt was now made to floor him, but it was unsuccessful. + +“That was a splendid move of General Miltiades at Marathon,” said one of the party, with a most solemn face; “he attacked in two +columns an army larger than his own.” + +“Ah, yes,” our brave general responded, “that was one of the toughest places I was ever in. I led the cavalry against the left, two +full brigades with two batteries and howitzers. They cut us up with grape and canister, but we broke them and took all their guns. +The general complimented me personally in presence of his whole staff. I had three horses shot under me and two bullet holes in my +coat.” + +Up to that moment I had never hoped to see a survivor of Marathon, but you cannot always tell what will happen. + +{225} + +[Illustration: 0235] + + + + +CHAPTER XVI--THE GLORY OF ATHENS.--ITS SIGHTS, SCENES, RUINS, AND RELICS. + + +_The Opera at Athens--Handsome Greeks?--The King and Queen--A Lovely Trio--Losing a Heart--Byron’s “Maid of Athens”--How She +Looked--Her House and History--The Acropolis by Moonlight--Waking the Guard--A Sham Permit--“Backsheesh”--The Parthenon by +Night--Greek Gypsies--Among the Curiosity Shops--Dr. Schliemann and his Trojan Discoveries--The Gold and Silver Vases of King +Priam--Where They Were Found--Relics of the Sack of Troy--Curious Workmanship--Some Account of the Excavations--We Leave Athens--A +Queer Steamer--“Pay or Go to Prison”--End of Our Steamship Adventure._ + + +THE Opera was in fashion at Athens, at the time of our visit, and all went there on the second evening of our stay in the city. The +theatre is rather small and the company not first-class, but on the whole the house and the performance were quite as good as one +could expect for a city of the population of the Greek capital. Both chorus and orchestra were small, and not very well trained, and +the scenery was evidently made to do duty in a great many ways. + +In my eyes the chief attractions were the people in the audience, and I did not pay very close attention to the performance. Here +and there you could see the national costume, but the great majority of those present were attired _a la Paris_, or rather in +the French costumes of fashions a year or two old. The national costume is worn only by the _pallicares_, who claim to be the +descendants of the original Greeks, and they show a great deal of pride of descent. Here is a description of the dress of a +_pallicare_ of Athens. + +A muslin shirt with a broad collar, but without a cravat; {226}stockings of goodly length and gaiters buttoned up to the knee, not +unlike the shooting gaiters of England and America. Then comes a full skirt, generally of some white material, gathered in plaits +at the waist, and reaching to the knee or just below it; then a small vest without sleeves, and another richly embroidered and with +open sleeves. + +There are garters of colored silk, and a belt of the same material, but the latter is generally concealed by a broad belt of +leather, which sustains a tobacco pouch, a handkerchief, a purse, and, according to the old custom, a pair of pistols, though the +latter are usually left at home. On the head is worn a red cap, something after the Turkish pattern, but larger at the top, and +having a blue tassel. The women of the same class wear a long skirt of silk, or some cheaper material, according to their financial +ability, with a velvet jacket open in front; and for a headdress they wear a red cap like that of the men, but with a larger top. +It bends over to the ear, and appears as if it were ready to fall off. Sometimes they omit the cap, and wear a large braid of hair +twisted around the head. It is not the natural growth, but of the kind known in America as “store hair;” it belongs to the wearer +either by inheritance or purchase. + +I looked among the audience for pretty faces, but saw only a few. One box contained three women who would be called handsome in +any part of the world, but they turned out to be Albanians, and not of the true Greek race. The other pretty ones were few and far +between, and on the whole I was fully prepared to endorse the assertion of Edmond About, that the Greek men are much handsomer than +the women. + +In the afternoon promenades, when the band played in the public square, I had no better luck in my search for beauty than in the +opera house. The prettiest women are oftener seen in the rural districts and in the islands than at Athens, and the peninsula of the +Morea is said to contain the best specimens of feminine beauty. + +The king and queen were in their box; they are regular attendants upon the opera, and the king is said to pay a portion of the +subsidy out of his private purse. + +They are a young and not ill-looking couple, and were dressed in ordinary evening costume, as if out for a dinner or a party. +{227}He is tall and thin, and she has a tendency to stoutness, and both are blondes, the king being Danish (son of the King of +Denmark), and the queen being Russian (daughter of the Grand Duke Constantine, and niece of the Emperor Alexander II). They present +a marked contrast in physiognomy to the darkskinned and black-haired Greeks, and the most unobservant stranger would never take them +for natives of the country. + +The succession to the throne appears to be well secured, as the royal pair have three children, and are yet very far from old age. + +And while on this subject, let me say that in Egypt, a few months later, I saw three sisters that were the perfection of beauty, +the admiration of the foreign men in Cairo, and the envy of all foreign women. They were daughters of a Greek merchant living at +Alexandria, and were the belles of the foreign population of that city. I could have lost my heart to any one of the trio, but no +favorable opportunity offered, and consequently I left the Orient heart whole. + +Now, for a little information about the population and government. Those who do not wish it, may go on till they find something more +interesting. The population of the kingdom, including the Ionian and other islands, is less than a million and a half, according +to the last census. The government is a constitutional and hereditary monarchy, and the constitution guarantees to the citizens +equality before the law, personal and religious liberty, freedom of the press, public instruction, and the abolition of confiscation +and the penalty of death for political offenders. For purposes of government, the country is divided into thirteen departments, +fifty-nine districts, and three hundred and fifty-two communes. The _prefets_ of the departments, and _sous-prefets_ of districts, +are nominated by the king, subject to approval by the chamber of deputies. The communal chiefs and councils are elected by the +people over whom they are to preside. + +The system of justice is based on the _Code Napoleon_, and the code of commerce is likewise on the French plan. + +Criminal matters are subject to trial by jury, and the same is the case with certain civil affairs. In general, the courts appear to +be well organized, but the judges are so badly paid that some {228}of them cannot support their families and be respectable without +taking an occasional bribe. + +The religion of Greece is of the kind known as the Greek Church, and almost identical with that of Russia. In Syra and other islands +of the Archipelago, there are many Catholics. + +There is only one completed railway in all Greece, and it has the enormous length of four miles. + +Carriage roads are not numerous, and most of them are bad; consequently it is hardly necessary to say that the interior of the +country is not much developed. + +Agriculture is in a primitive stage, and the soil, which does not lack fertility, has very little opportunity to show what it can +do. Commerce is more prosperous than agriculture, and most of the wealth of Greece is engaged in it. Most of the commerce of the +Levant is in the hands of Greeks, and there are many merchants of that nationality established in other countries. Most of them have +an affectionate remembrance for their native land, and frequently make heavy donations in its behalf. + +Of course the country must have an army and navy. The former includes about fifteen thousand soldiers of all arms and an enormous +number of officers; there are seventy generals in the army, and a proportionate number of other grades. + +The navy has an equally large staff of officers; it has about thirty-five ships, mounting one hundred and ninety guns. + +The finances are in that deplorable condition described by Mr. Micawber, when he alluded to the practice of allowing expenditures +to exceed the income. The annual revenue of Greece is about a million of francs less than the expenses. A minister of finance of +ability would be a great blessing to the country. + +I could give a few more solid chunks of wisdom, but I forbear out of pity for the reader. + +My head is an ant-hill of figures, but I shall proceed to seal up the outlets, and keep the units and tens in their place. + +I can tell you the number of square miles in Greece, the height of her mountains, and depth of her rivers, the age of the youngest +child in the country, and what the king had for dinner one day; I could even give the number of hairs on the back of a sea turtle, +and the price of a bottle of wine, for which you pay ten francs, but I forbear. {229}One afternoon, while we were wandering about +Athens and its suburbs, our guide pointed to a low house of most unpretending appearance, and enjoined us to “look at ze house.” + +We looked, and asked if there was anything remarkable about it. + +“That is ze house of ze ‘Maid of Athens’ of ze Lord Byron.” + +Of course we took a second look at the house, and as we did so, we saw at one of the windows the face of an old, very old woman. + +“Ah, zere is ze Maid of Athens herself. She look out and see us. You will go in ze house?” + +We held a short consultation and decided that we, a party of strangers without introductions in any form, had no right to thrust +ourselves into her house and presence. + +[Illustration: 8239] + +The “Doubter” was the only one who thought it would be the proper thing to rap at the door and say we wanted to see the lady. We +walked on, and he followed us protesting that he wanted to see her, but we paid no heed to his words. While walking sidewise with +his eyes fixed upon the house he slipped and fell into a large pool of mud, and the incident changed the currents of his thoughts so +that he said no more about the woman whom Byron has made famous throughout the English reading world. + +The Maid of Athens of the well known poem,--“_Zoe mou sas agapo_”--was twice married, and, at the time of my visit to Athens, was +far advanced in her second widowhood. I was told that her second husband was an Englishman, a Mr. Black, and that she was left at +his death with very slender means of support. A sub{230}scription was raised for her in England so that the last years of her life +were passed in tolerable comfort. I heard in London, just previous to my return to America, that she died in the summer of 1874, and +that the little house where she lived is now occupied by her sister. + +Whether the Maid of Athens was ever as beautiful as Byron represented her, I am unable to say. When I saw her it was more than fifty +years after the penning of the poem, and fifty years, you know, will make great changes in the features and forms of the best of us. +The face I saw at the window was old, withered, and wrinkled; it was not an unpleasant face, but age and sorrow had obliterated all +the beauty which may have shone there half a century ago. + +The moon reached the full while we were in Athens, and we embraced the opportunity to see the Acropolis by moonlight. + +In theory it is necessary to have a permit from the authorities to go there at night, but a friend hinted to us that nothing of the +kind was necessary. We followed his directions and this was the result. + +It was nine o’clock and later when we went there and rapped at the gate. We rapped loudly, waited awhile and then rapped again. + +The whole establishment of guards was evidently sound asleep, as all our rapping brought no response. + +Then we rattled the gate, threw stones on the roof of the hut, shouted and made a noise generally. + +No response. + +Then more rattling and rapping,--more stone throwing and shouting and with the same result as before. + +Finally I put my face to the bars of the gate and at the very tip-top and summit of my voice shouted the magic word, + +“_BACKSHEESH!!_” + +Instantly there was a sound of feet and voices in the hut, and half a minute later a guard came to the gate and said something +in Greek which I did not understand. Then I passed him a franc which his fingers closed upon, and I showed him another with an +intimation that he would receive it after we had seen the Acropolis. {231}That guard wasn’t an idiot; money he understood, but it +was also necessary that we should have a written permit, and he so insinuated. + +[Illustration: 0241] + +I gave him the first piece of paper I could find in my pocket--I think it was my wine bill on the steamer from Constantinople; he +looked at it by the moonlight, nodded, said “bono,” and opened the gate without further delay. + +It is impossible to describe the Acropolis by moonlight, just as impossible as it is to forget it. I never attempt what I know I +cannot do and therefore I leave the picture to the reader’s imagination. And I would say to anybody who is going to Athens, be sure +and time your visit so as to be there near the full moon, and on no account fail to spend an hour or two of a clear night in the +Parthenon and among the temples that surround it. I think the grandeur and majesty of the place are better felt at that time than +in the broad light of day. The softening effects of the rays of the moon are nowhere more perfectly shown than in the ruins of the +Parthenon. I have seen the Coliseum at Rome, and the temple of Karnak in Egypt by moonlight, and must give the palm of merit to +the Acropolis. These are built of {232}grey or yellowish stone which absorbs some of the rays and gives a certain somberness to the +picture. But the Parthenon is of white marble, so that the moonbeams light up the entire scene with a warmth and distinctness that +almost rival the effect of the morning sun. + +One day just outside of Athens we saw a small caravan of Greek gypsies. They were not a large party, some twenty persons in all, of +both sexes, and the usual variety of ages. They were dressed in a costume that seemed a compromise between the Greek and Turkish, +and some of their garments were in rags. The men had a proud, haughty air, as if the country belonged to them and they carried +nothing but their rifles and other weapons. The women were not so fortunate, as all of them had burdens; the foremost person in the +caravan was a woman who bore on: her back a cask that might hold eight or ten gallons, and, by the way she bent forward I judged +that the cask was pretty well filled. She was leading a string of ponies and each pony had a good supply of baggage on his back; +behind this group there was another woman leading another lot of beasts of burden. + +Some of the women and two of the men were mounted on horses; the women seemed to be stowed with other baggage because they were too +weak to walk, but the men were riding for the sake of personal comfort and not from necessity. A dozen sheep were in the rear of the +ponies, and were kept from straying by some of the men and by two or three wolfish looking dogs. Some of the pack horses had coops +of chickens among their loads, and on one of the packs a couple of hens were standing erect and appearing to enjoy their afternoon +ride. Altogether the cavalcade was quite picturesque and I regretted that I had no time! to make a sketch of it. + +We devoted an afternoon to the old curiosity shops of Athens, of which there is a goodly number. Vases, coins, statuettes and all +sorts of antiquities--many of them modern--were shown to us and we made a few purchases. Some of the jewelry was exquisite and +showed that the gold workers of ancient times were quite as skillful as their modern brethren. + +Dr. Schliemann, who has made himself famous by excavations on the site of ancient Troy, was then in Athens, and through the +{233}influence of a friend I obtained an opportunity to examine his very interesting collection. He had a great number of vases and +other specimens of pottery which he obtained at Troy from excavations at depths varying from twenty to a hundred and fifty feet. +A few of the vases bear inscriptions, but thus far no one has been able to decipher them, and the forms of most of the articles +discovered, show that they belong to a very remote period. + +There is a difference of opinion among the _savans_ concerning the antiquity of the articles discovered by Dr. Schliemann, and as I +know a great deal less about the subject than they do I do not propose to take sides. + +The enterprising explorer was full of courtesy and left his desk to accompany me for an hour or more through his collection. He +reserved the greatest curiosities till the last. + +After showing me many vases, cinerary urns, weapons, and implements of stone and copper, sculptures on granite, and other things +which were stored in a shed adjoining his house, he led me to his study to inspect a collection of photographs which he made at +Troy. While I was looking at these he unlocked a cabinet and brought out a number of gold dishes, vases, necklaces, and rings, and +placed them on the table. + +“Here,” said the Doctor, his eye kindling with delight as he spoke, “here is the treasure from the palace of King Priam. In my +excavations, I came upon the foundations of the palace, and one morning my wife and I, while my workmen were at breakfast, managed +to hit upon the locality of the treasure chest. You observe that some of these things appear to have been subjected to great heat, +&c., and partially melted. This was done, I presume, at the burning of the palace, after its capture by the Greeks, and these +articles had escaped discovery at the time the place was sacked. The heavy masses of _debris_ that fell upon them served as their +protection, and they lay undiscovered through the thousands of years that have passed since the siege of Troy. + +“Some of the scientists dispute my claim that these things belonged to Priam, but for myself I have no doubt of it. I think you can +be entirely confident that you are examining and handling dishes that have been touched by that celebrated king.” + +{234}I need not say that I was greatly interested in the collection, and that I lingered over it as long as politeness would allow +me to do so. + +One of the most interesting things I saw was a necklace and head-dress of pure gold--the workmanship was exquisite, and there +were upwards of five hundred separate pieces in the two articles. The style of the head-dress and necklace was like that we see on +pictures of Assyrian kings, and the ornaments were, doubtless, the property of some high personage. The pieces had been carefully +put together by the doctor, and he showed me photographs of them, taken before his laborious task began and after it was finished. + +I should add that the excavations at Troy were made by Dr. Schliemann, at his own expense and under his personal supervision. He had +many difficulties to contend with, including the opposition of the Turkish government and the thievish propensities of his workmen. +They robbed him at all opportunities, and it was recently ascertained that by far the larger part of the gold vases and other +valuables from the ruins of the palace were concealed by the workmen, and their discovery was quite unknown to him. The Doctor was +accompanied by his wife, who assisted him in every way in her power; but it was impossible for them to be everywhere at once, and to +supervise excavations going on in half a dozen places simultaneously. + +When we were ready for departure we packed our baggage and drove to the Piraeus, where we had a choice of two steamers to Syra. +One was the _Stamboul,_ our old acquaintance, on which we had passed a very rough night; the other was a Greek steamer, and we +determined to inspect her. + +A very brief inspection of her cabin was enough for us. The captain looked as if he hadn’t washed himself since he was born, and the +steward appeared never to have been guilty of such an act. + +The rooms had very little bedding, and the little that they possessed was so dirty that it had evidently been used for the +door-matting of a well-patronized bar room in muddy weather, and had afterwards served as the flooring of a pig-pen. {235}The +steward spoke nothing but Greek, and he had no assistant; as near as we could make out, he was steward, head-waiter, chambermaid, +assistant-waiter, cabin boy, cook, and forecastle attendant--anything you might happen to want. We were not long in deciding how +we should travel. The _Stamboul_ was not all that fancy paints a passenger ship, but she was infinitely preferable to the +_Mavrocoupolo_, or whatever her outlandish name was. + +This Greek steamer had the monopoly of the passenger trade between Syra and the Piraeus, and the other lines were not allowed to +sell tickets for that route. When we came to Greece, we bought tickets from Constantinople to the Piraeus, and had no trouble; we +now wanted to buy one to Syra by the Austrian Lloyd line, where we were to change to a ship of the _Messageries Maritimes_ (French). +But we couldn’t do anything of the kind, and the only way we could get around it was to buy third-class tickets to Chio (the first +port beyond Syra), and then pay to the steward on board the _Stamboul_ the difference between first and third-class prices. + +Was there ever a law so carefully drawn that somebody could not devise a plan to get around it? + +The company bit us pretty badly--the fleas helped them a little--as we found that we had to pay very dearly for our connivance at +violation of the Greek law. This was the way of it. + +We bought third-class tickets to Chio and went on board, where we paid the steward the difference between first and third-class. In +first-class fare, where tickets are bought at the agencies, meals and rooms are included. But after paying full rates, we were told +that we had only secured the privileges of the cabin, and must pay extra for meals and berths. + +We called for the captain, and protested that it was a swindle. He shrugged his shoulders, showed us the regulations, and said we +must pay. If we didn’t he must put us in prison at Syra. + +We thought the prison might be something like the cabin of the Greek steamer, and we paid the bill with the rapidity of a +well-trained flash of lightning. But we didn’t change our opinion on the subject, and to this hour we think that the directors of +the Austrian Lloyds are------ + +I pause, as there may be an international law of libel. + +{236} + +[Illustration: 0246] + + + + +CHAPTER XVII--ADVENTURES IN QUARANTINE.--RHODES AND ITS MARVELS. + + +_Missing our Steamer--A Serious Dilemma--A Study of Faces--Making a Row and What Came of It--Under the Yellow Flag--Adventures of +a Quarantined Traveller--Escaping the Plague--Mal-de-Mer--A Laughable Incident--Getting on Our Sea-Legs--Custom House Troubles--The +Potency of “Backsheesh”--Oriental Fashions in New York--“Doing” a Custom House Inspector--A Curious Tradition--The “Lamb” as a +Trade Mark--The Temple of Diana--One of the “Seven Wonders”--Singular Discoveries--A Horde of Scoundrels--The Island of Rhodes--The +Colossus--A Wonderful City--The Knights of St. John--Their Exploits--Surrendering to the Turks._ + + +WHEN I went on deck the morning after our departure from the Piraeus, the steamer was at anchor in the harbor of Syra. We expected +to catch the French steamer that was to sail that afternoon for Smyrna and the Syrian coast, and I looked around for the _Tibre_, +which was her name. + +She was nowhere in sight, and a boatman who wanted a job was kind enough to inform me that she had come and gone twelve hours +before. + +Here was a pretty caldron of piscatorial productions. As the rest of our party made their appearance up the cabin stairs I broke the +dreadful news to them, and made a careful study of their features as they received it. If there had been any profane persons in our +number, I think a swearing band could have been organized without much difficulty. + +Weren’t we on our ears and didn’t we go to the office of the company and make a row? {237}We had a printed time-table and demanded +why the steamer sailed before her advertised time. The agent explained that he was very sorry, but the fact was the steamer did not +touch at Naples on account of the quarantine there, and therefore she had reached Syra twenty-four hours ahead of time. There was +nothing for her to do at Syra and no reason why she should wait, and so he had let her go. + +We demanded a special steamer to take us to Smyrna, in season to overtake the _Tibre_, but the agent wouldn’t give it. We could hire +one for one thousand dollars, but that was paying rather high for our passage, and we demurred. + +The only thing left for us was to take a small steamer of the Austrian Lloyd’s that was to leave next day and might get us to Smyrna +in season to catch the _Tibre_. The agent telegraphed the state of the case to the agent at Smyrna, and away we went for the other +boat. + +There she lay in the harbor, a little, old, paddle steamer, named the _Wien_, a wooden craft that had been running a quarter of a +century. She did not look inviting externally. We wanted to go aboard and take a look at her cabins, but here was a difficulty. A +yellow flag floated from her topmast. She was in quarantine, and if we once set foot on her we could not go ashore again in Syra. +She had come from Trieste by way of Italy, and there was a five days’ quarantine in Greece against all ships from Italy. So we +waited until about the time of her departure. She was stopping for the steamer with the mails from Trieste, and there were no less +than four steamers in port waiting the same mails. + +We took a lounge around the public square of Syra, and drank beer and coffee at a restaurant; then we took another lounge and more +beer and coffee, and then we took a couple of carriages and drove to the interior of the Island, where there were some pretty orange +groves and some very attractive country seats. Then we came back and drank some beer and coffee, and went on the steamboat--the +steamer that brought us from the Piræus--to sleep. + +Next morning we started for the same sort of excitements as on the day before, and just as we started, we saw the Trieste +{238}steamer poking her nose around a headland and steaming toward the harbor. Then we gave up our projects, and prepared to +transfer ourselves to the _Wien_. + +She lay near the entrance to the harbor, and an ugly wind was blowing straight into the entrance. The wind wasn’t much for a +steamer, though she rocked about considerably, but it was altogether different with a row boat, such as we engaged to transfer us. +We made a contract for two boats, one for us and one for our baggage, for the sanitary reasons of the quarantine. The boat with +our baggage was towed alongside by a rope about thirty feet long, and then a couple of men descended from the steamer and put the +baggage on board. Then the boat was towed away again, and nobody could enter it until a plentiful supply of salt water had been +thrown over it. + +As for ourselves, we had gingerly work to get on board. Our boat went to the steamer’s gangway, and was held under it by means of +hooks and ropes, but she was not allowed to touch it. The waves were short and choppy, and we had to watch our chances and jump one +by one upon the gangway. The instant we touched it we were in quarantine, and so was everything about us. We got on board without +accident, and then came the work of paying. The price had been fixed beforehand, and the boatman wanted his pay at starting, but +we were firm in refusing. This was in accordance with our inflexible rule never to pay boatmen, hackmen, _et id oinne genus_, until +their services were ended. + +But there was reason in the request of the boatmen on this occasion, and we might have relaxed enough to pay him before getting on +board the steamer. Had we paid in the boat he could have received the money directly from our hands without any nonsense. When we +were all on board, one of our party went to the foot of the gangway and held out the stipulated napoleon. We and all our napoleons +were infected the instant we came on board, and the boatman was obliged to receive his in a tin cup of salt water. And if the party +who paid him had dropped overboard while leaning down, and the boatman had rescued him, the boat and all it contained would have +gone into quarantine the {239}prescribed number of days. Such an event has occurred several times in Syra and other ports. In time +of quarantine a man must be very careful about his movements. + +The _Wien_ got away from Syra about four in the afternoon, and put out into a very rough sea. The lady of our party went to bed +immediately, her husband didn’t feel very well, and two others of the party were as cheerful as a pair of chickens that have been +caught in a thunder shower. The fifth member of the crowd knew he wouldn’t be seasick, but had no appetite worth mentioning, and I +was left alone in my glory, to pace the deck or go below, as I pleased. + +I haven’t been seasick for a reasonable number of years, and didn’t want to begin again at that time and place. I have a suspicion +that I take a malicious delight in showing how well I can be when others around me are covering the sea with maledictions, and +furnishing pleasure and undigested food to the fishes that follow in the wake of the ship. + +To give an illustration of the way I can stand the rolling of the “deep and dark blue ocean,” let me relate one incident. + +Several years ago I went on board a steamer at Civita Vecchia, for Genoa. When we left Leghorn there were about sixty passengers, +as happy as though they had just returned from a wedding or a circus. When we got out to sea we struck into a Mediterranean squall, +such as sometimes blows the strings out of a pair of laced gaiters, or shaves the hair from the back of a bull dog. Those passengers +went below to study the interior construction of the ship. Among them was an Englishman, who told me he had made four voyages to +China, and hadn’t been seasick since he was a boy. I was the only passenger that didn’t go below, and I eat my dinner alone and with +an appetite that would terrify the keeper of a boarding house. My English friend was much disordered about the stomach, and when we +got to Genoa it was all he could do to get himself on shore. I took care of his wife and carried her down the gangway and up again +on shore, and was as polite as I knew how, and it was entire disinterestedness on my part, as I had never met her before, and her +husband was a big fellow who could fight if he wanted to, {240}and, moreover, seasickness had given her a bedraggled appearance that +was not calculated to incite love making to any alarming extent. + +She looked as though somebody had run her through a patent clothes wringer and forgotten to shake her out afterwards. + +As soon as the _Wien_ had left the harbor of Syra and got out to sea, she tossed about in a very lively way, and it was no joke to +walk along her deck without falling. One needed to have as many legs as a spider or a caterpillar to keep himself straight, and when +you were below deck, the creaking of the timbers was something surprising. + +“As long as she creaks she holds,” is an old maxim of the mariners, and if it be true, there was never a holdinger ship than the +_Wien_. + +We passed Samos and Naxos and other islands of the Ægean Sea, and when the moon came out I propped and chocked myself into a corner +on deck, and devoted the time to thinking about the siege of Troy and a dozen other things connected with the history of Greece. + +Particularly did I think of the gold and silver things I had seen in Dr. Schliemann’s collection at Athens, things that were said to +have come from the treasury chest of old King Priam, the same venerable oyster that fought Agamemnon and the other Kings of Greece. + +They are dead now, every mother’s son of them, and it was a pleasure while looking at Priam’s personal property, to know “that the +old fellow couldn’t come in to carry it off, and that no wandering heir could set up a Tichborne claim to it.” I read a great +deal about Priam when I went to school; a man named Homer wrote something about him, and I got up quite an interest in Priam, and +particularly in a young lady that they called Helen. Because somebody stole, or, as the pickpockets say, “raised” Helen, Troy was +besieged and destroyed with all its palaces and other good houses. + +We reached Smyrna about noon the day after leaving Syra, and found the _Tibre_ at anchor. There was a delay in leaving the _Wien_, +a vexatious delay, of nearly an hour, just when time was very precious. The formalities of the Turkish ports are not {241}to be gone +through in a hurry, as we found to our cost The doctor of the ship was rowed off to the health office to report everything correct. +Then the Doctor of the Port, a Turkish official, with a good deal of bombast about him, was rowed out in his boat. The crew of the +_Wien_ was ordered to form in line at the ship’s side, where the Doctor could see them. He surveyed them as carefully as he could +at a distance of twenty feet, and without coming on board he pronounced the ship all right, and admitted her to _pratique_. And then +what a scramble among the boatmen, and what a scene of confusion! + +[Illustration: 0251] + +There was shouting in all the languages of the Levant, and there was an amount of crowding and pushing that ought to have thrown +half of the boatmen into the water. They swore at each other, or at least the accent of what they said was very much like the accent +of swearing in other lands, and they clambered up the sides of the ship like so many monkeys. We had taken time by the forelock by +engaging a boatman and closing a bargain with him while waiting for _pratique_, as we thought it would save a few minutes, and was +easier to do when the boats and men were ten or fifteen yards distant, than when the latter were crowding the {242}deck. We were to +be taken to the _Tibre_ with our baggage, then to shore, and then back to the _Tibre_ again for a franc each. + +On our way to the _Tibre_ we were intercepted by a boat of the Custom House; the official was smoking his pipe in the rear of his +craft, and just gave a glance at our baggage, as if to note the number of pieces; he then extended his hand and pronounced the word +“backsheesh!” + +I, as paymaster of the party, gave him a franc, he waved his hand to indicate that we were a numerous party and were liberally +supplied with baggage. I added a franc, he nodded assent as his fingers closed on it, and the “_formalites de la douane_” were +finished. + +I unhesitatingly assert that the Orient has the most pleasing Custom House arrangements I have ever seen. No trouble, no overhauling +of baggage, no exhibition of your unwashed linen to a crowd of staring idlers, and no rumaging around generally in the places you +desire should not be rumaged at all. A little “backsheesh” to the official and everything is satisfactory. + +In Liverpool or New York, and likewise on the continent, you can sometimes buy your way through, but you often hit the wrong man, +and then there is a row. You may attempt to bribe an honest man, (generally a very newly appointed official,) and then you come off +badly. In Turkey you cannot make any such mistake, as the whole Custom House staff is on the make, and will take your bribes without +hesitation. + +I observe with pleasure, that our officials in America are learning something from the sleepy Orientals. + +On my last trip home one of my fellow passengers had a lot of stuff that was liable to duty, and he determined to get it through, if +possible, free of charge. So he packed his trunk, putting these things on the bottom and a lot of old clothes on top. Then he +spread open a ten dollar greenback and laid it upon the old clothes, slightly securing it with a pin. When his trunk was opened for +examination my friend turned away so that the inspector might not be troubled with his presence. + +The examination lasted about a quarter of a minute. The inspector closed the trunk with the remark that such a lot of old clothes +wasn’t worth carrying around; the passenger departed {243}for his hotel and when there and in the silence and solitude of his room +he opened the trunk. + +And behold, the pin that held the greenback was gone! + +And the greenback was gone likewise! + +What became of that greenback my friend never knew. He suggests that the pin, being of English manufacture, was liable to +confiscation and the officer only did his duty in seizing it. In the hurry of removing the pin the greenback may have adhered to it +and passed into the pocket of the officer without attracting his attention. + +[Illustration: 8253] + +When he emptied his pockets that night he was doubtless astonished at finding the greenback, and still more when he examined it and +found that it was counterfeit. + +We had less than two hours on shore, and therefore saw very little of Smyrna. We walked or rather ran through the bazaars, not +stopping to buy any anything, but threading our way among Turks, Arabs, Levantines, camels, donkeys, boxes, bales, filth, and other +Oriental things. The pavements were rough, and in many places they were muddy and slippery, and by the time we got back to the +landing we were thoroughly tired. + +It had been our intention to make a journey to the ruins of Ephesus during the two days’ stay of the _Tibre_, but this was out of +the question. + +Though Smyrna has enjoyed the advantages of commerce for a very long time, there is still a great deal of prejudice among her +people. Here is a story which was told me in illustration of this assertion: {244}Some years ago, an English merchant sent a cargo +of goods to Smyrna, and among the articles were a hundred pigs of block tin. The rest-of the cargo passed the custom house without +trouble, but the tin could not be landed, and the ship, at its departure, brought the metal away. + +And why? + +Because of the trade mark upon it. The smelters of this particular lot had adopted the figure of a lamb as their trade-mark, and +stamped it on each piece of tin. It happened that when the Crusaders went to Asia Minor, the banners of some of the divisions of +their army were ornamented with the picture of a lamb. Consequently, the lamb became unpopular, and has continued so to this day. + +The tin in question was re-cast without the representation of the hated animal, and sent again to Smyrna, where it was received +without hesitation. + +It was a great disappointment to us that we could not go to Ephesus, the seat of one of the “seven churches of Asia,” and a place +of great historical interest. A railway runs there from Smyrna, so that the journey can be made with comparative ease. There is a +considerable amount of walking and donkey-riding after one gets there, and the accommodations are not altogether palatial. Ephesus +was one of the cities which claimed the honor of being the birth-place of Homer, and it had a reputation for a variety of things +that do it very little good now. The greatest lion of Ephesus was the Temple of Diana, which was accounted one of the seven wonders +of the world; Diana was accounted nearly as great a wonder, in some respects, but she would be of very little consequence at the +present time. + +The temple at Ephesus was said to be four hundred and twenty-five feet long by half that distance in width. Its roof was supported +by one hundred and twenty-eight columns, each sixty feet high, and altogether the edifice was the largest of all the Greek temples, +as it occupied four times the area of the Parthenon. Like the latter temple, it contained a statue of gold and ivory, and there was +a vast amount of wealth about the building. The roof was set on fire one night by an incendiary named Erostratus, (whether John, +Charles, or William, I am unable to {245}say), who lost his head in consequence. He died happy, and avowed that he had no other +object than to immortalize his name. Hence came the declaration-- + + “The daring youth that fired th’ Ephesian dome, + + Outlives in fame the pious fool who raised it.” + +The city and temple disappeared during the Middle ages, and at the beginning of the present century the site was marked only by +heaps of rubbish, and by the Turkish village of Aya Soolook. + +In the past twenty years, excavations have been made there at various times, and are still going on. The foundations of the temple +have been discovered, and many interesting sculptures brought to light. + +Ephesus at one time granted the right of asylum, and was known as a city of refuge. + +Any scoundrel who had offended the laws and found things too hot for him at home, was all right in Ephesus; and the result was that +the city was overrun with criminals to such an extent, that the respectable inhabitants asked the Emperor Augustus to abolish this +right of asylum, which he did. Society was in the condition of that of Texas before her admission to the Union, and before she had +any laws to keep rascals in check. + +There used to be a couplet, to which our most South-western State was said to owe its name: + + “When every other land rejects us, + + This is the land that freely takes us.” + +Possibly the thieves, murderers, bounty-jumpers, and Tammany officials of the olden time used to say: + + “When law from the land would efface us, + + We’ll pack up our trunks for Ephesus.” + +Neat, isn’t it? Well, the Judge got that up just as we were sailing out of Smyrna. + +We were on board the _Tibre_ half an hour before her time of sailing. As we steamed out of the harbor, and the lovely bay on which +the city stands, we had a most beautiful sunset, full of {246}bright colors, in strong contrast to the dark and rugged hills that +form the setting of the bay. The general features of Smyrna are not unlike those of Naples, when looked at from a distance of half +a dozen miles. The harbor is one of the safest along this whole coast, and its trade appears to be quite prosperous. There is much +wealth at Smyrna, and a great many foreigners are settled there in business. The population is estimated at one hundred and fifty +thousand, of which the Turks and Arabs number a little more than half. Then there are forty thousand Greeks and Italians, fifteen +thousand Jews, ten thousand Armenians, and about five thousand Europeans of various nationalities. There are mosques, churches, and +synagogues among the places of worship, and the commercial character of the population imbues them with a great deal of liberality +in religious matters. + +A splendid quay was in course of construction at the time of my visit, and when it is finished the maritime importance of Smyrna +will be greatly increased. The stone for this quay was made on the spot, from the sand of the harbor, in the same way as the +artificial stone that forms the breakwater at Port Said, in Egypt. + +There are three lines of steamers engaged in the coasting; trade of Syria and Palestine--the French, the Austrian, and the Russian. +The French steamers run each way every fifteen days, the Russian every two weeks, and the Austrian three times a month. They touch +at most of the ports, and make their voyages very leisurely. As a general thing, they run from one port to the next in the night, +and rest there during the day. Take our steamer for an illustration. + +She left Smyrna just before sunset; at noon next day she was at Rhodes, where she lay till sunset, and then moved on. At breakfast +next day she was at Messina, and staid there till night, and so it went on, past Alexandretta (the port of Aleppo), Latakia, +Tripoli, and Beyrout. It was a very pleasant way of making the journey, as we were at sea during the night, and could spend the day +on shore, each time at a new place. The routes of the different lines vary somewhat, but all of them touch at Beyrout and Jaffa. + +We went on shore at Rhodes, and wandered among its palm trees, over its curious walls, and up the famous street of the {247}knights, +where the armorial emblems over the doors are still in place, left there by the Turkish conquerors in honor of the Knights of St. +John, and their gallant defense of the place before their surrender. The defence of Rhodes forms one of the brightest pages of +history, a page that should never be soiled and never be effaced. The site of the Colossus of Rhodes was pointed out; it was on one +of the bends of the land that form the harbor; the story that it stood across the entrance, and that ships sailed between its legs, +is a beautiful fiction, more astonishing than true. + +There are few places in Europe that have such a mediaeval appearance as this city of Rhodes; its walls and towers, and the ancient +appearance of its houses, carry the visitor half a dozen centuries backward more easily than do most places in the track of the +tourist. And the life there had a lazy, careless way about it, quite in keeping with the mural structures. People were lounging at +the water’s edge, some in the _cafés_, and some under the palm trees in front of them. Nobody was in a hurry about anything, and +even the servants of the _cafés_ had caught the contagion, and moved around as listlessly as though they had been appointed to +their own executions, and were trying to make as much delay as possible. There was little rivalry among the boatmen, and they good +naturedly assisted each other in getting to or from the little dock where we landed. + +Rhodes is the ancient Rhodes (a rose), and the name belongs both to the island and the city. The latter has a population of about +ten thousand, and of these there are six thousand Turks, while the rest are Jews and Greeks. The city is built in the form of an +amphitheatre, upon the bay that makes the harbor, but unfortunately the depth of water is not sufficient to afford anchorage for +ocean going steamers. It was a warm, still, clear afternoon when we were there, and the town as we approached it had a very quiet +and lazy appearance. The walls and towers, the work of the Knights of St John, carried us back to the middle ages, and it seemed as +if Rhodes had gone to sleep half a millennium ago and nobody had disturbed her since. Strabo described the ancient city of Rhodes as +a place of great magnificence, with many public edifices that were profusely adorned with works of art. There were said to have been +three {248}thousand statues in the city, and altogether it must have been a wonderful place. At present there are few remains of +anything prior to the occupation by the Knights of St. John in the early part of the fourteenth century. + +One of the brightest pages in the history of the Crusades and the events connected with them, is that whereon is written the +chronicles of the Knights of St. John. At the time of the first crusade the institution was in high favor with the crusaders, many +of whom joined it and bestowed their fortunes upon it. Up to that time it had been merely a secular institution, but its chief +determined to organize it as a religious body whose members took the vows of obedience, chastity, and poverty, and were to devote +their lives to the aid of the poor and sick in the Latin kingdom of Jerusalem. + +In the twelfth century the institution added another vow to those above mentioned,--that of bearing arms in defense of religion. The +order thus assumed a military character and rapidly rose in wealth and power. In some of the Saracenic wars the knights performed +deeds of great valor, and several battles were won by them. In the thirteenth century they were driven from the Holy Land, in +consequence of the reverses suffered by the crusaders, particularly in the battle near St. Jean d’ Acre. After this they established +themselves at Cypress. Here they assumed a naval character, as their ships carried pilgrims to and from the Holy Land, and had +frequent sea fights with the Turks. In A. D. 1309 they seized Rhodes, which had been a resort of Moslem pirates, and fortified it in +the manner we see it at the present day. They were several times assailed by the Turks, but repulsed every assault and made several +expeditions into Asia Minor. Their numbers were steadily recruited from the nobility of Europe, and one time nearly all the +best families of France, Spain, and Italy were represented among the Knights of St. John. In A. D. 1522 the Sultan Solyman the +Magnificent, besieged them with an army twenty thousand strong; they held out for six months--their whole strength was less than six +thousand men--they were at length forced to surrender. But their defence had been so heroic that the Turks allowed them to retire +with the honors of war, carrying their arms and standards + +{249} + +[Illustration: 0259] + +{251}and even some of their cannon. The Turkish fleet dipped its flags and fired a salute, as the Knights with tearful eyes sailed +away from the island which their order had held for more than two centuries. It is recorded that the commander, Phillipe de l’Isle +Adam, was the last to leave the island and that he turned and kissed his hand toward Rhodes as his ship sailed away. The trumpet +that was blown at Rhodes to give the signal of the retirement of the Knights is preserved at Malta, and I had the pleasure of +examining it several months after my visit to the scene of the heroic defence. After temporary sojourns in Candia, Sicily, and +Italy, the Knights, in A. D. 1530, were established at Malta where they built a strong fortress which resisted several sieges by +the Turks. They remained at Malta until 1798, when Napoleon, on his way to Egypt, seized the Island and virtually put an end to the +existence of the order. + +[Illustration: 5261] + +{252} + +[Illustration: 0262] + + + + +CHAPTER XVIII--SYRIA, THE LAND OF THE SUN.--DRAGOMEN, GUIDES, AND COURIERS. + + +_A Rough Night on Shipboard--A Sea-sick Turk--What he said--Rum and Petroleum--Meditations on Turkish Hash--The Camel, his tricks +and uses--A Knowing Brute--How he shirks a burden--George Smith, the Assyrian Savan--Beyrout--Its Antiquities and Wonders--Going on +Shore--The Dragoman and his office--Eastern Guides and their Character--Travelling on Horseback in Syria--The road to Damascus--An +unexpected trouble--Paying fare by Weight--Disadvantages of a heavy “party”--A trial of Wits--Waking up the Judge--Telling White +Lies--The “Doubter’s” Predicament._ + + +IT grew rough in the night, after we left Rhodes, and the _Tibre_ tossed about in a very lively way. + +There was a Turk in the state room on one side of me, and an Armenian woman in the room on the other side. + +The Turk rolled about very uneasily; the springs of his bed were rather noisy, and I could hear them creak every time he turned +over. I venture to say that he turned in his bed not far from 243,654 times in the night; not that I counted them, but only guessed. +Every time the ship gave a lurch he shouted “Allah!” and between times he cleared his stomach or his conscience of everything that +had rested there in the last ten years. + +As for the Arménienne, she took out her share in groaning, and she did that so well as to entitle her to the first place at an +Irish wake. Had she asked me for a diploma, I could have given her one that would have made her fortune, but she didn’t put in +an appearance till she came out to leave the ship at Alexan{253}dretta. She wanted to say her prayers, but was too weak to do +so, though she shouted “Constantine” as often as the Turk said “Allah.” As for the Turk, he stuck to his employment with most +commendable zeal. Between the two, I didn’t get much sleep during the night, and was glad when morning came and the steamer anchored +at Mersina. + +It was too rough to go on shore with comfort, and there was nothing to see after getting there, as the place is small and has no +special distinguishing features. + +Next morning we were at Alexandretta, the port of Aleppo; and there we went on shore. + +Almost the first object that caught my eye, as I stepped on shore, was a barrel of New England rum, with the name of the Boston +manufacturer carefully stencilled on its head. In nearly every part of the world where I have been, I have found that the enterprise +of Massachusetts has sent its rum, a harbinger of civilization, that must puzzle the heathen in their efforts to understand the +principles of Christianity. A barrel of petroleum was just beyond it, another bearer of light from the New World to the nations +wrapped in darkness. + +Our poetic fancies, on the juxtaposition of these gifts of America to the old world, were cut short by our entrance to the bazaars, +a series of low sheds with a street between them, little more than a couple of yards wide. Merchants were squatted in their shops, +with their goods piled all round them; shop, goods, and merchant, all included, rarely occupied a space more than eight feet square. + +The official known in American stores as a floor-walker would be entirely superfluous here; he might as well try to walk in the cage +of a canary bird as in an Oriental shop. + +The customer stands in the street, or sits on the low bench that forms the front of the shop; a party as large as +ours--half-a-dozen--blocked the street and made it inconvenient for others to get around or for ourselves to see anything. Then +there were camels, dogs, and donkeys moving about, and you had to look sharp to prevent being run over. + +There was a restaurant a little larger than the rest of the shops, but still very small; and there was a butcher’s shop, where +{254}a couple of men, with large knives, were making mutton-hash for native consumption. The hash was rolled around on a large +block, and cut with knives at every turn, and frequently the knife came so near the fingers of the operator as to endanger them. +With ordinary carelessness, there ought to be about two per cent, of fingers in a lot of hash after its preparation is complete. + +Outside the town we visited a group of camels. + +[Illustration: 9264] + +These patient beasts have a dingy hide, with thin hair, and their appearance is so ungainly that I should think they would be +ashamed of themselves. I would give something to know what is a camel’s idea of beauty; it must be something quite out of the +ordinary run. A little distance away, they resemble large turkeys, and, with heads stretched out when they trot, you would take them +for the aforesaid turkeys hunting after grasshoppers. A lot of the beasts were being loaded for the interior, and I was interested +in watching the operation. + +The camel is made to kneel, and then a quantity of old blankets is spread on his hump, on which to place the saddle. This is formed +of a few sticks joined together, much like the ordinary mule saddle, only somewhat larger. The freight to be carried is fastened to +this saddle by means of ropes, and the Arabs have a very keen eye for balancing the boxes and barrels that make up a camel’s load. +My pity was roused for a camel that made half-a-dozen ineffectual efforts to rise after he was loaded, and was only brought to his +feet by the assistance of one man pounding him and three others lifting at the load. But a gentleman of our party was familiar with +the camel, and said: {255} “The chances are two to one that the distress of the beast is a sham. They are up to all that sort of +trick when being loaded, as they sometimes secure a diminution of their cargoes by playing it sharp. I have seen an old camel sold +by putting a lot of empty boxes on him. They weighed very little, and yet he tried half-a-dozen times to rise, and couldn’t, until +he was cudgeled. The whining and groaning of the camel is a good deal of a fraud. You have seen western pack-mules in America do the +same thing.” + +Sagacious beast the camel! + +If the Hindostanee doctrine of metempsychosis is correct, I wonder what sort of spirits enter the bodies, of the ship of the desert? + +We saw the camel-train move out on the road to Aleppo, ninety miles distant, and we walked a mile or so upon the road. Two +passengers who were bound for Nineveh and Bagdad, on the Euphrates, left us here, and we saw them off on their journey. One of them +was Mr. George Smith, who was making researches at Nineveh for the British Museum and the London Daily Telegraph conjointly. + +He expected to be twenty-five days making the journey to Nineveh, and said it was possible that bad weather might make his route +somewhat longer. He made some valuable discoveries in his first explorations there, and hoped to make many more. I am sure all the +passengers of the _Tibre_ wished him every possible success. + +While I am writing these pages, his book on his explorations has been published in London, and is receiving the praises of the +scientific world. + +Camels and palm trees, ancient ruins, stray dogs, Arabs, water-pots, and other things, gave the road to Aleppo an Oriental +appearance, and the temptation to push forward to the great desert and away to the eastward was by no means a light one. But this +was not to be undertaken; we returned to the steamer, and were borne away towards Beyrout, where, three days later, after stopping +at two unimportant points, we landed and set our faces toward Damascus. {256}Bcyrout presents a pretty appearance from the water. +The land on either side sweeps gracefully around to form a bay, and at the end of this bay the city is nestled. Back of it is the +famous Mount Lebanon, from which were brought the cedars used in the construction of the Temple at Jerusalem; the sides of the +mountain are steep, but not precipitous, and the summit is frequently covered with clouds. + +Seen from the city, the mountain has a bleak, barren appearance, owing to the masses of white limestone cropping out at frequent +intervals and reflecting the sunlight to such an extent as to give it the name by which it is known, “the White Mountain.” The sides +of the mountain are cultivated in terraces, and the front walls of these terraces frequently consist of the solid limestone rocks. +As one looks up the mountain, he sees only the faces of these terraces, the verdure which they sustain being out of sight. + +The old town of Beyrout is very old, and its streets are narrow and very often rough and dirty. The new town, or rather the new part +of the town, has wide streets and is sufficiently well paved to allow carriages and carts to move about; the pavement is excellent +for Syria, but would have been considered very poor in an American city. The population is now about sixty thousand, which is +three times what it was thirty years ago; it is a mixed population of Moslems, Christians, and Jews--about as mixed as that of +Constantinople or Cairo. Business is active, and the city has a very pronounced air of prosperity. + +Antiquities and curious sights for the ordinary tourist are few in number and not very interesting. There are Roman, Assyrian, and +Arabic remains, in the shape of tablets sculptured on the rocky walls of the Nahr-el-Kelb or Dog River, about half an hour’s drive +from Beyrout; and there are a few traces in the town itself of the Roman occupation. All of them can be seen in a short time, and to +a stranger who has come straight from America, without stopping, they would doubtless be interesting. But where you have done Rome +and Athens, and half the cities of Europe and Asia, you won’t linger long over the antiquities of Beyrout. + +But all this time, while I have been droning about Beyrout and Mount Lebanon, I have kept you waiting at the gangway of the + +{257} + +[Illustration: 0267] + +{259}steamer. Well, you have the consolation of knowing that you have put in the time while waiting for the ship to undergo the +quarantine formalities and obtain _pratique_. + +A crowd of dragomen and guides invaded the steamer as soon as they had permission to come on board, and were very energetic in +endeavors to secure our patronage. They presented credentials that would have entitled them to anything short of canonization, and +to read their credentials you would consider them the best and most honest men in the world. + +We selected the guide belonging to the hotel which we had determined to patronize, and repelled as best we could all the others, by +telling them we had no need of their services, and should not take them. We obtained a boat, with a little bargaining, and went on +shore, where a dense crowd of Arab porters were in attendance. Two francs of “backsheesh” took us through the custom house, and +we followed guides and porters to the hotel, and were followed by a guard of honor of about a dozen dragomen, very much as an +organ-grinder is accompanied by a troop of small boys. + +While we were coming on shore there was a row between the guide of the hotel, and the dragomen belonging to the same establishment, +in consequence of the former trying to fasten himself upon us, for the journey to Damascus. The latter requested the guide to stick +to his business, and imperatively told him to mind his place and keep it. Some of my readers may ask the difference between the two +positions, and for their benefit I will venture an explanation. + +A guide is a necessary evil of European or Oriental travel, particularly the latter; you can get along in Europe without a guide, +unless you are pressed greatly for time and want to see things in the shortest possible limit, but in Oriental cities you will +find a guide indispensable, at least for the first two or three days of your stay, until you get the run of the place. The “guide” + belongs to the city and its surroundings; he is called guide in the Orient, and _valet de place_ or _commissionaire_ in Europe. In +Europe he generally knows something of the history of the city, where he shows you about and can tell you of the curiosities, the +date of the construction of the cathedral, palaces, _et cetera._ {260}But in the Orient you must not expect anything of the kind; +you must rely upon your guide book for all historical information, and as a general thing, must indicate to the guide the different +places you wish to visit. His services generally consist in taking you to those places, and in acting as your interpreter. As for +knowledge beyond his day and generation he has none. For example, a local guide in Venice will take you to the Doge’s palace, or the +church of St. Mark, and tell you the date of construction, the name of the builder, the uses of each portion, and will go on step +by step till he has delivered a sort of lyceum lecture, which he has carefully learned, has delivered a great many times before and +expects to deliver as often as he can get an engagement for an indefinite number of years to come. In Constantinople you wish to +visit the Mosque of St. Sophia; the guide will get the necessary ticket and take you there, and the most you can expect of him, +after you get inside, is to tell you which is the floor and which is the roof. Sometimes he is not equal even to that effort of +intellect. + +In Europe there is the travelling courier; he is engaged by people willing to pay for luxuries, goes with them from city to city, +looks after their baggage, makes most of their bargains, acts as their interpreter, and frequently as a local guide, and is supposed +to know the continent and its belongings pretty thoroughly. + +The dragoman is to the Orient what the courier is to Europe. The difference is caused by the difference of the two regions. In +Europe you travel by rail and steamer; in the Orient there are no railways, and in all Syria and Palestine, with the exception of +the one between Beyrout and Damascus, there is not a carriage road. You must travel on horseback, must sleep in tents, while between +the cities, and must have a regular camp equipage. + +The dragoman makes it his business to attend to all this. He supplies your parties with horses, tents, food, and everything else at +a fixed price per day, and when in the cities he supplies you with a local guide, but never acts as one himself. He is to the guide +what the horse is to the donkey, or a general to a captain, and he frequently puts on airs enough to set up a windmill. I hope I +have made a clear enough explanation of the difference between the two. {261}From Beyrout to Damascus there is an excellent road, +equal to the best turnpikes of America, and the _diligence_ roads of Europe. It was constructed by a French company under a charter +or firman from the Sultan, and is a triumph of engineering skill. Twice a day there is a _diligence_ each way over the road; the +morning departure is at four A. M., and the evening at six P. M. The time from Beyrout to Damascus fourteen and one-half hours and +from Damascus to Beyrout thirteen and one-half, owing to the difference of elevation. + +We went at once to the office of the company, where we were politely received, and after considerable talk, and an examination of +the _diligences_, we hired a special carriage, which was to take our party of six to Damascus and back, stopping midway long enough +to allow us to visit Baalbek. + +The entire cost, including the halt _en route_, and at Damascus, was about sixteen dollars (gold) for each person, certainly not an +unreasonable price. But we came near having to pay more, and it happened this way. + +We conducted our negotiations in the outer office, and when we had settled the whole matter, paid the money and received the ticket +there arose a question about some trivial matter which the agent said he would refer to the manager. The manager’s office was across +the hall, and as the agent entered it, he beckoned for us to follow. We sauntered in, one after the other, and on entering found +manager and agent settling the question we had raised. + +The manager raised his eyes as we entered. They rested upon us for an instant and then he started back as though somebody had drawn +a revolver upon him. + +“_Mon Dieu!_” he exclaimed, “and is _this_ the party for Damascus?” + +“_Certainement, monsieur_,” replied the agent, waving his hand toward us, whereat we bowed to the manager. + +There was the portly form of the judge in the foreground. He weighed two hundred and thirty pounds, avoirdupois, net, before +breakfast, and a great deal more after a square meal. + +Then came my slender frame of six feet one, with corresponding breadth of beam and depth of hold. {262}Gustave was as tall as I but +not equal to me in diameter. He happened, however, to be wearing one of my overcoats so that he bulged very respectably. + +Charley and the “Doubter” were in the rear. They were fair to middling in size but the manager didn’t see them, his eyes being +wholly filled with the foremost trio, and if he had been a young widow on a hunt for a husband he couldn’t have watched us more +eagerly. + +“Ah, _Mon Dieu, Mon Dieu!_” continued the manager; “we can never carry this party on single tickets. And where is the sixth?” + +[Illustration: 0272] + +“Madame is at the hotel,” I replied, “she is so small that we call her the baby. You should see her. _Elle est très petite, très +jolie, et trescharmante_.” + +My endeavor to divert his attention by an appeal to a Frenchman’s admiration for a pretty woman (many persons not of French birth +are troubled the same way) was of no avail. He t measured our heavy trio and returned to the charge by asserting: {263} “It is +impossible to take you for that price. We calculated upon two horses for the carriage and we must have three. What enormous men you +are.” + +The judge now found tongue and repelled the insinuation that he was _enorme_. + +“You think I am large? You should see my partner. He always rides in two carriages, and once when he slipped on the icy sidewalk, +the people for half a mile around thought it was an earthquake.” + +“_Pardon, Monsieur_,” I added, “_Son Excellence, Monsieur le juge_,” and I waved my hand in the direction of my friend, “is not as +heavy as you may think. He is nothing but a big bag of wind, as you would find if you should stick a fork into him.” + +This raised a laugh in which the manager joined. The judge retorted on me with a remark which personal respect impels me to keep +back from this narrative. It was sufficient to raise another laugh, and under the diversion thus created we got the manager into +good humor. We brought him around all right, but I firmly believe it would have cost us more if he had seen us before the ticket had +been paid for and delivered. As we bowed out of the room the judge was in the rear and caught the manager’s remark to the agent. + +“_Mon Dieu! Ils sont énormes_.” + +The “Doubter,” not knowing French, was standing by during the conversation without the faintest idea of what was occurring. He +looked on with an expression similar to that of a pig contemplating a railway train, and when we got outside he asked what it was +all about. + +“Something very serious,” said the judge. “The manager objected to so much weight, and wanted _you_ to remain behind. We tried to +compromise with him, but it was of no use, and you are to stay in Beyrout till we return.” + +Then the “Doubter” exploded, said he wouldn’t stay, and furthermore, he believed the judge was not telling him the truth; his doubts +were so strong on the subject, that when we reached the hotel he hired an English-speaking dragoman to accompany him to the stage +company’s office and learn the exact state of the case. + +{264} + +[Illustration: 0274] + + + + +CHAPTER XIX--THE GROVES OF LEBANON.--A NIGHT AMONG THE ARABS. + + +_The “Sights” of Beyrout--Excursion to Dog River--An Obstinate Carriage-Owner--How he was “Euchred”--Moral of this Incident--Off for +Damascus--Ascending Mt. Lebanon--An Arab Driver--Cultivating “Kalil,” our Jehu--The Cedars of Lebanon--A Grove as Old as +Solomon’s Temple--A Wonderful Old City--The Temple of the Sun--Mystery of Tadmor--Cyclopean Masonry--Monstrous Monoliths--Their +Dimensions--The “Doubter’s” Doubts and their Solution--Sleeping in an Arab House--What We Saw There--Divans as Couches--A Dangerous +Valley--The Robber’s Haunt._ + + +AFTER we had lunched we went out to see the town, and then we hired carriages for a drive to Dog River, which we were told would +require a couple of hours. We were to pay six francs each carriage “for two hours to Dog River,” and when we were seated the owner +of the stable demanded the money in advance. + +We wouldn’t pay. + +He threatened to unharness the horses, and actually began. + +We told him he must take us out of the carriages, and we lighted our cigars, and settled back for a comfortable rest. + +A crowd collected to see the fun. The owner swore that it was always the rule to pay in advance, and we replied that there was no +rule without one exception. + +He said he must take the money, as he could not trust his drivers, and we invited him to occupy the box till the end of the +excursion, and then take his pay. The upshot of the matter: was that he finally told the drivers to go ahead, and they went. Dog +River was reached in twenty minutes, and then the joke + +{265} + +[Illustration: 0275] + +{267}was apparent. We would have been there and back in an hour or less had we paid in advance, and there would have been no such +thing as redress. + +We kept the carriages two hours and took a drive of a couple of miles on the Damascus road to a pretty grove of pines. Then we +returned to town just inside of the stipulated time and handed over the pay to the drivers only when we were deposited at the door +of the hotel. + +Moral: Be cautious about paying a hackman in advance. + +We are told and believe that the horse is a noble animal--why is it that nearly every one who associates with him is a scoundrel? A +horse jockey is never held up as a pattern of honesty; the race track is the scene of much that is wicked, and as for hackmen, their +rascality is the next thing to an axiom--a selfevident proposition. + +Our carriage was at the hotel door at nine in the morning of the day after our arrival at Beyrout, and as soon as we could stow +ourselves away we were off. + +There was a comfortable space for five, but rather close work for six, and it was absolutely necessary that one should ride outside +with the driver. I undertook the task, and by a scientific arrangement of baggage built up a comfortable seat. We started, and I +went to cultivating the acquaintance of the driver. + +He spoke a little French, so that he could manage to understand me, but his strong point in the way of language was Arabic. He was +as black as---well, _one_ of the blackest men I ever saw--as black as the character of a candidate for office, when his opponent +takes a turn at him. His lips were curly and his hair was thick--you can read the other way if you like--and he couldn’t be excited +into a smile by any ordinary means. The only thing I could do to induce him to grin was to attempt to sing. He thought my singing +rather funny, but, as it frightened the horses, he begged me to desist. He was a skilful driver, and his name, Kalil, a name about +as common in that country as George or Charles with us. + +We rattled out of Beyrout past the forest of pines to which the European residents sometimes drive on a pleasant afternoon. A rain +during the night had moistened the road, and at several {268}places where the laborers were repairing it, the carriage was a heavy +load for the horses. These, by the way, were three in number, strong, sleek, well kept horses, that knew their work and performed +it. Hardly were we out of the city before we began ascending Mount Lebanon, and the ascent is by no means an easy matter. The summit +of the mountain where the road crosses it is five thousand six hundred feet above the sea level; as the crow flies, it is not more +than seven miles from this summit to Beyrout, but as you follow the road it is nearly twenty miles. We were not fitted with wings +for flying, and consequently we stuck to the road which the company provided for us. It was slow work for the horses, and, to ease +the load, the lightest and most enterprising of us left the carriage and walked. + +The road is of excellent construction and reflects great credit upon the engineer who made the surveys and laid it out. The cost +must have been something very great, and I was not surprised to learn that the investment had never paid well, in spite of the +apparently good business of the company. In addition to the two _diligences_ each way daily, the company sends a daily freight train +of fifteen wagons; whether there is anything or nothing for them to carry, it is all the same--the wagons start at a fixed time, and +are allowed three days for the journey, from one city to the other. + +There is a large station for freight in each of the terminal cities, and at reasonably regular intervals along the road there are +wayside stations with stables of good size, and with quarters for the station-keeper and attendants. The stables, stock, wagons, +carriages, and all other property of the company, appeared to be well kept, and without any meanness of management, and the +discipline of the men was very strict. I had reason to find it out in a practical way. + +I have done a good deal of staging and posting in various parts of the world, and have learned that it is generally a good plan to +get on friendly terms with drivers, no matter what their nationality, color, or previous condition of servitude may be. In pursuance +of this plan, I cultivated Mr. Kalil, the gentleman of Nubian origin, who conducted our _atelage_. I gave him a cigar as soon as we +started, and he thanked me by touching his hand to his breast, his lips, and his forehead--this is _a l’Arabe_--and when we pulled +up at a wayside cabaret to tighten some of the straps, I “stood treat” with a glass of arrack, which he swallowed without a grimace. +Then I intimated that if he would put us through lively, and never mind killing a horse or two, he could consider me good for a +liberal “backsheesh.” He shook his head and showed me the way bill, and I saw the company knew its business. + +The drivers are required to go between the stations at a certain speed, and they must not exceed it, neither must they fall short, +unless from unavoidable reasons. If they go too fast they are corrected; I do not know exactly how, but from the customs of the +country, I should imagine that for a slight offense a driver’s pay would be stopped, and he would be pounded a few days with a +hammer, a scythe, or a trace chain, till he died. For a more serious offense he would be treated with severity proportionate to the +enormity of his conduct. + +The time of arrival and departure at each station is noted on the way bill by the station master, so that there is no chance to cut +under in any way. I observed the station master examining the horses’ feet as soon as the animals were delivered to him and then +making notes on his book. I thought this a strange proceeding until I learned that the horses were numbered on the hooves, the +number being neatly cut with an engraving tool, or burned in with an iron. + +The company allows none but its own teams on the road, except on payment of a heavy toll; the old bridle road or track is in sight +most of the way, and we saw many pack trams of camels, mules, donkeys, and horses threading their way through the mud, while we were +rolling on a macadamized track. In no instance did we see a pack train on the modern road. + +Away to the north, over a rough and difficult road, are the famous Cedars of Lebanon. + +They are in a valley which is dominated by the high peaks of the range, and stand on a little hill or knoll, so that they are +visible from a considerable distance. + +The grove is not large--one can walk quite around it in half an hour--and contains not far from four hundred trees of all +{270}sizes. The old and gnarled trees are in the centre, while the younger ones form the outside of the grove. Not more than a dozen +can claim any great antiquity, but there are thirty or forty others that vary from three to five feet in diameter--the largest of +the trees, and supposed to be one of the oldest, is more than forty feet in circumference. + +[Illustration: 9280] + +The trees have been much defaced and broken by visitors, some of whom would no doubt carry away the whole of Mount Lebanon if it +could be packed in a travelling trunk. + +Though there are other cedar groves in Syria, the one here mentioned is the most important, for the reason that it is supposed to +have furnished the timber for Solomon’s Temple, as recorded in the Old Testament. Cedar trees were doubtless very abundant in the +palmy days of Jerusalem; at present they are very scarce, and if the natives and other barbarians continue to destroy their limbs +and build fires in the grove, as they do in these days, these famous trees will soon live only in history. + +Up, up we went along the sides of Mount Lebanon, the air growing cooler as we rose, and a violent hail-storm dropping upon us. It +was warm when we left Beyrout, and I mounted my box without an overcoat. Soon it grew cool, and I donned a light one; an hour later, +I abandoned the light for a heavy one; next I spread my shawl in front of me, and next I wrapped a silk kerchief around my neck. + +We made our second change of horses after passing the summit, and then began the descent. {271}Now we had speed; we wound down and +down, as we had wound up and up, but we went three or four times as fast. Far away at our feet lay a plain--the plains of Buka. +Two hours from the summit, we were at Stora, a wayside station, where we passed the night, and were most kindly treated by the +keepers--a Greek man married to an Italian woman, once a _danseuse_ at La Scala, Milan. + +Next morning before day, we were up and off for Baalbek, which lies about twenty miles away to the left of the road. + +It had rained in the night, and the soil was soft and sticky, making slow work for our horses. The mud clung to their feet and +formed huge balls, and we could only advance at a walk. The saddles were unused to us and we to them, and we hurt them a good deal. +When we dismounted at Baalbek, every one of the party walked like Falstaff’s recruits, wide between the legs, as though accustomed +to the gyves, and some of us were inclined to stand while at meals. We had no time to waste, and after lunch proceeded to do the +ruins. + +We found them all that fancy and travellers have painted them. They are grander and loftier than anything at Rome or Athens, and the +architecture is of a most beautiful and delicate pattern. The temple in its glory must have been something majestic, and I have seen +few things among the ruins and edifices of Europe and Asia more striking to the eye or more beautiful in general effect than the +court and colonnades of the Temple of the Sun. + +But the wonder of Baalbek is in the stones used in its construction. Hewn stones, twelve, fifteen, and twenty feet long, and +proportionately wide and high, are frequent in the walls and substructures. You grow weary of saying: “There’s one!” “Look at this!” + “and this!” “and this!” You wander down in the underground passages, and the size of the stones, placed as precisely as bricks in +a wall of a building of to-day, fairly astounds you; you come out, and look on the wall of the temple, and you find stones +twenty-four, twenty-eight, and thirty feet long, and proportionally wide and high. You see stones of this sort away up in the air at +the tip of the columns, and you wonder how they got there. + +In the western wall are three great stones, one of them sixty{272}four feet long, another sixty-three feet eight inches, and +another sixty-three feet; they are thirteen feet high and thirteen feet thick. They are twenty feet above ground, properly placed in +position, and they were brought from the quarries nearly a mile away. + +[Illustration: 9282] + +And in the quarries, is another stone of the same sort sixty-eight feet long, but not quite detached from the rock below. + +Don’t drop the subject now but pace off sixty-three feet in your garden or back yard or some other man’s yard or garden; then pace +off thirteen feet and then look up thirteen feet on the side of the house and then imagine a hewn stone as large, and after you have +done it you will just begin to imagine these stones as we saw them. + +During our evening halt at Stora one of us read aloud from the guide book the description of Baalbek. + +When we came to the measurement of the stones the “Doubter” explained: “Is anybody fool enough to believe such nonsense?” + +We tried to argue with him that possibly the stones were of that size, but he closed the argument as he did most arguments by +saying: “I know better.” + +On our way to Baalbek we saw the stone in the quarry and asked what he thought of it. {273} “That is nothing,” he replied, “they +haven’t moved it.” + +When we saw the three stones in the wall and measured their length and height he said they were joined together. + +He could find no joint and finally insisted that they were only thin slabs fastened to the walls, and to this day he insists that +he knows they are nothing like what they are represented to be. He vowed not to speak of them when he reached home for fear he would +not be believed. + +He always kept the hotel bills so that he could prove that he had been to the places we visited. + +“The ‘Doubter’ must be a veree great, what you call in English, liar, at home,” said our fair German companion one day, “if he +thinks people not believe him without his hotel bills.” + +The “Doubter” after all was a source of amusement to us at odd times, in spite of his high rank as a nuisance, and we finally +concluded that it was well to have him along on the same principle that the Romans used to receive a victorious general with shouts +of applause and triumphal honors and at the same time kept a slave at his side to call him opprobrious names and continually remind +him that he was mortal. + +The ancient Egyptian also set our party an example in the same way as they used to put a skeleton in one of the chairs at a public +or private festivity so that the guests might remember what they were coming to. + +We slept that night in an Arab house at Baalbek. Our beds were on divans or couches. We were tended by Arab man-servants and +maid-servants and were bitten by Arab fleas. The rooms of every Arab’s house contain divans that extend along the end furthest from +the door and sometimes along one of the sides. They consist usually of benches or frames not quite as high as the seat of a chair +and about three and a half feet wide and are covered with mattresses that render them agreeable to sit or recline upon We found them +quite comfortable after our hard day’s travel, though perhaps a trifle too hard for American natives. In the poorer houses these +divans are of the same material as the floor--solid earth--covered with a mat of straw. + +Most of the Arab houses are extremely dirty and abound in vermin. The one we occupied was quite neat and well kept, and {274}the +dragoman who accompanied us from Stora expressed surprise at our discovery of fleas. But we did not mind them as we were too weary +to be bothered about trifles, and fleas are familiar acquaintances to a person who has travelled in Italy, Russia, and Turkey. +Travelling, like poverty, acquaints one with a great many varieties of bed-fellows. + +We were up long before day; we breakfasted by candle light, and before the sun tipped the summits of the Lebanon range with golden +color, we were on horseback and away. Through the gray dawn we took the last look at the tall columns of the Temple of the Sun +standing as they have stood for centuries and may stand for centuries to come. + +Shall the edifices which we erect ever become like those of Baalbek, shrouded in a veil of mystery well nigh impenetrable, and fill +so little place in the page of history that future ages shall not know who built them and what was their purpose? + +Little, very little, is known of Baalbek; her foundation and her founders are unrevealed mysteries, and of her glory and progress +and decline we have only the most meagre information. That the city is very ancient there can be no doubt; that her edifices are +among the wonders of the world we have the evidence before us. + +We rode down the plain of Buka as we had ascended it the day before. A little after eleven o’clock we flung ourselves or rather +dropped ungracefully from our saddles and greeted the swarthy Kalil who had come out a short distance with the carriage to meet +us. Kalil and the horses soon took us to Stora where we dined and then packed ourselves in the carriage to continue our journey to +Damascus. We crossed the flat plain at a gallop and then entered a long valley leading up the range which is over against Lebanon. + +This valley is known as the Wady Harir; then we cross a plain and after leaving this we enter a narrow winding glen, the Wady +il Kurn, or “Valley of the Horn.” This pass is one of the wildest in the Anti-Lebanon; it is three miles long and was once very +dangerous on account of the robbers that infested it. The sides are rough and but slightly wooded and the bottom is evidently at +certain seasons of the year the bed of a torrent. + +{275} + +[Illustration: 0285] + +{277}Night came on and shrouded everything around us in blackness; there was an extra touch of darkness to it as there was no moon +and there were thick clouds between us and the stars. We could see little more than what was revealed by our lamps and that little +soon became monotonous. We crossed the plain of Dinas and entered the gorge of the Abana, the river which is the pride of Damascus, +and has always occupied a prominent place in her history. + +“Are not Pharpar and Abana,” said Naaman, the leper, “rivers of Damascus better than all the rivers of Syria?” + +Following the Abana we at length beheld the lights of Damascus, and at nine o’clock entered the city and were deposited at the door +of the only hotel it contains. + +[Illustration: 5287] + +{278} + +[Illustration: 0288] + + + + +CHAPTER XX--DAMASCUS--THE GARDEN CITY OF THE EAST. + + +_Dimitri and his hotel--Court-yards and fountain--How people live in Damascus--Parlors, bed-rooms and boudoirs--A bet and its +decision--The “Doubter and his Donkey”--The Street called “Straight”--Bab-Shurky--Spots famous in history--Shaking hinds across a +Street--Scene of St. Paul’s conversion--The Window of escape--Tombs of Mohammed’s Wives--The “Doubter” figuring on probabilities--An +unexpected upset--Visiting the lepers’ hospital--A frightful spectacle--The Great Mosque--View from the Minaret--The Bazaars and +Curiosity Shops--Making a trade--A case of Fraud._ + + +THE hotel at Damascus is kept by a Greek named Dimitri, who has been familiar with Syria for a great many years, and was in his +younger days a dragoman. + +His house is spacious, and more comfortable than I had expected to find it, and in appearance is the most Oriental of all the hotels +I have seen in the East. You enter by a low, narrow doorway, and passing a short vestibule find yourself in a marble paved court +open to the sky, and possessing a fine fountain When I say a fine fountain, I mean that it is so from an Oriental point of view--i. +e., there is a broad tank, with stone sides, where the water is kept constantly changing by means of a two inch supply-pipe, and an +equally large waste pipe. To the right of the fountain there is a recess about twenty feet square, where are divans and chairs in +abundance. + +Beyond the fountain on the opposite side of the court is the parlor or saloon. It is entered by an ordinary door, and you find +inside a marble floor as long as the room is wide,--about six feet {279}in width,--and having a fountain in the centre. The rest of +the apartment on each side of the marble floor is elevated about two feet and has steps leading up to it. + +The spaces thus elevated are richly carpeted and have divans on three sides. They have in Dimitri’s hotel a few chairs in front of +the divans; but these are rather out of place, and are only kept there out of deference to the foreign patrons. The roof is high, +and the highest part of it all is in the centre. We have reason to know about it, as we got into a discussion while waiting for +dinner, and two of the party risked a bottle of champagne on the result. + +[Illustration: 0289] + +One said the roof was thirty feet above the marble floor, and the other thought it was twenty-nine and a half. The nearest was to +win, and Dimitri sent for a pole and ladders and we measured it. The result was twenty-nine feet ten and one-quarter inches, and I +lost the wine. + +I have been thus particular in describing the court, fountain, and saloon of Dimitri’s Hotel for the reason that it will answer for +any well-to-do house in Damascus, with the exception of the chairs, which should not be introduced there. + +“Take away the chairs,” said Dimitri, “and my house is Ori{280}ental, but with them here, it is not. The instant chairs are +introduced the Oriental character is gone.” + +I should have added that his court contains several orange and other tropical trees; on some of the former the oranges were +ripening, and were plucked and offered to us. + +The height of the roof of the saloon may seem considerable, but we were told that it is frequently ten or twelve feet more, and +before leaving the city I saw some parlors which had I think forty feet of distance between floor and roof. + +Next morning we took a guide and started out for the sights. + +“The weather is fine to-day,” said the guide; “you had better take donkeys, and see what we have to see of the outside of the town. +To-morrow it may rain, and we can then see the bazaars, mosques, and houses.” + +We took his advice and donkeys, and started at once. He led us through crowded streets to the gates, or rather to one of the gates, +and then we proceeded to make a circuit of Damascus. + +Our starting point was Bab-Shurkey or the East Gate It is a picturesque piece of architecture somewhat dilapidated, but containing +traces of its former glory. Here was once a magnificent Roman portal with a central and two side arches which were walled up more +than eight hundred years ago. This gate is at the end of the “street called Straight,” by which St. Paul entered the city, and from +the top of the gate one can look along the street until it is lost in a confusion of buildings. It is not straight as we use the +word, but is enough so for Oriental notions. + +In the Roman period, and down to the Mohammedan conquest, there was a wide avenue where this street now is; it was about a hundred +feet wide and was divided by Corinthian columns into three parts corresponding to the three arches of the gate. They have been +distinctly traced in several localities. As you look down there now you see a narrow lane with uneven rows of buildings on either +side; the projecting windows almost touch each other, and in some localities they are less than a foot apart. Hand-shaking and +osculation would be easy across the streets, and elopements and intrigues are facilitated by the proximity of opposite dwellings. +{281}We went near the wall outside of the city, and were shown several of the local curiosities. We passed a projecting tower of +early Saracenic masonry, and near it our attention was called to an old gateway, which has been walled up more than 700 years. This +is the reputed scene of Paul’s escape from Damascus. + +The window was shown until within the past twenty years, when some changes in the wall removed it. + +In front of the gate we were shown the tomb of George, the porter who aided St. Paul in his escape, and was martyred in consequence. +Our guide was a Christian Arab, and spoke of the place with great veneration, as do all the native Christians. Beyond this is the +Christian cemetery, which was desecrated by the Moslems at the time of the massacre of 1860. Some of the tombs were opened and the +bones were scattered about; afterward some of those wounded in the massacre were thrown alive into the pit. The scene of St. Paul’s +conversion is located here. + +Not far away is the foreign cemetery; among those buried there is the accomplished historian, H. T. Buckle. + +The guide called our attention to the houses upon the wall of the city; it was from a house of this sort that Paul was let down in +a basket, and one can readily see that it was easy for Rahab, who dwelt upon the town wall of Jericho, to let “down the spies” by a +cord through the window. On several occasions in time of war, these houses have been removed, but they have speedily re-appeared on +the return of peace. + +The walls of the city were no doubt of some importance formerly, and are still a sufficient defense against Bedouin cavalry, but +they would be of no consequence to-day. Modern artillery would make short work of them, and there are places where a battery of +ordinary field guns could destroy them in a few hours. + +The city has outgrown the walls in several localities, and it is said that a third of the inhabitants are extra-mural. The +population of Damascus is estimated at about one hundred and fifty thousand. Twenty thousand of these are Christians and six +thousand Jews. The remainder are Moslems, and many of them are of the most fanatical character. {282}We halt at the Mohammedan +cemetery of Bab-es-Saghir, an area of undulating ground, covered with a forest of tombstones, and little whitewashed mounds of +brick, in shape resembling a house roof. + +[Illustration: 0292] + +These are the graves, and each has a head stone with an inscription in Arabic, and beside it, is a cavity for water, generally +containing a green branch of myrtle. Had we been there on a Friday we should have seen crowds of Moslem women weeping over the +graves of relatives or friends, and after the ceremony had ended they would have fallen to chatting pleasantly, as if their visit +were not a matter of grief. We saw the tombs of three of Mohammed’s wives, and of Fatimah, his grand daugh{283}ter, and we were +shown other graves, and tombs containing the remains of Moslem warriors, statesmen, and historians. + +The “Doubter” did not believe that Mohammed’s wives were buried there, and refused to dismount and enter the cemetery. When we +returned to the gate we found him prostrate in the dirt, and just rising with the help of the donkey drivers. It seemed that his +beast resented the notion of standing patiently for a man to sit on him, and after making a remonstrance in donkey fashion, he ended +by turning a somersault that unseated the “Doubter.” The latter jackass described a sort of cruciform parabola and at the end of +his gyrations found himself sitting down lengthwise, and with his back uppermost. Several new constellations and solar systems were +flying around his excited skull and his doubts as to the character of this planet were stronger than ever. + +“I don’t believe,” said he, as soon as his mouth was cleared of the dust that encumbered it, “I don’t believe that there is anything +around here worth seeing. We had better go back to the hotel and stay there.” + +“Nonsense,” replied one of us, “Damascus is the most interesting city of the East, within our reach; one of the oldest cities and +one that has undergone very little change in two thousand years.” + +“I know better than that,” said the “Doubter,” “nobody believes this city is two thousand, or even one thousand years old.” + +I came to his help just then and told him he was right; that the city was founded in 1811 by a colony of Arabs from New Jersey, +and was never heard of by the civilized world until December, 1847, when it was discovered by an Englishman named Smith. Somehow my +information did not please him, and he was sullen all the rest of the day. + +Later on I found what it was to be dropped from a donkey. I was dismounting, and the beast evidently wanted me to be quick about it. +Just as I leaned forward to swing my right leg over, the donkey dropped his head and shoulders and gave me a most beautiful fall. +I went down among other donkeys and in the dust of the street, but I flatter myself that I did it gracefully. A dozen Arabs were +standing around but not one of them smiled while all my companions let themselves out into laughter. I told {284}them it was not +polite to laugh at the unfortunate, but that didn’t appear to check them. + +We visited the house of Ananias, the High Priest, all the points connected with St. Paul’s stay in Damascus, and then we went to the +Mosques. + +Before doing this it was necessary to visit the American Consul or Vice Consul, and obtain a permit. The Consul is a native of the +country, a polite, affable gentleman, speaking English quite well, and showing a desire to serve the citizens and the interests of +the country he represents. He lives in a fine house of recent construction; his house was burned in the massacre of 1860, and he +narrowly escaped assassination. He received us in the style of the Orient, with coffee and pipes, and made us welcome to Damascus. +He sent at once for the desired permit and sent his janissary to accompany us in our visit to the mosque. + +Before going to the mosque we went to the site of the house of Naaman, the leper; a leper-hospital now occupies the spot. And +speaking of lepers, we afterwards went to the leper-hospital and saw half a dozen of the victims of this dreadful disease. Some were +blind, some had the face, some the arms, and some the legs, much swollen, and the face and hands of one were covered with scales. +Under the edges of these scales the flesh was raw and inflamed, and we were told that some of the patients in the hospital were +masses of sores. + +The Great Mosque occupies a quadrangle one hundred and sixty-three yards long by one hundred and eight wide. Part of this quadrangle +is a court surrounded by cloisters resting on stone pillars; the rest of the space is occupied by the mosque, which is four hundred +and thirty-one feet by one hundred and eight. We removed our boots and put on our slippers before entering the building. The +interior is divided into three aisles by two ranges of Corinthian pillars, which support round arches. In the centre is a dome one +hundred and twenty feet high by fifty feet in diameter, and standing on four massive pillars. The floor is of stone and covered with +soft carpets, and here and there on the carpets, were the Moslems at their prayers. Our attention was particularly attracted by one +devout old Jew, who wore a phylactery upon his forehead and who appeared to be utterly uncon{285}scious of what was going on around +him. On the eastern side of the mosque there is an elaborately carved Keebbek, or shrine, and below it is a cave, in which the head +of John the Baptist is said to be preserved in a casket of gold. + +There are three minarets to the mosque; the most important is the minaret of Jesus, at the south-eastern angle, and two hundred and +fifty feet high. + +[Illustration: 0295] + +There is a Moslem tradition that when Jesus comes to judge the world, He will descend on this minaret, enter the mosque, and call +before him men of every sect and nationality. We climbed to the top of one of the minarets, and obtained from it a fine view of the +city. + +Mosques, bazaars, houses, mud walls and flat roofs, remains of Roman and Saracenic columns, streets and court-yards, formed the +scene before us. Further off were the gardens, the olive and orange groves of Damascus; the Abana sparkled in the sunlight {286}like +a band or thread of silver; the barren hills beyond formed a sharp contrast to the fertile plain; and away in the distance we could +distinguish a belt of desert. Another mosque, whose minaret is covered with blue encaustic tiles, attracted our attention, and we +longed to visit it. To our disappointment we learned that admission was then impossible. + +A visitor to Damascus should take advantage of the first clear afternoon, to proceed at a late hour to the Salahiyeh hills, so as to +look upon the city at sunset. The road is pleasant and picturesque, and leads gently upward beyond a village that lies between the +hill and the city. An hour’s ride brings one to a point where the whole plain is spread out like a map at the spectator’s feet. + +Embowered in gardens and tinted by the lights that varied every moment, Damascus looked to us as much like an earthly paradise as +anything in the Orient. Away to the east was the range of Anti-Lebanon; to the north was the plain, with a strip of desert, and to +the south the plain stretched away and broke into the hills in the distance. We could trace out the shape of the city, and follow +with the eye the direction of its principal streets; the tall minarets and bright domes of the mosques formed salient features of +the landscapes, and altogether the scene was thoroughly Oriental. It was from this hill that Mohammed looked and pronounced Damascus +the most beautiful city of the world, and promised the most dutiful of his attendants, that they should be appointed to dwell there. + +Thus we looked upon the city which is doubtless the oldest in the world. More than three thousand years it has flourished; more +than thirty centuries it has stood there a city--the beautiful city of the plain. Nations have appeared and vanished. Kingdoms and +empires and republics have risen and fallen, but Damascus has stood unchanged. Thrones have crumbled, dynasties have come and gone. +Statesmen and poets and scholars have lived their brief period of existence, brief and insignificant. In the centuries that have +rolled over Damascus Saracen, Roman, Moslem, and Christian have besieged the city; twice it has been the center of empires, and many +times it has been the seat of power that was felt far away. Though never formally {287}occupied by Christians, it was one of the +early centers of Christianity, and for nearly three centuries this was the predominant religion. And later in its history the armies +of the Mohammedan empire went forth from Damascus, spreading the religion of the Prophet to Spain on the one hand, and to Hindos-tan +on the other. Damascus was then the seat of an empire the greatest on the globe, extending from the Himalayas to the Atlantic. +Wealth was poured into her coffers, and she became the richest as well as the mightiest capital. Though she has declined she has not +fallen, and presents to-day a picture of serene and well-deserved prosperity. + +Damascus without the bazaars would be Hamlet without Hamlet. Here you see the Orient in its perfection. Instead of shops scattered +through the city, as in the West, all trades, or rather all the persons in one trade, are brought together. The bazaars of Damascus +have had a world-wide celebrity for centuries, and there are none in the East better than they. You can buy there anything you want, +from a. slave to a cigarette, and from a sewing needle to a _parure_ of diamonds. You can wander for hours and days in the +bazaars; in the slipper bazaar, the tobacco bazaar, the seed bazaar, the mercers’ bazaar, the tailors’ bazaar, the clog bazaar, the +silversmiths’ bazaar, the spice bazaar, the book bazaar, the old clo’ bazaar, the iron bazaar, the pipe bazaar, and other bazaars to +the number of a dozen or more. + +There is a general similarity in the bazaars, so far as the externals are concerned; the shops are little pens, from four or six to +ten feet square, where the merchant sits or squats on the floor, and the customer sits on the little bench in front. The front of +the shop is entirely open during the day; it can be shut at night, but the locks by which it is held are of a very primitive and +very flimsy pattern. If the owner wishes to go away in the day time he spreads a net in front during his absence, and this is his +card to say he is “out.” The merchant does not press you to buy, and he generally seems not to care whether you buy or not. + +In the slipper bazaar you pass shop after shop where Oriental slippers of all patterns and values are sold; in the tailors’ bazaar +you find shop after shop where tailors are at work upon Oriental garments, and so you go on through one bazaar after another. + +A few articles for sale, such as ear and nose drops, rings and brooches, generally contained in a locked show-case, a foot square, +and the same in height; the shop-keepers exhibited their goods, but did not press them for sale; many of them stopped work to stare +at us, while others stuck to their business with Oriental indifference. A small anvil, a few hammers, pliers and rollers, and a +small fire of charcoal, kept in flame by a bellows of goat-skin comprise the whole outfit of a workman. The entire arrangement could +be stowed in a good-sized hat.{288}Part of the street called Straight is occupied by bazaars, and there is a network of them on both +sides of it. + +In the silversmith’s bazaar each man occupies a space about six feet square, in a sort of large hall, with low roof and many +supporting pillars; this space contains both work-room and salesroom. + +[Illustration: 0298] + +{289}In the arms bazaar there are all sorts of odds and ends of cimetars, matchlocks, sabres, pistols, lances, and the like. The +famous Damascus blades were offered to us, but they were not of that fine temper that permits you to tie one of them into a knot, +and so we did not buy. An antiquarian would be at home in this bazaar, and find many things to suit his fancy. + +We went to the silk bazaar, as one of our party wanted to buy some kerchiefs, and after looking around we went out of the bazaar +into a Khan, or caravansary. This was a court, with a fountain in the center. A double story of little rooms opened into this court, +and on the upper floor was a silk merchant we wished to find. + +The bargaining was conducted _a l’Orient_. We had coffee and cigarettes, and then the silks were shown. + +The merchant wanted twenty francs, the buyer would give six. + +Neither could do better, but they slowly unbent so that at the end of half an hour the prices were fifteen selling and ten buying. +Then we bade the merchant good-bye, and departed. + +We returned in an hour, and then the negotiations went on; the seller stuck at thirteen, and the buyer at eleven and a half, and +finally, after at least an hour of talk and the assurance of the merchant that the kerchiefs cost him more than that, a bargain was +closed at twelve. + +The _coup de grace_ was given when the buyer showed the money in bright Napoleons, and rattled them before the other’s eyes. + +The silk merchant wanted to sell something more, and sent his partner or attendant to bring a piece of goods from another room. The +piece came, the wrapping was removed, and behold! there appeared on the end of the roll a ticket with the name of a French factory +at Lyons. + +Much of the silk sold in Constantinople, Cairo, Damascus, Aleppo, and Bagdad, as Oriental, is from French looms. I have been +repeatedly told so by the merchants, and also by an agent of one of the houses especially devoted to Oriental fabrics. It requires +an expert to distinguish the native silks from the French ones. + +{290} + +[Illustration: 0300] + + + + +CHAPTER XXI--SYRIAN LIFE--DEALERS IN HUMAN FLESH--WE TRY “ZE LUXURIES OF ZE BATH.” + + +_In the Slave-Market--A Dealer in Human Flesh--A Stealthy Trade--Examining Female Slaves--Serfdom in Syria--Inside Views of a Syrian +Household--Jewish Houses--An Oriental Song--Smoking with the Ladies--Syrian Customs--A famous Arab Chief--Visiting +Abd-el-Kader’s house--The City of the Caliphs--Taking a Bath--Mohammed and his Trowsers--A new Species of Cushion--The +Bath-house--Disrobing--Securing our Valuables--Moslem Honesty--Sitting down in a Hot Place--Gustave’s Misadventure--Undergoing a +Shampoo--Rubbed to a Jelly--The Couch of Repose--A Delicious Sensation--“All ze luxuries.”_ + + +WHILE we were walking through the bazaars, the guide casually pointed out the slave-market, and of course we entered. Our way led +into a court yard, with a fountain in the center and a mosque at our side; off at one corner was the entrance to the slave-dealers’ +apartments. + +The merchant, a mild-mannered Moslem, was in the court yard, and had with him a black boy, a eunuch, for which he wanted thirty +pounds. We followed the dealer up a narrow staircase to a locked room which he opened. + +Four negro women were there, two sitting and two lying upon the floor, which was spread with rugs and blankets; the youngest may +have been sixteen and the oldest thirty. The dealer said something in Arabic, whereupon the women rose and stood in a row facing us, +where they were joined by the boy. All kept their heads turned away, but now and then darted furtive glances at us. We did not buy, +and after giving the dealer a couple of francs as “backsheesh,” we returned to the street. {291}In Damascus the slave trade is open. +In Cairo and Constantinople it flourishes by stealth. In neither of the last two cities are strangers permitted to see it, but in +Damascus there is no such concealment. The trade is not extensive, and is mainly confined to supplying servants for private houses. +The traffic in beautiful women for the harems is nearly a thing of the past, and so is the general trade in slaves for heavy labor +in large numbers. + +[Illustration: 0301] + +As far as I can learn, there was never a slave trade and slave employment half as extensive in the Orient as that which flourished +in the United States less than twenty years ago. + +Slaves in the East are a family possession, and are not reckoned as a specific item of wealth. + +We had been told not to fail to see some of the private houses of Damascus, as they are specially famous for their elegance. To +wander about the city you would not suppose that it has many rich interiors, but you find on investigation that mud walls frequently +lead to something rich inside. Judge not by appearances in Damascus. We entered some of the Moslem court yards, but were not allowed +to see the inside of the houses. We saw some Christian houses richly adorned and decorated, but they will all come within the +general description at the beginning of the preceding chapter. {292}There were many luxurious houses of Christian natives destroyed +in 1860, and few of these have been built. The Christian quarter still bears the marks of Moslem hate, in the large areas that lie +in ruins. The whole Christian quarter was burned, and about two thousand five hundred Christians were massacred. + +Despite the protection now extended to them by foreign powers, the Christians of Damascus do not feel safe, and are constantly +dreading a fresh outbreak of hostilities. + +Two Jewish houses that we visited had evidently cost a great deal of money; the dining room of one is finished in marble carving +around the entire wall, and the cost of this one apartment was said to be ten thousand pounds. + +In one of the Jewish houses, the hostess invited us to seats in the room where herself, the ladies of her household, and a couple of +visitors were squatted on divans and smoking nargilehs. They were much surprised that the lady of our party didn’t smoke, and they +wanted to stain her nails with henna and paint her eye-lashes. + +One of the lady visitors was a cantatrice, the Patti or Nilsson of Damascus, and at the request of the hostess we were favored with +a song. Her voice was a sort of rough falsetto, and there was little melody or rhythm about the song when considered from a European +point of view. How tastes differ! Such a song would not be listened to in Europe or America, except from curiosity; and the song +of Patti would, doubtless, be of no consequence in Damascus. Our guide told us that this lady has sung herself rich, and that she +frequently receives twenty or thirty pounds for an evening’s entertainment. + +We passed a very pleasant hour in this house, and shall long hold it in remembrance. I don’t believe we should have enjoyed it half +as well if the master had been at home, as I have a strong suspicion that we should not have been invited to drink coffee and smoke +with the ladies. + +We wished to visit the house of the famous Abd-el-Kader, but found it impossible. Twenty years ago, this man filled a prominent +place in history, but he is now nearly forgotten. He was born in 1807 in Algeria; he was descended from a long line of Emirs; +his father was noted for the wisdom and liberality of his rule over the Algerian province of Oran. {293}When the French occupied +Algiers, Abd-el-Kader was one of their fiercest opponents, and from 1831 to 1847 he maintained an active warfare, interrupted by a +few brief truces. In the last mentioned year he was captured and taken to France, but was soon released, on condition that he should +not return to Algiers, nor take arms in any way against the French. The terms of the contract have been faithfully kept, and he has +ever since been on the best terms with France. + +[Illustration: 8303] + +He resided for some years in Constantinople, and then moved to Damascus, where he spends the greater part of his time. He continues +to wear the Algerian dress, and his dark hair and beard make a striking contrast to his snow-white garments. + +Those who have met him say that he is a thoroughly courteous and highly polished gentleman, and in looks and bearing he is “every +inch a king.” + +Damascus is the most thoroughly Oriental in character of all the cities now in easy reach of the traveler. Constantinople and +Cairo have each a large foreign population, and can number their Franks by thousands, but Damascus has less than a hundred of them, +including missionaries, merchants, and nondescript Occidentals, who have wandered there by chance. The houses, bazaars, mosques and +baths are to-day what they were five hundred years ago, and the Moslem is so averse to progress, that there is no great probability +of any important change for five hundred years to come. + +As you wander through the streets of Damascus or stand in {294}its crowded market places, you are carried back to the days of +Haroun-al-Raschid, and gaze upon the pictures that became familiar to you in your boyhood perusal of the Arabian Nights. You forget +the Present, you are living in the Past, and, full of bewilderment, you scan the title page of your note-book to make sure that you +really tread the earth in the latter half of the nineteenth century. + +I had missed the Turkish bath in Constantinople; I could have taken one any morning and therefore postponed it until too late. +In Damascus I determined not to be so negligent, and accordingly arranged to try the Oriental bath on the second day of my stay. +Gustave agreed to go with me, and we consulted our guide about the time and place. Imagine our astonishment when Mohammed informed +us: + +“You must get up at five o’clock in ze morning and I takes you to ze bestest bath in Damas. Ze bath shut up at seven o’clock, and +you get no bath then afterwards.” + +This was early rising for us, but when you are in Damascus you must follow the custom of the Damascus blades. If, as the proverb +says, the early child has the worms, there must be an immense demand in Damascus for vermifuge and that sort of thing. We couldn’t +do any sight-seeing in the evening, for the reason that there was no sight-seeing to see. Shops, _cafés_, and all other public +establishments, were closed at sunset or a little later; there were no street lamps, and the facilities for getting about were very +limited. We stayed in the hotel in the evening, and went to bed at an hour we would have been ashamed to acknowledge at home. The +people that went to bed at such an inhumanly early hour must rise in good season. They do this not from any expectation of health +or wealth, as promised by the old couplet, but simply for the reason that they couldn’t endure to be in bed more than eight or nine +hours at a stretch; besides an Arab couch is not the most comfortable thing in the world, and doubtless has something to do with the +matutinal habits of the people. + +It is said that the eastern shore of the Mediterranean is called the Levant, for the reason that the sun rises there. The natives +rise before the sun, and to them rather than to the glorious orb of day is due the name by which the region is known. {295}Promptly +at five in the morning Mohammed was at our door and we rose. Day was just beginning to dawn when we emerged from the hotel and +started along the narrow streets that led to the bath-house. We kept close to Mohammed’s heels, and narrowly missed stepping on the +seat of his trowsers whenever he slackened his pace. The fellow’s “breeks” were about the baggiest pair it was ever my lot to gaze +upon; he must have bought them when cloth was cheap and the merchant willing to measure him with a fox-skin without counting the +tail as anything. When he stood up, the ample part of his trowsers just missed the ground by an inch or so, and when he walked +the depending mass of cloth swung unsteadily like a pendulum that has been on a spree. When he went over any little inequality the +garment dragged, and sometimes it caught and held the wearer fast. When he sat down he gathered the trowsers under him and formed +a sort of cushion that was comfortable to rest upon. It was then that we realized the design of the artist, and admitted that the +inventor of the Turkish trowsers knew what he was about. + +A good many people were astir, and more than once we caromed against the plodding Orientals and caused them to utter what sounded +like imprecations on the Christian dogs that had ventured to affront them. At length Mohammed brought himself to a halt and said: + +“Here, gentlemen, is ze bath; ze best good bath in Damas. You bathe here so good as never was afterward before.” + +The building was a low one, of stone, with a roof in which two or three domes were set like enormous kettles inverted. Light was +admitted through circular windows, or bull’s-eyes, like the cabin windows of an ocean steamer, let into the dome at intervals none +too frequent. In the vestibule we encountered a sort of door-keeper, to whom Mohammed said something in the language of the country, +and then passed on to the first room of the bath. + +“Here is ze bain beautiful. You shall know soon how he is good.” + +With that Mohammed selected a couple of attendants whose entire wardrobe was not worth fifty cents each. It consisted of {296}a +small tuft of hair on the crown of the head, the rest of the skull being closely shaven, and of a piece of cloth about the loins. + +I fell to the lot of a dark-skinned gentleman any way from twenty-five to forty years old, and with a muscular development about the +arms that would have done honor to a pugilist. + +[Illustration: 9306] + +He assisted me to disrobe, but was not very expert about it, being unfamiliar with the wardrobe of the Occident. + +“You will have ze bain avec all ze luxuries,--ze café, ze chibook, ze everyting,” said Mohammed in a tone of inquiry. “Certainly, +mon cher descendant of the Prophet,” I replied, “and you will do us the honor to go through the _moulin_ with us. Order baths for +three, and you yourself disencumber your corporosity of those habiliments and show us how to Orientalize.” + +“Pardon, gentlemens, but I no speak German; only English, French, Italian, Greek, Turk, and Arab. I no understand what you says. +Speak ze English, please.” + +“Well then; peel--strip off your clothes and go in.” + +“Ah! zat is bono,” replied Mohammed, and beckoning to a third attendant, he was soon in the costume of the Apollo Belvidere. My +attendant, as soon as he had stripped me, folded my clothes into a bundle, tied them up in a small sheet, and laid the package away +on a divan at the side of the room. + +“You will have all ze luxuries.” + +{297}I asked Mohammed if everything was safe, as we had our watches and some, though not much, money. + +[Illustration: 8307] + +We had given our letters of credit and the most of our coin to our friends before retiring the night previous, as we thought some +accident might happen if we left things around loose in the bath-house. + +“All tings is safe here,” explained our guide. “Zare is no Christians but you in ze house. All ze rest is Moslem, and all tings is +safe.” + +Thus reassured, we submitted to the situation. + +When they had removed our clothing they dressed us in towels around the loins and wrapped wet cloths about our heads. Then they +mounted us on wooden clogs that were difficult to keep in place, and which I kicked off in the next room whither my attendant led +me. The place was gloomy and full of steam, and the temperature anything but agreeable. It was heated by a furnace under the floor, +and the heat was carried around and made even by means of pipes and flues in the wall. While we stood uncertain what to do, two +or three buckets of water were dashed over us. I was not expecting it, and the shock of the water striking me in the breast was +sufficient to knock me down, I fell against Mohammed and he against his attendant, and we {298}all went into a heap. Mohammed was +fat and rather flabby, so that he broke my fall in the most satisfactory manner. + +[Illustration: 9308] + +It hurt him somewhat, but that made no difference, as we hired him by the day and paid his expenses. + +In one corner a lot of fellows were sitting on the floor and softening the asperities of the bath by singing an Arab air. Mohammed +said they were soldiers, but there wasn’t one of them with any more uniform than we wore, and certainly ours was very scanty. We +looked and listened, perspired and waited, and just as the place began to seem comfortable the attendants led us into another room +compared to which the first was a refrigerator. It was frightfully hot and took away the breath, and if I had considered myself a +free moral agent I would have backed out. + +Gustave thought he would sit down, and seeing a block of marble through the steamy atmosphere, he went for it. Before the attendant +knew what he was about Gustave had taken a seat. + +My duty to the moral and religious public requires the omission of the remarks of my friend immediately subsequent to his assumption +of the sitting posture. They were made in German, English, and French, and were brief and emphatic. {299}What he supposed to be +a block of stone proved to be a marble tub filled with water. The temperature was sufficiently elevated to cause him to howl with +pain, but it did no real damage. + +We squatted in a group on the floor after lifting Gustave from his tub, and there we sat puffing and perspiring for some ten minutes +or more. Then my attendant laid me on a stone bench and put me through what is called the “shampoo.” He squeezed, and rubbed and +pulled and pounded till I was as limp as a boned turkey and possessed as much consistency as a jelly fish. I expected to spread out +and run over the sides of the bench and I took a glance downward to see if there was danger of running off through the waste pipes. +I called faintly to Mohammed, and heard a husky “Monsieur” in response. + +“Have the goodness,” I said, “to ask this gentleman to put me in a sack if he wants to rub me any more. Any sack with small meshes +will do, but I want it tight enough to keep me together. + +“And Mohammed,” I added, “if there is a rolling mill or a wire-drawing establishment handy he could facilitate matters by running me +through it, and then”-- + +A bucket of hot water was poured over me, and some of it entering my mouth put an end to my appeals for mercy. I was soon let off +and taken into the first room, where several buckets of water each cooler than its predecessor were thrown over me. Then I was wiped +dry, and a cool dry turban was wrapped around my head, and I was clothed in a white garment, and laid away on a divan. Blankets +were wrapped around me, and coffee and a chibook were brought. Gustave was similarly mummified and placed near me, and Mohammed was +stowed away on the opposite side of the room. We reclined there smoking and sipping coffee, sipping coffee and smoking, talking and +drowsing, drowsing and talking, for nearly an hour. Coffee was never more delicious than then, and I solemnly aver that I never +had more enjoyment of a pipe. The long stem of the chibook allows the smoke to cool before it reaches the mouth, and there was a +delicate flavor to the tobacco that adapted it to the listless condition of mind and limp condition of body which follows the bath. + +We dressed, paid our “backsheesh,” and departed happy in mind and body over “ze bestest good bath in Damas.” + +{300} + +[Illustration: 0310] + + + + +CHAPTER XXII--TRAVELING IN A CARAVAN--SIGHTS ON THE WAY. + + +_Turning our faces eastward--The land of the Sun--Palmyra, Bagdad, and Babylon--The desert in summer and winter--A dangerous +road--The Robbers of the Wilderness--Ruins in the Desert--A city of wonders--The haunts of the Bedouins--Engaging an escort--The +start for Palmyra--On a Dromedary’s back--The environs of Damascus--A bed on the sand--“Everyone to his taste”--A knavish +Governor--Winking at Robbery--In the Desert--On the great caravan track--Caravansaries, what are they?--The high road to India--An +Arab fountain._ + + +HOW I longed, when at Damascus, to push further into Asia. Before me lay the land of the Arabian nights--the valley of the +Euphrates and of the Tigris; beyond the horizon my imagination pictured the battlemented walls of Bagdad, her white domes and arrowy +minarets shining among the waving palms. + +I walked her streets once trodden by the feet of Haroun-al-Raschid and made familiar in the stories that were written in his time +and--if we may believe our tradition--for his entertainment.. I fancied myself upon the site of Babylon or of Nineveh, and amid the +crumbled ruins of those once powerful cities that represented the grandeur and greatness of the ancient East. + +I followed the story of Xenophon in the retreat of the Ten Thousand, and stood upon the ground where Alexander marched to the glory +that made him The Great. I was upon the threshold--yes, I had passed the portals--of that part of the East which has suffered least +from the progress and enterprise of the Occident. With longing eyes I looked beyond the rising sun and wished, oh, how I wished, +that I might go on and on till I should {301}tread the soil of Ormuz or of Ind, and feel upon my brow the spice-laden breezes of +fair Cathay. + +But fate was inexorable and many things conspired to prevent my further progress. We had arranged to keep together till we reached +Egypt; the rest of the party were pressed for time and had determined upon Damascus as the Ultima Thule of their journey. The season +was not favorable for an overland excursion as we might be caught in winter storms in the desert, and furthermore the robbers were +more dangerous then than in the summer. From Damascus it is customary to travel with a caravan under a heavy escort, and there would +be no caravan for several months. The authorities will sometimes give an escort and be responsible for the safety of the traveller, +but such an outfit costs heavily and requires a very long purse. Arrangements can be made to ride with the fortnightly mail from +Damascus to Bagdad, but there are various objections to this mode of journeying. + +I thought over all the obstacles in my way and concluded that it was best to keep with our party and go on to Palestine and Egypt. +Among the reasons which impelled me to this decision was the fact that I had neither time nor money enough to go farther East, +and besides I should be cut off from the society of the “Doubter.” I might get along without money by setting up as a dervish and +begging my way, but could existence be possible without our skeptic? Consequently I _must_ go to Egypt. + +Even Palmyra had to be given up, and, sighing, I turned my face to the west. But I fell in with a French traveller, who had come +overland from Bagdad and spent a day at Palmyra, and I listened with boyish interest to his account of what he saw there. + +It is no small matter to reach Palmyra, for the reason that it stands in the midst of desolate wastes, which are the possession or +at all events the “backsheeshing” ground of the most lawless of the Bedouin Arabs They have no conscientious scruples about robbery; +the only point in their favor is that they are averse to shedding blood, and unless he offers resistance, the traveller can feel as +certain about saving his life as he is of losing his property. They may strip him of everything and leave him naked, on foot, and +without food or drink in the middle of the desert, but they have qualms of conscience about murder, though {302}quite willing their +victim should starve or roast to death. Those who assert that the Bedouins are heartless and cruel, should take note of the above +fact, and make an ample apology if they have hitherto said anything uncomplimentary about these plundering blackguards. + +It is absolutely necessary to have an escort in going to Palmyra, and one can be found among the Bedouin sheiks, loafing around +Damascus. Under their convoy the traveller can consider himself secure; they are pretty honorable in this respect, and after getting +a heavy “backsheesh” for safe conduct, they carry out their contracts, though they expect an additional “backsheesh” on their return +and the delivery of the traveller to himself, in good order and condition. It is better to leave money and valuables in Damascus, +taking only enough coin along to pay trifling expenses, and leaving the compensation of escort and dragoman at the banker’s or +consulate. If you are going overland to Bagdad, carry your money in drafts and circular notes, and not in gold. The Bedouin has a +sharp eye for money, and much coin is sure to attract it. + +The Palmyra journey should be made with camels or dromedaries, for the reason that there are long stretches without water. Horses +may be ridden, but there must be one or more camels at any rate to carry water for them. The sheiks always prefer to take no horses, +as they can thereby make the journey more quickly, and consequently cheaper. + +Well, let us suppose we are going to Palmyra. We have completed all our arrangements, agreed upon the price to be paid, and how to +pay it, have arrayed ourselves in Oriental garments, mounted our dromedaries, and filed out of the city. There may be a difficulty +in obtaining a sufficient number of dromedaries for the start, and in that case we ride horses to Kuryetien, about! two days’ +journey from Damascus. There the sheik will have the necessary animals assembled and waiting our arrival. + +We strike away to the northeastward, going at first along a paved road and among the groves and gardens for which the country around +Damascus is famous. We meet crowds of people on their way to town, and accompanied by camels and donkeys: bearing the produce of the +farms. In some seasons of the year {303}we will meet long strings of camels, which have come from Bagdad, laden with dates, silks, +leather goods, and other merchandise from that city; there may be dozens of these in a single party, and sometimes there may be +hundreds of them. The drivers are brown, and not over clean; water has been a scarce article among them, and the rivers of Damascus +are to their eyes a most welcome sight. One would think that the privations of the desert would inspire no great love for the arid +waste, and yet these wild Arabs are so attached to it that they make their stay in the city as brief as possible, and the moment +their business is ended they hasten back to their wanderings in the wilderness. + +“Give me a pillow of snow,” said a Laplander, breathing his last in a Southern clime, “and I shall die happy.” + +“Give me my bed of sand in the desert,” says the Bedouin Arab, “and I shall sleep in peace.” + +Every man to his own liking. Tastes are different all the world over. + +Ten or twelve miles from Damascus, we leave the groves and shady gardens, and emerge upon a plain irrigated by the waters of the +Barada. The plain is cultivated, though generally destitute of arboreal productions, and here and there are the little clumps of +trees where the houses of the farmers are embowered. We passed some villages in the groves; we see a little hamlet on the plain to +our right, but evidently we were not likely to find a dense population. Now we leave the plain and ascend a some-what rugged path +along a barren and rounded mountain which attains an elevation of nearly two thousand feet above the valley of the Barada. In an +hour or so we reach the pass, and at the ruin of an old caravansary we look down upon a plain which stretches away like an ocean and +fills the eastern horizon. + +Five villages are in sight; they are the homes of the people that cultivate portions of this plain. Wheat and barley are the +principal products of the plain, and they find a market in Damascus. The inhabitants are peaceable, but their frequent encounters +with Bedouin plunderers have made them acquainted with the use of weapons, and give them a rather warlike appearance. They dress +much like the Bedouins, and a stranger finds it difficult to distinguish one from the other. {304}The first night of the journey is +usually spent at Jerud, a large village, which is the capital of the province and the dwelling place of a Turkish _agha_ or petty +governor. He has a company of cavalry at his command to resist the Bedouin Arabs, and not unfrequently has occasion to use them. It +is hinted that he sometimes shuts his eyes while a foray is in progress, and begins the pursuit when the plunderers have reached a +secure distance. Of course the robbers are expected to do the square thing under such circumstances, and make an honorable division +of the spoils. But we should not listen to such calumnies, as we expect to stop over night in the governor’s house, and as long +as we are under his roof we receive every hospitality. The assemblage is a mixed one, as there are Arabs from half-a-dozen tribes +spending the night there, and we are expected to show no haughtiness in any way. The man who goes around with his nose in the air +will run the risk of a snub from some of his fellow-guests. + +Out of Jerud we go in the morning at a pretty early hour, and very soon we are in the Desert. We have left the fertile country +behind us, and before and around we have the treeless and desolate waste. We are in a wide valley bounded by bleak and barren +hills whose sides present an unvarying panorama of grey rocks and earth. The ground is not sandy, but is covered with fragments +of limestone and flint, and now and then we see a little tuft of coarse grass struggling to maintain an existence, and evidently +doubtful about keeping it up. + +Birds and beasts are rare; in fact there is no inducement for them to stay there. When speaking of birds in such a locality, I am +reminded of the story of a traveller at an unpromising place somewhere in Utah of Nevada. He entered the diningroom of the only +hotel and asked for breakfast. + +“Can give you beefsteak, fried ham, and curlew,” said the landlord, whose beard resembled an inverted sage-bush, and whose belt +revealed a bowie-knife and revolver. And he added, “The curlew is very good.” + +“What is curlew?” said the wayfarer. + +“It is a bird that we shoot round here.” + +“Has it got any wings?” + +{305} “And can it fly?” + +“You _bet_ it can fly!” + +“Then bring me some beefsteak,” said the traveller, emphatically. “I want nothing to do with a bird that would stay in this +miserable country when he could fly away from it. No curlew in mine, if you please.” + +[Illustration: 8315] + +Three or four miles from Jerud we pass a village where there is a fountain, and then for nearly thirty miles the road follows the +desert valley as before. + +A hot sky above, bleak mountains on either hand, before us an undulating plain, shut in by these mountains, and beneath our feet the +gravelly, flinty, verdureless soil, and our caravan slowly winding onward, form the scene presented to our eyes. Can we believe that +this route has had an existence for centuries? + +Thousands and thousands of years--history does not tell us for how long--this way has been trodden by the feet of patient camels and +less patient men. It was the caravan route from Damascus to the opulent East. Ages and ages ago began and flourished a commerce +now greatly decayed; as we look from the backs of our beasts of burden we see here and there the ruins of castles and caravansaries +which once formed the halting places of the merchants when night overtook them, protected them against robbers, and in turn, +perhaps, protected the robbers and sent out predatory bands for purposes of plunder. Once this was the great road to India and Far +Cathay, long before the sea routes were known, and when navigation was in its most primitive state. Steam and sail and the mariner’s +{306}compass have laid a destroying hand on the caravan traffic, and in place of the myriad trains of camels that once moved along +this mountain-girdled valley we find now but a comparatively thin thread of commerce. The world is a world of progress. + +We reach Kuryetein, a large village occupied by Moslems and Christians in the proportion of two to one. It is in the same valley +we have traversed all the way from Jerud, which continues to Palmyra, forty miles further on. Here is an oasis in the Desert; a +fountain bursts from the end of a low spur which juts out of the mountain range and touches one end of the village. + +It is quite possible that the man who declared it remarkable that great rivers run by large cities might insist that there is a +fountain near Kuryetein and dispute our assertion that Kuryetein is near a large fountain; but we wont be particular about words, as +we are to stop here over night and want to have a peaceful time of it, to prepare us for the fatigues of to-morrow. + +The water from the fountain is carried in little canals by a very careful system of irrigation over a considerable extent of ground, +and creates fertility in what would otherwise be a barren waste. Kuryetein is in the country of the Bedouins, and these Arabs +frequently come and camp near the village on account of the water that constantly flows there. They bring their flocks j and herds +and constitute themselves a general nuisance, as they are not particular about camping grounds and take the first place they can +find, without much regard for the owner’s rights. If I were obliged to live in a village situated as this is, and under all its +disadvantages, I would move away at once. + +The broken columns and large stones, hewn and squared, lying around, indicate beyond a doubt that a city of importance once stood +here, but the most diligent inquirer can learn nothing of the inhabitants concerning the place. It stood there as far back as they +can remember, and that is all they know about it. + +{307} + +[Illustration: 0317] + + + + +CHAPTER XXIII--TENT-LIFE AMONG THE BEDOUINS.--THE WARRIORS OF THE DESERT. + + +_Among the Bedouins--A Genuine Son of the Desert--High-toned Robbers--A Sample of Bedouin Hospitality--Etiquette in an Arab +Encampment--A Cas-e of Insult--Tent-life and its Freedom--A Nation of Cavalry-Warriors--Bedouin Dress, Manners and Customs--Their +Horses and Weapons--A Singular Custom--A Caricature Steed and his Rider--Arab Scare-Crows--On the Road to Palmyra--A Mountain of +Ruins--The Grand Colonnade--The Temple of the Sun--A Building Half a Mile in Circumference--An Earthquake, and what it did--The City +of the Caliphs._ + + +WE are sure to see some of the real Bedouins of the Desert during our stay here, and this will be a good place to learn something +about them. + +The real, untamed Bedouin differs from the shabby counterfeit we see around Jerusalem and Beyrout as a five dollar gold piece +differs from a bogus cent. The real Bedouin rides a fine horse (which is almost always a mare), and he gets himself up in a style +sufficiently gorgeous to be a partial compensation to the traveller for being robbed by him. He is a dignified, high-toned thief, +and transacts business on the square; he is never impolite, even when plundering you, and his hospitality is unbounded. + +When you go to a Bedouin encampment you must stop at the first tent; if you pass it by for a better looking one you will offer the +owner an affront he cannot easily forget, and ten to one he will come around and ask you to step out on the sidewalk and and have a +little pugilism _a la Bedouin_. They wisely put the {308}Sheik’s tent nearest the roadway, and consequently the stranger naturally +comes into his hands and becomes his guest. They do all in their power to make the visitor comfortable, and treat him always to the +best the place affords. He has the full and free run of the village, can go to the opera or circus without paying a cent, and can +run up as large a bill as he chooses at any of the bars and restaurants. He pays nothing for carriages, morning papers, cocktails +and cigars, and the street cars; hospitals and rat pits are always open to him. For a real free-and-easy to a stranger, nothing can +beat a Bedouin encampment. + +[Illustration: 0318] + +A gentleman who has seen much of the Bedouins between Damascus and Palmyra speaks of them as follows: + +“The Amazeh are probably the most powerful of all the Arab tribes. They scour the Desert, from the Euphrates to the borders of +Syria, and from Aleppo to the plain of Nejd--in winter emigrating to the Euphrates, and sometimes spreading over Mesopotamia; in +spring they come up like “locusts for multitude” along the frontier of Syria. They can bring into the field ten thousand horsemen +and nearly ninety thousand camel riders, and hair, having, usually, broad, vertical stripes of white and brown. On the head is the +_cafia_ or silk kerchief, held in place by a cord of camel’s hair. The sheiks are distinguished by a short scarlet pelisse lined +with fur or sheepskin, and they wear large boots of red leather while the common people generally walk barefoot. + +“The women are almost all handsome when young, and in form {309}they are lords of a district forty thousand square miles in area. +They are divided into four great tribes, which are not unfrequently at war, though they call themselves brothers. + +“Their dress consists of an under garment of calico, gray or blue, reaching to the midleg, and fastened round the waist with a +leathern girdle. The sleeves are wide and have very long, pendant points. Over this is thrown the abba or loose cloak of goat’s +{310}and feature many of them are models. But they have bad tempers, are oppressed with hard work from their youth, and soon lose +all their freshness and beauty. Their dress is very simple, consisting of a wide loose robe of blue calico, fastened round the +neck and sweeping the ground. On the head is a large black veil usually of silk but seldom used to cover the face. They are fond +of ornaments; rings, ear-rings, bracelets and anklets of glass, copper, silver and gold are worn in great abundance. Five or six +bracelets are often found on a single dark arm while rings of all shapes and sizes cover the fingers. + +“The principal weapon of the Bedouin is a lance, about twelve feet long and steel pointed, and the opposite end contains an iron +spike for fixing it in the ground. In a charge the lance is held above the head and just before striking it is shaken so as to make +it quiver from end to end. All the horsemen carry swords and some of them carry pistols and daggers. The Bedouins have a novel mode +of warfare with dromedaries each carrying two men. The foremost of these men has a short spear and a club or mace at his saddle bow +and the other carries a matchlock. + +“They seldom fight pitched battles. Guerrilla warfare is their forte. To fall upon the enemy suddenly, sweep off a large amount of +booty and get back to their own territory again, ere rescue or reprisal can be effected, is the Arab style. Plundering parties +often go a distance of eight or ten days’ journey. Every warrior rides his mare but has a companion mounted on a dromedary to carry +provisions and water. The latter remain at a rendezvous while the horsemen make the attack. In their forays the Bedouins never kill +an unresisting foe unless tempted by blood-revenge.” + +The real Bedouin is not a large personage. He is rarely taller than five feet and seven or eight inches, and is not inclined to +corpulence. He appears taller than he really is by reason of his erectness, and he has a light, elastic step and performs every +movement with ease and grace. His features are sharp, his nose aquiline, his eyes dark, deep set and generally lustrous, his beard +thin and short and his hair long and worn in greasy plaits down each side of the face. The complexion is a dark olive, but it varies +considerably among different tribes. {311}The Bedouins of Jerusalem and most other parts of Palestine are a burlesque upon the sons +of the Desert. The “Doubter” called them sons of thieves, or something of the sort, and for once we agreed with him. + +[Illustration: 0321] + +The first one that was pointed out to me was enough to make a chicken laugh or a mule sing. He was mounted on a horse that looked as +if he had walked out of a bone-boiling factory by mistake and was waiting to go back again and take his turn. His (the horse’s) pet +hold appeared to be in waiting, and certainly his general style indicated that he could put the time in that way better than in any +other unless it were in dying. + +As for speed he couldn’t pass any other horse, short of a dead one, except by going the other way, and I have a strong belief that a +dead horse would have given him a reasonably lively trial. + +He was all over knobs like an Irish blackthorn and the “Doubter” took him at first for a lot of oyster shells nailed against a +garden gate. He drank through his left eye or rather the socket for it, and then his upper lip curled over in a sort of a hook that +was very convenient in picking up anything; one ear hung forward and the other aft; his tail had been originally “set up” but it +had broken and lopped half way so that it doubled back on itself in a manner remarkable to behold. {312}The rider was as great a +burlesque as the horse. He looked like a last year’s scarecrow, coming home from a drunk, and in gazing upon his looped and windowed +raggedness you experienced a desire to move him to the nearest cornfield, run a bean pole through him, and set him up on a stump. As +a work of art, he was worthy a place among the pictures and statuary in the capitol at Washington, and it was fortunate that none of +our aesthetic Congressmen could have a chance at him. He carried a spear and tried to wave it at an imaginary foe, but before he +got it in the air the point fell out and disconcerted him. We turned away to hide our tears--and smiles. A regiment of oil derricks +would, be about as serviceable as one composed of these fellows, so far as fighting qualities are concerned. If I am ever robbed +I hope it will not be by one of these cheap-John Bedouins. I should feel as badly as a man I once knew who was telling me of an +accident from which he was limpingly recovering. + +“To think,” said he, “that I should have been ten years at sea, and four years in the army in the field, with never a scratch, and +then be run over by a swill-wagon and have my leg broken.” + +In the forty miles and more from Kuryetein to Palmyra there is not a drop of water, and the journey is generally made in one day +with a single brief halt. The valley is the same and varies from four to eight miles in width, and the features of the landscape are +the same as before. + +By and by the mountains shut in upon the valley and leave only a narrow and crooked pass. We enter this and suddenly the whole mass +of ruins upon the site of Palmyra are spread before our wondering eyes. + +The scene is wild, strange, grand, and gloomy. Ruins heaped on ruins, rows and rows of columns with great irregular gaps where +Time and man have performed the work of destruction; huge pillars rising singly and in groups, scattered masses of enormous stones, +broken arches and gateways and porticos, walls of immense strength encircling what was once the city, and in the back ground the +great Temple of the Sun, these form the picture. Baalbek is humble in our minds as we look at Palmyra. No other ruin in Syria can +compare with this. As we rode along the dreary stretch from Kuryetein to Palmyra we tried {313}to imagine the spectacle that was to +be revealed to us, but our imagination fell far short of the reality. We forget our fatigue and as our camel kneels we dismount and +stand lost in admiration and amazement. + +The greatest of all the ruins in Palmyra is that of the Temple of the Sun. The edifice was originally a square court, measuring +seven hundred and forty feet on each of the four sides, and its walls were seventy feet high. Near the centre of this court was the +temple, composed of Corinthian columns, which supported an entablature elaborately sculptured and revealing a high state of art. The +work here is quite equal to that at Baalbek, and the resemblance in many points is remarkable. The temple is much defaced, as it +has been used both as a fortress and a mosque, and in the latter instance the pious Moslems sought to remove as much as possible the +indications of a pagan origin. Time has been more kind than man; the clear air of the Desert has preserved the sculptures wherever +man left them untouched, and many of them are now as clear and sharp as when the architect pronounced his work complete, and stood +in triumph at the entrance of the once magnificent portico. Remember that the columns of the temple were almost seventy feet high, +and that inside the court nearly a hundred columns still remain standing! + +About three hundred yards from the temple is the entrance to the grand colonnade, which originally consisted of four rows of +columns, extending from one end of the city to the other, a dis tance of nearly an English mile. The columns were each nearly +sixty feet high, including base and capital, and of the fifteen hundred that originally composed it, nine-tenths have fallen. It is +thought that Palmyra has at some time suffered from an earthquake, as in some places whole ranges of columns are thrown down in +such a way as to indicate that their fall was simultaneous. No one knows when this work was erected, but from certain marks on the +stones, it is attributed to the time of the Emperor Hadrian. + +The temple and the colonnade are the great wonders of Palmyra, and I will not detract from them by attempting a description of the +other ruins inclosed within the walls or scattered among the hills that surround the site of this won{314}derful city. Let us fix +our attention on the two objects I have named. + +Palmyra, or Tadmor, owes its origin to Solomon, King of Israel. In his time the route of travel and commerce to and from the East +lay in this direction, and he determined to found a city which should protect it. He, therefore, as recorded in I Kings ix. 18, +built Tadmor in the wilderness. + +For nearly a thousand years subsequent to the time of King Solomon, the name of Tadmor does not appear, but it became noticeable +about the beginning of the Christian Era. After its submission to the Emperor Hadrian, its greatness increased rapidly; then it +underwent a series of varying fortunes, until about the beginning of the fourth century, when the time of its grandeur came to +an end, and its decline and fall were rapid. In the twelfth century it had a population of more than four thousand; now the only +inhabitants of Palmyra are a few dozens of dirty and sullen Arabs, who live in hovels erected in the court yard of the Temple of the +Sun. + +We spend a day at Palmyra, wandering among its ruins and musing upon Solomon, and Hadrian, and Zenobia, whose very names are unknown +to the people now dwelling there. Early the next morning we resume our seats in the saddle and return to Damascus. + +From Palmyra one can travel to Bagdad by way of Mossool, and I met several gentlemen who had made the journey. It is a fatiguing one +and must be made partly in the saddle and partly on a raft, unless the traveller is fortunate enough to find a boat at Mossool. The +shores of the river are somewhat monotonous, and the principal incidents of the route are the danger of an upset. + +Bagdad is well known to us from the recurrence of its name so frequently in the Arabian Nights. A British official who visited it a +few years ago, says that it covers an enormous space for an Oriental city. Its population is estimated at about eighty thousand. The +chief part of it consists of Arabs and Turks, but there is a large colony of Persians and other Orientals, as well as a fair number +of Christians, and a few Jews. + +The town proper is on one side of the Tigris, which is spanned by a bridge of boats, but the fine houses are scattered on both {315} + +[Illustration: 0325] + +{317}banks. For a third of the year the climate of Bagdad is delightful, another third it is a trifle too warm for comfort, but can +be endured, and for the remaining third it is so hot that it could give points to the inside of a smelting furnace and then beat it. +At this time the inhabitants take shelter in their cellars, and anybody who has a refrigerator to sleep in is considered fortunate. +They bake their bread by putting the dough on a platter and setting it in the sun, and when they want to roast a turkey or a joint +of mutton, they put it on the housetop for a quarter of an hour about noon. I haven’t the documents for all the above statements, +but know a man who will prepare them if paid in advance. + +There is a curious disease in this part of the world, and its ravages extend through the valleys of the Euphrates and Tigris, and as +far west as Aleppo. In Bagdad it is called the date-mark, and further west is known as the Aleppo button. + +It is a sore, obstinate and annoying, but painless, and appears on any part of the body just as a boil does in Christian countries, +It stays twelve months, and then heals of its own accord, leaving a scar which stays for life. At first this scar is the color of a +date, but it fades out in a few years, and resembles the rest of the skin. + +Everybody must have it once, and only once; the disease is impartial, as it shows no distinction between natives and foreigners who +have not taken out their papers of naturalization. The gentleman who is my authority says he knew an officer in the British army, +in whom the date-mark made its appearance while he was travelling from Bagdad to India. It remained untouched, and then an English +doctor attempted to cure it. + +He cauterized it every day for four weeks, and at the end of that time the sore dried up and healed. Everything went on well for a +month, and then the sore reappeared--not in the old spot, but in four other places, where it remained five months and then vanished. +{318} + +[Illustration: 0328] + + + + +CHAPTER XXIV--ADVENTURES IN THE MOUNTAINS OF SYRIA. + + +_“Doing” Syria--The “Short” and the “Long” Route--How to Choose Them--Engaging a Dragoman--Farewell to Damascus--Preying on +Travelers--The Wonderful Rivers of Syria--Crossing the Desert--A Picture of Desolation--Scene of St. Paul’s Conversion--A Striking +Contrast--Ancient Ruins and Modern Hovels--A Night with the Bedouins--A Hard Road to Travel--A Glorious View--The “Doubter’s” + Mischance--The Lizard in the Boot--A Ludicrous Scene--Gustave’s New Joke--Mollifying a Native--The Massacre at Hasbeiya--Treachery +of a Turkish Colonel--Scene of Christ’s Labors--In the Holy Land._ + + +THE “short route” of Syria and Palestine is to land at Beyrout, proceed to Damascus, by way of Mount Lebanon, and then return to +Beyrout. There one takes ship to Jaffa, whence he visits Jerusalem and the country around it, and returns to Jaffa to sail away to +Egypt or some other country. + +The “long route” is to land at Beyrout and proceed to Damascus, as before. From Damascus one goes overland by Tiberias to Jerusalem, +and, after seeing the Holy City and surrounding country, takes ship at Jaffa. This route may be reversed by landing at Jaffa and +taking ship at Beyrout. + +From Damascus to Jerusalem, by the “long route,” is a horseback journey of seventeen days. It may be shortened by rapid travel, +and extended to any limit; if you hire the dragoman and his outfit by the day, the longer you make the time the better he will be +pleased. + +The spring is the best time of the year for making this excursion, as it comes between the period of “the early and the latter +rain.” There are no carriage roads in this part of the country, + +{319} + +[Illustration: 0329] + +and the traveller must make up his mind to the discomforts of a saddle and to lodging in a tent. A dragoman will undertake to supply +him with everything--horses, tents, food, bedding, and all--for a stipulated price, which varies with the size of the party, the +time of year, and various other circumstances. I shall have more to say on this subject in another place, and will jump at once into +the saddle without wasting time upon preliminaries. The long route was impracticable for our party at the time we were in Syria, but +I gave it a very careful study, and from the sources at my command obtained the fullest information concerning it. Let us undertake +a journey by this ancient way, and we will carry the “Doubter” along with us. He can’t be spared. + +We leave Damascus by the Salahiyeh suburb, passing along a paved road and making a gentle ascent that gives us a good view of the +city every time we choose to turn our heads. Some of the houses in this suburb are quite good, and we are not surprised to learn +that many of the merchants of Damascus make their residence here. As we reach the end of the large village we pass some ruined +mosques and tombs, but we have seen so many of these things that our attention is hardly attracted by them. The Moslems of the past +must have been more devout than are their descendants of to-day, as they built a great many edifices for religious and memorial +purposes, to which very little attention is paid at present. The Syrian Moslem does not seem to care for the antique any more than +does his Turkish brother; there may be exceptions, but I think the rule holds good. For the ruins of Baalbek and Palmyra, the Syrian +has no veneration except for their money-making qualities; the few people that live near them are not attracted to either spot +by any love for it, but solely because it is a good place for “backsheesh.” Take away the tourist and his gold and silver and the +natives would move elsewhere. + +I am the more severe on these worldly-minded Syrians, who remain unmoved in the face of the stupendous remains of a past age when +I contrast them with the guides and runners, hackmen-and peddlers, hotel-keepers and hotel-waiters, who assemble at Niagara and +similar places in America. At Palmyra, or at the Pyramids, the Arabs pester you for “backsheesh,” and greatly {320}mar your interest +and pleasure. But at Niagara did any one ever hear of such conduct on the part of the men who make their living there? The noble +qualities of the American (generally a naturalized one), come out strongly at Niagara; the beauty and sublimity of the cataract +never fail to impress the resident with the sense of his duties to his fellow-man, and while the Arab will endeavor to make you pay +ten times what you ought, his Niagara prototype is satisfied with five times, provided he knows he cannot possibly lie you out +of any more. I have been at Niagara and Long Branch, the White Mountains and the Yosemite Valley, and thus speak knowingly. And +whenever an Arab endeavored to defraud me I thought how much better things were at the fashionable resorts in my own country, and +derived much consolation from the reflection. + +We take a last view of Damascus from a point where the road crosses a hill about five hundred feet above the city, and nearly two +miles away. We see the valley of the Abana in all its loveliness, and realize how much is due to this river and its never-failing +waters. We can fully understand the pride with which the native of Damascus contemplates this perennial stream and do not wonder +at the reply of Naaman, when told to wash in Jordan. The river is made all the more lovely by its fringe of trees and the +wide-spreading gardens where it flows, and the greenness of the foliage is rendered all the more apparent when we contrast it with +the barren hills around. The river, divided here and there into several streams, foams and ripples through the glen that leads it +down from the mountains to the plain below. Our road lies along this glen, and we suddenly leave it and emerge upon the plain of +Dimas. + +The change is quite abrupt, from the rich verdure of the valley to the sterility of the Desert, for this plain is really a desert in +miniature. The soil is hard and dry, more like flint than earth, and, if you happen to traverse it in summer, you find the heat is +intense. It happened to be raining when I crossed this plain, and moreover, it was in the winter, so that I escaped the sensation +of undergoing a torture by roasting. It is difficult to realize that such a barren waste can exist so near such a charming city as +Damascus. The plain is about ten miles across, and from one {321}side to the other there is not a green thing to be seen, unless the +traveller may consider himself one. + +After crossing the plain of Dimas we enter the mountains, where we find a few pleasant valleys and ravines, and have some rugged +scenery that is not disagreeable. From one of the passes the guide points out another road, which leads more to the eastward, +and where the scene of Saul’s conversion is located. There seems to be some difference of opinion about the exact locality, and I +suspect that nobody knows the real state of things. + +The tradition which locates the conversion there dates back to the time of the Crusades. Some authorities make the scene of the +conversion almost under the walls of Damascus, and others within a mile or two of that place. It all depends upon what is meant by +“near Damascus.” If we were at San Francisco, and speaking of Albany, we might say “it is near New York,” but should hardly use the +expression if we were at Trenton or Hartford. However, it makes no difference about the conversion; we know it happened on the road +from Jerusalem, and was near Damascus, so that a mile or two is of no consequence. + +We pass several villages and wind among the hills, and in some of the villages, or near them, we find the remains of temples which +were doubtless magnificent in their time. They are supposed to have been dedicated to the worship of the sun, though their history +and origin are unknown. We are in front of the mountain of Hermon, known here as Jebelesh-Sheik, and it is observable that in +several places the temples are made to face it, leading to the supposition that the mountain was an object of veneration and +worship. + +We pass the night in our camp, at the little village of Rasheiya; we are not in the village, but near enough to enable the beggars +and the lame, halt, and blind to find us without trouble and ask for “backsheesh,” which they are sure to do. The white top of Mount +Hermon rises above us, and we look upon it with longing eyes. Who will join me in climbing it? + +We will divide the party for a day. We will put the “Doubter” with the rest of the mules and send them around to Hasbeiya, where +they can wait till we get down on the other side of Hermon. We will start before daybreak, climb the mountain, and, {322}by making +sharp work of it, can get down to camp in season for a late supper. We shall feel as tired as though we had been run through a +rolling mill; climbing Mount Hermon is serious business, and a thing to do once. Nobody would undertake it a second time, for the +mere pleasure of the trip. + +Hermon is, with one exception, the highest mountain in Syria, Lebanon being the most elevated. Its summit, or rather its highest +summit, for it has three peaks, is about ten thousand feet above the sea level, and for the greater part of the year is covered with +snow. In fact the snow remains there the entire year, as there are certain ravines and valleys where it never disappears completely, +but lies in sloping streaks visible at a great distance. The mountain is of gray limestone, like Lebanon, and as one looks up its +sides there is an aspect of almost complete barrenness. The central peak is entirely destitute of vegetation, with the exception of +a few thorny bushes that seem to cling there in utter hopelessness. + +The view from the summit is magnificent, and well repays us for our trouble. On the north we have the ranges of Lebanon and +Anti-Lebanon, with the valley of Bukaâ between them. To the east is the plain of Arabia, spreading out like an ocean, and dotted +here and there with ranges and clusters of hills that look not unlike islands. Southward is the Sea of Galilee, and beyond it we can +trace the deep valley of the Jordan till it is lost in the distance and shut in by the mountains of Gilead and Samaria. We can see +the sunlight playing on the waters of the blue Mediterranean in the west, and trace the coast line, with all its sinuosities, from +Mount Carmel to Tyre and Sidon. At our feet and all below us the mountains and valleys, rivers and ravines, are traceable, and as we +turn around the points of compass from north back to north again, a beautiful panorama is revealed to us. + +On one of the summits of Hermon there are the ruins of a small temple; they are on the very top and near the edge of a cliff, and +the character of the work indicates great antiquity. + +Their history is unknown. But careful students of the Bible have connected them with certain passages which seem to show that the +temples were used for purposes of idolatry. + +We descend and rejoin our companions at Hasbeiya, where we + +{323} + +[Illustration: 0335] + +{325}find the “Doubter” in trouble with a native. He took off his boots to cool his feet after getting into camp, and while the +boots were lying on the ground a lizard crept into one of them and nestled down into the toe. When he attempted to don them again +the lizard was in the way, and the old fellow danced around as if he had been educated for an organ grinder’s monkey. The nimbleness +and desperate energy of his movements, as he vainly endeavored, in his excited state, to pull off his boot, was a performance that +the astonished natives had never before witnessed. + +[Illustration: 8337] + +He tugged and twisted, and hopped about on one leg, in a very expert and fantastic style. + +Finally he removed the boot and out came the lizard, one of those harmless, pretty little things that are found all through Syria. +One of the natives had witnessed his contortions, and on seeing the very slight cause for it the impudent aboriginal laughed. + +This was very wrong for him to do, and also very rare, for the Syrians are a solemn race and about as little inclined to risibility +as an Indian. + +The “Doubter” accused the native of putting the lizard into the boot and called the dragoman to translate the accusation. Native +denied the charge and wanted “backsheesh” as a salve to his wounded honor. The “Doubter” wouldn’t give it, and thus is the situation +when we arrive from Mount Hermon. + +“Go away, boy, go away,” he repeats in the intervals of the demand for “backsheesh.” The boy does not heed the remark and grows more +importunate as he sees we do not take sides with the “Doubter.” + +“Isn’t this Hasbeiya?” Gustave says, with a twinkle in his eye. + +I nod and speak assent. + +“You must give him something at once,” says Gustave, turning to the skeptic. “This place is the most dangerous in {326}all Syria. +The majority of the inhabitants are _Chrétiens_, and will murder you on the slightest provocation. If that boy goes away unpaid, +after you have doubted his honor, he will bring down a dozen or more armed men and your life won’t be worth three centimes.” + +The “Doubter” is incredulous, but there is enough in Gustave’s statement to alarm him, and we see that he changes color. After a +moment’s hesitation he suggests that Gustave had better pay the boy and send him away if the place is so very dangerous. + +“That will never do,” responds Gustave, “_you_ have committed the offense and it is you they will be after. Do you see those men in +front of that house? They know something is wrong. Give the boy half a franc and send him away.” + +The “Doubter” reluctantly draws half a franc from his pocket and places it in the boy’s hand. He is suspicious that he has been +hoaxed, but he has some regard for his continued stay on this planet and is willing to pay a small sum. But rather than give a franc +he would take the chances. One must draw a line somewhere, you know. + +Before 1860 Hasbeiya contained a population of about five thousand, four-fifths of them Christians. It was the scene of one of the +most terrible massacres of that year. The town stands in a glen, and is surrounded on three sides by high hills which are terraced +and covered with vineyards, and fig and olive trees. In a secure place on a rocky ridge is a strong building formerly the palace of +a local chieftain, and capable of resisting any attack with small arms. In 1860 it had a garrison of two hundred soldiers commanded +by a Turkish colonel, and when the Christians were attacked by the Druzes they appealed to the Colonel for protection. He gave them +a written guarantee of safety on condition that they should come into the palace and surrender their weapons, which they did. They +were then kept for seven days in the palace and at the end of that time the colonel ordered the gates thrown open. The Druzes were +admitted, and the Christians to the number of a thousand were massacred. The soldiers of the garrison did not join in the massacre, +but they prevented the Christians fleeing or seeking concealment, and in some instances pushed them forward to be killed. The +Colonel {327}was afterward tried, condemned and shot, at Damascus, by order of the British Commissioner, Lord Dufferin. He (the +Colonel) insisted that he was acting under authority of his superiors, and the belief is very prevalent that the whole series of +massacres was covertly ordered from Constantinople. + +From Hasbeiya we take an early start and ride to Banias through a rough and picturesque country, fairly wooded for Syria and +containing frequent olive groves. We pass a lot of villages, each looking so much like the other that it is not worth while to try +to make much distinction between them. We pass near one of the sources of the Jordan, a fountain that has flowed without cessation +for unknown thousands of years, and will probably flow on for thousands of years to come. One of the villages on the route contains +the tomb or one of the tombs, of Nimrod, the mighty hunter. Very little is left of it--about as much as there is of Nimrod himself. + +Banias, better known as Cesarea-Philippi, is picturesquely situated. A mountain crowned by a ruined castle overlooks abroad terrace +which commands a fine view of mountain and plain. The ruins of the city and the huts of the modern town are situated on this +terrace, and the spot reflects creditably on the man who chose it. I don’t think he is around now, as he performed his work a good +while before King Solomon was thought of. The time of the foundation is unknown, but it is certain that a city stood here at a very +early date. The name Banias comes from Panias or Panium; the Greek settlers in Syria established here a temple to the worship of the +God _Pan_ and from the establishment of the temple a city grew up. + +The ruins are of considerable extent, and comprise among other things a citadel, inclosing a quadrangle of four acres or more within +massive walls. The modern village is within this citadel, and contains forty or fifty huts and houses built with flat roofs, like +nearly all houses in Syria. How are the mighty fallen! The walls of the city have suffered from earthquakes and vandalism, but more +especially from the roots of plants and trees that have forced the stones apart. The same is the case with the castle that overlooks +the town at an elevation of quite a thousand feet. {328}A steep path leads up to the castle and it requires an hour of toilsome +climbing to reach the top of the hill. The castle has a curious shape; it is about a thousand feet long by two hundred broad, and +narrows considerably in the centre, so that it looks like two castles side by side. Many of the stones composing the walls are of +great size, for such an elevation; they are frequently ten or twelve feet long, and accurately hewn and dressed. One can spend hours +in the castle studying its construction and looking out upon the beautiful panorama that greets the eye from its walls. Antiquarians +and archaeologists are at variance concerning this castle; some of them give it an existence from a period long before the Christian +Era, while others think it is not more than twelve or fifteen hundred years old. + +The city did not become prominent in history until the time of Herod the Great. Josephus relates that “Herod having accompanied +Cæsar to the sea and returned home erected to him a beautiful temple of white marble near the palace called _Pentium_. This is +a fine cave in a mountain under which there is a great cavity in the earth, abrupt, deep and full of water. Over it hangs a vast +mountain; and under the cavern rise the springs of the river Jordan. Herod adorned this place, which was already a remarkable one, +still farther by the erection of this temple which he dedicated to Cæsar.” + +The description is accurate. The temple is gone, but there are Greek inscriptions and sculptured niches on the face of the cliff +which were made at the time the temple was erected. The great fountain which forms the principal source of the Jordan bursts from +the side of the cliff through a cavern, now partially choked with rough rocks and fragments of ancient buildings. The waters roll +and break through a rocky channel as they begin their course down the deep ravine which leads them on and on till they are swallowed +in the dark and gloomy bosom of the Dead Sea. + +Hermon, the high mountain, is in front of us, and its triple summit stands cold and majestic now as it stood in the days that were +made memorable by the recorded miracles of Christ. + +{329} + +[Illustration: 0341] + + + + +CHAPTER XV--“FROM DAN TO BEERSHEBA.”--JOURNEYING THROUGH THE HOLY LAND. + + +_Our first morning in Palestine--Breaking Camp at Banias--“From Dan to Beer-sheba”--Explanation of the phrase--The Cup of the +Hills--The Golden Calf of Jeroboam--Story of Vishnu and his Idol--An Incident and its Moral--The Battlefields of Joshua--A singular +species of Plough--The “Doubter” in a quandary--Joseph’s Pit--The Sea of Galilee--Fishing with Poisoned Bait--Capernaum and +its Ruins--Scene of Christ’s Miracles--The Birthplace of Mary Magdalen--A horde of Beggars--A Pitiful Spectacle--The Robber’s +Cave--Herod and his Strategy--The Jews of Tiberias--A Seedy Crowd--Ruins of the Ancient City--The spot where Christ fed the +Multitude._ + + +IN the morning we are roused by the voice of the dragoman or one of his servants, and have half an hour for dressing. We rise +reluctantly, for we are still weary from the fatigues of yesterday, and how we do wish for just a few minutes more. + +The “Doubter” pulls at the handle of the Judge’s umbrella, under the impression that it is a bell-knob, and sleepily asks for a +cocktail. But there is nothing of the kind to be had, and after grumbling at everybody and everything, he proceeds to his toilet and +soon comes out with an appearance suggestive of an Italian brigand who has had a run of bad luck. + +While we are at breakfast, the men strike the tents and are off. They go straight to our camping place for the coming night, so that +they will have everything ready by the time we arrive. One pack-horse and a servant with the lunch remains with us, and they and +their burden come in very handy about noon. We have no trouble in getting up good appetites in this clear air of Palestine, though +unfortunately it is a trifle too warm for com{330}fort. A rugged path, where the rocks threaten to give us some dangerous tumbles, +brings us to Tell-el-Kady, about four miles from Banias. This place is better known as Dan. Who has not heard of going “from Dan to +Beersheba?” The latter place--Bir-es-seba, or “well of the covenant”--is on the southern border of Palestine, while Dan is on the +northern. Consequently, “from Dan to Beersheba” means “from one end of the country to the other.” The identity of the site cannot be +doubted, as the place is clearly described in Biblical and other history, and the remains of the ancient city are here. + +There is a sort of cup-shaped mound here, in a plain, less than a hundred feet above it, and possibly a thousand yards across. The +whole place is covered with a tangle of brushwood and weeds, and if we take the trouble to penetrate this thicket, we shall find +hewn stones, broken columns, and other indications of the city that has passed away. There are some oak trees here, and one of them +can boast of considerable size. It is one of the oaks of Bashan, and others can be seen on the mountain near us, and dotting in +irregular patches various parts of the landscape. The oaks of Bashan are less famous now than they were three thousand years ago. + +History tells us that this was once a Phoenician settlement, under the name of Laish, and was captured by some Danites, who changed +its name to Dan. They took things easily, and had a good time, and whenever there was a chance to make an honest penny by a little +robbery, they were up to the scratch. + +Dan is mentioned in the first book of Kings (xii. 28-32) as one of the places where Jeroboam erected a golden calf. + +Jeroboam understood human nature, when he selected gold as the metal of which the calf should be made. Brass would have been just as +bright, but it has its defects, and the chief one is a lack of intrinsic value. + +Vishnu once appeared in the guise of a beggar to a Brahmin who was superintending the erection and dedication of a temple in one +of the sacred groves of India. The temple was complete, and the Brahmin was directing his fellows how to place the pedestal for the +idol which he was just taking out of the box. He removed the straw and wrappings, and brought to {331}light an idol of common wood, +with pieces of white porcelain for eyes. + +“Stop, O, Brahmin,” said the beggar. “Erect not that wooden idol, for your temple will then be no more than others.” + +“But make an idol of pure gold, and give it a pair of diamonds for eyes, and the whole world will come here to worship.” + +The beggar waved his hand, and behold! an idol such as he had described stood upon the pedestal. The Brahmin turned to thank the +stranger, but he had disappeared. + +And that shrine has ever been the most sacred in all the land of India. + +The Brahmin sent the wooden idol back to the factory, and they accepted it at twenty per cent. off, less the freight and charges for +repacking. And they sold it to a retail cigar dealer, who used it for a sign in front of his shop. + +The most interesting thing at Dan is the great fountain of the Jordan. It bursts out at the western, base of the mound, and forms a +small pond, and out of this pond flows the stream, the largest in all Syria from a single source. + +Less than an hour from Dan, over, a stony and marshy plain, brings us to Ain Belat, another fountain, and there is another of the +same sort not far away. There is nothing particularly interesting here, and so we go on to Ain Mellahah, where we find the tents +waiting for us near an old mill that stands by the spring. + +Lake Huleh, a sheet of water about three miles by four, is close at hand, but it has no intrinsic attractions. + +All around the lake is a marshy ground, spreading out on the North into a plain, that has some claims to fertility. The Bedouins +cultivate it after a fashion, and some speculators have bought ground there and leased it out to the natives. + +Syrian agriculture is of a very primitive kind. They use, in this country, the root of a tree for a plough, and they do little more +than scratch the soil. An American plough, either ‘breaker’ or ‘subsoil,’ would drive the natives into confluent hysterics, and the +sight of a steam-plough turning half, a dozen furrows at once would strike them dead with astonishment. + +The first time the “Doubter” saw one of these Syrian scrapers, he asked what it was. When we told him it was a plough, {332}he said +he knew better, and we needn’t try to “play it on him.” Then we thought it might be a horse-rake or a wheel-barrow, possibly a brake +to attach to a fiery saddle-horse to keep him from descending a hill too fast. + +[Illustration: 0344] + +Then we concluded it might be a pillow or a tooth-pick, and finally a part of the equipment of a lunatic asylum. The “Doubter” at +length concluded it was a weapon of warfare, and with this wise conclusion he dropped the subject. + +Our forenoon’s ride from this camp is a dreary one. We have five hours of it, or nearly that period, in a wild country +overlooking the valley of the Jordan on the left, and having no attractions of its own. It is a scene of desolation. There were +no trees--scarcely is there any vegetation, and the only inhabitants are people who live somewhere else. The hot, dry landscape is +unforbidding in every feature, and only the historic character of the country rewards us for our trouble. + +We come to a wretched Khan, which is said to contain the pit into which Joseph was thrown before he was sold by his brethren. The +authenticity of the story rests only upon tradition, and there are two or three other places in the country which claim to be +the real, original, Joseph’s pit. They show us the hole, which is certainly capable of containing a man. The “Doubter” does not +{333}believe it is the real pit, because he cannot see the footprints of the fellows that flung their brother in. Some one tells the +story of the New York boot-black, who was induced one day to go to Sunday school. The teacher told the story of Joseph and asked: + +“What did Joseph’s brethren put him in the pit for?” + +“I know,” said the gamin, with a confident air. + +“Then tell us.” + +“Fifteen cents!” shouted the young vagabond. + +He was a frequenter of the old Bowery Theater, and familiar with the prices at that establishment. + +But we are in haste to go on; for before us is the Sea of Galilee, shimmering under the scorching rays of a Syrian sun. It lies +deep-set in a basin of rough, barren mountains, and its surface, as we first look upon it, is very far below us. If any of us have +pictured a lake, surrounded with luxuriant fields and shady groves, its waves kissing the feet of waving palms, and reflecting the +rich foliage of the tropics, we are doomed to disappointment. It is a scene of desolation, akin to that revealed when we look from +the bleak hills beyond Bethlehem, and cast our vision downward to the Dead Sea. The country must have undergone a great change in +the past two thousand years, as we cannot understand how it could support the population that history accords to it. + +The lake is oval in shape, and about thirteen miles long by six in width, and where there were many boats in Christ’s time, there +are now only two. These are devoted more to the ferriage of travellers and their excursions to points of interest along the shores, +than to the fisheries. A favorite mode of catching fish at the present time is to poison them with bread crumbs soaked in corrosive +sublimate. The fish die, and rise to the surface, whence they are gathered and taken to the market of Tiberias for sale. The natives +do not mind any little trifle like this, but foreigners should be cautious about the fish that they eat. + +All around the shore of the lake is historic ground. We reach it at Capernaum, or rather at one of the three points claimed to be +the site of that city, and known by the modern name of Khan Minyeh. It has, perhaps, the best claims to recognition, but I shall +not attempt to say that it is or is not the real place. {334}The ruins are not extensive, and can be seen in a short time. Traces +of foundations and walls of buildings can be found here and there among the brushwood, and now and then a broken column or capital +rewards the search of the explorer. + +[Illustration: 0346] + +Proceeding along the western bank of the lake, we reach Magdala, the birth-place of Mary Magdalene. The shore of the lake in +this part is quite fertile, but the fertility is not utilized, except to a very slight degree. Game is not unknown here, but the +varieties are not numerous. Quails are abundant, and so are turtle doves. “The voice of the turtle is heard in the land,” is sure +to be repeated by some one of the party as we ride through the tangle of thistles, weeds, and brushwood that lines the way from +Capernaum to Magdala. + +In itself, and without its historic associations, Magdala is of very little consequence. It contains about twenty houses, of the +Syrian pattern, flat-roofed, and not over-pleasing in appearance. There are ruins of houses of a more pretentious character, and the +indications are general that there was once a town here, of some consequence. + +The inhabitants come out of their squalid dwellings and beg for anything we choose to give. Money, old clothes, defaulted railway +bonds, State bonds, shares in a petroleum company, cold meat, bound volumes of newspaper files, and anything else can {335}be +included in the word “backsheesh.” It is a generic, not a specific, term, and those who continually din into your ears the +supplication, “Backsheesh, O Howadji!” are not at all particular about what they receive. + +[Illustration: 0347] + +It is a good dodge to get the first innings on them once in a while. When you catch sight of a native approaching you, it is morally +certain that he intends to beg. Take the bull by the horns, approach _him_ and ask for “backsheesh.” He will generally see the +point, though he does not always do so. + +We have time to take a little run to some curious caves that lie in a cliff about half an hour’s ride from Magdala. A steep and +{336}narrow path leads to them, and while we are climbing it we see how easily the caves could be defended. Their origin and history +are unknown, and they were evidently the work, not of one, but of several, generations. They are mentioned by Josephus as fortified +caverns, belonging to the city of Arbela, whose ruins are close at hand. At various periods they have been the resort of bandits, +and probably would be so at present if the bandit business was at all profitable. Herod the Great had an unpleasantness with some +free-booting gentlemen who dwelt in these caves. They made things disagreeable for travellers and others, and would not divide with +the King, and so he sent an army to teach them better manners and bring their heads home in carpet-sacks. But the fellows defended +their lives, their fortunes, and their sacred honor so desperately, and had so good a place to defend them in, that the army +couldn’t gain a point on them. + +But Gen. Herod knew a thing or two, and after scratching his head awhile over the problem, he sent for his carpenters and +blacksmiths and ordered them to get their tools ready and then come before him at five o’clock the next morning. + +They came, they saw, (each carpenter had one,) and they concurred with him. + +“Go,” said the general to the carpenters, “and make some boxes of strong plank, about six feet square and four feet high. Make them +as strong as you would a travelling trunk for a thousand-mile journey on an American railway.” + +Then turning to the blacksmiths he said: + +“And you, sons of Vulcan, get up lots of ox-chains, strong enough to support these boxes with a thousand pounds in each.” + +“A thousand pounds, in sovereigns, will weigh more than the same amount in five-pun notes,” said the boss blacksmith, musingly. +“Does Your Majesty pay gold or paper?” + +“A thousand pounds avoirdupois, you idiot,” replied the King. The blacksmith apologized, and whispered to his neighbor that he +thought it would turn out so, as the King was hard up, and couldn’t raise five hundred guineas in a month unless he stole them. + +The boxes were made, and the _ferblantiers_ and _charpentiers_ wondered what the king could be about. When they were ready, + +{337} + +[Illustration: 0349] + +{339}he put a dozen infantry men with plenty of carbines and revolvers and supplies of provisions and ammunition into each box, and +lowered the whole lot of them simultaneously down the face of the cliff above the canals. Thus the soldiers were enabled to make it +nasty for the robbers. They killed most of them, and what they didn’t kill they flung over the face of the precipice. + +[Illustration: 0351] + +We will not go back to Magdala, as there is a shorter route to Tiberias, which is our next point of interest. As our cavalcade +enters the town, the inhabitants turn out to greet us, and we hear a word we think we have heard before--“backsheesh.” The people +differ materially from those of Magdala and Capernaum, in being more numerous; in other respects there is a marked similarity. +They wear the same amount of dirt, rags, and sore eyes, and an ophthalmist could make a fortune here, provided he could get rich by +practicing without fees. There are about two thousand inhabitants, one-third of them Jews, and they are a very seedy and unhappy lot +of Israelites. I presume that those who are born in Tiberias want to die there, and to look at them one would think that they ought +to wish to die as soon as possible. + +Tiberias is a sacred place for the Jews, as they believe that the Messiah will rise from the sea of Galilee, and after landing in +the city will proceed to the summit of Mount Safed, which {340}is not far away. Comparatively few of the Jews speak Arabic; they are +divided into two sects, one of Russian and the other of Spanish origin, so that they use the languages of the countries whence they +or their ancestors came. They are not on the best of terms with their neighbors, and live in a part of the town assigned to them. + +Tiberias once had a wall; the remains of it are there yet, and it was in tolerable condition until about forty years ago, when an +earthquake played the mischief with it and left it full of great gaps and cracks that are anything but pleasing. Your earthquake, a +real, first-class one, is a consummation not devoutly to be wished. + +The ancient city is scattered promiscuously along the shore of the lake, but there isn’t enough of it to make more than half-a-dozen +hog-yards. The modern town has absorbed nearly all that was worth absorbing. + +There is a Latin convent at Tiberias, with a church attached to it, which is regarded with veneration by many Christian pilgrims. +Like Jerusalem, Tiberias is a sacred spot for both Christian and Jew, and thousands of Jews consider it a blessing to be buried +there, and it certainly would be a blessing to bury those that we see in Tiberias. It was at one time their chief residence in +Palestine, and was their most prominent city for more than three hundred years. Tiberias has been in the hands of Jews, Persians, +Arabs, and Crusaders, and has had the usual misfortunes of Oriental towns. + +There are some warm baths near Tiberias, and they are highly recommended to strangers. The natives never patronize these baths +or any other. The only time a Syrian washes himself is when he gets caught in a shower, without an umbrella, and can’t find any +shelter, or get home. + +All around the lake there are historic spots. Days could be spent in a study of the places whose names have been made familiar to us +by a perusal of the Old and New Testaments. + +{341} + +[Illustration: 0353] + + + + +CHAPTER XXVI--IN THE HEART OF PALESTINE. + + +_Bathing in the Sea of Galilee--Standing on holy ground--How the “Doubter” was unhorsed--A second Absalom--Lunching on the summit +of Tabor--Saracenic Vengeance--A Reminiscence of the Crusades--A magnificent Sight--Discussing “Backsheesh” with the natives--The +“Doubter” as a Cashier--The Grotto of the Holy Family--Mary’s house--The house of Loretto--The story of the Miracle--The Monk +and the “Doubter”--Dean Stanley’s explanation--Joseph’s Tool Chest--The “Doubter’s” demand--The Witch of Endor “at +home”--Blood-Revenge--A pertinacious feud--Saul and the Witch._ + + +WE have bathed in the Sea of Galilee and played with the pebbles on its sandy beach; we have visited places named in Holy Writ, and +henceforth their mention will have for us an additional charm. And now we will fold our tents like the Arabs, (or let the Arabs fold +them for us,) and as silently steal away. Our faces are turned towards Jerusalem. + +Our horses toil slowly up the ascent--a long and weary one--which leads from the shore of the sea of Galilee. At Tiberias we are +six hundred feet below the level of the Mediterranean. The plain which we are now approaching is five hundred feet above us, and +consequently we must make an elevation of eleven hundred feet to gain it. The way is rough in many places, and we wonder how it has +been allowed to remain so in all the thousands of years that it has been in use. + +As we emerge from the deep basin which encloses the lake we see before us a mountain, like a huge mound or tumulus, rising out of +the plain and dominating it in all directions. It is Mount {342}Tabor, and beyond it is the plain of Esdraelon. Between us and the +base of the mountain lies an undulating plateau over which we find an easier road than the one we have just been climbing. + +We are on the great route of the caravans, between Egypt and Damascus, and the first objects of interest are the ruins of “The +Merchants’ Caravansary,” or--in the language of the country--_Khan-et-Tujar_; one of the pashas of Damascus built it about three +hundred years ago, for the protection of the caravans which were often troubled by robbers in those days, but the buildings long ago +ceased to be of any use, and have been allowed to go to decay. + +They are worth an examination, as specimens of modern Saracenic architecture, and this is all. + +We press forward toward Mount Tabor, and in an hour or more are at its base. + +[Illustration: 8354] + +We ascend by a difficult path that winds among oaks and thickets of thorn bushes, and are brought to occasional halts by the +slipping of saddles and other slight mishaps. + +The “Doubter” while passing under an oak from which he has attempted to pluck a stick to serve as a whip. His hand has caught in +the branches, his horse does not stop to ask what is the matter, and the next instant horse and rider have parted company. The horse +goes on as if nothing had happened, and the “Doubter,” after hanging an instant, and reminding the per{343}son next behind him of +the misfortune of Absalom, drops into the path below. The horse is caught by some one in advance; the “Doubter” is picked up and put +together and after swallowing a dose of brandy is lifted into his saddle and enjoined to let the oak limbs alone in future. He bends +so low for the rest of the ride, that his nose almost touches the mane of his steed. He is determined not to get into trouble again. + +We reach the summit--fourteen hundred feet above the sea--and dismount from our panting horses. Lunch is served under one of the oak +trees that invites us to rest beneath its foliage, and we endeavor to make ourselves comfortable. After lunch we devote a couple of +hours to a ramble around the spot; we might camp here, but we prefer to pass the night at Nazareth, whither our camp was moved when +we started from Tiberias. + +We now find that Tabor is not circular in shape, but oval, the greatest measurement being from East to West. The summit is slightly +rounded and is about a thousand yards long by half that in width. There are many ruins on the summit, or rather masses of ruins; +the principal thing to attract the attention is a massive wall, or the remains of one, which enclose the most of the space. It was +evidently a stronghold in its time, and was defended by bastions and towers, and gateways, one of which is still standing. There are +the foundations of houses, some of them of considerable size, and we have no hesitation in accepting the statement that a strong and +important town once stood here. There are cisterns hewn in the solid rock, and they have continued their uses down to the present +time. We are permitted to slake our thirst with water, drawn from one of these cisterns--cisterns from which men have drank in all +ages, from the days of Moses to the present time. Barak drank here when he assembled the hosts of Napthali to attack Sisera, the +captain of Jabin’s army; Joshua and Gideon may have stood by this very well; here stood the Crusaders when they advanced upon +Jerusalem, and here a few years later Saladin may have rested, as he exulted over the victory that expelled the hated Christian from +the land. If we are imaginative, we can picture a kaleidoscope of warriors, who fill the pages of sacred and profane history and +stalk before us like the line of Banquo’s Kings, which the witches {344}revealed to Macbeth, and if, like the “Doubter,” we are +unimaginative and do not believe, or care for anything, we will eat our cold chicken and boiled eggs, and say nothing. + +The best view of this part of Palestine is obtained from Mount Tabor. The plain of Esdraelon is before us, or rather below us, and +we can contemplate its undulations, its stipples of villages, its dark dots of trees, its ravines and its bright verdure--if the +season is propitious--as we contemplate from our easy chair the figures upon our carpet. On the East we see the valley of the Jordan +and the mountains of Gilead, rising like a long and rugged wall from the deep clift where the river flows. Hermon and the range of +Lebanon fill the north and the ruin-crowned summit of Safed--the holy mount of the Jews where was “the city set upon the hill,” is +full before us. In the West is Mount Carmel, the scene of Elijah s sacrifice--reverenced alike by Jew, Christian, and Moslem through +all ages down to the present day. No other place disputes the honor, and Carmel is destined to possess it for all time to come. + +South of us we have the mountain of Little Hermon, with the villages of Nain and Endor and other villages not far away. On the plain +below were fought the battles of Barak and Sisera, and the guide points out the spot where the hosts were assembled. + +In another direction he points out the scene of the battle of Hattin where, nearly seven hundred years ago, the Crusaders were +defeated, and their hold upon Palestine was broken. Both armies were in full force; that of the Christians was led by the King of +Jerusalem, and that of the Moslems by the great Saladin. The Christian army came to this plain and encamped there without water and +greatly fatigued by their march. The Moslem army attacked them at dawn, and all day the battle continued. At its end the Christians +had been overpowered with a loss of thirty thousand men. The remnant of the army fled to Acre, but the King was captured, together +with the Grand Master of the Templars and Raynauld of Chatillon. + +Saladin had threatened to put to death, with his own hand, this Raynauld through whose treachery the war had been brought on. He +treated the other captives with the respect which their rank deserved, but showed the utmost contempt for Raynauld, + +{345} + +[Illustration: 0357] + +{347}towards whom he kept his word. Raynauld was executed; the other prisoners were liberated and allowed honorable escort out of +the country. Saladin was a noble old warrior, and he had the instincts of a gentleman, though he never wore a dress-coat and kid +gloves, and did not understand how to dance the German or escort a lady to the opera. + +Mount Tabor disputes with Hermon the honor of the Transfiguration. The tradition which locates it here dates from the fourth +century, and was then generally believed. Churches and convents were erected on the summit of Tabor, and many pilgrimages were made +there, and when the Crusaders came to Palestine they established a monastery there, and gave its abbot the authority of a bishop. +The Greek monks come here in procession from Nazareth, on the occasion of the Feast of the Virgin, and the Latin monks have a +festival, once a year, in honor of the Transfiguration. The exact location which the monks give for the miraculous event is near the +southeastern angle of the fortifications, where a vault has been fitted up as an altar. + +We descend from Tabor in the direction of Nazareth, and a ride of two hours from the summit brings us to our camp. The road is +crooked and narrow, and winds among forests of oaks and tangles of brush, until within a mile or more of Nazareth, when we get among +bare hills. A little out of our way is the dirty village of Deburich, on the site of Dabareth, which is mentioned twice in the Old +Testament. There is nothing attractive about the place; it has the repulsive features of most of the Syrian villages, and you +wonder how the natives manage to live, or even wish to do so. They discuss the “backsheesh” question with us, and we have the whole +perambulating mass of dirt, rags, and sores adhering to us from the moment we enter the place until we are a quarter of a mile away. +We set them upon the “Doubter,” by giving them to understand that he is the cashier of the party, but unfortunately they don’t stick +to him long enough to give the rest of us any peace. + +There are several objects of interest here connected with the life of Christ. The guide takes us to the Virgin’s Fountain, and to +the church and convent erected over the grotto which is said to have been the dwelling place of the Holy Family. The town {348}is +situated in some ravines and along some ridges on the side of a hill overlooking the plain of Esdraelon, and the buildings appear +to have been dropped down higgledy-piggledy, without any regard for regularity. The houses are better than those of many Syrian +villages, as they are built of stone and are kept clean in all the places where dirt cannot accumulate. But they are repulsive +enough inside, and one needs a pair of stilts to enable him to walk through the streets without soiling his boots. + +The population is variously estimated--no census is ever taken--at from three to four thousand. Only about seven hundred of these +are Moslems; the rest are Christians of three or four kinds, with the addition of a few Jews, who must be very unhappy among so +many people of a different faith. But, taken altogether, the inhabitants are not a pleasing lot, and as you look at them, you do not +wonder that the question was once asked, “Can any good thing come out of Nazareth?” + +Nazareth was unknown in history until the Annunciation. The event has been commemorated by the erection of a Latin convent, where a +Greek church once stood over the site of the house of Mary. + +The convent is of considerable extent, and has a massive exterior, followed by equal massiveness within. The church is about seventy +feet square in its interior dimensions, and the roof is supported by strong piers, which are covered, as are also the walls, with +paintings representing scriptural scenes. A flight of steps, fifteen in number, leads down to the chapel beneath the church, and in +this chapel the scene of the Annunciation is located. + +You first enter a vestibule about twenty-five feet by ten, and from this we enter the sanctum, which is of about the same +dimensions. It contains a marble altar and a marble slab, with a cross upon it, which marks the spot where the Virgin stood at +the time of the Annunciation. They show us a marble column cut in two, one part apparently suspended from the roof and the other a +little way below it, and resting on the floor. The monks solemnly tell us, that the invading infidels cut through this column, in +the hope of bringing down the roof, but a miracle interposed to uphold the column and has kept it there to this day. + +{349} + +[Illustration: 0361] + +{351}Then they take us into a grotto back of the altar and up a staircase into the Virgin’s kitchen, which is only a small cave, and +must have been a very poor sort of kitchen at best. The monks manifest much veneration for the Sacred Grotto, and pious people from +Christian lands have made handsome donations for the support of the church at Nazareth. As the church stands over the site of the +house of Mary, the “Doubter” demands to see the house. The guide tells him that it is gone, and while he is trying to make his +statement understood, one of the English speaking monks puts in a word: + +“You should understand,” he says, “that the house is at Loretta, in Italy, and that Loretto is called the Nazareth of Italy. It is +the house that was here once, the real house of the Virgin Mary.” + +“Yes, but how did it get there?” asked the “Doubter.” + +“Who moved it, and how was it done? I don’t believe you could move one of these stone houses all the way to Italy.” + +“Ah, there is the miracle, and I will tell you,” says the monk, and he begins to rattle away as though he had committed the story to +memory from a guide book. + +“The house stood here for hundreds of years, and then it happened that the Moslems defeated the Christians in battle, and threatened +to destroy everything in Nazareth. They were camped in the plain, and sent an army up here. Just as the army came to the edge of the +town, some angels came down and took the house away. They carried it to Europe, and set it down on a hill near Fiume, in Dalmatia, +and then, when it was found that the place wasn’t safe, they took it away to Loretto, and there it is now.” + +“Very strange,” says the “Doubter,” “very strange. And do they do this sort of thing often?” + +“Not often,” replies the monk. “You see it was a miracle; and if they performed miracles every day they wouldn’t be miracles.” + +The “Doubter” says he doesn’t believe a word of it, and turns away. The monk continues his account, and says: + +“There can be no doubt that the house is in Italy, and that it was moved by a miracle. It was known to be there more than {352}four +hundred years ago, and the Pope, Leo X, told all about it in a papal bull, in the year 1518, and authenticated it so that there +could be no chance for any body to disbelieve.” + +Of course, there could be no chance after this. Dean Stanley thus explains this matter: + +“Nazareth was taken by Sultan Kalil in 1291, when he stormed the last refuge of the Crusaders in the neighboring city of Acre. From +that time, not Nazareth only, but’ the whole of Palestine, was closed to the devotions of Europe. The Crusaders were expelled from +Asia, and in Europe the spirit of the Crusades was extinct. But the natural longing to see the scenes of the events of the sacred +history--the superstitious craving to win for prayer the favor of consecrated localities--did not expire with the Crusades. Can we +wonder that, under such circumstances, there should have arisen the feeling, the desire, the belief, that if Mahomet could not go +to the mountain, the mountain must come to Mahomet? The House of Loretto is the petrifaction, so to speak, of the ‘last sigh of the +Crusades.’” + +From the Church of the Annunciation we are taken through some of the dirty streets and alleys, to Joseph’s workshop--a modern +building fitted up as a chapel and held by the Latin monks. The structure is modern, but they show an old wall, or a fragment of it, +in the interior, and this is quite sufficient. + +The “Doubter” asks for Joseph’s tool-chest, and insists upon seeing it. They compromise the matter by bringing an axe of a very +modern pattern, and bearing the word ‘Birmingham’ on the helve. This might do for one of the faithful, but the “Doubter” won’t +swallow it, (not the axe, but the story,) in spite of the urgent assurance of the rest of us that it is all right. + +Then they take us to “the Table of Christ,” where, according to tradition, our Saviour sat frequently with his disciples, both +before and after the resurrection. It is only a table-shaped rock, about three feet high, and a chapel has been built over it. + +The rivalry between the Greek and Latin churches is very bitter, and the monks at Nazareth tell some hard stories about each other. +Their traditions do not agree in many points, and they are very tenacious about them. Thus, the Greeks claim that the angel’s first +salutation to Mary was at the fountain, on {353}the eastern side of the village, where she went often to draw water. It is called +the Fountain of the Virgin, and the Greeks have erected a church over it and called it the Church of the Annunciation. In order to +be impartial to the Greeks and Latins, every traveller should visit both churches. + +[Illustration: 0365] + +The fountain is interesting, as affording a study of the habits of the people. The young women, and old ones too, come there to draw +water and gossip and make eyes at the young men, tell all the late scandals, discuss the fashions, and display their pride, envy, +friendliness, humility, and all the other sentiments and emotions that can be exhibited at such a place. How the gossiping tongues +must have wagged at this fountain eighteen hundred years ago! and didn’t they criticise Mary and her family? The pretty, bare-footed +girl who came daily to the fountain, to fill her jar, which she poised on her head before tripping gracefully home{354}ward, little +dreaming that she was to be the mother of one who should preach salvation to the world and found a religion to be embraced by all +the civilized nations on the globe. + +But we will leave Nazareth and wend our way southward. + +We ride to Endor over a rough and rather dreary road, that winds over hills and through glens where robbers might waylay us, and +where men have been waylaid on many occasions. In this part of the country murders are not infrequent, and are caused chiefly +by feuds between tribes and families. Some of these feuds date back hundreds of years, and are based on the Scriptural theory of +blood-revenge. Centuries ago there may have been a quarrel between two men, about some trivial matter, and the quarrel may have gone +on till one of the men killed the other. Then a relative of the murdered man killed the murderer or one of his family, then this +killing was avenged, then this, and then this; so it has gone and will go on, until one family is annihilated, and possibly both, +and very often the feud extends to the different tribes. It is for this reason so many men go about with guns and pistols and eye +each other so cautiously. + +Nearly everybody, to use the vernacular of California, is “hunting for a man,” and sooner or later he finds him, or is found. It is +rather respectable than otherwise to die with one’s boots on, here, just as it used to be in Arizona; and it is currently reported +that when a man thinks he has had about enough of his native Syria, and has no row on his hands, he goes and kills somebody, so that +this somebody’s relatives will turn to and kill _him_. He is thus able to accomplish two things--he can die like a gentleman, with +the satisfaction of knowing that he has put somebody else out of the world in an equally gentlemanly way. And moreover, he bequeaths +a legacy of blood-revenge to his descendants, that will give them something to occupy their minds with, and prevents the country +becoming peopled too densely for comfort. + +Endor is an uninteresting village, of not more than twenty-five houses, and it is the same thing over again--dirt, rags, and +wretchedness--such as we have seen all the way along. We have had enough of it--let us move on. + +{355} + +[Illustration: 0367] + + + + +CHAPTER XXVII--THE LAND OF THE PHILISTINES.--SAMARIA AND ITS PEOPLE. + + +_The City of Nain--“Spoiling the Egyptians”--Ruins of an old Philistine City--Curious Strategy--The Torches in Pitchers--Kleber and +the Turks--Ahab’s Palace--Tropical Picture--A Crusader’s Church--More “Backsheesh”--The Samaritans of To-day--The Mount of Blessings +and the Mount of Cursings--A Despised People--A Strange Religious Belief--A Parchment Thirty-five Centuries Old--Jacob’s Well--Its +Present Appearance--The Tomb of Joseph--The Scene of Jacob’s Dream--The Philistines’ Raid._ + + +A RIDE of less than an hour from Endor takes us to Nain, the “City” of Christ’s time, but now a small village. The ruins show that +the place was once important, and the guides point out the old cemetery, at whose gate the miracle is located. + +As we ride on, we pass the valley of Jezreel, a fertile spot, which might be made productive in the hands of some other people than +these lazy, shiftless Syrians. The inhabitants are a mixed lot, as they include, besides the regular hash of Moslems, Christians, +and Jews, a colony of Egyptians brought here by Ibrahim Pasha. These fellows were put here, because of the richness of the soil, and +the stern old warrior thought he had given them a good thing. But they have an impression that it is more honorable to steal than to +work, and consequently make it rather disagreeable for their neighbors. The latter get even with them, by making occasional raids in +return, and justifying themselves by some remark or other about “spoiling the Egyptians.” From what I can learn of their history, I +think these Egyptians were pretty well spoiled before they came to Syria. {356}By going a little out of way we can visit Beisan, +the ancient Bethshean, whose ruins cover an area nearly three miles in circumference. It was a city of temples; four of these can +be distinctly traced in one group, and others are scattered around promiscuously. Bethshean was of Phoenician origin, and was the +principal abiding place of the Philistine god, Dagon. The citadel stood on the hill, overlooking the city, and on its walls the +Philistines hung up the bodies of Saul and Jonathan. + +The “Doubter,” on hearing this, looks for the bodies, and unable to find them, refuses to believe any part of the story. + +Below the citadel is the theatre, semi-circular in shape, and nearly two hundred feet in diameter. Tradition says that Julian, the +Apostate, used to give _matinée_ performances here to his friends, at which he occasionally had a lot of Christians cut up. +They were popular for a time, but the shrieks of the victims interfered so much with the conversation in the boxes and with +peanut-selling in the galleries, that the show had to be given up. + +There is a large fountain--Ain-Jalud--in this valley, where Gideon is said to have fought his celebrated battle with the Midianites, +described in the Old Testament, when he ordered his men to conceal their torches in pitchers, which they were to break when the +proper signal was given. It was one of the best pieces of strategy on record, and was brilliantly successful. + +Several battles have been fought in this valley and in its neighborhood. The latest was that between the French and Turkish armies +in 1799. Gen. Kleber had moved from Nazareth to attack the Turks, and was met by the enemy near the village of Fuleh. + +He formed his army into squares, with artillery at the angles, and in this way resisted the charges of cavalry for six long hours. +He had three thousand men and the Turks were fifteen thousand strong, but the effective fire of the French held the enemy in check, +in spite of their determined bravery. At the end of six hours, Napoleon arrived with fresh cavalry and infantry and attacked the +Turks on flank and rear. Thus surrounded, the latter became panic stricken, and retired in disorder, with heavy loss. + +It was the discipline of Kleber’s division and its powers of continued resistance, that gave the victory to the French. + +We soon arrive at the modern village of Sebustieh, which {357}stands on the site of Samaria and has a population of four or five +hundred Moslems, badly disposed towards strangers. The Crusaders built a church here and dedicated it to St. John, but it has been +converted into a mosque, that cannot be entered without the use of the magical “backsheesh.” And this has to be applied skillfully, +to avoid offense; a very good way is to take the keeper of the mosque into your confidence and do the “backsheesh” business through +him Give him a fair allowance of piasters to distribute to the crowd after you have gone, and he will generally set his cudgel at +work among them. He is an honorable man, and you can feel certain that he will faithfully distribute the money--to himself. Samaria +was a fine city in its time, and the ruins that cover the hill confirm the accounts of the historians. Many of the stones of the +old temples and colonnades have been built into the walls and terraces of the modern town so that the extent of the city is not +perceptible to a casual observer. + +From Nazareth to Nablous, we cross the basin just described, and climb a long ascent to the crest of a ridge. Thence our road is +through glens and over hills, but it is less rough than most of the routes we have heretofore traveled. Nablous is a city of about +eight thousand inhabitants. This is the ancient Shechem, which was assigned to the Levites and made a city of refuge--a place where +a man who had murdered anybody or otherwise shocked the fastidiousness of his neighbors, could live a virtuous and respectable life +and be safe from harm. No extradition treaty could touch him, and he might hope in course of time, to become mayor or alderman +in his new home, and have a finger in the city treasury. The authorities used to try the refugees who came there, and, in case of +wilful murder, the fellows were delivered up to justice. But if the trials were anything like those of murderers in olden times, it +was a pretty safe thing for a man to get into a city of refuge, as he could plead accident and insanity, especially the latter, and +get off without trouble. + +Shechem, or Nablous, is chiefly interesting to-day as the residence of the Samaritans; there are considerably less than two hundred +of them and they live now, as they did in Christ’s time, and long before it, following the same occupations, obeying the {358}same +laws and worshipping after the ancient manner. We read in the New Testament that “the Jews have no dealings with the Samaritans,” + and the statement applies at this day and hour as it did when these words were written. + +Down to a few centuries ago, there were colonies of Samaritans in three or four of the Oriental cities, but they have all +disappeared except this one at Nablous. They date from the Assyrian conquest of Israel and the carrying of the people into +captivity. They came from the East, to settle in the deserted cities, and added to their own religion some features of Jewish +worship. Rejected by the Jews, they determined to have a temple of their own, and they erected it upon Mount Gerizim, one of the +hills overlooking Shechem. They go there now, as they have always done, to celebrate the Feast of the Passover, and follow the mode +prescribed in the twelfth Chapter of Exodus. Six lambs are roasted after the ancient method* and eaten by the people, and no infidel +Christian, Jew, or Moslem is allowed to touch any of the meat or any part of the culinary apparatus. They accept the first five +books of the Bible as their gospel, but reject all others; they accept Moses as the only law-giver, believe that a Messiah is to +come, believe in the resurrection of the body, and in a state of future rewards and punishments, and they keep all the feasts and +fasts enjoined in the Pentateuch. They also keep the feast of Purim, on the ground that it celebrates the journey of Moses to Egypt +to deliver the Israelites, and not as the Jews celebrate it for the release of their people by Queen Esther. + +What a strange people! The only remaining adherents of a faith that was once wide spread through Syria--a link binding us to the +mystic past, and carrying us back more than thirty centuries of time. They are born, they live, they think, they worship, they die +as their ancestors have done for more than a hundred generations. To them the present is a dream, the past the only reality. + +They have a synagogue, and by dint of energy and “backsheesh,” we may visit it. They show us the famous Samaritan Codex, the copy of +the Pentateuch, which is said to be the oldest MS. copy in existence. It is on parchment, about fifteen inches wide and twenty-five +yards long, and is much defaced and injured + +{359} + +[Illustration: 0371] + +{361}by time and handling. There has been much discussion concerning this parchment, and many pages have been written to prove or +disprove its antiquity. The Samaritans claim that it is thirty-five hundred years old, and they give the name of the writer, but +he is not there now to swear to the truth of the statement. As Sergeant Buzfuz would say, “his is in itself suspicious.” That it is +very ancient there is no doubt, and the reader may take his choice as to date of manufacture. The “Doubter” says that he saw in the +parchment the watermark “Eagle Mills”--Jones and Smith, encircling a flying eagle with a shield in his claws. But I don’t believe +him. + +We pass Gibeah, the ancient Geba, and next come to Bethel, now called Beitin, where Jacob lay down, as you see the Arabs lying now, +with the earth for a bed and a stone for his pillow, and dreamed that he saw a ladder reaching to Heaven, and angels ascending and +descending upon it. Abraham pitched his tent here, and here was buried Deborah, the nurse of Rachel, under an oak tree, which Jacob +had chosen. + +We pass Ramah, a heap of ruins, in which a modern village is huddled. Its inhabitants have no higher object than the extortion of +“backsheesh” from travellers, and they keep up a steady din of supplications as long as we are in their vicinity. We pass out of the +fertile country and come again among the limestone hills, the eternal hills “round about Jerusalem” We are looking anxiously for the +Holy City, and finally, as the sun is sinking and the approaching night spreads the shadows over the glens and valleys, we climb the +crest of Scopus and look away toward a rounded mountain, crowned with a monastery. + +This is the Mount of Olives; nearer to us, and at its feet lies a city with grey walls and with domes and minarets rising above +them. Do we need to be told that we are gazing upon Jerusalem? + +We halt a moment at the Damascus gate. From one of the Arabs that gather about us, let us borrow the Enchanted Carpet, which may +have belonged to his ancestor, celebrated in the Arabian Nights. Seating ourselves upon it, we utter a wish to return to Damascus, +and behold, in an instant we are once more in the court-yard of Dimitri’s hotel. + +{362} + +[Illustration: 0374] + + + + +CHAPTER XXVIII--FROM DAMASCUS TO JAFFA.--INCIDENTS OF THE TRIP. + + +_Once More in Damascus--Taking the “Short Route”--Starting for Beyrout--The Fountains of Damascus--Rain-Storm in the +Anti-Lebanon--Stora and its Model Hotel--Poetical Fancies--A Compliment to Mine Host--The “Doubter” as a Rhymist--Climbing Mount +Lebanon--Tropic Suns and Arctic Snows--View from the Summit--A Vision of Fairy-Land--Coming Down on the Double-Quick--In Sight of +the Mediterranean--Taking Ship for Jaffa--Sidon to a Modern Tourist--Tyre--Jaffa--A Dangerous Roadstead._ + + +WE have done with Damascus and the country beyond it; we have studied the road to Palmyra and Bagdad, and the overland route to +Jerusalem; we have seen the bazaars, the fountains, the slave market, the mosques and the churches, and we have looked from the +Salahiyeh hills when the setting sun was gilding the domes and towers of the city. Our carriage is waiting to bear us away to +Beyrout, where we will “take ship for Jaffa,” as did the men of Solomon many centuries ago. + +We started out of Damascus in a pouring rain, but we didn’t think it would be much of a shower, and kept on. Just outside, we +crossed a bridge over the Abana, or rather over one of its seven branches, and then followed the stream upward for a few miles. The +Abana formerly flowed in a single stream; the founders of Damascus determined to utilize it for beautifying the city, and well did +they perform their work. Here and there, as you ascend the stream, you see dams thrown across to direct first one portion and then +another, and from these dams there are artificial canals, sometimes tunneled through the rock, and all {363}leading toward the +cluster of domes, and minarets, and roofs that mark the locality of the city. + +Through all parts of Damascus the Abana is carried in divisions and subdivisions, now in open channels and now in aqueducts +concealed beneath the street. Fountains foam and bubble at every street corner and sparkle in every dwelling; water, clear, bright, +and beautiful, is everywhere, and man or beast has no need to thirst. + +It is this abundance of water that has created much of the fame of Damascus and made it attractive in the eyes of travellers. Beyond +Damascus is the desert, without water or verdure; all around, east, west, north, and south, the country is rugged, and more or less +barren. + +The traveller from Bagdad, from Mecca, from Aleppo, and from other points, has wandered over treeless wastes, where rock and sand +are the only objects to greet his eye, and the only water to quench his thirst is the hot and brackish liquid carried in goat skins +at his saddle bow. After long and weary days he arrives at Damascus, embowered in gardens, and at every step through her streets he +sees a fountain. Is it any wonder that he considers Damascus as second only to Paradise? + +The rain didn’t stop, as we had expected. It kept coming steadily during the six hours--that seemed long enough for sixty--between +Damascus and Stora. + +We warmed and dried ourselves as best we could before going to bed, but there was a good deal of moisture in our clothes when we got +up in the morning. We didn’t feel particularly gay, especially as the morning was cold and the rain was continuing, but there was +nothing to do but to push on. The steamer was due at Beyrout that day, and would leave in the evening, and if we missed her we +should be stuck there for ten days. + +We wrote in the visitors’ book some complimentary things about the hotel at Stora before we went to bed in the evening. One was a +macaronic verse, the first line English, the second French, the third German, and the fourth Spanish. This was the combined effort +of the party; then the Judge and I broke into verse as follows: + + “At Stora we, half dozen tourists, + + Have fared unexpectedly well, + + For hostess and host, we, as jurists, + + Declare they _can_ keep a hotel.” + +{364}Then the “Doubter,” remembering the hardships of his ride to and from Baalbek, broke out with a nursery rhyme like this: + + “We went up from Baalbek to Stora, + + And, riding, grew sorer and sorer. + + This rough land of the Prophet, + + If I ever get off it, + + Sure, I’ll not come again, begorra!” + +We had suspected that the “Doubter” was of Hibernian origin, and now we knew it. He owned up and said that his ancestors were among +the Kings of Tipperary. But his poetic production did not find a place in the book, for the reason that it was not complimentary to +the country, and did not reflect the opinions of the rest of the party. + +Up we went on the eastern slope of Mount Lebanon, the air growing colder, and the clouds enveloping us more and more densely as we +ascended. I sat on the box and shivered, and vowed not to be caught again in such a scrape. By-and-by we were at the summit. There +was an inch or so of snow on the road, and more on the rocks, and the wind was sharp enough to shave with. I was chattering like a +magpie, and would have given something for a cup of hot tea, or something that would warm me. Kalil pointed to the sea, which just +then appeared below us through a rift in the clouds, and its reflection in the warm sunlight was something pleasing to look upon. + +It was a long way down--fifty-six hundred feet--but we were good for it. Kalil turned down the brake a little, not enough to prevent +the turning of the wheels, and not enough to keep back the horses, who went on at full speed. Now the air grew warmer, now the +clouds broke away and fled over the mountain top, now the snow grew thinner and soon disappeared, now we could see Beyrout hovering +like a bird over the land that skirts the bay, and looking bright and genial in the warm sunlight. The Mediterranean rippled and +sparkled in the sunlight; far out on the water we could see stipples of white sails, and here and there we could discover the long, +dark streaks on the horizon that marked the path of a steamer. The waves broke over the rocky beach with + +{365} + +[Illustration: 0377] + +{367}an uneven surge, and a silver thread widening as it advanced its winding way among the rocks showed us where lay the river that +reaches the sea just north of the city. + +Winter was left behind as we descended the mountain at a break-neck pace; spring opened upon us, and soon the spring was succeeded +by the warmth of summer. We were once more among the palm trees; oranges and citrons twinkled on the branches that bore them, +and reflected back the golden light of a Syrian sun. The dim lines on the water developed into waves; the ships, at first faintly +outlined, revealed all the details of spars and rigging, and the confused mass clinging to the land and marking the locality of +Beyrout developed into the many colored domes, and towers, and roofs of an Oriental city; and as we drew rein at the door of the +hotel, close to the water’s edge, we forgot our troubles, and breathed an atmosphere warm and invigorating as September. + +It was rather rough when we went on board the steamer which was to take us to Jaffa, and the wind increased during the night, so +that by morning it was a respectable gale. The steamer was to start at daybreak, and stop at Caifa, half way to Jaffa, but the wind +was so high that she didn’t go. She started once, but the sea was so rough that the captain hesitated and came to anchor again. We +contemplated Beyrout that day and part of the next, and we had a similar contemplation of Caifa. The agent came out in a boat, and +said he could not get a single lighter to venture out, as there was a very heavy sea breaking on the shore. So without landing or +receiving any freight, we departed; some passengers went ashore, among them several who had tickets for Jaffa, but were fearful that +they would not be able to land there. Among the deck passengers were several Jews who were coming to Palestine to settle and make +their fortunes. The story that the Rothschilds had bought Palestine from Turkey, or rather had taken it, as a collateral for a loan +which Turkey could not pay, was current among them. + +We passed between Beyrout and Caifa, the port of Saida, the ancient Sidon, which disputed with Tyre the mastery of the seas. It +was once a great city; now it is a dirty, ill-kept town, with a population of not more than eight or nine thousand, and {368}with a +commerce so insignificant that it does not pay the steamers to call there. Where it formerly boasted an extensive fleet, it has not +now a single vessel larger than a fishing boat! + +[Illustration: 0381] + +We pass in front of Tyre, one of the oldest, as it was once one of the most powerful cities of the East. It has been many times +destroyed and rebuilt, and a careful investigator can find the remains of at least a dozen different cities either in its ruins or +in the historic accounts. At present there are less than four thousand inhabitants, Christian and Moslem, in the proportion of half +and half. + +Jaffa has always borne a bad reputation on the score of safety, as it has no port where ships can lie, and is not even protected +by projecting headlands Its harbor is an open roadstead, and if {369}the wind blows from the south or west, or any point of compass +between them, boats cannot venture out on account of the heavy surf. In summer the weather is generally favorable, but not always +so, while in winter it is about an even wager for or against communication between ship and shore. Our captain said that in some +winters he had been able to land at Jaffa every trip, and in other winters he could not land at all. I heard of one man who wanted +to go to Jerusalem, and had gone past Jaffa five times unable to land there. And I heard a dragoman say that he had gone to Jaffa +nine times, and never failed to land each time. You see the difference between good and ill luck. + +If we had arrived on any of the previous eight days, we would have been unfortunate; two steamers had gone past in that time, one +of them with three hundred pilgrims for Jerusalem, which were carried to Port Said, and would be brought back from there. But the +morning we sighted Jaffa the weather was propitious, and as we cast anchor the ship was soon surrounded by boats ready to take +the passengers ashore. We lost no time, as we were fearful a wind might arise and detain us, and so we closed our bargain for +transportation to land at the usual rate of one franc for each person, including our baggage. + +[Illustration: 5382] + + +{370} + +[Illustration: 0383] + + + + +CHAPTER XXIX--ENGAGING A DRAGOMAN.--OUR START FOR JERUSALEM. + + +_Views of Jaffa--A queer-looking City--The Oldest Inhabited Town in the World--The Massacre of Jaffa--A Stain upon the Memory of +Napoleon--A Contract with a Dragoman--A close margin--The value of Credentials--An honest Arab--Getting into Saddle--An American +Colony--Their German Successors--The Fruits of the Country--Generous conduct of the “Doubter”--On the road to Jerusalem--A night at +Ramleh--In a Russian Convent--The Gauntlet of Beggars--The Pest of the Road--Begging as a Fine Art--The “Gate of the Glen”--Among +the Mountain Passes--In sight of the Holy City._ + + +JAFFA presents a curiously terraced appearance, when seen from the water, and its flat roofs and low arches show its Syrian +character. There is a semi-circle of rough rocks that form a sort of harbor for small boats, and it requires good steering to carry +a boat through the entrance, only ten feet wide, without accident. The surf breaks violently when the wind is high, and makes a +landing or embarkation dangerous. The town looks more beautiful a mile or two away than when close at hand. + +The landing place was dirty, and crowded with all sorts of unclean Arabs, and the streets were crooked, narrow, and so full of +mud and dirt as to make walking a serious matter. Traditionally, Jaffa is the oldest city in the world; it is said to have existed +before the flood, and it is likewise recorded as very old by history. It was one of the towns allotted to the tribe of Dan, and is +mentioned as the landing-place of the rafts of cedar and pine from Lebanon for the construction of Solomon’s temple. + +It was an important place at the time of the Crusades, but gradually dwindled in commercial and other consequence. Napoleon + +{371} + +[Illustration: 0384] + +{373}caused it to be talked about at the beginning of the present century, by his massacre of the garrison of four thousand men, who +had surrendered on condition that their lives should be spared. + +We proceeded with our baggage to the German hotel, followed by a bodyguard of dragomen and guides similar to those that had escorted +us at Beyrout, and animated with the same noble ambition to make contracts that should transfer money from our pockets to theirs. +As soon as we were at the hotel we held an audience of dragomen, and finally selected one that seemed to answer our purpose. As a +matter of precaution, we went with him to the German Consul--the American Consul was out of town--and bidding him wait at the door, +we consulted the man of authority. He pronounced the dragoman good, and we closed with him, on the Consul’s recommendation. He +was to take us on a nine days’ trip to Jerusalem, Bethlehem, Mar Saba, the Dead Sea, Jordan, Jericho, and Ramleh, at an expense of +twenty francs for each person per day. + +He was to provide all requisites for the journey; three double tents--one for each two persons--servants, beds, food, English +saddles, side saddle for the lady, saddle and pack horses, and to pay all hotel and convent expenses, and supply local guides in +Jerusalem; he was to provide sufficient escort when needed, and to pay all fees and “backsheesh” of every kind, except at the Mosque +of Omar. The party was to be at liberty to change the route, and to stop whenever it chose. The horses were to be sound, strong, +kind, and active, and if any of them were disabled, the dragoman was to provide suitable substitutes without extra charge. In case +of dispute, the matter could be referred to the German or American Consul at Jaffa or Jerusalem. + +While on the road, the food should consist of tea or coffee in the morning, with eggs, bread, and butter; luncheon at noon, of +chicken or cold meat, eggs, bread, cheese, and dessert; and dinner as good as the hotel dinner. In Jerusalem the party could have +choice of the Mediterranean and Damascus hotels. + +Ten napoleons were to be paid at starting, and the remainder, half in Jerusalem and half in Jaffa, on our return. {374}Ali Solomon +was the name of our dragoman, and I will do him the credit to say that we were entirely satisfied with him. He kept his contract +more faithfully than we expected he would, and in some points exceeded its terms. + +[Illustration: 0387] + +I don’t recommend him to anybody else, for fear he may have suffered a change of heart, and become a rascal; men are very uncertain +in this respect. + +I once had a servant whom I supposed to be honest enough to be a model for the rising generation. He left my employ to seek fortune +and turn an honest penny elsewhere, and I gave him a ‘character’ which a student of theology might ertvy. On the strength of my +recommendation, he obtained a situation with a gentleman, whose milk of human kindness had not been curdled by experience. John was +trusted with things in general, and requited the confidence by stealing a hundred dollars, and then stealing away. And no man, so +far as I have heard, knoweth, to this day, the place of his sojourn. + +Since then, I have been cautious about commendations, and, for this reason, I will only say of Ali, that _we_ were entirely +satisfied with him, and believed him honest and faithful. If he robbed his next customers of the filling of their back teeth, it is +no affair of ours. + +We selected horses from a large number, and very good horses they were. About 2 o’clock we rode out of the German colony of Jaffa, +which has bought the property formerly held by the American colony from Maine. The Germans are prospering, and promise well for the +future. I was told that the Americans {375}might have prospered, if their affairs had been well managed, but that their leader was +about the worst head that could have been chosen. Only four, I believe, of the American colonists remain there, three women and one +man. One woman is in a state of poverty, but I was told that the rest were making a good living. The Germans have a good manager at +their head, and all of them are industrious. They have a second village about two miles away from the one originally founded by the +Americans. + +Through a street paved with mud and filth, and bordered by tents and booths, where oranges and other things edible--in theory or +in practice--were exposed for sale, we moved toward the interior and away from the sea. Orange groves were on every side, and we +appreciated the reputation of Jaffa for this excellent fruit. + +Even the “Doubter” was convinced of the excellence of the oranges, as he filled his pockets without expense, and became liberal +enough to bestow an orange upon a small boy who held his horse and wanted a slight “backsheesh” in return. “I don’t believe money is +good for you,” he said to the boy; “you had better take an orange.” The boy could have had all of this sort of thing that he wanted, +and indicated an objection to receiving payment in fruit, but his objections were of no avail. + +One of the “Doubter’s” strong points was in never paying at all for small services, or in paying in something that cost him nothing. +His sympathy was roused for a poor woman in Jaffa, and as we finished dinner he took a large orange from the table and said: “I +would like to give this to that poor woman over the way.” We applauded his burst of generosity in giving away what belonged to the +hotel, and didn’t let him hear the last of it for a day or two. + +Outside of Jaffa, the road goes over a flat or undulating country, evidently quite fertile, excepting at intervals, where it is too +sandy for cultivation. For saddle horses the road is excellent; it is intended for a carriage road, but has never been finished, +though carriages do manage to get over it now and then, all the way to Jerusalem. The story goes, that when the Sultan visited Paris +in 1867, the Emperor told him that Eugenie wished to visit Jerusalem, but was unable to ride there on horseback. {376} “There shall +be a good carriage road there in a year,” said the Sultan, and he at once gave orders for its construction. But somehow it still +remains in an unfinished condition, and the promise to complete it within a year is like many other promises of the Turkish ruler. + +The Russians have a convent at Ramleh, for the accommodation of Russian pilgrims to Jerusalem, and there is also a Latin convent +there, under the management of French and Italian monks. + +[Illustration: 9389] + +The Latin establishment is really a convent, or rather a monastery, but the Russian one is more like a hotel, as it is kept by a +Russian family, whereas the Latin convent is really in the hands of holy men, clad in hood and cowl. Our dragoman rode ahead and +arranged that we should stop at the Russian convent, and sent a boy out to meet and guide us into the place. + +Along the road side, as we entered, there were a lot of beggars--twenty or more--drawn up, or rather squatted in line where they +could assail us. Some were blind, some had lost their hands or their fingers, and each of them held up his mutilated stumps to +attract attention. We were told some of them were lepers, but that the majority had been mutilated either by themselves or their +parents in order to insure their success as beggars. One of our party gave a small coin to the worst looking of the mendicants, and +immediately the whole crowd set in pursuit. + +If you give a gratuity in Syria, you are at once pursued by all the beggars in sight, including the one to whom you have made a +donation, and nothing short of a blow with a cudgel will shake + +{377} + +[Illustration: 0390] + +{379}them off. This systematic begging is apt to harden one’s heart, especially when you find it impossible to satisfy the demands +of an applicant. The government would do a charitable work if it would assemble the beggars of Ramleh into a close room and +asphyxiate them over a charcoal fire. They have been suppressed two or three times, but are sure to spring up again. + +We were up early, and for three hours had a road very much like that of the day before. This ride brought us to the Bab-el-Wady, or +Gate of the Glen, where there is a sort of hotel which furnishes everything for the traveller, except food, drink, and lodging, and +there is a room where you can sit at a rickety table in a rickety chair, and eat the provisions you have brought along. + +From this so-called hotel we moved up a glen or valley with the rocks on both sides of us, and the road making a steady ascent. We +were now among the rugged mountains that extend to and beyond Jerusalem, a dreary and almost sterile waste, whose every aspect is +forbidding. + +I know of no mountain ride more dreary than that from Babel-Wady to Jerusalem. In nearly all other mountain chains I have ever +seen, you have frequent glimpses of scenery that would partly reward for your toil, but here there is nothing of the kind. It is a +succession of rough and rounded summits, too rocky for cultivation, and not broken enough to be picturesque. A few villages nestle +in the glens, and there are occasional patches of olive trees, but the general aspect is one of unredeemed sterility. + +The road from Jaffa to Jerusalem is about thirty-six miles in length: travellers generally divide it by going to Ramleh--nine +miles--the first day, and to Jerusalem the next. The ordinary time for a party unused to travel is twelve hours; going up we made it +in ten hours, and coming back we did it in seven and a half, which was very fair speed. + +We wound along the mountain road, and four hours after leaving Bab-el-Wady, the foremost of our cortege swung his hat from one of +the rounded summits. “Jerusalem,” said the dragoman, and at the word we pressed forward. + +There lay the Holy City, as it lay when the Crusaders came hither to wrest it from the hands of the Moslem, and as it has greeted +the eyes of many a pious pilgrim in more modern days. {380}Its towers and walls rose before us, while around were the everlasting +hills of Israel. Tasso’s lines describing the first view of the city by the Crusaders came involuntarily to my mind. + + Winged is each heart, and winged every heel, + + They fly, yet notice scarce how fast they fly, + + But by the time the dewless meads reveal + + The golden sun ascended in the sky, + + Lo! towered Jerusalem salutes the eye. + + A thousand pointing fingers tell the tale, + + “Jerusalem!” a thousand voices cry; + + “All hail, Jerusalem!” hill, down, and dale + + Catch the glad sound, and shout, “Jerusalem, all hail.” + +[Illustration: 0393] + +The towered walls recalled the pictures of Jerusalem, with which the whole world is familiar, and we seemed to be entering a city +that we had seen before. The Turkish soldiers at the gate made no opposition to our entrance. Formerly strangers were kept waiting +at the gate until their passports had been sent to the j police for examination, and sometimes the detention lasted two or three +hours. A few steps inside the gate brought us to the door of the Mediterranean Hotel, where we dismounted and made ourselves at +home. + + +{381} + +[Illustration: 0394] + + + + +CHAPTER XXX--THE LIONS OF JERUSALEM.--THE TEMPLE, THE SEPULCHRE, AND THE HOLY OF HOLIES. + + +_First Sights in Jerusalem--Appearance of the streets--What the “Doubter” thought--A change of opinion--The Tower of David--The +Street of David--Church of the Holy Sepulchre--Scenes around it--Palace of the Knights of St. John--Via Dolorosa--Damascus’ +Gate--Walls of the Holy City--Visiting the Temple--The Haram and Mosque of Omar--Visaing the Substructions--A triple +veneration--Place of Wailing--The Quarries--Remains of an Ancient Bridge._ + + +AS soon as we were fairly in Jerusalem and had brushed up a little, we started out to see some of the many sights that the city +contains. + +[Illustration: 9394] + +Apart from its historical interest and the picturesque appearance of its walls, towers, and domes, Jerusalem is the reverse of +pleasing. Its streets are narrow and badly paved, and no effort is made to keep them clean. Some of the narrow ones are particularly +filthy, and one must have good boots and be careful about his steps to walk safely along these ways. I laughed inwardly as {382}the +“Doubter” hesitated at some of the corners and showed a determination to turn back, or rather an uncertainty about going forward. + +[Illustration: 0395] + +When we descended the Danube, we stopped a short time at Belgrade, the capital of Servia, and standing on the frontier between +the Occident and the Orient. The pavement there was rougher than that of European cities, and the “Doubter” doubted if there was +anything worse in the world. + +“Let us hurry up,” said he, “and get to Constantinople or Jerusalem where the streets are better.” + +{383} + +[Illustration: 0396] + +{385} “Why, my dear “Doubter,” said I, “these are far better than the streets in those cities. They have worse pavements and deeper +mud.” + +“I know better,” was his rejoinder, and that closed the argument. I said nothing till I had him climbing the wide street that leads +from Top-Hané to the Hotel de Byzance in Constantinople, and there I gave him a little prod about Belgrade. He got out of it by +saying that he knew Jerusalem was much better. + +Naturally, I was pleased when I managed to get him between two mountains of mud, or something of the sort, in a narrow street in +Jerusalem, and just as he was extricating himself, I asked about Belgrade. + +He made no reply that I heard, but I saw his lips moving and his mental agitation was so great that he slipped and fell where the +mud was worst. He was not presentable in polite society after that, but rather looked as though he had been hired out by the day as +a friction roller for smoothing a freshly flowed swamp. + +From the front of the hotel, one can see the Tower of David, the structure which King David erected upon Mount Zion, according to +Biblical history. + +From the Jaffa gate, also called the Hebron, and the Mediterranean gate, runs the street of David, descending the hill and +subsequently ascending another to Mount Moriah Our first walk was down the street of David to the first turning to the left. + +This took us into Christ street, and a walk of three or four minutes there brought us, by a single turning, into the space in front +of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. + +This space was full of beggars, and of people selling various sorts of ornaments and relics. Some had rosaries made of various +kinds of wood, generally of the olive tree or the seeds of the olive; some had crosses and holy pictures cut in mother of pearl; and +others had old coins or stone ornaments made of pieces of the Temple of Jerusalem. The traders and beggars were very persistent, and +one could not stand a minute in contemplation of the building without being annoyed by the one class or the other. More than one of +us wished that a scourge could be set in motion to drive away these pests from the exterior of a building, which is regarded with +special interest by all Christian people. {386}We could not enter the church at that hour, and so we contented ourselves with +a visit to the hospital of the Knights of St. John, or rather to its ruins. We walked along the Via Dolorosa and were shown the +supposed spot where Christ rested his cross, then we went along the street of the Gate of the Column and the street of the Palace, +to the Damascus Gate. + +[Illustration: 0399] + +Then, as it was approaching sunset, we returned to the hotel and had a pleasant conversation with Dr. De Hass, our newly appointed +Consul to Jerusalem. + +On our way back to the hotel we stopped in two or three of the many shops where olive wood is wrought into various interesting forms +for strangers to buy and carry away. It seemed as if about one-fifth of the inhabitants of Jerusalem were engaged in the manufacture +of objects of olive wood. Canes, boxes, portfolios, candle-sticks, and a hundred other things were made of olive wood, and some of +them were very pretty. {387}Jerusalem is the same towered city as of old, and her walls have a massive appearance. Sultan Suleiman +erected them, as they now stand, in the year 1542; but portions of them were standing before that time, and some of the towers have +undergone very little change in the various calamities which the city has suffered. + +[Illustration: 8400] + +The latter portions were built from the ruins of the older walls and generally on the sites of their predecessors, so that the city +has preserved its form with but little alteration. + +The distance around the walls is about two and a half miles, and in this distance there are five gates; the most important of these +are the Jaffa gate and the Damascus gate, the others being but little used There are two gates wholly or partially walled up; one of +them being the Golden Gate on Mount Moriah, and the other, the gate of Herod. The principal streets of the city run at right angles, +and by them Jerusalem is divided into the Moslem, the Christian, the Jewish, and the American quarters. + +So much for the general description of Jerusalem. + +To those familiar with Bible history, the enumeration of the holy places of Jerusalem would be to repeat many names with which they +are already familiar; to those who are not Biblical students, the list would be tediously long; I shall therefore confine my account +of Jerusalem to the story cf what we saw and did during our brief stay. Any one wishing to know more of the city has doubtless +within his reach one or more books, that will give the required information. A perusal of the Bible, especially of those portions +describing Jerusalem, would not prove at all injurious. + +We entered by a gate in the wall, and the transition was quite sudden from the confused mass of houses where we had been wandering +to the open space of the Haram. We ascended a flight of steps to a broad platform, and stood in front of Kubbet-es-Sukrah, or Dome +of the Rock, as the central mosque is called. + +It is generally known as the Mosque of Omar, for the reason that the Kalif Omar is credited with its construction. There +{388}Accompanied by a guide and by a janizary of the consulate, we started out of the hotel in the morning and descended the street +of David to the entrance of the Haram or Sacred Enclosure, the name given by the Arabs to the portion of Mount Moriah that contains +the Mosques of Omar and El-Aska, and formerly contained the great temple built by King Solomon. + +[Illustration: 0401] + +The Haram occupies a large space, almost equal to a fourth of the city; it is surrounded by strong walls and is dotted with +platforms, niches for prayer, cupolas and olive trees in addition to {389}are two or three stories about its origin, but, whatever +that may have been, the architect deserves great credit for erecting a building beautiful in itself and quite in keeping with the +surroundings. + +[Illustration: 8402] + +It stands on the very summit of Mount Moriah on the sacred rock, supposed to have been the site of the threshing floor of Or-nan, +the Jebusite, which King David bought for fifty shekels of silver. The building is octagonal, and each of the sides measure +sixty-seven feet. The octagonal form is preserved in the interior, where the rock is inclosed in a railing and rises above the level +of the floor. + +Unfortunately, the mosque was undergoing repairs at the time of our visit, and the interior was full of scaffolding, while the floor +was covered with rubbish. + +[Illustration: 9402] + +But we could see enough to show that the mosque is a structure of great beauty. The lower part of the wall is composed of colored +marbles in complex patterns, and the upper part contains no less than fifty-six windows of stained glass, equalling in beauty +anything that can be found in Westminster Abbey or the cathedrals of Europe. + +The dome presents an imposing appearance, whether seen from the outside or from within. Externally it is a prominent feature of +Jerusalem, and no picture of the holy city would be complete without it. + +Antiquarians are in doubt as to the extent of the great temple, but there is likely to be a complete solution of the difficult +questions when the work of the Palestine Exploration Society is finished. The English and American sections are working in perfect +harmony, and have portioned out their territories so that they shall not come in contact or perform the same work twice over. Part +of their efforts are directed to settling the discussions about the extent of Solomon’s Temple, and they have already made some +important discoveries. {390}We were shown the localities of the excavations, and after visiting the two mosques in the Haram we went +below ground to look at the substruction of the great temple. We descended a flight of steps into a subterranean apartment where +there is a sculptured niche, which bears the name of “The Cradle of Jesus”. + +[Illustration: 9403] + +Our guide lighted some candles, and we kept on down another flight of steps that brought us into some vaults, containing numerous +pillars about five feet square and constructed of huge stones. The t arches supported by these pillars were generally semi-circ ul +ar, and the whole work had an appearance of great durability. Only a portion of this subterranean space has been explored, and the +extent of the arched space is unknown. These were for the purpose of making the ground level and thus prepare it for the foundation +of the great temple. + +We were shown some roots of trees that have made their way through the platform and run a long distance through the underground +debris. The crusaders used these vaults as stables, and some of the holes in the pillars where they fastened their horses can still +be seen. None of the horses are there. + +Jerusalem is emphatically the Holy City. It is a little singular that it should be venerated by the disciples of three great +teachers, Moses, Christ, and Mohammed, and that while Christians + +{391} + +[Illustration: 0404] + +{393}call it the Sacred City, the Arabs should have almost a similar title for it. Its Arabic name _El-Kuds_ signifies “The Holy,” + and the rock beneath the dome of the Mosque of Omar is the locality of the triple veneration. + +[Illustration: 0406] + +At the south-east corner of the rock, we were conducted into a chamber or excavation, called the Noble Cave. It is asserted to be +the praying place of Abraham, David, Solomon, and Jesus, and in its center there is a slab of marble covering a cavity, which is +called the well of spirits by the Moslems. Some call it the gate of Paradise and others say it leads to a place whose character is +quite the reverse. The guide stamped upon it, and the sound that resulted showed that the place was hollow. + +It is generally claimed that this rock, now covered by the dome of the mosque, was the site of the altar of Solomon’s Temple. +The Jews used to come to this rock as far back as the fourth century to wail over the departed glories of Jerusalem; but when the +Moslems took the city, and appropriated the spot, a new wailing place was selected On one corner of the rock the guide showed the +footprints of Mohammed, where his foot last touched the earth when he went up to heaven; and near it is the hand {394}print of the +Angel, who seized the rock and held it down to prevent its going to heaven along with the Prophet. + +Thus the Jews revere the spot as the site of the altar of their temple; the Christians revere it as the praying place of Jesus, and +the Moslems revere it for the reason above given. Strange indeed that it should thus be the sacred spot of three distinct religions. +No other place of the globe compares with it in holiness. + +[Illustration: 0407] + +We looked from the walls of the temple over into the Valley of Jehoshaphat and saw Absalom’s pillar and other objects of interest. +The garden of Gethsemane was pointed out, and over against us was the Mount of Olives with its triple summit and the crown of the +Church of the Ascension, and the building erected by the _Princesse de la tour l’Auvergne_. The olive trees had lost their leaves +and were bleak and bare, and the sides of the hill had an uninviting appearance. + +Down to the Brook Kedron our gaze extended, or rather to its bed, as the valley was dry and dusty as if no brook had ever flowed +there. Other places of historical or traditional note were pointed out, but we were too far away to discern them clearly. + +{395} + +[Illustration: 0408] + +{397}We left the temple and proceeded to the wailing place of the the Jews. Here are the foundations or a small portion of the lower +walls of the great temple where, every Friday, the Jews come to wail and weep over their downfall. Half a dozen Jews were there are +the time of our visit; with their faces to the stone, they read from their prayer books in a low wailing tone that was exceedingly +impressive. + +At the wailing place there were visible five courses of beveled stones in a fine state of preservation; in some places they have +been worn considerably by the kisses of the devotees, that for many centuries have pressed around them and wept for the downfall of +Jerusalem. Both sexes and all ages are represented here, and they have come from all quarters of the globe. + + “Oh! weep for those that wept by Babel’s stream, + + Whose shrines are desolate, whose land a dream; + + Weep for the harp of Judah’s broken spell; + + Mourn--where their God hath dwelt, the godless dwell.” + +From the Place of Wailing we returned to the hotel, and, as soon as we had taken lunch proceeded to The Quarries, an excavation +which is entered just outside of the Damascus gate. + +This is supposed to be the locality whence came the stone for the Great Temple, and it was only a few years ago that it was +discovered. The quarries extend beneath the city, and one can walk more than half a mile from the entrance directly under Jerusalem. + +We wandered around here for about an hour, lighted by candles that saved us many a disagreeable fall. The slope of the interior is +very steep, and how the stones were managed there, is a mystery. The Judge had several slips, but none of them were serious, as they +all happened among the sand and smaller chips of limestone. On our return to the hotel, he took a respectful position in the rear of +the party, and for an hour or more was locked in the recesses of his own room. What he did while thus secluded, I cannot say, but I +know that he summoned a servant to bring him a needle and some thread. + + +{398} + +[Illustration: 0411] + + + + +CHAPTER XXXI--AMONG THE MONKS. + + +_From the Gates of Jerusalem to Bethlehem--A Touching Incident--Tent-Life at Bethlehem--The Milk Grotto--Its Miraculous +Character--The “Doubter” Expresses Himself--The Oldest Christian Church in the World--Quarrelsome Monks--A Deadly Fight--Remarkable +Conduct of the “Doubter”--Pious Pilgrims--A Christmas Festival--A Corpulent and Hospitable Monk--A Wearisome Ceremony--The Monks in +Costume--The Women of Bethlehem--A Bevy of Beauties--Under Guard--Armenian Soldiers--Travelling to Saba--Among the Monks--A Curious +Convent--Armed Against the Bedouins._ + + +WE were in the Holy Land at Christmas time, and arranged to attend the Christmas eve festivities in Bethlehem. About two o’clock in +the afternoon of the day before Christmas we mounted our horses and turned our attention to the southern horizon. + +Out of the Jaffa gate we filed, and then past the Hill of Evil Counsel, and near the so-called Lower Aqueduct we took the road to +Bethlehem. + +The road was much like that which brought us to Jerusalem--a path among rocks and hills--though the latter were less abrupt, and +there were in many places considerable areas of tillable land. It is a ride of less than two hours from one city to the other, and +there are few objects of interest along the route Rachel’s Tomb was pointed out, and also the well, whose waters David longed for +when he was in the cave of Adullam. + +The Tomb of Rachel is a small building, surmounted with a dome, and possessing no peculiar features. The structure is modern, and +probably in the thirty centuries that have passed + +{399} + +[Illustration: 0412] + +{401}since Rachel was buried there, several buildings have crumbled to dust and been replaced by pious hands. + +The authenticity of the spot is vouched for by all who have written on the subject, and the tomb is one of the few shrines which +Jews, Christians, and Moslems agree about in their traditions, and have not seen fit to quarrel over. We made a short halt, and one +of our party read aloud from the Bible the brief and touching narrative of Rachel’s death. It had a new and fresh interest to us, +and we all listened attentively to the simple story. + +Bethlehem is on a rather steep hill-side, and presents an appearance of terraces as one looks at it from a short distance. It has +the low mud walls and flat roofs of most Syrian towns, and apart from its historical interest, and the possession of the Church of +the Nativity, it is of little importance. As we approached it, the convent on the eastern side presents an appearance, not unlike +that of a baronial castle of the Rhine or Danube, and recalls to us some of the walls that frown upon those famous rivers or +overlook the lovely valleys of Western Germany. Coming nearer, the soft lines of the picture become clearly defined, and as we enter +the city and thread its streets, we find that it is not unlike Jerusalem and Jaffa and other places in Syria, through which we have +journeyed. + +There is no hotel at Bethlehem, and the influx of strangers consequent upon the Christmas festivities had filled the Latin convent +to its fullest capacity. We determined to begin our camp life here, and so sent our tents forward in the morning, to be ready for +our arrival. + +We found them pitched in a little field just outside the town, and close to the “Milk Grotto,” where tradition relates that the +Virgin and Child hid themselves from the fury of Herod, sometime before the flight into Egypt. Here the Virgin nursed the Child, and +the soft stone is said to have the miraculous power of wonderfully increasing women’s milk. Bits of it are carried to all parts of +the world for this purpose. The Abbe Geramb says of it: + +“_I make no remarks on the virtue of these stones, but affirm as an ascertained fact, that a great number of persons have found +from it the effect they anticipate_.” {402}Of course we visited the grotto, which was a sort of chapel, j lighted with lamps. The +“Doubter” asserted his lack of faith in the virtue of the stone, but nevertheless he brought away some of it, but refused to give +the customary gratuity to the custodian, much to the disgust of the latter. + +From the Milk Grotto we went to the Church of the Nativity, beset at every step, as we were at every moment on the streets of +Bethlehem, by venders of ornaments of olive wood and mother i of pearl. The church, if we include the buildings connected with +it, covers a large area, as it belongs to three rival sects of Latins, Greeks, and Armenians, and each has a convent or monastery +connected with it. The church itself is about one hundred and twenty feet by one hundred and ten, and is divided into a nave and +four aisles by Corinthian columns, which support horizontal architraves. + +The pavement and roof are in very bad condition, and the whole church looks as if it would soon tumble to pieces. It was built by +the Empress Helena, in the early part of the fourth century, and is probably the oldest monument of Christian architecture in the +world. + +The reason of its dilapidated condition is found in the jealousy of the rival sects of monks; any two of them will unite to prevent +the third making the repairs so much needed, and no two of them will consent to allow another to have anything to do with the +church. Several times the monks have had fights for the decoration or possession of the Grotto of the Nativity, and it has been +found necessary for the government to station soldiers there, to preserve order. + +Two or three years ago, one of the factions set fire to the decorations which another had put up, and the whole place was filled +with smoke, and some of the walls were disfigured. During the fight at the fire some of the monks were killed, and up to the present +time there is a continuance of the feeling of hostility. The Crimean war owes its origin, in part, to the question of the possession +of the Church of the Nativity, and more than once a few square inches of the rock floor of the grotto have been very nearly the +cause of war in Europe. The whole space is carefully parcelled out among the rival sects, and Turkish soldiers {403}are constantly +on duty there, to preserve order! How we Christians love one-another. + +Guided by a native Christian, a dealer in relics, who spoke French, and attached himself to us with an eye to business, we entered +the church, and descended a flight of steps to the grotto, a low vault about forty feet long by twelve feet wide. At the eastern end +is a marble slab in the pavement, and in the centre of the slab is a silver star, bearing the inscription: + +“_Hic de Virgine Maria Jesus Christ Natus est._” + +“Here Jesus Christ was born of the Virgin Mary.” + +Every moment pious pilgrims entered the grotto, and kneeling, kissed the star. Our guide kissed it, and so did another native +Christian who followed us, and each monk, as he entered, gave a similar sign of his reverence and his faith. The “Doubter” knelt, +and the rest of us were dumb with surprise, as he was a persistent scoffer at everything in the shape of religion, and had no more +reverence than a crocodile. For a moment, we thought he had been the object of a miracle, and that we should have occasion to record +a conversion of a most remarkable character. + +But it resulted otherwise; he rubbed his hands several times over the star--a spot which all the pilgrims around us were regarding +with the deepest reverence--rubbed it as one feels the texture of a piece of cloth, and then rose to his feet. + +To our united enquiry as to what in the world he was trying to do, he said he wanted to. find out what the inscription was. We said +nothing at the time, as the place was not a proper one for a lecture, but when we got outside didn’t we give it to him? + +Sixteen silver lamps burn constantly, year in and year out, over the star, and behind them are little pictures of saints, some of +them set with precious stones. Over the star is a plain altar, which belongs to all ‘the sects in common, and each must dress it +with the proper ornaments, when its turn comes to celebrate mass. There is a small chapel, dedicated to “The Manger,” on the south +side of the grotto, and at the other end of the grotto is the Chapel of the Innocents, dedicated to the children slain by Herod. +There are several other grottos beneath the church, and all of them are of a sacred character. + +It was dark when we left the church and returned to our tents to dine and take a short rest, preparatory to a vigil long after +{404}midnight, to witness the ceremonies of Christmas Eve. Table was set in one of the tents, and we dined better than at any of the +Syrian hotels. We had brought a bottle of champagne from Jerusalem and finished the meal with a Christmas glass to friends at home. + +Before leaving Jerusalem for Bethlehem, we found that our Consul, Dr. De Hass, was going there with his wife, and had secured +quarters in the Armenian convent. We saw them soon after our arrival, and arranged to call on them about ten o’clock in the evening, +and while away some of the time previous to the ceremony. + +Taking our dragoman to guide us, we found the convent, and after wandering through several corridors, were shown into the waiting +room, where two or three men were asleep on divans. One of them was the janizary of the Consul, and after rousing him and waiting +till he rubbed his eyes into the proper position of openness, we sent a message to Dr. De Hass. + +He came at once to meet us, and behind him was a stout, rosy, well-fed monk, of the Armenian brotherhood, with a heavy bunch of keys +dangling at his waist. Evidently, a monastic life agreed with him. He was the very picture of health, with possibly a trifle more +flesh on his bones than most of us would desire. He could speak no language that we knew, but he motioned us to seats, and in a few +moments served us some excellent tea, which we found quite refreshing. In tea-drinking and conversation, half an hour passed away. A +little before eleven o’clock we entered the church, which was rapidly filling up for the service. + +We decided not to go into the innermost part of the church, as we would be unable to get out, in case the ceremonies were prolonged +to a very unusually late hour, and so we halted in the vestibule, while the consular party went forward to take seats among the +dignitaries. + +The priests were busy with the mass, and the church was rapidly filling, so that in a little while it was difficult to find standing +room. Most of those present were young girls, and I judge by their similarity of dress, that they came from a school, or were under +some general management. They were in white Turkish trowsers and overskirts, and their head-dresses were quite richly + +{405} + +[Illustration: 0408] + +{407}decorated with coins and mother-of-pearl ornaments. They knelt on the ground, and maintained their kneeling position for a +longtime without apparent fatigue, though some of them who were doubtless accustomed to early hours, fell asleep, or looked very +drowsy. + +Bethlehem has some celebrity for the beauty of its women, and in looking over that congregation I think I saw more pretty faces than +I had seen elsewhere in all Syria. In the vestibule, there were two confessionals, and at each of them there was a line of young +women and girls, waiting for their opportunities, as a crowd waits at a post-office, or the ticket-box of a theatre. To judge by the +attendance at the confessional, I should suspect that these young misses were not the models of all that is good in the world. + +The church was blazing with candles, and the Christmas decorations were pretty, but there was nothing unusual in this part of the +service. What we had come to see was the procession to the Grotto of the Nativity, and we were anxious to know when this was to come +off. + +The heat of the candles and the bad atmosphere rendered the church quite uncomfortable, and so we wandered off into the Greek +portion, where there was no service and only a few people. Turkish soldiers were standing around, ready to suppress any tumult, and +other soldiers were within call. + +We loitered around here for awhile, and then descended to the grotto, which was hot and full of foul air, like the church. Between +the church, the grotto, and the Greek church and the corridors of the Armenian Convent, we whiled away the time until two o’clock in +the morning, when we descended the stairs to take seats on a stone bench in front of the Grotto of the Manger and not more than ten +feet from the sacred silver star. + +Here we sat nearly an hour, watching occasional pilgrims, descending the stairway and kissing the shrine, and the preparations for +the grand procession. There are two stairways, one belonging to the Latins, and the other to the Greeks and Armenians. The latter +staircase was most of the time crowded by Greek and Armenian monks, but they were not allowed to descend into the grotto, except on +one occasion, when a Greek priest, clad in rich robes, carried a censer in front of the shrine and repeated {408}a prayer. I fancy +that he did it less out of reverential feeling than to show the Latins that he had a right to perform service there. + +A long service was read in the Grotto of the Manger, called also the Grotto of Adoration, and finally the floor was cleared, and a +heavy carpet was spread in front of the shrine. When the carpet was brought, the grotto was filled with people, who were pushed +back with considerable rudeness, all except the strangers--a dozen or more, including ourselves. These were all treated with great +respect, and allowed the best places for witnessing the ceremonies. + +All this time the soldiers stood there with fixed bayonets, and once in the progress of the service the guard was changed, with a +good deal of the clang of arms, that had a strange sound at such a time and place. + +Finally, when it was near three o’clock, we heard the sound of a chant proceeding from the church, and coming nearer and nearer. +Soon the sound reached the head of the Latin stairway, and craning our heads around, we saw the front of the procession. Now it +descended, and slowly and slowly it came into view. + +Eight boys carrying candles, and robed in the white vestments, familiar to those who attend the Catholic service, led the way, and +behind them were priests and monks, to the number of twenty or more, all richly dressed in the appropriate robes. + +I regret to be unable to give the ecclesiastical rank of all the personages in the procession, and can only say that they included +all the dignitaries of the Latin church in this part of Syria, and I was told that two persons, high in office, had been sent from +Rome, to be present on this occasion. + +Behind these holy men were the Consuls of France, Italy, Austria, and other Catholic countries, and some French and Italian military +and naval officers, who happened to be in Jerusalem in time for the ceremonies. The forward part of the procession entirely filled +the grotto, so that the Consuls stood on the stairway near the bottom while the service was going on. + +The service was short, and was read slowly and distinctly, with many genuflections and obeisances of adoration. The service lasted +less than fifteen minutes, and ended with the presentation + +{409} + +[Illustration: 0422] + +{411}of a doll in a cradle. Then the procession slowly retired, as it had entered, and the solemn chant died away in the distance. +We returned to our tents, and as I took out my watch to wind it, I found that the time was half-past three in the morning. Rather a +late bed-time in a country where early hours are the fashion. + +We did not hurry in the morning, but paid another visit to the church, where we found the grotto full of people, as on the day +before. About ten o’clock we started for our day’s ride to Mar Saba, where our tents had been sent forward. We halted on the way at +the Grotto of the Shepherds, the place where the shepherds were told of the coming of Christ. + +The route from this point lay over a rough country, and in some places we could look far down into glens several hundred feet deep. +Some parts of the way the path was along the edge of these steep hillsides, and was not very wide. I didn’t like it over much, as my +horse had an inexplicable desire to walk as near the edge as possible. I argued with a whip, to cure him of this habit, but he would +not be cured, and I had to trust to luck. Happily, no accident befell any of us. + +We reached Mar Saba a couple of hours before sunset, and found the tents near the convent. St. Saba is reported to have come here +in the fourth century and entered the cave of a lion, who kindly got up and left when the holy man entered. To remove all doubt upon +this point, they show you the cave. The convent is built in a peculiarly wild and rocky locality, overlooking the precipitous valley +of the Brook Kedron. + +From one part of the wall you can drop a penny or a pebble in a sheer fall of five hundred feet. The building is an extraordinary +one, as it is stuck against and over a cliff, full of natural and artificial caves in such a way that it is impossible to tell what +is masonry and what is natural rock. + +To visit the convent, one needs a permit from the Superior at Jerusalem. We had the proper document, and it was delivered; the monks +carefully surveyed us from a wall far above our heads, and then gave orders for the opening of a massive and strongly-bolted door. + +No woman is allowed, under any circumstances, to cross the threshold of Mar Saba. Harriet Martineau says the monks are {412}too holy +to be hospitable, and another has added that they are too pious to be good. We were not admitted until the one lady of our party had +walked a sufficient distance away to prevent the possibility of her darting in when the door was opened. + +There are sixty monks in all at Mar Saba. The convent is reported to be rich, but the monks are not a corpulent lot, and have a +general indication of living in a bad boarding-house. They never eat flesh, and their exercises are very severe. One of them showed +us about, and a dozen or more of the rest spread out on the pavement of the court, a quantity of canes, beads, crosses, shells, and +olive-wood ornaments, in the hope of selling some of them. + +We gave our guide a couple of francs for showing us around. He was particular to ask if it was for himself or the convent. Of +course we told him it was personal, and he thereupon asked us again, in a voice sufficiently loud to make his companions hear and +understand the situation. + +There is a very old palm-tree, said to have been planted by the saint in person; they showed us the tomb of St. Saba, two or +three chapels, and a quantity of bones, belonging to the monks that lived there in the seventh century, and were massacred by the +Persians, There is a curious picture of the massacre, and it hangs over the skulls and arm-bones of the unhappy victims. The convent +was captured two or three times during the crusades, but for several centuries it has rested in peace. It is in the midst of the +country of the Bedouins, but the monks never permit the Bedouins inside the door, and the walls are strong enough to resist any +attacks they might make. + + +{413} + +[Illustration: 0426] + + + + +CHAPTER XXXII--AMONG THE BEDOUINS.--TRAVELLING UNDER ESCORT, AND LIVING IN TENTS. + + +_Sleeping under Tents--A Bedouin Encampment--A howl for “Backsheesh”--A Queer crowd--An illusion dispelled--An eccentric +“rooster”--Our guard--A little bit of humbug--“Going for” the “Doubter”--A case of blackmail--On guard against Robbers--A protection +from the Sheik--Thievery as a profession--Waters without life--A curious bath--A Flood of Gold--The “Doubter” in a rain storm--A +dangerous Ford--A Nocturnal Mishap--An atrocious robbery--The “Doubter” once more in trouble--A Turkish escort--Falling among +thieves--The Judge’s opinion on shrinkage--The “Doubter” in the role of a mummy._ + + +WE slept in our tents pretty soundly, and when the dragoman roused us at six o’clock, we were not in a mood for getting up. We +rose however, and took our breakfast without delay, and were off in good season. We went a short distance up the valley of the brook +Kedron, and then crossed it, to turn away to the eastward. + +Just as we left the valley, we passed a Bedouin encampment. It consisted of half a dozen black tents, the reverse of attractive, in +appearance, and not more than four feet high. A couple of camels stood near the tents, a dozen or more dogs, of a wolfish look, came +out and barked at us, and as many dirty and half naked children, saluted us with the cry “_Hadji, backsheesh,” “Hadji, backsheesh,_” + “Pilgrims, present,” “Pilgrims, present.” All travellers in this country are considered pilgrims, and hence the appellation they +gave us. + +A single view of this encampment was enough to dispel any romantic notions we might have formed of the delights of a Be{414}douin +life. There may be something very poetical in living with these dirty Arabs, but I beg to be excused. I had rather sleep in a +comfortable bed, in a comfortable house, than in all the Bedouin tents in Syria. There is a great difference between romance and +reality. You remember Moore’s lines: + + “Will you come to the bower + + I have shaded for you? + + Your bed shall be roses + + Bespangled with dew.” + +Very nice aren’t they? Well, a fellow once took the starch out of them by adding a line of reply: + +“Twould give me the rheumatiz and so it would you,” + +which is about the size of it. + +[Illustration: 9427] + +All parties making this journey require an escort. We had one, and it consisted of one man. He was a picturesque looking rooster, +with a burnous or cloak, that may have been new once, though I doubt it, and he kept a handkerchief tied around his forehead. H e +would have been of great service in a fight; his gun was of an antiquated pattern, and when he tested it in camp, he snapped it half +a dozen times before it would go off. He was an inveterate beggar of tobacco for cigarettes, and kept two of us reasonably busy to +supply him. + +He took a great fancy to my tobacco pouch, and tried to intimate that I should give it to him, but I assumed an air of stupidity, +and couldn’t understand him. Twenty times in the course {415}of the day he renewed the topic, but always with the same result, and +in spite of all his signs, I would not comprehend. Probably he set me down as the stupidest idiot he had ever met, and my dullness +may have served to enliven his subsequent stories to his friends. He got after the “Doubter,” but that worthy refused to talk with +him as soon as he discovered that he couldn’t talk, and that the Bedouin wanted to beg something. + +The region between Jerusalem and the Jordan and Dead Sea abounds in these rascals. They are shepherds and robbers, according to +circumstances. We found them tending their flocks or loafing around their villages, and frequently they conversed with our escort. +Had we been unaccompanied, one of the villages that we passed would have signaled to another, and we should have been plundered. We +took the precaution to leave all our money, letters of credit, and everything of that sort, except our watches, with the keeper of +our hotel in Jerusalem, so that we would not have been a very valuable prize, but at the same time it would have been inconvenient +to be robbed. + +The Sheik of the tribe lives in Jerusalem, and it is to him that travellers look for protection. + +A party is going to the Dead Sea and Jordan, and is to start to-morrow by way of Bethlehem and Mar Saba. The dragoman notifies the +Governor of Jerusalem, and the Governor notifies the Sheik, who sends an escort of one, two, or four, or it may be a dozen men. And, +furthermore, the Sheik comes to the dragoman and receives from him five francs for each traveller, as a sort of insurance tax. + +The Sheik is thus made responsible for any loss, and if we had been robbed while in the hands of the escort, the Governor would have +made the Sheik shell out, to the extent of our loss. Not long before our visit, a traveller under escort was robbed of two thousand +francs; his loss was promptly made good to him on his return to Jerusalem. All travellers in the Bedouin country require an escort +from the tribe of each region they pass through, and to go without such escort would be madness. + +Suddenly, while we were winding among the rough hills, we came out of a little gorge, and gazed upon a mass of rough, billowy hills, +spread and scattered below us, and looking bare and {416}white in the slanting rays of a December sun. To the left lay a plain, +somewhat broken, and with a line of trees winding through it; this was the valley of the Jordan, and the trees marked the course +of the stream. To the right, shimmering and glistening in the sunlight, and broken at its edge into a fringe of foam, raised by the +strong south wind, that was then blowing, lay the Dead Sea--that weird waste of water that buries the cities of the plain. Down, +down, down, winding among the rocks and over little stretches of plain we made our way; the hills that had been below rose around, +and we rapidly approached the level of the j plain, thirteen hundred feet below the waters of the Mediterranean. The distance was +deceptive, and we were a long time in reaching the Dead Sea. + +I had expected to find a scene of desolation, as some writers, have said that no fish live in the waters of the Dead Sea, and no, +plant grows near it. It is true that there is no living thing in the Dead Sea; the fish brought into it by the Jordan are instantly +killed by the salt water, but the reeds and bushes grow as near this sea as they are ordinarily found near the ocean or any of its +arms. I found some within a hundred feet of it, and they seemed to be doing well. The vegetation is quite luxuriant in many places, +notwithstanding the apparent lightness of the soil. + +We took a hasty bath in the Dead Sea, just long enough to test its buoyant qualities. The human body cannot sink in the dense water; +you float very much as a cork floats in ordinary water, and speedily lose all sense of danger from drowning. The water contains +twenty-six per cent, of salt, and is clear as the purest spring water. There is a wonderful bitterness in it, and a few drops in +the mouth makes you feel as if you were trying to gulp down a drug store. + +After you have been a short time in the Dead Sea, you have a prickly sensation all over the body, and if you get some of the water +in your eyes, you feel anything but cheerful. + +When we came out, the water stuck to us with a feeling like molasses, and until we reached the Jordan and luxuriated in its fresh +water, we felt as sticky as so many postage stamps. + +An hour’s gallop across the Jordan plain took us from the Dead Sea to the Jordan, which we reached at the bathing place + +{417} + +[Illustration: 0430] + +{419}of the pilgrims. The water was of a dirty yellow, and the river was not more than eighty or a hundred feet wide; the current +is quite strong, and at the bathing place the bed is covered with rough stones, that made walking unpleasant to our bare and tender +feet. + +Willow, tamarisk, and balsam trees fringe the banks, and in a little grove of these our lunch was prepared, while those of us who +wanted to wash off the salt of the Dead Sea went to take a bath in the Jordan. I got rid of the sticky sensation, and emerged from +the Jordan without much delay. The water was altogether too cold for comfort. + +In my younger days I thought the Jordan was something like the Mississippi, my impression being derived from the old hymn which +says: + + “On Jordan’s stormy banks I stand, + + And cast a wistful eye.” + +Elsewhere the same hymn records that: + + “Sweet fields beyond the swelling flood + + Stand dressed in living green.” + +The stormy banks and swelling floods led me to imagine that the Jordan was a mile or two in width, and with waves like those of the +ocean. What a difference between the imagination and the reality! + +The Jordan is one of the most tortuous rivers in the world; a map of it looks like a line of Virginia fence, only more so, and I +have heard somebody say that the Jordan river is so crooked that you can’t tell half the time which side you are on. + +An hour and a half took us to Riha, better known as the site of Gilgal, and by some said to be the place where Jericho once stood. +It is now a miserable village, one of the most forlorn in Palestine; and the principal objects that we saw were dirty children and +dirtier adults, who all begged without distinction of age or sex, for “backsheesh.” + +I attempted to take a sketch of a group of them, but they were evidently ashamed of themselves, and ran away. + +We dined well and retired early; it rained nearly all night, and not only rained, but blew, and during the night I was wakened by +the cold, wet canvas of the tent coming slap in my {420}face. I dreamed something about trying to swim up Niagara in winter, and +then I woke. + +We called the dragoman and servants, and set things to rights as well as we could,--but the ground was so soft, that the tent pegs +wouldn’t hold well. We were a forlorn lot in the morning, and started off after breakfast, very much as if we were going to our own +funerals. + +The stream was so swollen that we couldn’t ford it with safety, and so we went up a mile or two and crossed by an ancient aqueduct, +half full of water. + +[Illustration: 9433] + +The horses were driven through the stream, while we walked or were carried on men’s backs along the aqueduct, which was a foot wide, +with sides eighteen inches high, while the elevation was about fifty feet above the torrent. + +I removed my boots and waded over, as I thought it rather ticklish to be carried. The “Doubter” was half way? over, when his bearer, +who knew his burden’s views on the “backsheesh” question, I doubted his ability to carry him further. The “Doubter,” much to his +disgust, was put down where the water of the aqueduct was deepest, and had to pass the rest of the day with wet feet. + +We climbed the hills along the way to Jerusalem, and at several points saw the remains of the old Roman road. The route has the same +condition of safety that it had when a certain man went down from Jerusalem to Jericho, and fell among thieves. Robberies are not +unfrequent, and the treatment of the victim is the same as it was eighteen hundred years ago. A couple of years ago, an English +gentleman, on his way to the Jordan, fell into the hands of the Arabs, close to the ruined Khan, which is {421}said to be the site +of the inn to which the good Samaritan carried the traveller whom he found by the wayside. The treatment of this Englishman is +exactly described in these words: “They stripped him of his raiment and wounded him and departed, leaving him half dead.” + +While in the valley of the Jordan, we saw no other traveller than ourselves. Had we happened there at Easter time, we might have +witnessed an interesting spectacle. + +On Monday of Passion Week occurs the ceremony of the bathing of the Pilgrims. The devotees gather in Jerusalem to the number of +several thousand, some of them having come hundreds of leagues in order to be present on this occasion. In a disorderly array, they +march out of the Holy City and down the road from Jerusalem to Jericho. The Turkish governor of Jerusalem sends an escort, under +command of an officer, to protect the pilgrims from robbers, and also to preserve a sort of discipline among them, and prevent +overcrowding and loss of life, at the banks of the Jordan. A camp, or rather a bivouac, is formed on the Plain of Gilgal, and long +before daybreak on the following morning, the whole party is roused. + +The scene at this moment is said to be wildly picturesque, and strikingly similar to that which some authorities describe as +presented at the “baptism of John.” + +Tom-toms are beaten, with no attempt at harmony, and thousands of torches flash out and lighten up the wide space covered by the +bivouac. In a few moments the noise is hushed, and the torches are extinguished; then the host moves in silence towards the river, +to the spot where tradition has located the baptism of’ our Saviour. + +The departure from the bivouac is timed, so that the party shall reach the bathing place about dawn. The eastern horizon displays +a belt of light that reveals the sharp outlines of the mountain of the Land of Moab, and the ruddy tinge increases as the Pilgrims +descend into the fringe of foliage that masks the banks of the river. At the broad opening that marks the bathing place, they +congregate and prepare to wash in Jordan. + +The whole river is speedily filled with people of both sexes and all ages; the bath is not conducted according to Occidental +{422}notions of etiquette. Prayers and blessings are uttered, and all are too intent upon the observance of their religious duty to +pay any heed to ideas of propriety. + +The ceremony ended, the multitude returns to Jerusalem, and reaches the city about sunset. Many stragglers fall out by the way, and +sometimes the Turkish escort is busy for two or three days, bringing in the last of them. The road, is dreary, and there is very +little upon it to keep up the traveller’s interest. We found it especially so, as a drizzling rain came on when we were about half +way. + +We passed Bethany and wound around the Mount of Olives, then past Gethsemane, and entered Jerusalem by the Bab-el-Asbat, or Gate of +the Tribes. We were thoroughly benumbed and wet, and ill-natured; and when our horses stopped at the door of the hotel, every one +of us were so nearly frozen that we had to be assisted to dismount. We walked as so many mummies might walk, and with difficulty +dragged ourselves to our rooms. We were cold and wet through, and not one of us had a change of clothes, all our heavy baggage being +at Jaffa. + +What should we do? + +I proposed going to bed, although it was two P. M., and sending my clothes to the kitchen to dry, and I was not long in undressing. + +Everybody else did the same; all except the Judge, who was afraid his clothes would shrink so much that he couldn’t get them on +again. He didn’t relish the idea of going naked about Jerusalem in that weather and riding bareback in the saddle to Jaffa, so he +sat on the stove in the parlor for the rest of the day. + +Late in the afternoon we received our clothes from the kitchen, and were able to appear presentable at dinner time. But we all had a +wrung out appearance, and were not over amiable. + +The “Doubter” borrowed a pair of trowsers from one of the waiters. They were very tight and very short, and made the old fellow +resemble an animated mummy or the materialized spirit of a blacksmith’s tongs. He had taken cold, and his teeth rattled so much that +it was proposed to set him to music, and then sell him as a pair of castanets. + +{423} + +[Illustration: 0436] + +{425} + +[Illustration: 0438] + + + + +CHAPTER XXXIII--THE HOLY SEPULCHRE, AND SHRINE OF THE CITY OF DAVID + + +_A Snow-Storm in Jerusalem--The “Doubter’s” Opinion of Gum-Shoes--Kicked by a Vicious Horse--An Obliging Moslem--A Guard of +Turks--Bloodthirsty Christians--An Extraordinary Shrine--The Angel’s Seat--The Quarrels of the Greek and Latin Monks--A Spot of +Marvels--The Soil Pressed by the Feet of Christ--Strange Traditions--The Discovery of the True Cross--The Spot where Peter Denied +his Lord--The Scene of the Last Supper--What a Wealthy Jew Did--The Man who was his own Father--The “Good Thief”--Extracting +Sixpence from the “Doubter”--A Pertinacious Guide--Trying to Elude Pursuit--. A Claim for Damages--Loading Up with Oranges--Talking +in Four Languages._ + + +AS we lay in bed all that afternoon at Jerusalem, the snow continued falling and the wind blew, so that the place was anything but +cheerful. By sundown there were four inches of snow, the most--so the hotel-keeper said--that had been seen there in fifteen +years. During the night it changed to rain, and in the morning the streets were as “sloshy” as could well be imagined. The pool of +Hezekiah, just back of the hotel, contained a strange mixture of snow, ice, and water, and did not accord with the description of it +as made by summer visitors. + +When I looked out in the morning, the mingled snow, mud, and water that filled the streets brought me back to my own dear New York, +and I fancied that I was once more on Manhattan Island in a January thaw. + +The snow had ceased, but it was raining at intervals, and very hard when it did rain. We sent out and bought some gum overshoes, +all except the “Doubter.” who didn’t believe gum-shoes were good for anything, especially when they cost so much as in Jerusalem. +Furthermore, the “Doubter” had incautiously ven{426}tured too near the hoofs of an ill-mannered horse, and had been kicked by the +latter to such an extent that he thought best to stay in his room. + +We started out to visit the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, and again found it closed. The different sects of Christians fight so much +about the church that the key has to be kept by Moslems, as none of the Christians will allow the rest to hold it! + +[Illustration: 0439] + +We held two or three consultations with as many sects of monks, and at last found that an order from the Armenian Patriarch could, +at that hour, procure the key from its Moslem holder, who, on the promise of “backsheesh,” would consent to obey the request to open +the church for us. At another hour, another patriarch would need to be consulted. + +Two of us started with our dragoman, and with some rebuffs we at length found the Armenian Patriarch, or rather his secretary. + +He sent a messenger with us to the Moslem key-holder, and the latter worthy, on promise of three francs, consented. + +As at Bethlehem, a Turkish guard is constantly maintained in the church where Christ is buried, to prevent His disciples shedding +each other’s blood! What a spectacle is presented for the contemplation of the followers of Mohammed! No wonder they look upon +Christians with contempt. {427}abandon his pipe and accompany us. Thus we succeeded in getting the church open, but there were half +a dozen fellows in the way, each of whom wanted “backsheesh.” All this delay and annoyance comes from the quarrels of the Christians +and their jealousy of one another. + +[Illustration: 0440] + +{428}The ponderous key was turned, and we entered the church. The door was closed behind us, to prevent the entrance of any person +not belonging to our party. Immediately in front of the door is a marble slab, set in the pavement and inclosed by a low railing; +this is called the Stone of Unction, on which Christ’s body was laid to be anointed. It is over the real stone, and completely +covers it, as the guide explains, to prevent the latter being broken and worn by the numerous pilgrims that visit it. + +Further off is the spot where the Virgin Mary stood while the body of Christ lay on the Stone of Unction, and further on to the +right is the rotunda, which contains, in its centre, the shrine after which the church is named--The Holy Sepulchre. + +The sepulchre is covered by a small building twenty-six feet by eighteen, of a style of architecture impossible to describe in +writing. There is an entrance by a low door in the east end, and this brings you into the so-called Chapel of the Angel, for the +reason that here sat the angel that rolled away the stone from the mouth of the sepulchre. A fragment of the stone is shown; the +Latin monks say, however, that the real stone was stolen by the Armenians, and is shown by them in the Armenian Chapel on Mount +Zion. + +From this chapel we enter the sepulchre, a small vault about seven feet square, and having on one side the sepulchral couch, about +two feet high, and covered with marble; in fact, everything is of marble to such an extent that no part of the original rock can +be seen, and it is hard to accept the assurances that the whole tomb is carved out of the solid rock. The couch of the sepulchre is +used as an altar, and is carefully portioned off among the contending sects. I presume that any one of them would prefer to see +the church and its contents utterly destroyed rather than any one of the others should obtain possession of it. Quarrels are not +infrequent in the church over the right of possession or service, and on one occasion there was a scuffle, with a good deal +of hair-pulling and rending of garments, in the sepulchre itself, between a Greek and a Latin monk. The Greek was the physical +superior, and came off victorious. + +To enumerate, in the shape of an itinerary, all the places we visited in the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, would be to make + +{429} + +[Illustration: 0442] + +{431}a tedious narrative. It is rather curious that so many places have been found in the small space covered by the church and its +annexes, and it is not at all wonderful that many Christians should be skeptical on the subject. There has been, and still is, a +violent discussion as to the genuineness of relics and localities, and ponderous volumes have been written on both sides. + +Tradition and history assert that the Romans built a temple to Venus, on the hill where Christ died, and that a marble statue of the +goddess was set up on the site of the cross, and a statue of Jupiter over the place of the Resurrection. In the fourth century the +Emperor Constantine caused a removal of this temple, and the erection of a church over the spot. The Empress Helena, Constantine’s +mother, came to Palestine to search for the Cross and the Holy Sepulchre, and in her presence the discovery was made. + +We were shown the chair where she sat during the removal of the earth that covered the True Cross and the crosses of the two +thieves. According to the tradition, the three crosses were found side by side, and it was impossible to tell which was the true +one. A woman, sick of an incurable disease, was brought and laid upon two of them, without any effect; when she was placed on the +third, she rose and walked away in perfect health. Of course there could be no doubt after this, and the cross was declared genuine. +It must have been of goodly size, as there is enough of it extant in churches and private collections to build a steamboat. + +Whatever opinion there may be as to the genuine character of the relics and places exhibited, there is great interest attached to +the spot, and the time spent in the church passes very rapidly. We were two hours in the church, where we thought we had been less +than thirty minutes; we had lingered over each place whose name had been made familiar to us in the Scriptures, and would have +remained longer had not the time pressed us. Finally we left the church as we had entered, and after paying our guides the necessary +“backsheesh,” sent them away. The peddlers and beggars around the church redoubled their efforts and appeals, and kept a cordon +around us till we reached the street. + +From the Holy Sepulchre we went to the Palace of Caiphas, on Mount Zion, which is in the hands of the Armenians. Ser{432}vice was +just ending in the church, and it had a strange appearance, in consequence of the Oriental costumes of the worshippers and the +Oriental manners in which the service was performed. We were shown the stone that covered the mouth of the sepulchre, the spot where +Peter stood when he denied ever having known Christ, and the rock on which the cock stood and crowed at the time of Peter’s denial. + +They also showed the prison where Christ was confined, so that we had two of these from which to select, the other being in the +Church of the Sepulchre. + +Further along on Mount Zion we went to the Conaculum, or scene of the Last Supper. The building is in the hands of the Moslems, +and one of them, a dirty looking Arab, showed us up a flight of stairs and into the “supper room,” where the supper is said to have +taken place. At present the room is bare and dirty, and occupied by Moslems, who lounged around and begged for “backsheesh.” There +is nothing peculiar about its architecture and nothing intrinsically to give it the slightest interest. + +Under this building, Moslem, Christian, and Jewish traditions unite in locating the tomb of David, and also that of Solomon and +other kings. The Moslems have a mosque there, and will permit no one to enter it far enough to reach the tomb. Once in a great while +a special favor will be shown to a Jew by a Mohammedan friend, and he can get a slight glimpse of the interior; but although the +spot is particularly venerated by the Jews, the government will not open it to them. Several attempts have been made to buy the +place, but unsuccessfully. + +The Latin monks once had possession of the buildings, but they lost it through bad management. A wealthy Jew of Constantinople +was in Jerusalem, and asked to be permitted to visit David’s tomb and say his prayers there. They refused this very natural and +reasonable request, and the Jew went off. As soon as he reached Constantinople, he sought an interview with the Grand Vizier, +and induced him to expel the Latin monks from the building that covered the spot. In a year or two he went back, armed with the +necessary firman, that enabled him to say his prayers at the tomb of David, and thus relieve his conscience of any burden that may +have been resting upon it in consequence bring us to the Fountain of the Virgin. Siloah’s Pool is a basin or reservoir, about fifty +feet by twenty, and not far from six yards deep. There is an underground passage between this pool and the Fountain of the Virgin, +which has been explored by Dr. Robinson and others, and found to be very tortuous, and {433}of any dubious transaction in old +clothes, or in exorbitant interest for money he might have loaned. + +[Illustration: 0446] + +Passing out from the Caenaculum and descending to the Vale of Hinnom, we can visit the famous Pool of Siloah or Siloam; and a walk +of ten minutes or more further along the valley, will {434}so small, that one is obliged to crawl on hands and knees in order to +pass through it. + +The Fountain of the Virgin is the more picturesque of the two. It is at the bottom of an artificial cave, and the stairway that +leads down to the water has given it the name by which it is known to the Arabs, “The Fountain of the Mother of Stairs,” and +old tradition says that women accused of adultery were required to drink of the water from this fountain. If guilty, they died +immediately; but if innocent, they were unhurt. + +A remarkable feature of this fountain is the irregular flow of the water, which has been verified by many persons. Sometimes the +water in the basin will rise twelve or fifteen inches in a few minutes, then become stationary, and in five or ten minutes more, it +subsides to its ordinary depth. In some seasons this phenomenon occurs twice or thrice daily, while at other times the intermittent +periods will be several days apart. This is doubtless what was meant in the New Testament, where it is said “an angel came down +at certain seasons and troubled the water.” The local belief is, that there is a dragon in the fountain; the water flows when he +sleeps, but stops when he is awake. + +From the Coenaculum we took a long walk to the tombs of the Kings--sepulchres hewn in the rock, and evidently of great antiquity. +They have accommodations for about twenty persons, but are rather damp and uncomfortable. + +The hills all around Jerusalem are full of these tombs, cut in the solid rock. Most of them have a legendary history that assigns +them to some Biblical character, but the authenticity of these histories is extremely doubtful. + +We managed to extract some amusement out of our guide, at Jerusalem, (a local professional, engaged by our dragoman,) but not so +much as with the fellow who served us at Athens. He was so good natured, and showed so much readiness to do anything we wanted, +that we hadn’t the heart to annoy him If he had been less amiable he would have been much more to our liking. His use of the English +language was our best hold, and his conversation rattled on with an utter disregard of the relative positions of nouns and verbs. +{435}We asked how long he had been guide there, and he responded, “I guide have been thirty-four years. Before I was guide I was my +father.” + +Here was a case for Darwin. What the fellow wanted to say was, that his father was guide before him, and thinking we did not fully +understand him, he went on: + +“Before I was born, I was guide ten years. Before my father little boy was, I was guide. Before I was old man, I die my father. My +father I die before he was twelve years. I was forty years before my father was born.” + +The mystery increased, and the more he explained the more he got things mixed. + +In the church of the Holy Sepulchre, when pointing out the historic spots, he did it somewhat in this wise: + +“Here is where was Jew man crucify Christ. He was two thief with him crucify; one was bad thief and one good thief was. Here cross +was for good thief.” + +When we went to the mosque of Omar he offered to supply us with slippers for a sixpence each, and those of us who had left our own +slippers at Jaffa consented at once to the arrangement. The “Doubter” was of the lot, but when it came to paying, he had no change +and wanted to cheat the man out of his due. He had a Turkish coin worth about a penny, and told the guide he must take that or +nothing. + +While the “Doubter’s” attention was taken up with something, we told the guide to freeze to him and compel him to pay. We promised +to support him in his efforts, and with this assurance he went ahead. + +He came up from behind and silently placed himself at the “Doubter’s” side, and as he did so, extended his open hand before our +companion’s face. He suited his word to his action, and his action to his word, by saying in a mild tone: + +“‘Doubter’--sixpence.” + +There was no response. Half a minute later the request was repeated: + +“‘Doubter’--sixpence; for slippers, sixpence.” + +The Turkish penny was again offered, and again refused, with: + +I stopped him and developed a new plan. The guide remained on the sidewalk, in front of the hotel, and in a quarter of an hour the +“Doubter” opened his door, peered out cautiously to see that the coast was clear, and then took his way to the parlor. He seated +himself before the fire, and I gave the signal, and just as he remarked, “I’m glad that awful man has gone,” the guide slipped in +like the ghost of Banquo at Macbeth’s feast. Again he extended his hand, and again he said: + +“‘Doubter’--sixpence.” {436} “‘Doubter’--sixpence.” + +And so it went on for two hours, and I think the old miser was appealed to on the average, about once a minute. Whenever the guide +lagged we urged him forward, and as he had right on his side and sixpence in his eye, he worked with a will. + +[Illustration: 0449] + +In vain did the “Doubter” order him away and appeal to the rest of us, to tell the guide to leave We made no interference, except +to offer to lend the “Doubter” the sixpence, which he declined. The “Doubter” slammed the door in the guide’s face, who then gave up +the pursuit. {437}The old fellow surrendered. He borrowed a sixpence and paid the guide, and the rest of us gave the man a couple of +francs for his persistence. + +There was nothing now for us to do but to leave Jerusalem, and the next morning by ten o’clock we were set down at the door of the +hotel at Jaffa, whence we had started nine days before. We paid oft our dragoman, and at his request wrote a certificate, setting +forth that he had served us to our entire satisfaction, and that we were as contented with him as it would be possible to be with +any dragoman. He suited us all, except the “Doubter,” who wouldn’t have been satisfied even if he had had the Sultan of Turkey for a +dragoman. He tried to get a reduction on account of the kicking he received from one of the horses, and was much chagrined when the +dragoman, at our suggestion, pretended to misunderstand him, and said he did not make any extra charge for things of that kind. + +While we were busy talking about something or other, the sharp eyes of Madame discovered the steamer, and we gave an Indian yell of +delight. Our baggage was ready, and soon we had it on the shoulders of porters and were off for the landing. + +The usual “backsheesh” took us through the Custom House, and the muscular arms of Arab boatmen swung us out of the little harbor +of Jaffa and over the swelling waves of the Mediterranean. The ship was a full mile from shore, and it was a long pull and a +strong pull to get us there. On board we found we were the only cabin passengers, and could have all the after part of the ship to +ourselves. + +I have before stated that Jaffa is celebrated for its oranges, which are largely exported. As soon as the steamer anchored she was +surrounded by boats loaded with boxes and baskets, the boxes being made with open sides and tops, so as to allow a free circulation +of air. The boxes and baskets were hoisted in over the ship’s side amid much confusion and a vast amount of talk. Italian, Russian, +Arabic, and Turkish filled the air; everybody talked at once, and you could hardly distinguish one sound from another. The liveliest +scene was when a boat was emptied and dropped away, and another came in to take its place. + +There would be half a dozen boats struggling for position, and they would push and crowd at a frightful rate. The men of one +{433}boat would deliberately push another boat back and crowd their own in, and of course this would rouse the ire of the ousted +ones. The volleys of words would set up an Arabic dictionary. I don’t know whether there was any profanity in what they said, but I +fancy so. Now and then in the struggle some one would tumble into the water, but he was soon up again, and didn’t seem to mind the +wetting. + +[Illustration: 0451] + +Deck passengers on a Levantine steamer generally appropriate a part of the deck that suits them, and stay there during the voyage. +They spread their carpets and blankets where they find room and squat by day and sleep by night on the spot selected. Directly in +front of the after cabin, a lot of deck passengers were thus installed, and when the crate-like boxes and the canvas covered baskets +were piled near and around them, they began to help {439}themselves to oranges. Two fellows that were camped together would work in +partnership. One would get near a basket, and would work cautiously until he had a hole large enough, then quietly withdrawing an +orange, would pass it to his pal, who would conceal it behind his baggy breeches and flowing robes. The operation would go on until +a peck or so had been taken, when another freshly arrived basket would be sought. + +Nine o’clock came, and we were still at the same work, and the decks were covered. Finally the captain said that no more could be +taken, and half a dozen boats were sent back to land as fully loaded as they came. Steam began to blow from the pipes, in a few +moments the screw was started, the anchor rose from its bed, and we were under way. + +Under a clear night sky of the Mediterranean, I sat on deck watching the bright stars above, the glittering waves below, and the +phosphorescent gleaming track of the ship, as she plowed through the waters. The twinkling lamps of Jaffa faded into indistinctness +and then went out, and, last of all, the staring light-house sank below the horizon and was hid from sight. + +We lost sight of Palestine. Our winter journey in the Holy Land was a thing of the past, to be a pleasant recollection for the +future. + +[Illustration: 5452] + + +{440} + +[Illustration: 0453] + + + + +CHAPTER XXXIV--THE LAND OF PHARAOH.--THROUGH THE EGYPTIAN DESERT. + + +_In Sight of Egypt--A light-house looming through the fog--On the soil of the Pharaohs--An invasion of boatmen--Scenes in the +streets of Port Said--Encore de “Backsheesh”--The great Suez canal--Negotiations with a cobbler--A ludicrous situation--A bootless +customer--Egyptian jugglers--Going through the Market--A disagreeable spectacle--A pocket steamer--Drinking to absent +friends--On the “.raging canawl”--Sleeping on deck--A sunrise in the desert--On the summit of the Isthmus--An onslaught by +Arab-baggage-smashers._ + + +THERE it is! There is the light-house!” + +Half a dozen of us looked in the direction indicated, and saw a tall column that rose apparently out of the sea, as the fog and +distance did not reveal the low coast of Egypt, nor the long jetty that has been thrown out to form a harbor. + +The steamer moved steadily onward, and in a little while there was a fringe of houses, and then a fringe of masts, then a long line, +lighter than the sea in its color, swept away on either hand to mark the coast. In its center appeared the jetties, that form the +outer harbor of Port Said. A small steamer came out to meet us, and from her a pilot came on board, to direct us between the jetties +and into the inner harbor. + +These jetties, or moles, are of artificial stone, two-thirds sand, and one-third hydraulic lime, mixed in a frame and allowed to +harden. Each block weighs twenty-two tons, and contains about three hundred and twenty-four cubic feet. The blocks are not piled +regularly to form a well built wall, but are dropped in, hig-gedly-piggedly, like a lot of bricks dumped from a cart. This {441}has +been found to be the best form of sea wall, as it breaks the force of the waves more completely than would a structure with a smooth +front. The sand has settled in and filled up the cavities below the water line; at first it silted through, but an occasional use of +the dredge kept the harbor in proper condition. + +The lighthouse is a magnificent structure of concrete, one hundred and sixty feet high, supporting a lantern twenty feet high, and +flashing every three seconds with such intensity, as to be visible twenty miles. Three other lighthouses of similar construction +have been placed in the interval--one hundred and twenty-five miles--between Port Said and Alexandria. + +The steamer entered the harbor, and before her anchor was down, her decks were invaded by the usual swarms of boatmen, on the +lookout for a job. We were almost within jumping distance of the shore, and had we possessed the strength and activity of fleas, +in proportion to our size, we should have made short work of going ashore. Not being thus gifted, we made the usual bargain for +transportation to the land, and from the shore, through the Custom House, to the hotel. + +The customary “backsheesh” of two francs saved us from an inspection of our baggage, and we were soon at the hotel. I cannot speak +very highly of this establishment; there are two hotels that keep up a warm rivalry, and are first-class in their prices, if in +nothing else. Whichever hotel you patronize on visiting Port Said, you will wish you had gone to the other. + +Port Said is modern; it was founded in 1859, and owes its existence to the construction of the Suez Canal. Previous to that time, +there was no town there, and not even a single house. Early in April, a small body of laborers landed there, and on the 25th of +that month, M. de Lesseps, the projector of the canal, in the presence of a dozen Europeans and six or eight times that number of +natives, removed the first spadeful of earth in the great enterprise, that was to open a water way from the Mediterranean to the Red +Sea. A few huts had been erected on the site of the present city, which was named Port Said in honor of the then Viceroy. + +The spot was not an attractive one, nothing but a strip of sand without vegetation, and without a drop of fresh water. As the +{442}works of the canal progressed, the town grew and presented a scene of great activity. It was said to be at one time the largest +workshop in the world. It has lost this character since the canal was completed, but is still a city of eight or ten thousand +inhabitants, regularly laid out in streets and squares, and boasting a pretty and luxuriant garden. + +There is considerable activity in the streets, and the numerous shops, stores, churches, hotels, mosques, and the like give it a +permanent and not unpleasing appearance. The business is all more or less connected with the canal, and will doubtless increase as +the business of the great water-way increases. + +It does not take long to make a tourist’s survey of a modern town in the land of antiquities, where nothing is considered old that +does not date further back than the Christian era. Where you count centuries by the score, you will not pay much attention to a +decade, and grow enthusiastic over works where the mortar has scarcely settled, and paint, if there be any, is still wet. + +Our first effort in Port Said was to ascertain when we could leave it, and we found that this could not be done before midnight. We +could go on a small steamer as far as Ismailia and thence by rail to Cairo, and if we wished to take a detour to Suez, there was no +law to prevent our going there. + +We sauntered around the city; some of our party had their hair cut, some ate pastry in a _café_, some resorted to a beer garden in +front of the hotel, and one, (myself,) took a seat by the side of a cobbler, whose stall was in the open air, while he mended one of +my boots. Half a dozen Arabs stood around to look at me, as I crossed the bootless leg over the booted one and endeavored to appear +pleased. + +The cobbler had about half finished the job, when he suddenly remembered that he must go to dinner. To this I objected until my +boot was done. I had no wish to sit there while he dined, and possibly took an after-dinner nap of an hour or so, and after a slight +wrangle I succeeded in convincing him that he had better finish the job before doing anything else. + +The Arab portion of Port Said is quite distinct from the Frank quarter, and is separated from it by a marsh, that can be +{443}crossed over a rickety bridge or circumambulated by following the sea shore. + +We took a stroll there in the latter part of the afternoon, and found crowds of natives surrounding a few jugglers and mountebanks, +whose tricks were by no means extraordinary. I had a lot of Turkish coppers, which I had brought from Syria, and found altogether +uncurrent here. To get rid of the coins I threw some to the jugglers and to a few beggars. None of them appeared to be pleased to +receive this money, and evidently they had been served the same trick by previous travellers. + +There was a part of the market where fish and vegetables were offered for sale, the venders having little stands about the size of +dressing-tables, and not particularly clean or attractive. There were two or three restaurants where fried fish was waiting to be +devoured, the restaurant,--cuisine and all,--occupying a space not more than eight feet square. Many of the natives were suffering +from ophthalmia, and on the eyes of some of the children there were masses of flies eating away the oozing matter and forming a +disgusting spectacle I should say that one in twenty of those I saw there were blind of an eye, and one in fifty was altogether +bereft of sight. + +We dined at the hotel and then slept until nearly eleven o’clock, as we knew there would be no sleeping accommodations on the boat. +It was New Year’s Eve, and some of the party proposed to celebrate the New Year, which would come in as we left Port Said, so we +took a couple of bottles of champagne and some glasses to the steamer. + +It was about half-past eleven, when we left the hotel, and followed our baggage on the backs of the Arab porters to the landing. + +The boat was an insignificant affair, carrying the mail and having room for very little else. The cabin was not far from seven feet +by twelve; there were seats for about sixteen persons, and there was a small table in the centre, which was speedily piled up with +baggage. Two or three native officials were there when we arrived, and they had done what we should have done had we been first. +They had taken the best places, and were comfortably settled into the corners. As the clock struck {444}twelve, the ships in the +harbor fired salutes and let off fireworks, and quite a quantity of rockets went up from the shore. We opened our champagne, and +each drained a glass to friends at home, and a wi-sh that the end of the year might be as propitious as its commencement. + +Our steamer blew her whistle and swung out from the wharf, and in a few minutes we had passed out of the basin and were in the +canal. + +Straight as a sun-beam the canal pushes away from the sea coast, and then through the low desert. For nearly thirty miles it has no +curve, but is as direct as it is possible for the engineer to lay it out. The banks were not very high in this part, as there was +not a large quantity of earth to be dredged out, and from the deck of a large steamer one can look over a wide extent of marshy lake +and swamp. + +As we were scarcely a foot above the water and in a small steam launch, we could not look over the bank, and were obliged to content +ourselves with the contemplation of the sloping sides of the canal. They were very monotonous, even with the poetic addition of a +full moon and clear sky. The night went on and so did we, but I fancy the night had much the best time of it. We could not lie down, +and there was hardly room for us to sit inside. I secured a camp stool and got outside, making the end of the cabin serve as a rest +for my back. Wrapped in my overcoat and plaid, I managed to keep warm, though with some difficulty, and after a time I felt sleepy, +but dared not risk going to sleep there, through fear that I should fall overboard. + +Then I sat down, or rather reclined on deck, and, making a pillow of an anchor, managed to get along comfortably. Every time I waked +and looked out we were steaming along through the canal with the same interminable stretch of sand on either side. By-and-by there +was a blush of light in the east, then there was daybreak and then there came sunrise. + +We grew better natured as we thawed out under the welcome rays of the sun, and felt the dryness vanishing from our lips, and a +gradual disappearance of that general feeling of mussiness that you have after sitting up all night. The sands became warm in the +glow of the morning, and everything that before had been sombre was now brilliant with flashing light. {445}I do not often see the +sun come up in these later years, never when I can avoid doing so; but whenever I am caught with a sunrise on my hands, I think it +is about the best thing out. A sunrise in the desert is rather an extra affair, and considerably “lays over” the ordinary one that +we can see at home by staying up till the next day. + +We touched the dock at Ismailia in little more than seven hours from Port Said, and were glad enough to get on shore. A crowd +of Arabs at the landing was as ravenous as a lot of young tigers; we tried to keep them back with words and gestures, but to no +purpose; they seized our baggage, and would not put it down till we laid about them with our canes. + +There were a hundred of them, all vociferating and snatching for baggage at the same instant; and I flatter myself that it was a +triumph of genius over muscle when we succeeded in putting that baggage in a pile and making the fellows stand back, and tender +proposals for its transport to the railway station We let the contract to the lowest bidder, who took the lot at four francs. The +instant the bargain was closed, he and half the crowd fell upon the pile as if they had been wild beasts, and it disappeared +like a-pint of whiskey among a dozen backwoodsmen. At the station, after we had paid the money agreed upon, they had an awful row +dividing it, and there seemed to be at one time a brilliant prospect of a homicide. + +The history of the Suez canal enterprise was given to the world with great minuteness of detail, at the time of its opening in 1869, +and I shall not attempt a description of it here. + +[Illustration: 5458] + + +{446} + +[Illustration: 0459] + + + + +CHAPTER XXXV--IN AND AROUND THE CITY OF THE CALIPHS. + + +_A Costly Breakfast--Ismailia--The Palace of the Khedive--On an Egyptian Railroad Train--Rolling Through the Desert--The Delta of +the Nile, What Is It?--The Garden of Egypt--Cairo--The Mighty Pyramids--Life at an Egyptian Hotel--Sights of the Capital--Cairo +of To-Day--Occidental Progress and Oriental Conservatism--Burglaries and Other Modern Improvements--Cosmopolitan Costumes--A Harem +Taking an Airing--A Daring Robbery--The Battle-Field of the Pyramids--Slaughter of the Mamelukes--Singular Escape of Emir Bey._ + + +WE breakfasted at the only hotel in Ismailia, paying a frightfully high price for the meal, and then we hastened to the railway +station to take the train to Cairo. We had no time to look about the town, but the little we saw was pleasing. The houses were +embowered in trees, and there were pretty gardens here and there, some of them very tastefully arranged. There was a broad avenue +from the landing place to the railway station, and there is a well-built quay, more than a mile long. + +The Khedive has a palace here that looks, from a distance, like a comfortable and cozy residence, and there has lately sprung up +a sea-bathing establishment on the shores of the lake. Port Said and Ismailia are the urban results of the canal; the former is +practical and the latter is both practical and beautiful. + +We waited at the station nearly an hour, the train being somewhat late in coming from Suez. Finally it appeared and we entered it. + +The coaches were not attractive in the way of cleanliness and comfort, and we were rather more crowded than we liked to be. {447}We +moved off at a dignified pace, along the banks of the Sweetwater Canal, and with the desert stretching out around us. + +There is very little to be seen on the railway journey from Ismailia to Cairo. Part of the way we were in the desert, and a part of +the way we skirted the rich delta of the Nile. + +[Illustration: 8460] + +We passed towns and villages in great number, and saw fields bright with verdure, although it was midwinter. Men were at work in the +fields, with no abundance of clothing, and half-naked children were playing out-of-doors as they might play in New York in August. + +We made brief stoppages at half a dozen stations, possibly at double that number, as I kept no reckoning, and about six hours +after leaving Ismailia we saw the Pyramids sharply outlined against the western sky, where the sun was setting, as they have stood +outlined for more than forty centuries; and as dusk had fallen and darkness was gathering around us, we rolled into the station at +Cairo, and were speedily in the midst of a noisy crowd of the usual attendance upon arriving trains. Soon we ran all the gauntlets +of the station and its surroundings, and were quartered in the comfortable Hotel du Nil. + +It was after six o’clock in the evening when we reached the hotel, and we had just time to prepare for dinner when the bell +announced that the meal was ready. It was the first of January, {448}and the proprietor stood treat on the occasion, everybody being +liberally supplied with champagne. The hotel seemed to promise well, and we went to bed contented and happy. + +Twenty years ago or more, Cairo was far more Oriental than it is to-day. There was no railway in Egypt, and travellers were not +numerous. + +[Illustration: 9461] + +The few that came here were not sufficient to manners and habits of the people. The foreign population was small, and left nearly +everything in the hands of the natives, and the foreigners in the service of the government were few and far between, and generally +in irresponsible positions. _Maintenant ou a changé tout cela_. + +Egypt has her network of railways and her maritime canal; she has telegraphs, she has steamboats, she has a navy, armed with rifled +cannon, she has an army, many of whose officers have come from other lands, and whose soldiers are supplied with breech-loading guns +of the most approved patterns. The foreign quarter of Cairo contains inhabitants from all parts of Europe, and they can be counted +by the thousand. The city can boast of parks and gardens of great beauty; tall buildings of stone rise above the humble edifices of +Arab architecture, and there are wide streets and boulevards, where the smooth pavement supports the wheels of elegant carriages of +European manufacture, drawn by horses of great beauty and value. + +The costume of the Occident mingles with that of the Orient; the Frank jostles against the native; the church rises in sight of the +mosque; and the sound of Christian worship mingles with the voice of the Muezzin as he chants in the minaret the call + +{449} + +[Illustration: 0462] + +{451}for the faithful to assemble at prayer. You may see a group of women, closely veiled and mounted on donkeys, under the escort +of a tall eunuch, whose features and complexion mark his Nubian origin. It is the harem of a Moslem out for an airing, and you may +seek in vain to penetrate the veils that cover the faces of the fair riders. Their baggy dresses are puffed out like balloons, as +the breeze blows against them, and they are as much Oriental as though they had stepped from the pages of the Arabian Nights. + +The next minute there comes before you a handsome carriage, drawn by a pair of high-stepping horses, and containing a beautiful +woman dressed in all the taste and elegance of Paris or New York. It is the wife, perhaps, of a resident foreigner, and you may +see many carriages and many occupants in the course of your promenade. The procession on the donkeys makes way for the vehicle, and +halts until it passes. Thus the customs of the Occident are invading the once dull and listless East. + +Cairo has grown rapidly in wealth and importance in the past score of years, particularly in the last decade. The Moslem is no +longer supreme in commerce as of yore, and finds it useless to sit idly and wait for a customer, as once was his wont. The bustling +habit of the European is becoming engrafted upon the country, and the railway and telegraph are teaching to the people the value of +time and the disadvantages of the old modes of locomotion. Builders are busy in Cairo, and large edifices, on the plan of Paris, are +completed, or in the process of erection. + +The new part of Cairo can boast of straight avenues, with lines of shade trees and with rows of well-built houses, from whose +windows peep out women, whose unveiled faces show they are not of Moslem faith. While I was in Egypt, a gentleman arrived there +after an absence of more than twenty years. He told me he could not recognize that part of Cairo beyond the Ezbekieh gardens. All +was changed, and where once were open fields or waste places, there are now the streets and avenues of a city. + +There is a handsome bridge of iron across the Nile, and there is a broad and well-built carriage-road from Cairo to the foot of the +great Pyramids at Gizeh. Steamboats are plying on the {452}river, and factories rear their tall chimneys on the land. Rows and rows +of shops are conducted by foreign capital and tended by foreign men. The streets are lighted with gas, and it is proposed to provide +them with wooden pavement, like that which has found favor in many American cities. The post-office is efficiently managed, and so +is the police--both of them on the European model. + +The temperance of the Orient may prevail among the original inhabitants, but the foreigners manage to get drunk with as much freedom +as they would at home, and likewise to be arrested and fined. And so many Christians have found their way there, that crime can be +no longer suppressed. + +While I was in Cairo there was a burglary that would have done honor to London or New York. A jewelry establishment was entered at +night, and property to the value of six thousand pounds sterling was taken. The robbers entered by breaking a hole in a side wall, +and they took away everything, except a quantity of clocks, that were evidently too cumbersome. Not a watch, not a piece of jewelry +of any kind was left behind, and the fellows got clean away. Does not this sound like civilization? + +Polygamy is growing unpopular, and the natives are becoming content to live with one wife each, according to the Western custom. +And, still following the Western custom, they abuse her, and stay out late of nights, at the club or the theatre, or somewhere else, +and are not over liberal in supplying her pecuniary wants. Slavery is not altogether suppressed, but is greatly restricted, and has +no legal protection. Gambling houses abound, not only for native, but for foreign patronage, and to judge by the number of these +places, the foreigners that come here are fond of combats with the tiger. + +I might name many other indications of the change that has come over Egypt, but the foregoing must suffice. + +One of our first excursions was to the Citadel. Its character is shown by its name; it was built in 1166, by Saladin, as a defence +to the city, but the site was rather unwisely selected, as it is dominated by the Mokattam--a hill directly behind it--and has once +been taken by batteries, stationed on the latter eminence. It is strong enough to resist an attack by small arms, {453}and some of +its towers are quite massive and picturesque. It is quite extensive, and contains a palace and a mosque, the latter built almost +entirely of alabaster. The interior of the mosque is particularly rich, in consequence of the material used in its construction, +and the arches have a curious effect, quite impossible to describe in writing. The palace also abounds in the same material, and +contains some very handsome rooms. + +But the great charm of the citadel is the view from the platform. One can look upon the Nile and a portion of its rich valley, +and on nearly the whole city of Cairo. The roofs of the houses are below the feet of the observer, and there are only the highest +minarets of the mosques to approach him in elevation. In the west are the Pyramids, standing in the edge of the desert, and looking +more grand than when one sees them from the bank of the river. + +The best time for this view is at sunset, and if the air is clear there are few pictures anywhere in the world to surpass it. There +is a wonderful contrast between the flat roofs and domes and minarets of the city, and the rich green of the open country beyond. +Altogether the view from the Citadel at sunset is one that should not be missed by a visitor to Cairo, and once enjoyed it is not +likely to be speedily forgotten. + +We were shown the spot where one of the Mamelukes saved himself, by jumping his horse over a wall and down upon a pile of rubbish +thirty or more feet below. The horse was killed, but the rider was not hurt. + +Mohammed Ali found the Mamelukes troublesome, just as the Janizaries were in Constantinople, and he determined to get rid of them. +He invited them to a banquet at the palace, and they came in their richest suits, and when they were all in the courtyard of the +palace, his Albanian body guard opened fire upon them from the surrounding windows and from the crenelated walls. The gates had been +shut, and there was no chance of escape, and all were slaughtered except Emir Bey, the one who saved himself in the way mentioned. +This little incident occurred in 1811, and put an end to the disturbances that the Mamelukes frequently created. + +Mohammed Ali loved peace and quietness and was willing to {454}do anything in reason to secure them. The Mamelukes were constantly +making trouble, and rendering the throne insecure; in fact they had the power of saying who should or should not be the ruler of the +land. Is there anything more natural, than that he should study how to get rid of them, and in such a way that his motives could not +be questioned? If he had asked them to come to his palace and be killed, there is every reason to believe they would have remained +away; at any rate some of them would have been fastidious, and declined his polite invitation, so that his scheme for bagging them +all would have failed. It was much better to invite them to a banquet; a man is much more likely to go to a good dinner, than to +accept the honors of a butchery in which he is to occupy an objective place. Some men are so particular. + +Why didn’t he poison them at the banquet, some one may ask. Poisoning isn’t respectable, and besides, you always run a risk of +changing glasses with somebody, and getting into your own stomach the arsenic you intended for his. Servants are careless at dinner, +and then you always have some guests, who don’t drink and are quite likely to detest the particular kind of soup or pie where you +have placed your medicine. Besides, when you poison a man, he has no time to prepare for death, while in a massacre like this he has +lots of it. The Mamelukes that were not shot at the first fire had at least a quarter of a minute for preparation, as it would +take quite that time to open the windows and level the rifles. Then you must add the period required for the bullets to go from the +rifles to the Mamelukes, and altogether you will conclude that the time must have hung heavy on their hands. Those not killed at the +first fire, had the additional time required for reloading, and you must remember, before condemning Mohammed Ali for taking them +unawares, that the rifles of that day were charged at the muzzle and were much slower to load than the Sharps, and Mansers, and +Chassepots of our time. + +The more you study this massacre of the Mamelukes, the more you must admire Mohammed Ali for the way he managed it He attended to +the details, and did no bungling work. + +{455} + +[Illustration: 0468] + + +{457} + +[Illustration: 0470] + + + + +CHAPTER XXXVI--AN INTERVIEW WITH THE KHEDIVE.--LIFE IN THE CITY OF THE NILE. + + +_The Khedive, who is he?--A hard-worked Pasha--His personal habits--My interview with him--Adventures of an old hat--Arranging +ourselves for a royal reception--An eastern Monarch in a European dress--An unimpeachable costume--A fluent talker--Bedouin +Reporters--A carriage from the Harem--Two pair of bright eyes--Unveiling the women--A talk with a couple of pigmies--A nation of +dwarf-warriors--My impressions of the Khedive._ + + +MOHAMMED Ali, the founder of the present ruling family of Egypt, was a man of great ability, but his energies were devoted to +repairing the damages done by the misfortunes that preceded his reign, rather than to marking out new paths of progress for Egypt. +At the time of his death in 1848 the country was much the same as in the early part of the century. + +Under the rulers that succeeded him, particularly under Said Pasha, some progress was made; but it was not until the present +Viceroy, Ismail Pasha, ascended the throne, that Egypt began her career of improvement. There were a few steamboats on the Lower +Nile before his time, and the construction of the Suez canal had been begun, but the railway was practically unknown, and the cities +and villages were in much the same condition that they had been for a long time. Nearly all the great public works owe their origin +to the present Khedive, Ismail Pasha, and he can point with pride to Egypt as she stands to-day. + +If anybody imagines that it is easy work to be king, he would change his mind, if he could, for a few weeks, make an exchange of +places with Ismail Pasha. There is not, I was told, a more {458}industrious man in the country than the Khedive. He rises early, +takes his bath and makes his toilet; then he takes a light breakfast and sits down to work a little past seven o’clock, and +sometimes before that hour. + +[Illustration: 9471] + +There are a lot of documents to examine, and questions to decide, which occupy him until eight o’clock, when his ministers arrive, +and he holds counsel with them on matters connected with their different departments. + +Thus his time is consumed till near eleven o’clock or between ten and eleven, when he gives audiences to miscellaneous officials, +to the foreign representatives and to strangers whom they have arranged to introduce to His Highness. This lasts until noon when +he retires to breakfast and a rest of an hour or so; then he generally takes a drive in his carriage, and very often has one of his +ministers to accompany him, so that quite possibly he combines pleasure with business, by discussing affairs of state during the +drive. + +The latter part of the day is passed according to circumstances. Sometimes there will be more bureau duty and ministerial +interviews; sometimes there are state dinners and court ceremonies, and sometimes an important matter will come up unexpectedly, so +that business and ceremony are crowded close together. Sometimes he attends the opera in the evening, but this not often, and +when he goes there he does not remain to the end. He retires early, so as to have plenty of rest, and he lives very carefully and +regularly. He is said to be abstemious in matters of food and drink, for only by his regular habits could he preserve his health +through so much hard work as he performs. + +Through the kindness of Mr. Beardsley, our diplomatic agent and Consul-General for Egypt, I had the pleasure, one day, of an +interview with the Khedive. At a visit to the palace a few days before, Mr. Beardsley had asked to present two of his fellow +countrymen, Mr. Bayard Taylor and myself, and on the same evening he received notice that half-past ten on the day in question had +been fixed for the reception. We were notified at once, and accordingly crowded our slender forms into our dress suits, brushed our +stove-pipe hats into the best available appearance, and sallied forth from our hotel. + +[Illustration: 8472] + +Candor compels me to say that my hat was not new, and had passed through a variety of experiences by sea and land, in rain and dust, +and in numerous mishaps that had creased, and indented, and thread-bared its once glossy skin and faultless shape. + +It had been new once, but since then I had transported it across Europe, summered it in Vienna, taken it down the Danube, into +Southern Russia, through the Crimea and carried it to Constantinople, Athens, and Smyrna, into Syria and Palestine, and thence into +Egypt. + +Don’t you think that a hat which has been through so much would need a great deal of polishing to fit it for a vice-regal +presentation? + +But it went through the ordeal gloriously, and as I kept it behind me most of the time, the Khedive never made--to me at least--any +comment about it. + +As for Mr. Taylor--well, I may be revealing a secret and it may breed a quarrel between us, but candor again compels me to speak +out. His hat wasn’t his hat but another gentleman’s, borrowed for the occasion, or if it wasn’t it might have been. I never saw him +wear it before, and it was much better than mine, {460}which was only fit to be seen when out of sight. Mr. Taylor ought to have +been proud of that hat when he compared it with the one I carried, but if he was, he was too polite to hurt my feelings, and didn’t +manifest any haughtiness. + +Accompanied by Mr. Beardsley, we drove to the Abdeen Palace, where the Khedive resides with his family,--a neat and substantial +looking edifice, in the western part of Cairo. As we entered the courtyard and drove to the door, the sentinels on duty presented +arms, and we were met at the doorway by Murad Pasha, the Master of Ceremonies, who greeted us cordially and escorted us to the +waiting room on the ground floor. + +Here we spent some fifteen minutes,--as we were ahead of time--in conversation with the Master of Ceremonies and with Ibrahim Pasha, +nephew of the Khedive. The secretary and assistant secretary of the Khedive were present, and we were introduced to both. The time +passed away rapidly, as all were fluent in French and the conversation was not confined to particular topics. + +Promptly at half-past ten we were ushered up one side of a double staircase, that turned and formed a single broad escalier, a +dozen steps or so below the audience floor. Murad Pasha accompanied us to the foot of the broad stairway, and thence we--the +Consul-General and ourselves--proceeded alone. As I raised my eyes I saw the Khedive standing carelessly at the further side of the +room; when he caught site of our advancing column he stepped forward to meet us. He first greeted Mr. Beardsley, who followed the +greeting by introducing Mr. Taylor with a few carefully chosen and appropriate words concerning him. Then came my turn, and while +the Consul-General was making the introduction, the Khedive shook hands with us and welcomed us to his house. He then led the way to +the audience room, a smaller parlor, overlooking the court yard. + +The reception hall, where he met us, was furnished in the French style, with large mirrors and Parisian furniture; the audience +parlor, whither we followed him, was similarly adorned in European style, with chairs and sofas covered with snow-white linen, and +with a marble table in the centre. The walls were covered with blue paper, figured with small flowers of a grayish tint, {461}and +the curtains and fixtures were in harmony with the walls. A tasteful chandelier above the table was filled with candles, ready for +lighting, and on the table was a box of cigars, which, doubtless, were equally ready for lighting. + +If we had gone there expecting to find the ruler of Egypt wearing baggy trowsers and a turban and smoking a _nargileh_, we should +have been greatly disappointed. His dress is entirely European, with the single exception of the _fez_, or _tarboosh_, which covers +his head. His coat and trowsers were of English cut; the former was double-breasted, with silk trimmings on the lappels, and he wore +it buttoned after the style of a morning or walking coat in London or New York. + +His shirt-front was almost entirely concealed by a black cravat or necktie, fastened at the crossing with a single pin of what +appeared to be a ruby; beyond this pin he wore no jewelry whatever. His spotless white collar was turned down, and from the neatness +of its fit and the careful polish it presented, I judge that he has a better laundress than I was able to find in Cairo. I was on +the point of asking him to recommend me to her, but forebore, on the supposition that he might prefer to keep such a good washwoman +to himself. + +The figure of the Khedive is not of the lean and hungry kind; he appears to be about five feet nine in height, and is decidedly +inclined to stoutness, without being ill-proportioned. + +Physically, he appears to have lived well, without any overfeeding. His face is full and broad, and he wears a closely-trimmed beard +and moustache of a brownish hue. When in repose, his face is quite thoughtful, but as soon as he begins to talk it lightens up, and +there is a constant play of animation over all his features. His brown eyes sparkle, and he accompanies his facial expression with +frequent gestures of his hands, quite in contrast to the solemn and stately manner which we associate with Oriental rulers. + +The Khedive took a seat in the corner of the room, and motioned us to places near him, one on his right and two on his left, so that +he could address all three without any necessity for a change of position beyond a very slight turning of the head. He began the +conversation by asking Mr. Taylor if this was his {462}first visit to Egypt. The latter replied that he was there twenty years ago +and made a journey to the White Nile. + +“Ah, yes,” said His Highness, “that was in the time of Abbas Pasha.” + +Mr. Taylor bowed assent, and remarked the wonderful changes that had taken place since that time, and the great progress that he +noticed all around, to which the Khedive made acknowledgment by a slight but graceful bow. + +There was a pause of a few seconds, which was broken by a question from Mr. Beardsley as to the latest intelligence from; the upper +country, where the Egyptian troops had a battle with the army of the King of Darfoor. + +“Nothing very recent,” was the reply of the Khedive; “nothing since the news two or three weeks ago of the battle in which the King +was defeated. The report was that the King attacked our forces, and was defeated with heavy loss, but it must have been his son, +as the King himself, _le pauvre diable_, is totally blind, and couldn’t do much in leading an army. I am sure it must have been his +son, though the dispatch did not say so.” + +Conversation then went on, concerning Darfoor and its extent and resources. The Khedive spoke of the effort he was making for the +suppression of the slave-trade, and said they had a force stationed there to watch the frontier and liberate the slaves which were +being transported by caravans. + +“The Bedouins inform us,” said he, “of the movements of the caravans, so that we have no difficulty in knowing where they are. We +have told the Darfoorians that we do not wish to interfere with them, only in stopping the slave trade, and we are on good terms +with them, except in this one matter.” + +He said, further, that the Darfoorian army had four cannon, and that in the recent battle the Egyptians took three of them. + +I asked him where they obtained the cannon, and he said, with a smile, that two of them were sent as a present from Said Pasha, the +former Viceroy, to the King of Darfoor. These two guns were among the three captured; the third was a very old and nearly useless +piece that the Darfoorians bought, probably, from some of the traders to the sea-coast, and the other gun which they still retained +was of the same sort. {463}I asked what kind of small arms the Darfoorians had, and he replied that, in addition to their lances and +bows and arrows, they had flint-lock muskets, quite inadequate for coping with the breech-loading rifles with which his own army is +equipped. + +After some further talk about the Darfoorians and the country of the Soudan, which Egypt has recently explored, and continues to +explore, the conversation turned upon the pigmies, which had been brought from Central Africa. The Khedive gave us some interesting +details about them, and recommended that we should go and see them at the _Kasr-el-Nil_ barracks, where they were then kept. There +was a brief conversation about the explorations of Livingstone, Schweinfurth, and Miani, and when it ended, the Khedive rose, and +we did likewise. He accompanied us to the head of the staircase, gave each a farewell hand-shake, and said, in addition to the usual +phrases of civility, “If I can be of any service to you, do not hesitate to inform me.” + +We thanked him for his proffered kindness, bowed our adieux, and descended the stairway. At the foot we were met by the Master +of Ceremonies, who accompanied us to the waiting-room, where we had left our overcoats, and subsequently accompanied us to our +carriage. + +Our interview with the Khedive lasted about twenty minutes. He speaks French easily and correctly, and without any hesitation +whatever. His manner throughout was easy and frank, and thoroughly pleasant, and such as to remove any embarrassment on the part +of a visitor. There were touches of humor in his utterances, which cannot be rendered into English without losing their charm, and +therefore I will not attempt to give them. + +From the Abdeen palace we drove to the barracks of _Kasr-el-Nil_ to see the little men about whom His Highness had told us. Just as +we left the palace, we met one of the harem carriages, containing two women, guarded by a couple of soldiers and the same number of +eunuchs. The four were on splendid horses, the soldiers preceding and the eunuchs following the carriage. The blind of the carriage +was down, and as the vehicle whisked rapidly past us, I caught sight of a couple of veiled faces with flashing bright eyes, and with +pretty features just visible beneath the thin gauze. {464}It was a passing vision, a glimpse of a moment, that left no impression +that could be retained. It is an impression which one receives quite often in Cairo, if he chooses to look toward the harem +carriages when making their afternoon promenade. The family of the Khedive are more fortunate than that of any other Mohammedan +ruler, as it can ride in carriages and see far more of out-door life than the royal ladies of other Eastern cities. + +The Khedive is no bigot, as many things indicate. I was told, though how truly I cannot say, that he is quite willing to allow his +wives to appear unveiled after the European manner, and that probably they will do so before many years. I fancy that the prejudices +of the women would be found stronger than his. Custom of long standing declares that no modest woman goes with her face uncovered. +To ask a Mohammedan woman to unveil her face in public, would be as bad as to request a fashionable belle of New York to walk along +Fifth Avenue in the costume of the Black Crook. + +As we entered the parade ground of the barracks, we saw what appeared to be a couple of negro boys, playing at one side, and +ascertained on inquiry, that they were the dwarfs or pigmies, for whom we were searching. We called them up and examined them +closely, and they were certainly rare curiosities. There were only two, the taller said to be twenty and the shorter ten years old; +we measured their height, and found them respectively forty-six and forty-three inches in their shoes; the younger, as he stood +beside me, came not quite up to my hip. The eldest measured twenty-four inches around the chest and twenty-seven around the waist; +their abdomens protruded considerably, and their backs were quite hollow. + +This excessive protuberance of the abdomen is probably due to their vegetable diet, as the Khedive had told us that they lived, when +at home, almost entirely on bananas and similar fruits. They stood quite erect,--I held a stick perpendicularly behind each of them, +and found that when their heads touched it, their backs were more than two inches from it. + +Their necks are short, their limbs well formed, though they are somewhat bowed in the legs, and their feet are long and flat. Their +heads are a curious study. The complexion is not the {465}deepest black of the negro of Nubia, but has rather a brownish hue; their +hair is woolly, and their noses are flat, as though broken in with a hammer. + +On looking down over the forehead of the elder, I could see the lips protruding beyond the nose; and it appeared too, that the +nostrils extended further than did the centre of the organ of smell. The lips are full and rounded, but less thick than those of the +negro generally. Their faces were bright, and had a pleasing appearance, though not indicating a high intellect. + +Accompanying them was a “Dinka” negro, from the White Nile, and Mr. Taylor questioned him in Arabic about the pigmies and their +country. He said these men came from a region in the interior, and that it took the caravans a year and a half to go there and +return. Very little was known about the pigmies, beyond the fact that their country is quite extensive, and all the people are +of diminutive size. The King was no larger than the taller of the two before us, and they are a warlike people, who fight very +earnestly to prevent anybody visiting them. Their country is covered with jungle, and they conceal themselves in the thickets and +send showers of arrows upon the invaders. + +We endeavored to get them to talk, but they would not. One of the soldiers told them to speak, but the elder turned away rather +sullenly, and would not utter a word. The soldiers said their language was quite unlike Arabic, Nubian, or any other that they ever +heard, and further said the pair talked a great deal and very rapidly, when playing together. The name of the elder was Tubal, and +that of the younger Karrell, and they call their country “Takka-lakka-leeka.” + +Dr. Schweinfurth, the distinguished German explorer, learned something about these people; but it was the good fortune of Miani, an +Italian, who had been a long time in Africa, to visit them and secure three specimens, two men and a woman, with whom he started +for Europe. But he died while still in the wilds of Africa, and his papers and effects, including the three pigmies, were sent to +Khartoum. There they were seized, to cover certain debts of Miani’s to merchants in Khartoum, and the pigmies, who were supposed to +be slaves, were thrown into prison, where the woman died. They were not kept there long, {466}as the facts about them were speedily +made known, and soon after their release from prison they were sent to Cairo. + +The Khedive showed a deep interest in the subject of the country of the dwarfs and its peculiar population, and quite probably +the expeditions he has since sent into Central Africa were instructed to learn something more of them and to penetrate the remote +district if possible. + +During our conversation he called special attention to the fact, that a dwarf of any race has a head disproportionately large, and +arms or legs disproportionately long or short. “But you will see,” said he, “that these little men are perfectly formed, like a +well-shaped adult, with the exception of the abdomen, which is due to their vegetable diet, and that the elder has hands and fingers +like those of a person who has reached his full size.” We looked for dwarfish peculiarities, but found none, and were quite of the +opinion of others who have examined them, that they are a race of pigmies. + +From the Kasr-el-Nil we drove through the new part of Cairo, along the broad macadamized streets, and after dropping the +Consul-General at his residence, returned to our hotel with the reflection that we had passed an agreeable, interesting, and +instructive forenoon. + +I was particularly struck with the thorough information of the Khedive, and the interest he manifested concerning the pigmies, +and about Darfoor and other subjects of our conversation, and asked Mr. Beardsley if he was equally well informed about matters in +general. + +“Equally so,” was the reply. “I don’t see how he manages to keep so well posted as he does; he has a remarkably retentive memory +about everything, whether of business or any other matter. When I mention anything that we may have talked about weeks before, he +remembers how it was left at that interview, and shows that it has by no means passed his mind.” + +“He knows the course of European, Asiatic, and American politics; understands the religious questions in England and France, and any +other important topic; has the run of affairs in Spain or other revolutionary countries, and is, in fact, _up_ in all the news of +the day. He must read a great deal when we think {467}he is at rest, and he must remember all that he reads. He attends personally +to all the affairs of the country, and though he leaves the details to his ministers, there is no question, except of a very trivial +nature, that is not submitted to him for decision. Any matter concerning the government in any way, goes through the department to +which it belongs, but must always go before the Khedive before it can be decided.” + +The title, Khedive, is a Persian one, equivalent to “viceroy,” or, as some persons assert, to “king.” The ruler I have been +describing is the first occupant of the Egyptian throne to wear the title. He is addressed in conversation as “Your Highness,” and +is generally spoken of as “His Highness.” The ministers of state and other high dignitaries in Egypt are known as “Excellencies,” + and to address one of them without the prefix, “_Votre Excellence_,” might give offence. They hold rank as pashas, and are nearly +always gentlemen of liberal education and marked ability. “Pasha,” like “Khedive,” is of Persian origin; it is of great antiquity, +and was originally used to designate the governor of a city or province. There are several grades of pashas, just as in our country +there are several grades of generals. In some parts of the Orient the pasha, when he goes abroad, is preceded by an officer bearing +a pole, from which is suspended the insignia of the great man’s rank. + +If he is a first-class pasha, his rank is indicated by three horse tails, and he is called a pasha of three tails. Then there are +pashas of two tails (much more common than cats with two tails), and there are also one-tailed pashas. + +Soon after I left Egypt, one of the high officials was removed and furnished with an indefinite leave of absence. A friend, writing +me from Cairo, stated the case thus: + +“You may have heard of the change whereby the head of one of the departments has become a pasha of no tail whatever.” Which was not +a bad way of putting it. + + +{468} + +[Illustration: 0481] + + + + +CHAPTER XXXVII--STREET-LIFE IN CAIRO. + + +_Cairo, old and new--A visit to the ancient city--The Nilometer, What is it?--Measuring the rise of the Nile--Moses in the +Bulrushes--Tombs of the Caliphs--An Egyptian funeral--Curious customs--“Crowding the Mourners”--Water-carriers and their ways--A +noisy tobacco-vender--Glimpses of the Arabian Nights--Among the Bazaars--Street scenes in Cairo--A cavalcade of Donkeys--Hoaxing +a Donkey-boy--Amusing spectacle--Putting up a ride at auction--An Arab story--A Nation of Liars and why!--Mosques of Cairo--Stones +from the Great Pyramid._ + + +CAIRO consists of two cities, the new and the old, and they are two or three miles apart. Old Cairo is on the bank of the river, +near the island of Roda, and is quite picturesque, being, full of narrow, crooked streets, where one must be very cautious to +prevent being run over. The windows project so far over the street that they frequently touch, and it would be the easiest matter +in the world to go from one to another. The city was formerly much more extensive than now, and many of its houses are in a ruinous +condition. + +From old Cairo we went to the island of Roda to see the famous Nilometer, where the rise of the river during the inundation is +recorded. It is nothing more than a deep pit or well, with a column in the center, marked with a graduated scale. This Nilometer is +about a thousand years old. There is a more ancient one at the island of Elephantine, near the first cataract, and history records +that there was one in use at the time of the Pharaohs. Near the present Nilometer is the spot said by tradition to be that where the +infant Moses was found by Pharaoh’s daughter. + +[Illustration: 0482] + +{469}The island is quite pretty and is covered with fruit and other gardens. Outside the city, and close to the border of the +desert, are the tombs of the Barghite Sultans, which are generally called, though erroneously, the tombs of the Caliphs. The real +burying places of the Caliphs of Cairo are in the city, not far from the bazaars, and in the busiest part of this very busy capital. + +The Moslem awaits death with the utmost composure. When a learned or pious Moslem feels that he is about to die, he performs +the ordinary ablution, as before prayer, that he may depart from life in a state of bodily purity; and he generally repeats the +profession of his faith. It is not uncommon for a Moslem on a military expedition, or during a long journey through the desert, to +carry his grave linen with him. It often happens that a traveler in such circumstances has even to make his own grave; completely +overcome by fatigue or privation, or sinking under a fatal disease in the desert, when his companions, if he have any, cannot wait +for his recovery or death, he performs the ablution, with water, if possible, or, if not with sand or dust which is allowable in +such case, and then having made a trench in the sand as his grave, lies down in it wrapped in his grave clothes, and covers himself +with the exception of his face with this and taken up in making the trench: thus he waits for death to relieve him, trusting to the +wind to complete his burial. + +The ceremonies attendant upon death and burial are nearly the same in the cases of men and women. When the rattles in the throat, or +other symptoms, show that a man is at the point of death, an attendant turns him round to place his face in the direction of Mecca, +and closes his eyes. + +Many of the tombs of the Turkish grandees have marble _tarkeebehs_ which are canopied by cupolas supported by four columns of +marble. There are numerous tombs of this description in the cemetery at Cairo We were rather disappointed in our visit to the tombs +of the Sultans. They were originally very handsome, but are now in a very ruinous condition, and they bid fair to be altogether +destroyed before many years. There were two or three with lofty domes and minarets, quite like the mosques of Cairo. They were +really intended as mosques, in connection with the {470}tombs, so as to furnish praying places for the faithful whenever they wished +to pay respect to the dead. + +From the outside and at a little distance they present a fine effect, with their backing of sand-covered hills and the general +surroundings of approaching desolation. Inside we found portions of the smaller walls torn away to be used in other buildings, and +in one of the mosques, cows and donkeys were stabled. The windows were broken and ragged. The floors were dirty and the attendants +were noisy Arabs, who seemed to have no other object in remaining there than the collection of “backsheesh,” in which they were most +persistent. + +At the cemetery near these tombs we saw a funeral procession and followed it, out of curiosity. Half a dozen men, some of them +blind, and each resting a hand on the shoulder of another, led the way and chanted a melancholy air. Then came a man with a small +coffin borne on his head, and behind him were half a dozen women and as many boys, the women closely veiled according to the custom +of the country. + +The procession did not move in couples, according to the Occidental custom; there was no observance of regularity, except that the +men were in front of the coffin and the women and boys behind it. They moved through the country to a spot where a grave had been +opened; near it the women stopped and sat down, and the bearers placed the coffin on the ground, a priest uttered a prayer, and +then the man who had brought the coffin--a sort of oblong box, with a shawl over it--removed the shawl, and took from beneath it the +corpse. + +It was that of a child about two years old, and was completely wrapped in cloth and bound around with cords, somewhat as one might +wrap a bale of goods to keep it from falling apart. The man advanced to the edge of the grave, and placed the corpse inside, +with very little ceremony, or rather, with no ceremony at all. The women set up a mournful cry, and one of the men of the party +approached us and told our guide that they wished us to retire. As soon as the request was translated, we walked away, feeling that +we had been guilty of an intrusion. + +I saw several funeral processions in Cairo, and had previously seen them in Damascus, Smyrna, and other Oriental cities. At {471}all +of them the custom was the same, the singers preceding the corpse and the mourners following it. The one here described was the +burial of the child of a poor woman, and there was little display and little ceremony. Some of the processions that came under my +notice were of considerable extent, the singers or chanters numbering from fifty to a hundred, and being accompanied by mollahs or +priests. + +The corpse, in such cases, was covered with rich shawls, and at the head of the coffin there was a small post to sustain the cap +worn by the deceased. In the tombs of the wealthy these caps remain at the head of the coffin, and the visitor to the tombs of the +various Sultans of Turkey will not fail to notice how invariably the fez is placed at the head of him who once wore it. + +The coffin is supported on the shoulders of four bearers, and there is frequently a relay to take their places from time to time; +and there is a large following of friends of the deceased, some on foot, and some mounted on donkeys, and from time to time a sound +of wailing rises from the mourning party. + +Some of the mourners are professionals hired for the occasion, while others belong to the family of the defunct. The crowd in the +street does not suspend its avocations, or pay the slightest sign of respect for the procession, beyond making room for it to pass. +And frequently persons in a hurry, and wishing to cross the line of procession, do so without ceremony. + +A stranger in Cairo sees a great deal to amuse him, and if he keeps his eyes open he can learn much that is new. + +The water of the wells in Cairo is slightly brackish, and many people obtain their livelihood by supplying the inhabitants with +water from the Nile. The water seller, or carrier, has across his shoulders what appears to be a sack when carelessly observed, but +proves on examination to be the skin of a pig or a goat. The skin has been taken off as near whole as possible and is then sewn up +so that when filled with water it has the shape of the animal that once wore it. It is filled through the neck, which is not tied, +but held in the hands of the bearer, who carries his burden across his back and sustains it in place by means of a strong strap. + +Some of these water skins have a long neck and a nozzle that points into the air like the muzzle of a rifle. The skin hangs on the +{472}bearer’s back, and the spout is behind his shoulder; in his hands he has a couple of brass cups, which he rattles to secure +attention. + +When he finds a customer, he fills one of the cups through the nozzle, and the accuracy and skill he displays in the operation +evince long practice. + +[Illustration: 9487] + +As he walks along he calls out sometimes, “Moie, moie!” but more frequently some Arabic words that mean, “O, ye thirsty! O, ye +thirsty!” and occasionally he adds something about the delights of a cup of cool, delicious water, and sounds the praises of the +special lot that he carries. + +I was told by persons who understand the language, that there is much poetry in its every-day use, and the water carrier, as I have +just explained, is poetical in his appeals, and so are the street peddlers of all grades. The venders of vegetables, of candy, of +bread, and other edibles do not, as a general thing, name the articles they have for sale, but they address appeals to the hungry, +allude to the tortures of hunger, and the pleasure of satisfying it. The seller of shoes appeals to the unshod, and beseeches +them to go barefoot no longer. The seller of tobacco calls to those who smoke and love the fragrant Latakiah, or the invigorating +Koranny. “O, ye man,” “O, ye woman,” “O, ye old man,” is shouted by your donkey driver as he guides you through the crowded streets, +and he changes it to “O, ye people,” when the number is so great that he cannot afford to address them in detail. + +{473} “Backsheesh, O, Howadji,” (a present, O, gentlemen), is the appeal of the beggar to the passing stranger. The dealer in fresh +clover for donkeys’ food chants, “From green fields I bring the odors of fresh verdure,” and the squinting merchants in the Perfume +Bazaar vaunt the praises of their wares in words that fill the Moslem mind with thoughts of Paradise, and bear it away from prosaic +thoughts and duties of every-day life. + +[Illustration: 0488] + +Somebody has said that to find a Princess Scheherazade, you have only to scratch the back of your Cairene donkey boy, and with a +slight encouragement he will begin to talk in the strain of the Arabian Nights. I found it so to some extent in my acquaintance with +the Egyptian capital. Most of the donkey drivers that frequent the fronts of the hotels can speak English, and some of them quite +well. They are as a class bright and {474}intelligent, and can be relied upon for information as to the customs of the people. Their +knowledge of localities is sufficient for all the purposes for which a guide is usually employed, and as soon as our party, in its +collective capacity, were through with sight-seeing, we fell back upon the donkey boys, and dismissed our professional guide. + +Whether the Cairenes indulge to-day in stories like that of the Enchanted Horse, and Sinbad the Sailor, I am unable to say, but in +the matter of scandal they are quite up to the Occidental mark. One of the donkey boys at the hotel told me a variety of incidents +connected with the harems, and some of them are of a very apochryphal character. + +There is one peculiarity of the Arab that a stranger will not be long in detecting, and that is his readiness to answer each and +every question you may put to him. Ask him something, and if he knows the answer he will generally give it; if he does not know, he +will reply with anything that his imagination suggests, and he does it as gravely as though he were expounding a text of the Koran. + +One day, I asked a donkey boy how much he would ask to take me to the Astor House. + +“Two shillin’,” was the prompt reply. + +He hadn’t the remotest idea where it was, but did not hesitate a moment to undertake to find it. So I asked him where it was. + +“I savez, I savez; on the Esebekiah,” he replied, and pushed his donkey around for me to enter the saddle Other boys came up, and I +said I wished to go the Astor House and Tammany Hall. + +In half a minute the whole crowd was vociferating, and the price fell from two shillings to two francs, and then to one shilling. +I was obliged to end the matter by hiring a donkey and going to the citadel. Every driver was ready to take me to the places I +mentioned, and was confident he could find them. + +The Arabs have a story which they tell, to account for their tendency to falsehood. + +They say that His Satanic Majesty once came on earth with nine bags full of lies. He scattered the contents of one bag in Europe, +and then started for Asia, Africa, and the Oriental Isles. + +{477} + +[Illustration: 0490] + +{492}He arrived at Alexandria in the evening, and was to continue his work next day, but during the night some wicked Arabs stole +the other eight bags, and distributed the contents among their people. + +Cairo is not so rich in mosques as Constantinople, but there are several, of no small importance. + +[Illustration: 8492] + +The finest of these is that commonly known as Sultan Hassan; it stands just below the citadel, and is a prominent feature in the +view of the city. The Cairenes are justly proud of it, and have a story that the King cut off the hand of the architect, to make +sure that he would not repeat his work. + +But as this little incident has had its run in all countries and ages, we may conclude that the King did nothing of the sort. It is +much more likely that he compelled the architect to wait for his pay, and finally accept fifty cents on the dollar. + +The stones used for constructing this mosque, came from the great Pyramid; some of them were recut, but the greater part are in +their original shape. The interior consists of a dome, resting on four grand arches, the eastern one having a span of sixty-five and +a half feet. The dome is of wood, and, like many other domes in Cairo, is not kept in good repair. + + +{478} + +[Illustration: 0493] + + + + +CHAPTER XXXVIII--THE BAZAARS OF CAIRO.--EGYPTIAN CURIOSITY SHOPS. + + +_More About the Bazaars--How They Sell Goods in Cairo--Furniture, Fleas, and Filth--Trading in Pipe Stems and Coffee Pots--A +Queer Collection of Bric-a-Brac--Driving Close Bargains--A Specimen of Yankee Shrewdness--A Miniature Blacksmith Shop--A Cloud of +Perfumes--Gems, Guns, and Damascus Blades--An Arabian Auction--At the Egyptian Opera--The Dancing Girls of Cairo--The Ladies from +the Harem--A Scanty Costume--The Ballet of “The Prodigal Son”--The Ladies of the Opera and Their Life._ + + +ONE of the first objects of interest at Cairo is the great centre of trade, known as the bazaars. They are not so compactly +arranged as the bazaars of Damascus, or of Constantinople, and in some features they are inferior to those of either of the above +cities; but they are nevertheless very interesting, and never fail to charm the visitor. + +Suppose you are in the newly added quarter of Cairo--say at the French post-office--and wish to visit the bazaars. You pass along +a broad and macadamized street, with French shops on one side and a row of unfinished buildings on the other, that have a +Parisian appearance. With two or three turnings in streets of this sort, you arrive at the Mooskee, a broad street--broad for the +Orient--leading into the native portion of Cairo. + +The Mooskee was once a sort of narrow lane, but was widened by one of the former Pashas, not without opposition on the part of the +Moslems. Here the rows of foreign shops continue; they are French, Greek, Italian, English, and German, arranged without any regard +to nationalities. At first, they are all foreign; as you advance, you see here and there a shop, attended by a {479}native; and +as you go on and on, the natives increase in numbers, and the foreigners decrease. At first the shops have windows and doors, and +counters, like those in London or Paris, but as you go on, you find here and there one on the plan of the Orient, the front entirely +open, and the goods displayed from within to a customer standing in the street. + +Here is a niche where was once a window; it has been walled up, and the stones which close it are about eighteen inches inside the +line. + +[Illustration: 8494] + +This space would be of no use in the West, but here in the East it has been utilized, and we find a couple of cobblers squatted +there, with their benches of tools in front of them. Very small are these benches, and as for the tools, they are not numerous. +Further on we see open-fronted shops, tended by foreigners, and close-fronted shops tended by natives; then we come to a section +where all the shops are open, and natives are more and more numerous; finally, by turning,--we may go to the right or left, as we +choose,--under the shadow of a decaying mosque, we enter the bazaars, and the habits and costumes of the Orientais rise around us. + +In many parts of the Mooskee there is a roof thrown quite across the street, a roof consisting mainly of timbers, with openings +through which the light can stream and the rain can fall. Some of the Oriental cities have the streets covered, and there are +openings here and there, to admit the light. Cairo is not covered, but her streets are so narrow, and the house-tops project so far, +that in many places the streets are rather sombre, even at mid-day. Everywhere you see little balconies and projecting windows, the +latter covered with wooden grills or lattices, through which women can see without being seen; however brightly the lights of the +harem {480}may burn within, they cannot be observed from without. The merchants in the shops find this dimness to their advantage, +as it gives to some of their wares the appearance of a fineness which they do not possess. + +Turning to the left out of the Mooskee, we entered the bazaar of Khan-Haleel, so named after a Khan, which was built about’ six +hundred years ago, and is still standing without much alteration. + +[Illustration: 9495] + +We entered the Khan and found a square court yard surrounded by rooms opening upon it, where the merchants who come from other +cities display their wares and sleep at night. + +The Khan, or caravansary, is of less consequence now than formerly, throughout the parts of the East that have been invaded by +railways; in Aleppo, Bagdad and other inland places, its character is still retained. A caravan arrives in a city, and a merchant +belonging to it seeks a caravansary, hires a room and displays his goods to whoever wishes to buy. He pays a small rental and takes +his meals where he likes; in the smaller towns the master of the Khan will supply him with food, but not so in the large cities. The +furniture of the Khan consists generally of matting and fleas in about equal portions; sometimes there is no matting, but the fleas +are sure to be on hand, and on the entire body as well. Orientals do not mind them, and I am half inclined to believe that they +would be unhappy without those nimble little attendants. + +The bazaars in the immediate vicinity of the Khan Haleel are mainly devoted to the sale of pipe stems, coffee pots, and various odds +and ends of nearly everything. You can buy tobacco, old {481}coins, boots, and jewelry; and there are several shops whose native +owners are devoted to the sale of European nick-nacks. + +Further on, you come to the jewelry bazaar; we entered it by a low door, which had a flooring of soft mud, that induced some very +careful walking and brought one of our party to temporary grief. + +The jewelry bazaar is a curious place. The street is about six feet wide, in some places not over five, and you stand in the street +or sit on the front edge of the shop while making your bargains. Not more than two or three persons should go there together; we +were six, and we blocked up the whole way, so that it was difficult for us to see anything and for others to get past. The shops +were from four to eight feet square, and the stock was partially displayed in a little show-case a foot square and the same in +height, and partially kept in a safe in a rear corner. Generally when we examined the articles in the case, the merchant, who was +squatted near it, opened his safe and took out something from it. The diminutive extent of the shop enabled him to reach safe, +show-case, and everything else, without leaving the place where he was seated. In most cases, when he was obliged to move about, he +did it without rising. He hopped along very much as a tame seal moves about in a menagerie. + +The selection of jewelry is not large. It consists of ear-drops, brooches and bracelets of fine filigree work, that nearly always +includes a crescent, with a few stars of gold or little drops of real or imitation turquoise. Some of the sets are so arranged, that +the necklace and brooch form one piece, that can be taken apart so that the necklace will form a pair of bracelets and leave the +brooch to be worn separately. Some are of gold, some of silver, and some of silver gilded, and the sets are generally quite cheap in +comparison with the prices of jewelry in America and England. + +You must bargain a great deal, and if you pay anything like the price asked at first, you are sure to be cheated. Never offer more +than half what they ask, and you will do better not to offer more than a third to start with; the merchant will decline at first; +then he will fall slowly, and after a time he will be about {482}half way between your first offer and his. You can then come up a +little, and if your offer is at all reasonable, he will close with, you, though frequently not till after you have walked away. + +To show what can be done by judicious bargaining, let me cite an instance. + +One of our party admired a pair of ear-drops, and asked the price. + +“Twenty francs,” was the reply. + +Buyer declined to be a buyer at that figure, but ventured to offer five francs. The merchant put the jewelry into his box and shook +his head. Then our party prepared to leave, and the merchant fell to fifteen francs. Buyer rose to six francs, and after a great +deal of haggling, they met at seven francs and a half. In another instance, a trade was made at ten francs for something for which +thirty francs had been demanded, and frequently half, or more than half the first price, was taken off to make a trade. An Oriental +merchant expects you to bargain for his goods, and is quite surprised if you accept his offer at starting; and if you do it, you can +be certain that you have deceived, yourself. + +In many of the shops the makers of jewelry were at work; of course we were interested in seeing them. The man sat or squatted on the +floor, in front of a small anvil; behind him was a little furnace, with a charcoal fire, which was kept alive by a bellows, worked +by a boy or by the foot of the man. The bellows was in keeping with the rest of the equipment of the place--sometimes it was a +bag of goatskin, and sometimes it had the shape, and was about the size of a Chinese lantern. The tools consisted of hammers and +pinchers, and the men showed great dexterity in working them. Gold and silver are made to take curious shapes in the hands of +these fabricants, and some of their performances appeared akin to magic. They had little turning lathes in some of the shops, and +occasionally a man would hold with his toe the article which he was endeavoring to put into shape the size of a small egg; there is +no saucer, but in its place there is a little socket of the general shape of a flower vase, and into this the cup fits very neatly. +They must wear out, or become lost, at a remarkably rapid rate to judge by the quantities that were offered for sale. + +The jewelry bazaar has many windings, and, somewhat to our surprise, we came out after many crooks and-turns by a passage-way, only +a few feet from where we had entered. + +Brass pans and pots for cooking purposes are in demand, and so are plates, on which to serve up sweetmeats. In some of the {483}Not +far away from the jewelers is the bazaar of the tinsmiths and workers in brass. Their shops are small, like all shops in the Orient, +and their furnaces were much on the same style as those of the workers in gold and silver. + +[Illustration: 0498] + +They were hammering brass and tin into a variety of shapes, the most common article being the pots for making coffee, and the little +stands that hold the cups. They bring coffee to you in the Orient in a cup about {484}shops they tried to sell us some very ancient +plates of Saracenic manufacture, and the rapidity with which they reduced their figures, led me to suspect that the articles were +skilful imitations, rather than genuine. The brass and tin bazaars are quite extensive, and the trade in these articles is evidently +large. + +Constantly, on our way, we were beset by men, who wanted to guide us and act as intermediaries in trade. These fellows hang around +the bazaars and make a living in two ways; they get a fee from the stranger and a commission from the merchant, and the commission +is generally the most important of the two. It makes little difference whether you take them as interpreters, or hire a dragoman +from the hotel; both will have a commission, and sometimes the dragoman is worse than the regular frequenter of the bazaars. After +a little practice, and by picking up the numerals and a few other words of Arabic, I was able to do my own shopping, without the +intercession of a guide, and found I could get along much better when alone. Many of the merchants understand the French or Italian +numerals, or what is more frequently, a combination of the two; with a lingual hash, composed of Arabic, French, and Italian, one +can manage to trade very fairly. + +You can barter leisurely, or you can go rapidly through many bazaars. You can go in the _Hamzowce_, or silk and cloth bazaar, where +silks, cloths, and similar goods are sold, mostly of European manufacture; but as the dealers are all Christians and scoundrels, and +the articles they sell are familiar to us, the place is not particularly interesting. + +You can go into the _Terbeeah_, or perfume bazaar; and it is here that you buy, or think you buy, the famous “otto of rose.” + +I spent the whole of one morning, bargaining for some of it, and at last bought half a dozen bottles, only to be told when I reached +the hotel, that I had been cheated in the price. There is a wonderful odor of sandal wood and otto of rose, and a dozen other things +in this bazaar, and the rows of bottles and jars behind the turbaned and squatting dealers, form a picture that: is by no means +unpleasant. Strips of gilded paper are hung in front of these bazaars, as a sign of the articles sold within. I was unable to +ascertain the meaning of them, and concluded {485}that they were arbitrary in their character, like the striped poles that we place +in front of a barber’s shop. Here, as everywhere else, you must haggle a good deal about the price, and keep a sharp eye, to see +that you get the article you have bought. + +[Illustration: 500] + +There are different localities for different goods. In one bazaar you find cotton and silk stuffs, and in another they have garments +made of the same material. In one there are shoes and slippers, in another saddles, and in another flags and tents. Here you find +silk and gold cord and lace, and there you can discover stores of precious stones. Here are sugar, almonds, and dried fruit, and +there are tobacco and coffee. Here is the market for guns, swords, and arms of various kinds, and there is the market for fowls and +vegetables. In the arms bazaar you may {486}find a wilderness of old weapons, and not unlikely you may purchase a sword that flashed +in the days of Haroun-al-Rasheed, and helped to spread the faith of Mohammed through the sleepy and careless East. + +Among the dealers in gems, you will find diamonds and turquoises in great number, and they will be drawn one by one from the pocket +of the merchant and placed in a little box which he holds in his hand. If you like, you may visit the bazaar where old clothes are +sold, and if you have a fancy for garments that have done duty on Moslem backs, your desires can be met with the utmost ease. And +don’t fail to come to the bazaars on Mondays and Thursdays, and witness the sale of goods at auction. It is not like an American +auction, where the dealer stands in one place and has the buyers clustering round him. In this case, the auctioneers go through +the market, carrying the goods and calling out the prices that have been offered. This mode of selling gives a fine opportunity for +fraud, and it is quite likely that a great deal of it is practised. + +Though pretty well tired out when through with the bazaars, we took a turn at the opera house in the evening. I have seen opera and +ballet in pretty nearly every city where they make a point of giving them finely, and before coming here, I believed I had seen +the very best in existence. The opera house at Cairo is not a large one, but it is quite sufficient for the wants of the present +population of theatre-goers. The seats and boxes are well arranged, and I purposely went to various localities during’ the +performance, and found I could hear about equally well everywhere. There is a strong company, especially rich in tenor* and soprano +voices It was here that I heard the opera peculiar to Cairo, under the name of Aida. Aida was written by Verdi, to the Khedive’s +special orders; the scene is laid in Egypt, during the period of the greatest power of the Pharaohs, and the special locations are +at Memphis and Thebes. The piece was literally put on the stage without regard to expense; the costumes and scenery were made with +the utmost care and attention to details, and in every respect they conform to the period represented. Thus, in the scenery, the +temples and the services in them are restored, the actors are dressed as were the ancient {487}Egyptians, and the dialogue is made +to conform to the manners and customs of the time. As you sit in the parquette, or in a comfortable box, you are carried back four +thousand years to the days when Isis and Osiris were the divinities of the land. + +Careful studies were made of the sculptures and paintings on the walls of the temples and tombs of Upper Egypt, so as to secure +fidelity in all the details. The rehearsals had evidently been numerous and thorough; I never heard in London or St. Petersburg, +Paris or Vienna, Milan or Naples, an opera better rendered, while I have heard a great many whose rendition was far behind it in +point of excellence. Aida is popular with the resident opera goers, and if a stranger wishes to see a Cairene audience at its very +best, he should attend one of the representations of this opera. The boxes and parquette will be well filled, and he may possibly +get a view of the solid form and intelligent face of the Khedive. Opposite the vice-regal box there are several boxes reserved for +the ladies of the harem; there is a screen of wire-gauze in front of them, so that the fair occupants can see, without being seen. + +There is a ballet called the “Prodigal Son,” with the scene laid in Egypt and with the costumes of the Pharaonic days. It rivals +Aida in magnificence, and is generally sure of a good audience or rather _vidience_ as, following the Oriental and European custom, +it is all in pantomime, with never a spoken word. + +The ballet troupe is quite large, and the action of the piece goes on incessantly for about an hour and a quarter. The costumes and +scenery are appropriate,--the former scanty, as with the ballet everywhere, and the latter rich and typical of the place and time +represented. The cost of maintaining this troupe must be great, and evidently the ladies composing it are well paid, as they drive +daily in fine carriages on the Shoobra road, and dress like countesses, who have fortunes in their own right. + +There is a small theatre opposite the opera house, where they give French comedy and light operas, three or four times a week, and +give them very well. The opera and ballet are very popular with the ladies of the Khedive’s harem; they prefer the music and dancing +of the Occident to that of the Orient, just as they prefer the fashions of Paris to those of Bagdad and Khiva. + + +{488} + +[Illustration: 0503] + + + + +CHAPTER XXXIX--ADVENTURES WITH A DONKEY.--A DAY AT THE RACES. + + +_A “Syce” what is he?--A Man with a Queer Dress and Large Calves--A Gorgeous Turnout--An Escort of Eunuchs--Veiled Beauties--A +Flirtation and its Consequences--The Tale of a Dropped Handkerchief--The Donkey as a National Beast--A Tricky Brute and an Agile +Driver--An Upset in the Mud--Astonishing the Natives--A Specimen of Arabic Wit--Going to the Races--The Grand Stand--A Dromedary +Race--An Aristocratic Camel--The Arrival of the Khedive--Starting Up the Dromedaries--Cutting an Empress._ + + +A STRANGER is impressed during his first days in Cairo with the spectacle of runners in front of carriages to warn people to get +out of the way. These fellows have a picturesque dress and muscular legs, and their duty is to clear the way, by keeping a few yards +in advance and warning people that a carriage is coming. An appendage of this sort is called a syce, and formerly it was necessary +that he should be a native born Egyptian, but at present a Nubian may aspire to the position, and it is not unusual to see syces of +the complexion of charcoal in front of elegant carriages. Public fiacres and ordinary private carriages have each but a single syce, +but the carriages of the Khedive and all official turnouts must have a pair of syces running side by side. + +The syce carries a stick, which he holds perpendicularly in the air. As he goes along he warns people by his shouts; it occasionally +happens that a crowd of common Arabs will be in the way with their donkeys, and if they do not move at the vocal admonition, the +stick is brought into use with no savor of mildness. {489}The most gorgeous turnouts in Cairo were, of course, those belonging +to the reigning family, and used on state occasions. The Khedive ordinarily rides with very little display; he has a two-horse +carriage, open or closed according to the weather or other circumstances, two syces in front and two outriders or household guards +behind him. + +[Illustration: 0504] + +The carriages of the harem are quite as gorgeous as his, and they have the additional escort of one or two eunuchs, sometimes on +horseback, and at others seated on the box with the driver. Sometimes the blinds are drawn, and again they are open, but in either +case the face of the fair occupant cannot be seen, as it is invariably covered with a veil. + +The eyes only are visible and they are generally pretty, I think I may say invariably so, and have that soft, melting lan{490}guor +for which the Orient is famous. Concealment has its advantages here as elsewhere; what we can see is rarely as beautiful as what +we do not see. The unattainable is always of more value than what is within our reach. Possibly all the women of the harem are not +beautiful, but I had the word of a lady who has been in the sacred enclosure, that there are faces there whose beauty is rarely +equalled in the Occident, and there was one that roused my informant to a pitch of enthusiasm more appropriate for a young and +ardent man. + +Some of these carriages of the harem have been associated with scandals of a mediocre character. I was told of one whose occupant +used to drop her veil to a dashing young officer when promenading on the Shoobra Road, and on one occasion let fall an embroidered +and perfumed handkerchief, which he picked up and retained. + +As the story goes, he was imprudent enough to speak of the adventure and to show the trophy, and one day he was told his presence +was no longer needed in the Egyptian army, but that his resignation would be accepted. How much truth there is in the story I +cannot say, I am sure; I was not present; never saw officer or handkerchief to my knowledge, and neither have I ever seen the veiled +beauty. But who among us would have neglected to peep at her face if he had the opportunity? + +The beast par excellence of Egypt is the donkey; he ought to have a place on the national coat-of-arms, as much so as the llama has +on that of Peru. The horses of Egypt are magnificent, some of pure Arabian, and some of a cross between English and Arabian stock, +and are famous for their speed and beauty. But they are a luxury that not everybody can afford, as their support requires a constant +outlay, not to speak of the first cost of the property. But the donkey is universal, and everybody can have one, unless he is the +poorest of the poor. + +At every hotel door there are groups of them ready saddled at all hours of the day, and you can hire them cheaply. If you can make +a bargain in advance you can hire a donkey at three or four francs a day, inclusive of the boy, to drive him, though the latter +generally looks for backsheesh in addition to the price of the beast and saddle. I have hired donkeys frequently for half + +{491} + +[Illustration: 0506] + +{493}a franc an hour, though the hotel keepers tell you that a franc an hour is the proper fare. + +Most of the excursions in and around Cairo must be made on these animals, and even in many places where you can take a carriage the +donkey is preferable. You can ride in the narrow lanes and among the bazaars, or you can go into the open country at a gallop, as +though pursued by a wolf, or a guilty conscience. No matter how fast you go, the boy will keep up with you, and he never seems to +be out of breath. If you want to go slowly he does not understand you, and will continue to cluck and strike the beast at the very +moment you are expostulating with him. + +One day I took a donkey for an afternoon ride to old Cairo, and explained to the boy that I was in no hurry, and wished to go +gently. “I understand,” he said, and as we started he hit the donkey a violent blow, that sent him off on a gallop. + +Two or three times I expostulated, and finally I threatened to thrash him with my cane if he struck the donkey again without orders. + +“I understand,” he said, “no strike donkey no more,” and we were off again. + +Within two minutes he struck the animal. The promised thrashing was administered, and even that was not enough to make the boy +mindful of what I wanted, and several times he involuntarily hurried the animal ahead. It was the force of habit, which to him was +perfectly uncontrollable. + +The donkey is a patient beast; he never kicks or runs away, never takes fright, never asks for backsheesh, and he can bear a burden +that seems out of all proportion to his size. He does not get drunk or stay away from home by circumstances which he cannot control, +and he can be boarded and lodged at a very cheap rate. His food consists of beans and chopped straw, with an occasional _bonne +bouche_ of fresh cut grass, of which you see great loads coming daily into the city on the backs of camels and donkeys. + +The pace of the donkey is a walk, an amble, or a gallop according to circumstances, and at whatever speed he is going he is +generally as easy as a cradle. The natives ride without stirrups, owing to the donkey’s tendency to stumble; he does not fall very +{494}often, but you never know when he will go down in a heap under you, and he is most likely to do this when at full speed, the +very time when you least relish this sort of business. + +[Illustration: 0509] + +When I reached Cairo I was not up to the dodge of riding without my feet in the stirrups, but I soon concluded that I had better +learn. One afternoon I had a donkey that was very good, from a progressive point of view. There was a party of us, and we went at a +gallop, and my beast was ahead most of the time. Suddenly he went down, very much as a wet towel falls on the floor when you drop it +from your hand, and I went down like another wet towel when it is not dropped but flung into a corner. + +Had my feet been out of the stirrups they would have touched the ground as I fell, and I should have been standing erect and +dignified, and could have contemplated my donkey in a heap as Xerxes contemplated the remains of his fleet at Salamis. But I was +comfortably fixed in the stirrups, and so I went forward and turned about eleven-sixteenths of a somersault before I settled into a +sprawling position on and in the sand, to the great delight of the multitude who are never happier than when seeing a {495}stranger +make an ass of himself. I got up and found myself uninjured, though I presented the appearance of having been used as a street +sweeping machine. + +You may think this is drawing the donkey business to a considerable length, but you wouldn’t think so if you knew what a prominent +place the animal has in the life and locomotion of modern Egypt. But through fear of wearying you, I will stop now; only let me tell +you of the wit of one of the drivers. + +One day I hired a donkey for a franc to make a journey for which the driver demanded three francs at the outset. When the bargain +was concluded we started, but the beast was very slow, and I said to the driver that his steed was not good. + +“Yes, donkey good,” was his reply. “Give donkey three francs, he good donkey; he no good for one franc.” + +Soon after my arrival we had the pleasure of attending the horse races and noticing some of the peculiarities of the country. + +The track for the Cairo races is two or three miles out of the city, on a large plain to the right of the Abooseer Road. + +We left our donkeys in charge of their drivers, and bought tickets for the Grand Stand. The spectators were a mixed lot of natives +and Europeans, nearly all the former being in European dress, with the exception of the fez or red cap, which covers the head at all +times, whether in doors or out. A good many eunuchs were there and mingled freely with the crowd in and around the stand. They were +nearly all tall--some of them unusually long in the legs--were clad _a la European_, and were rather gorgeous in the matter of watch +chain. One who stood near me had a double length vest chain, a fob chain, and a chain around his neck. If there had been any other +way of wearing a chain I presume he would have adopted that also. + +Many of these neutral gentlemen were active in the discussion of the races; some of them made considerable wagers, and one of +them, taller and rather older than the rest, appeared to exercise considerable authority over the jockeys, and superintended their +mounting and weighing. The jockeys were of all colors and nationalities; there were English, French, and Italian jockeys; and there +were Arab, Egyptian, and Nubian jockeys. There was comparatively little betting over the result, and quite {496}an absence of the +yelling and hooting heard at all races in England and at some in America. + +[Illustration: 0511] + +Just before the commencement of the races, a dozen carriages came upon the ground, bringing the ladies of the harem. A separate +space was assigned to them; in this space the carriages were driven and a rope was drawn around, and guards were stationed to keep +out intruders. + +The ladies remained all the time in their carriages, and as they were closely veiled and the blinds of the carriages were partially +closed, nobody got a peep at them. It is quite an innovation for them to come to the races at all; the seclusion of the women of the +Orient is so great that a man would usually be as likely to think of taking his dog to see an entertainment as of taking his wives, +or any one of them. I believe the day is not {497}far distant when the ladies of Egypt will discard the veil and go with uncovered +faces like their Occidental sisters. The Khedive has done much in the way of assimilating his people with those of Europe, and he +will do more as time goes on. + +On the second day the affair opened with a race of dromedaries. Four of these animals were entered, but only three put in an +appearance. They were not beautiful beasts; I don’t believe one of them, in his wildest moments, ever imagines that he is handsome, +and he ought not to do so if he sets himself down to tame deliberation. The dromedary is a sort of fine edition of the camel; he +bears the same relation to a camel that a setter or terrier bears to that “yaller” dog of America. He kneels to be mounted, and he +starts off at a swinging pace, arching his neck rather gracefully, and not appearing to be in a hurry. + +The saddle for racing is a sort of hollow dish, in which the rider sits. He does not straddle the beast as we would mount a horse, +but he sits in this trough, or dish, and crosses his legs in front of him. His place is not an uncomfortable one, except that it +is pretty high in the air and a fall from it would be no joke. Since I saw that race I have done some camel travelling, and have my +opinions, but of that I will speak by and by. + +These three dromedaries started off very well at the word of command, and went around the track at the rate of twelve miles an hour, +though they did not appear to be doing half as much. + +The dromedary race did not begin until after the arrival of the Khedive, who came in a carriage with his sons and some of his +ministers, and was accompanied by a dozen or so of riders, and there was a good deal of bowing and hat lifting, but there were +no cheers. Cheering after the Western plan does not seem to be in vogue in Egypt, and certainly it would not take well with the +dignified demeanor of the Orient. + +The Khedive acknowledged the compliment by a bow to the right and the left as he entered the grounds, and the carriage moved rapidly +to the stand set apart for him and his friends. On the stand he mingled unceremoniously with the rest of the party. Among them +there was one lady, the Duchess of Parma, to whom he was courteously polite. Quite a contrast, this, I thought to the conduct of the +Sultan, whom I saw in 1867, at Paris, rudely {498}walk past the Empress without offering his arm or even speaking to her. She was a +woman and an Infidel Christian; no one could expect the commander of the Faithful to be polite to her. + +There are different ways of regarding the subject from our standpoint; we think that Mohammedanism degrades woman below her proper +level, by secluding her and by treating her not as a companion of man, but as a thing for his amusement, or for the perpetuation +of the human race, as the soil is made to perpetuate the fruits of the earth. And the Mohammedan looking at us thinks that we raise +women above their proper level and allow them too much part in our affairs. But the Western theory is yearly gaining more adherents, +and the position of woman is yearly becoming more exalted. And the enlightened ruler of Egypt is the first Mohammedan Prince or King +who has ventured to show in public a feeling of respect toward the gentler and prettier half of humanity. + +[Illustration: 5513] + + +{499} + +[Illustration: 0514] + + + + +CHAPTER XL--THE PASHA AND THE PRIESTS.--EGYPTIAN LANGUAGE--SCHOOLS AND RELIGIOUS CEREMONIES. + + +_Egypt and her relations with Turkey--The Army and Navy--Egyptian history boiled down--The reigning family--Wonderful +Relics--Mohammed Ali as a ruler--The Pasha and the priests--Ordering a Wedding--Married on short notice--Gratifying the Empress +Eugenie--An Arab school-room--A college with nine thousand students--A jaw-breaking language--How to indite an epistle +in Arabic--The caravan to Mecca--Going on a pilgrimage--A horrible ceremony--Trampling on dervishes--The “Bride of the +Nile”--Extraordinary customs._ + + +EGYPT is sufficiently independent to have a government of her own, and to maintain a standing army. She pays an annual tribute to +Turkey of half a million pounds sterling, but the amount varies somewhat, according to circumstances. In return for this tribute she +is allowed to do pretty much as she pleases in the way of contracting loans and making internal improvements. The army is restricted +to fifteen thousand men, but by means of an arrangement for short terms of service it is practically four or five times as large. +The organization of the army is very much on the European model, and the troops are drilled according to the modern systems of +tactics. + +The artillery arm of the service has been made as effective as possible, and the batteries consist of breech-loading cannon, from +Krupp’s manufactory in Germany. The navy is not large, but the ships that compose it are of the most approved construction and their +armament is of steel breech-loaders, like the land batteries. {500}The infantry are equipped with improved rifles, and the cavalry +has a revolving carbine, with a removable stock, so that the weapons may be changed at will into a pistol or a rifle. In the last +few years, the government has availed itself of the services of many foreign officers, the most of them from America. These are +scattered among all branches of the service, the most of them being in the corps of engineers. Under their management the country is +being carefully surveyed, and an elaborate map is in preparation. + +Egypt has had a great many rulers. The dynasties of Kings of ancient Egypt were no less than thirty-four in number, and then came +the Romans about the beginning of the Christian Era. They reigned for a few hundred years, then the country was conquered by the +Arabs, and later on, it fell into the hands of the Turks. Near the end of the last century, it was invaded by the French, they +remained about three years only, when they were expelled by the English, and soon after their arrival the renowned Mohammed Ali was +made the ruling pasha. + +He reigned from 1806 to 1848, when he became imbecile, and was succeeded by his son Ibrahim Pasha, who died after a reign of +two months. Ibrahim was followed by his nephew Abbas Pasha who reigned from 1848 to 1854, and was succeeded by the fourth son of +Mohammed Ali, under the name of Said Pasha. In 1863 Said was succeeded by the present ruler Ismail Pasha, second son of Ibrahim +Pasha, the eldest having been drowned in the Nile in 1856. + +There you have Egyptian history boiled down into a small space. I have not thought any reader would care to know the names of all +the kings of Egypt from Menes, five thousand years before Christ, to Ismail nearly two thousand years after Christ. + +Some were jolly old fellows, who lived as luxuriously as they knew how, though I dare say, none of them ever tasted raw oysters on +the shell, or prairie chicken broiled and on toast. They used to dress rather elaborately, and they built some magnificent temples +and tombs, which still remain to be wondered at by modern mortals. + +No construction of the present day can begin to compare with them in grandeur, but of this I shall have more to say by and by. +{501}The kings were buried with great care, but their tombs have been plundered in modern times, so that very little of the royal +relics can be found. + +Occasionally they stumble on something and it is at once put into the museum at Cairo. Through the kindness of the director of this +museum I was one day allowed to hold in my hand the heart of one of the most famous of the warrior kings of the XIXth Dynasty. It +wasn’t much of a heart, a dried and bandaged affair of little consequence, but it was no common occurrence to grasp it, and remember +that it once beat beneath the breast of a great warrior, who lived and loved, and ruled and died, three thousand years ago. + +Nearly all the modern greatness of Egypt is due to her present ruler. Mohammed Ali, was a man of great ability, and under his rule +the country received an impetus in the right direction. He founded schools, dug canals, and did many things for the prosperity of +the country, and when he had determined to act in a certain direction, he didn’t allow himself to be thwarted. At one time he had +decided to widen the Mooskee, now the principal street of the old part of Cairo, and was about to begin work when the Moslem priests +interfered and declared they would bring anathemas upon him if the design was not relinquished. + +He ordered the contumacious fellows arrested, and threatened to decapitate them unless they behaved themselves, They were in no +hurry to be ushered into the presence of Mohammed the Prophet, and so they yielded to Mohammed the Ruler. + +This recalls the story of Peter the Great, when he founded St. Petersburg and compelled the priests to bring the bones of one of the +saints from their resting place at Vladimir. The priests did not like the new location, and one day they took the bones and started +off for Vladimir, declaring that the ghost of the departed had told them to do so. Peter sent after them, with the threat of making +ghosts of all of them, unless they returned, and they did return, bones and all. There is nothing like having a will of your own, +and the power to use it. + +The Khedive is like his grandfather in many things, and is not easily thwarted when he has made up his mind to anything. He is a +liberal ruler, and believes in the enterprise and progress of {502}the Occident, rather than in the slow coach system of the Orient. +Though a Mohammedan he is no bigot, as is shown by the perfect freedom accorded to all religions, and by his personal gift of land +to any Christian society that wishes to build a church. + +He has a difficult position to occupy, as he is a Mohammedan and ruler of Mohammedans; when he comes in contact with any of the +prerogatives of the religion, he is obliged to devise a course that shall keep the religion inviolate. For example he wishes to +abolish slavery and to destroy the slave trade, but here he comes in contact with the Koran, which permits the ownership of human +property. + +He sends an army into the regions of the Upper Nile, and destroys the business of kidnapping and the importation of slaves; he +cannot liberate the slaves now held in Egypt, but he orders that when a slave runs away the machinery of the law shall not be used +for his recapture. Any slave in Cairo may run away, and be safe from arrest; owners and slaves are aware of this state of things, +and consequently the owners treat their slaves so well that they are not inclined to run away. I was told that slaves were generally +better treated than free laborers. This state of affairs was not unknown in some parts of our own border states previous to our +civil war. + +As an illustration of the power of the Khedive over his subjects, I will mention an incident which was narrated to me. + +When the Empress Eugenie was in Egypt she expressed a desire to witness an Egyptian wedding. The Khedive summoned an officer of his +staff, and told him to be ready to be married the next day. + +One of the ladies attached to the harem was designated as the bride, and the wedding came off in grand style, to the delight of the +Empress and of all concerned. His Highness paid the bills and set up the couple in good style, including the present of a house, +where the Empress paid them a congratulatory visit. + +An Arab school is a curiosity. The pupils study their lessons aloud, and make the place about as noisy as a political meeting, and +how they can learn, any thing is a surprise to a person from the Occident, where silence is considered desirable in a school-room. + +I looked repeatedly into these schools, and generally + +{503} + +[Illustration: 0518] + +{505}knew where they were, at least half a minute before I reached their doors. The master squats on the floor at one side of the +room, or stands among some of his pupils who are seated in rows or promiscuously through the rest of the apartment. Their lessons +are given to them upon slates or large cards, and they sit rocking back and forth and studying aloud. + +When they have committed a lesson, they go to the teacher and recite it, and if found perfect they receive another. The instruction +consists of reading and writing, the latter generally including passages from the Koran. + +Down to the time of Mohammed Ali, the schools of Egypt were not based upon any system; anybody who wished to to open a school could +do so, and children were sent there and received on payment of a small fee. Under that ruler a public school system was established; +it declined somewhat under his immediate successor, but has been revived and improved, to some extent, by the Khedive. + +The schools are divided into civil and military, and the civil schools are subdivided into primary, secondary, and special. + +In the primary schools, the pupils receive instruction in reading, writing, and arithmetic, and in most of them some foreign +language, generally French, is taught. When a certain proficiency is reached, the pupils enter the secondary schools, where they +are instructed in Arabic, and may also study Turkish, French, and English. The Arabic course includes history, pure mathematics, +geography, and drawing, and sometimes algebra and _belles-lettres_. + +From these schools a pupil may be passed by examination into one of the special schools, which are five in number, as follows: + +Land Surveying and Commercial School; Law School; Polytechnic School; _Arts et Metiers_ School; and the Medical School. + +The time required for study and graduation in these schools varies from two to four years each. The Medical School has a school +of midwifery for women, and is the only institution for feminine education in Egypt. The military schools include every branch of +military education; they are on the European model, and many of the professors are Europeans. {506}Every Christian community in +Cairo has its own schools, and some of them are quite large. There is an American mission school, and also an English one, and there +are French, Greek, Armenian, and Coptic schools, so that the Christians are not likely to grow up in ignorance. Many of the mosques +have free schools, and _medresse_, or colleges, attached to them. + +The _El Azhar_ mosque is the great college of Cairo, and also the principal university of the East. There are small porticoes, +divided into apartments, for the use of natives from different parts of Egypt and the Orient, each province or country having a +room to itself. The professors receive no salaries, but live upon presents from the pupils, and by copying books or performing other +literary work. There are nine thousand students, and more than three hundred professors attached to this university! Nearly all the +sciences taught in all the colleges of the globe have a place here. + +Arabic is not an easy language to acquire to perfection, but I am told that one can learn to talk it fairly in about twice the time +that it would take for learning a European language. In the short time that I was in Cairo I picked up a smattering, as I make it a +rule to do in all countries where I expect to stay more than a month. + +You will be astonished to find how far you can get along with a few words, if you only set about it in earnest. My Arabic was much +like the English of some of the donkey drivers; there were no prepositions and conjunctions in it, and the construction of the verbs +placed all the rules of grammar at defiance. + +In fact, you can get along without many verbs when you are put to it. All you want is the name of the thing you are after, and the +words for “how much.” Then you must have the numerals, and thus armed and equipped, you may set out on a shopping excursion with a +brave heart, and a consciousness that every shop-keeper you deal with will cheat you if possible. + +The Arabs begin to read a book where we would finish it, and they generally read from right to left, though not always. When they +write they hold the paper in the left hand, and grasp a small stick in the right. This stick is sharpened to a point, like a pencil, +and dipped in the ink, and with it the letters are formed with considerable rapidity. {507}As in some of the cities of Europe, there +are men whose profession it is to write letters for those unable to write, and you see these men squatted on the sidewalk, with +paper, pen, ink and sand before them, ready for a customer. They have a peculiar kind of ink-stand in Cairo; it is made of brass, +and has a long handle running back nearly a foot. This handle is hollow, and holds the pens, and it serves the purpose of sustaining +the ink-stand in the girdle. The ink is generally a little thicker than ours, but they can write with European ink without trouble. +You see these ink-stands very often in the girdles of merchants and accountants in the bazaars, and it is not unusual to see a man +standing or squatting on the sidewalk, and engaged in the production of a letter. And the oddest thing of the whole business is to +see him holding the paper in his hand; if you ask an Arab to sit at your desk to write a letter, the chances are fifty to one that +he will pick up the paper instead of placing it on the flat surface, as is our invariable custom. In the government offices they +have learned to write with the paper flat on the desk, but they do not take to it kindly. + +I have seen a high official sit at his desk and pick up a document in order to affix his signature, and he continued to hold the +paper until he had signed it and appended his seal. The seal is a very necessary part of the business; it is not put on with wax, +but is stamped with ink. + +Every year a caravan leaves Cairo for Mecca, and is accompanied by pilgrims to the birth-place of Mohammed. The march is through the +desert, and consumes from sixty to eighty days, sometimes exceeding the latter number. The annual pilgrimage from all parts of the +Mohammedan world is about seventy thousand, the number going by land is steadily decreasing, for the reason that one can now go +by steamer to Djeddah, on the Red Sea, and from thence two or three days on foot will bring him to the Holy City. Steamers run +regularly from Suez to Djeddah, and in the season of pilgrimage there are extra boats that carry deck passengers at a very low fare. + +The departure of the annual caravan from Cairo is a scene of great pomp. A camel is designated to carry the Mahmal, or sacred +canopy; it was originally designed to contain such of the {508}wives of the Caliphs as wished to make the journey, but latterly +it contains nothing, and has become simply a rich decoration, which ultimately finds a place in one of the mosques. Another camel +carries the _Kiswe Ji en nebbe_, a quantity of rich silk, covered with sentences from the Koran, embroidered in letters of gold. + +It is annually supplied from Cairo for lining the temple at Mecca; the old one is returned and cut into small bits for distribution +among those of the faithful who are unable to make the pilgrimage. + +The caravan starts from the Citadel, and there is generally a large crowd in attendance, to see it off. It has always been the +custom for the reigning Viceroy or Caliph to witness the departure of the caravan, but for two years the Khedive has not been +present in person. He has sent a deputy, in the shape of his son; the Viceroy or his deputy presents a purse of gold to the rider +of the camel to pay the expenses of the journey, and, formerly, this purse was noted for its size and weight. It has grown small by +degrees, and beautifully less, and the probability is that before many years, the presentation will cease altogether. The Khedive +shows a most emphatic desire to put an end to the useless and expensive mummeries that have been handed down to him from the early +days of Mohammedanism. + +The return of the pilgrims is quite an event in Cairo, but not so great as the departure, for the reason that the caravan straggles +a great deal, and the individual members are inclined to hurry to their homes with as little delay as possible. Formerly there was a +suspension of labor and a grand festival, but at present there is little more than a procession of the returning pilgrims. + +There is a much more disagreeable occurrence on the birthday of Mohammed, when the ceremony of the _doseh_ is performed. + +The word in Arabic means “treading,” and is descriptive enough as far as it goes. The return of the pilgrims from Mecca is arranged +so that it falls near the anniversary of the _Moolid en-Nebbe_, or birthday of the Prophet. There are many festivities on this day +which correspond to our Christmas; services are held in all the mosques, and those who can afford a good dinner and {509}suit +of clothes are sure to have them. There are ceremonies not only in the mosques, but on the streets. Dervishes go about with pins +sticking through their flesh, or bearing heavy burdens, and show no signs of pain or fatigue. + +Formerly there were dervishes who went about with coils of live serpents around them, and occasionally they amused the crowd by +eating one of the snakes. This pleasant practice has been discontinued, partly for the reason that many over-sensitive people +objected to it, and partly because the dervish stomach could not easily digest this irregular food. A man may eat a live snake, but +I doubt if he is likely to “hanker after it” any more than the countryman in the “crow” story. + +The public squares are filled with booths, swings, and other means of amusement, and there is always a dense crowd around them. +Reciters of romance are numerous, and any person familiar with the language of the country may hear the tales of the Arabian Nights, +or similar works of fiction, chanted in slow, measured accents, by men who have carefully committed them to memory. Formerly there +were many _Ghawasee_, or dancing girls; their employments were not entirely confined to dancing, and their appearance in public has +been forbidden by the authorities. There are frequent processions of dervishes, and at night the streets are hung with lanterns and +otherwise made more gay than usual. + +The ceremony of the _Doseh_ takes place just after the noon prayers, and a great crowd is always gathered to witness it. The +Sheik of the Saadeeyah dervishes passes the night and forepart of the day at the Mosque of Hassaneyn and devotes the time to the +repetition of prayers and invocations which shall fit him for the ceremony. When all is ready he mounts a horse and sets out, +accompanied by a numerous delegation of Moslems from various parts of the city. His horse is led by two men, and he proceeds at a +walking pace. + +At the spot selected for the performance some two or three hundred persons lie down in the street, closely wedged together so that +they make a very fine imitation of a corduroy road. Their heads are all one way and resting upon their folded arms, and the crowd +ranges close against them in a very compact hedge. Their {510}backs are upward, and they mutter “Allah!” + +“Allah!” without intermission while waiting the conclusion of the ceremony. + +When the Sheik approaches this novel causeway his horse becomes restive, and refuses to go on, but he is pulled by the two men who +hold the bridle and urged by those behind so that he does not hesitate a great while. But evidently he does not like his employment. + +[Illustration: 0525] + +He ambles rather hastily over the human pavement, and toward the end he gives a jump that would break into a gallop were he not +restrained by the man at his bridle. The fellows forming the pavement rise up the instant the horse passes over them, and join the +crowd which presses from behind, with an irregular shout of “Allah! Allah!” and this is the ceremony of the _dosch_. + +The Moslems insist that no harm comes to any one from the tread of the horse, as the dervishes are protected by the direct +interposition of Providence. Each person receives at least two treads from the horse’s feet, and in addition he has the gentle +footsteps of the two men leading the horse. One of these {511}worthies walks on the heads and the other on the feet of the prostrate +forms, and they endeavor to give everybody a show. They take short steps so that nobody shall be missed, and between them and the +horse, the corduroy performers ought to be satisfied. Whether from motives of delicacy or out of regard for the animate soil on +which they tread, these grooms walk barefooted, and carry their shoes in their hand. It is also worthy of remark that the horse +ridden by the Sheik is of medium size, and wears no shoes, and the Sheik is always a small man. In having a miracle wrought before +the eyes of the people, the Moslem priests are careful to make the conditions as easy as possible. They might select a horse of the +largest size, have him freshly and sharply shod and ridden by a Sheik whose weight would entitle him to the Presidency of the Fat +Men’s Association. But they know what they are about, and do nothing of the sort. + +I have talked with Moslems and other residents of Cairo about the _dosch_. The former insist that the prostrate men are saved by +a miracle, while the latter believe that more or less harm comes every year to the performers, and is concealed by the rush of the +crowd from behind. Any cry of pain that may be uttered is completely drowned by the shouts of the crowd; the horse steps on that +portion of the body which is very useful in occupying a chair, and can sometimes be kicked with impunity, and it is possible that +his feet have no lasting impression. + +At any rate not a shriek is heard, and no one is ever known by the public to have been injured. The dead and wounded, if any, +are dragged away and kept out of sight, and so great is Eastern stoicism, that not one of those trampled on will venture to give +utterance to his pain, as by so doing he would lose the protection of Allah; and be denied admission within the gates of Paradise! + +When the Nile has reached a certain height during the period of the inundation, there is a ceremony of cutting the embankment and +allowing the water to spread over the land. This was formerly an affair of great consequence; its origin is unknown, as the custom +existed in the time of the Pharaohs, and among the earlier dynasties. The place selected is at the opening of the canal, a short +distance from old Cairo, and formerly nearly half the population turned out to see the performance. {512}At the appointed hour the +Governor of Cairo, or a deputy of the Pasha, makes his appearance, accompanied by a gorgeous retinue of officers, and preceded by a +band of music. When all is ready half a dozen men rush forward and open the embankment with hoes and spades, and instantly the water +rushes in and fills the bed of the canal. The governor then throws a handful of money into the canal, and this is scrambled for by a +crowd of boys, who stand ready for it. + +Tradition says that formerly a virgin was thrown into the water and sacrificed to the river god, but the custom no longer prevails, +at least, in its original form. A pillar of earth is built up just below the opening, and dressed in white, and this is supposed to +represent the Bride of the Nile. Sometimes a doll is thrown into the water, as a substitute for the living girl formerly sacrificed; +whether the River God is satisfied with this offering, I am unable to say, but as the fertility of the Nile Valley is the same from +year to year, it is fair to presume that the sacrifice by proxy does not displease him. + +There are several other ceremonies at Cairo, but they are steadily declining in importance as year after year rolls on. The +government is becoming more and more practical, with each succeeding change of seasons, and as the government goes the people +follow. Cairo was once a stronghold of Islam; to-day it has ceased to be a reliance of the Moslem power, and probably the end of the +century will see it far more Christian than Mohammedan in character. It has ceased to be a center of fanaticism, and a Christian may +now walk through all its streets without fear of insult on account of his religion. + + +{513} + +[Illustration: 528] + + + + +CHAPTER XLI--THE GREAT PYRAMIDS.--IN THE KINGS’ BURIAL CHAMBERS. + + +_A Visit to the Great Pyramids--A Fellah not a Fellow--Sakkiehs and Shadoofs--A File of Camels and Donkeys--A striking Spectacle--A +horde of Arabs--Troublesome Customers--The Great Pyramid--How we climbed it--A Giant Stairway--Dimensions Extraordinary--The lost +Arts--Standing on the Summit--The Judge’s Predicament--Arab Cormorants--What we saw from the top of the Great Pyramid--Wonderful +Contrasts--Performance of an Arabian Acrobat--A race down the Pyramid Stairs--A perilous Descent--Penetrating the Interior--The +King’s Chamber--A dusty Receptacle of Coffins--The Sphinx--A mysterious Statue._ + + +EVERY visitor to Cairo makes at least one journey to the famous pyramids of Gizeh, and generally takes an early opportunity to make +it. Until within a few years there was considerable labor and fatigue to the excursion as it was necessary to ride there on donkeys, +and the whole trip required not less than five hours of saddle exercise. There was also the necessity of crossing the Nile on a +ferry boat, and as there was generally a crowd of men, boys, camels, and donkeys at the ferry, the journey across had a reasonable +amount of excitement in it. Now you ride to the Pyramids in a carriage and along a macadamized road, and you cross the Nile over an +iron bridge that is a great improvement upon the ferry. + +At my first visit we made up a party of twelve and therefore took three carriages for which we paid twenty francs each carriage, +quite a reasonable price compared with hack fares in America. + +We started about nine o’clock, after crossing the river found {514}ourselves among the fertile fields that produce many of the +vegetables consumed in Cairo. Fellahs were at work in these fields, some of them very scantily clad, particularly those who +manipulated the _sakkiehs_ or water lifters. A _sakkieh_ is a very primitive machine and consists of a pole and bucket supported +like the old fashioned well-sweep of America. The term _sakkieh_ is applied to all the apparatus for raising water, but the proper +name for the Egyptian pole and bucket is _shadoof_. The _shadoof_ is very ancient, as it is represented on the walls of the tombs +constructed three or four thousand years ago. + +We met troops of camels and donkeys laden with green provisions for Cairo; the majority of them carried freshly cut grass for the +sustenance of donkeys, horses, and camels, piled in great loads that half concealed the animals that bore them. The grass thus cut +is sold quite cheaply, and as many as four or five crops can be taken from the land in the course of the year. The fertility of the +Nile soil exceeds that of any land I have ever seen elsewhere; the lower Mississippi with all its richness is far behind it. + +Although good roads have been provided here burdens are still carried almost entirely on the backs of animals, very few carts being +in use. Almost the only vehicles visible here are the carriages of tourists going to or from the Pyramids or visiting one of the +Khedive’s palaces. There is a fine palace on this side of the Nile known as the Gezereh, and there are two new palaces in course +of construction. In spite of the tightened money market and the general absence of cash, the Khedive continues to make extensive +outlays on palaces and their adornments. He has several sons, and it is desirable that each shall have a home of his own. + +As we drive towards them the Pyramids fill the horizon, or rather they rise very prominently out of it. When we are yet an hour’s +drive from their base they seem not more than ten minutes away, an optical delusion, partly attributable to the clear atmosphere and +partly to the great size of the structures themselves. A house two stories in height stands at the foot of the first pyramid, and by +observing what a slight speck it makes against the great mass you can form an idea of what is before + +{515} + +[Illustration: 0530] + +{517}you. Long before we are near the Pyramids our carriage is surrounded by Arabs, bent on serving us in some way, or at all +events in wringing money from us. They follow the carriage at a run and have no difficulty in keeping up with us. Most of them run +bare-footed and keep their great clumsy shoes in their hands as the least fatiguing way of carrying the burdens. + +At the edge of the fertile land the road ascends an elevation and here it is necessary for us to dismount and walk as the track is +covered with sand that has blown from the desert and makes the ascent very difficult for a loaded vehicle. The horses have all they +can do to take the empty carriage up the slope and the drivers are obliged to use the whip very freely. + +We came to a halt on the broad open space below the Great Pyramid, and the drivers immediately removed and unharnessed their horses, +and took out the poles of the carriages. The Arabs flocked around us to make bargains for the ascent; there are some thirty-five or +forty that stay here to serve-travellers, and they have a fixed tariff for the ascent and the journey into the interior You pay two +shillings to the sheik of the tribe for the ascent and two more if you go inside, and for this he furnishes you with two or more men +to assist you. Half a dozen will volunteer to accompany you but two are quite enough. + +A friend had told me what to do so I stipulated that only the two men to serve, me should come near me otherwise I should pay +nothing. I required the sheik to select the two and away we started. A boy carrying a gargolet of water followed us, and I found +him desirable and consented that he should accompany me. The unusual exertion gives one a dryness in the throat that it is well to +alleviate occasionally. + +The Great Pyramid is built on a rock platform, about a hundred feet above the level of the plain below; from a very early period, +it was one of the cemeteries of Memphis, and at the present day the remains of tombs are scattered all around, most of them being +buried in the sand. The stones for building the pyramid came from the other side of the Nile, and were ferried over in boats to the +end of a causeway that was built to facilitate their transport to the place where they now lie. + +As it now stands, the pyramid consists of a series of steps {518}from two to four feet high, and very few of them are less than +three feet. To make the ascent, you yield yourself into the hands of the two Arabs appointed to accompany you; they stand above, and +lift you up by the arms, at the same time indicating where you are to place your feet. + +Imagine a series of steps as high or higher than an ordinary dining-table or writing-desk. + +[Illustration: 9533] + +And then remember that you must ascend on these steps a perpendicular height of four hundred and eighty feet. + +Originally, when completed, the pyramid had a casing of granite and limestone fitted into these steps, so that an ascent was +impossible. The casing has entirely disappeared, having been removed for building purposes in Cairo at the time of the Caliphs; on +the second pyramid, part of the casing still remains, though, broken in places, and gives an idea of the beauty of the whole, before +the work was injured. + +And now a few figures; skip them if you like, and don’t say anything about them. + +The great pyramid is seven hundred and forty-six feet long, and four hundred and eighty feet high. It covers an area of five +{519}hundred and thirty-six thousand square feet, or nearly thirteen acres. Its solid contents are calculated at eighty-five million +cubic feet. How much do you suppose that is? + +Well, you could build a wall four feet high and two feet thick, and something more than two thousand miles long, with the stones in +this pyramid, or you could build a wall twelve feet high and four feet thick all the way from Cincinnati to St. Louis--a distance +of three hundred and forty miles. And if you piled it up around Manhattan Island, where New York stands, you would encircle that +metropolis with a wall twenty feet thick and forty feet high. And remember that all this stone was hewn from the quarries, and moved +and piled up before the days of steam! + +How were the pyramids built? That is a conundrum which many people have puzzled over, and nobody has been able to answer. +The Egyptians have left nothing to indicate how they performed their work, and nobody has been able to devise a satisfactory +explanation. Many men have theorized about the matter, and every time anybody builds up a theory the rest of them show that it was +impossible to build the pyramids in that way. One of these days, something may be discovered to throw light upon the matter, but at +present all is darkness. + +All this time I have had you climbing up the northeast corner of the great pyramid, halting occasionally to take breath and a +swallow of water, and a glance at the country around and below us. It is tough work for the muscles, to climb these high steps, but +if you are patient and careful you will get along without much trouble. + +In about fifteen minutes we are at the top, and the Arabs indulge in a hurrah as we get there. They pestered me on the way up to +give them a personal fee, in addition to what I gave the sheik, and I promised it to them on condition that they should not allude +to it again until they reached the base. The men I had were strong, healthy fellows, rather dignified in their bearing, and they +spoke English, French, and Italian sufficiently well to be understood. They handled me without difficulty, and by making them +understand what I wanted at the outset, and being firm with them, I had no trouble. + +The Judge had so much bother with the Arabs, that he was {520}rather disgusted with his visit. About a dozen of the fellows +accompanied him, and gave him all sorts of assistance. Two pulled him up, and two pushed; one unwound his turban, and two others put +it around the Judge’s waist in order to lift him. + +[Illustration: 9535] + +Another carried his overcoat, another his cane, and another a bottle of water, and two or three others gave directions as to the +proper places for his feet. + +When he reached the top, they wanted some “backsheesh,” and he was injudicious enough to give it. This opened the ball, and they +kept at him; and he gave away, there and at the base of the pyramid, something over twenty-five francs. Each man who pulled and each +who pushed wanted something; the fellows who lifted at the turban wanted something, and the owner of the turban wanted something for +the use of it; the man who carried his overcoat wanted something, and so did the cane-bearer and the water-bearer; then the other +fellows wanted something, and after they had received something all around separately, they asked for a general fee in addition. You +could no more satisfy these brigands with any ordinary lot of money, than you could bail out Lake Erie with a teaspoon. + +Originally, the summit of the great pyramid was a point or very {521}nearly so; it has been removed so that it is now about thirty +feet square, some of the blocks resting higher than others. You can sit around them there very comfortably, but there isn’t much to +see when you are there--that is, nothing very different from what you can see at the base. On the west is the desert, north is the +rich delta of the Nile, east is Cairo, beyond the river and backed by the Mokattaw and other hills that fill the horizon, and south +there is the valley of the Nile, opening between the double lines of desert on either side. There are no mountains to attract the +eye with their varieties of color and jaggedness of outline; there are no lakes shining in the sunlight, and there is no glimpse of +the ocean with its ever-beating waves. + +The prettiest artificial features of the landscape are the walls and domes and minarets of Cairo, and the most salient natural +features are the sharp contrast of valley and desert. There is no intermediate ground; at one place it is rich alluvium, and six +inches away lies the arid sand. The one is a deep, rich green; the other is a greyish white, dazzling where it reflects the sun, and +tinted with the faintest shade of purple where it does not. The one is the perfection of fertility, the most fecund spot of land on +the globe; the other is bleak and utter sterility, with not the tiniest blade of grass or shred of lichen to relieve its desolation. +Nature draws nowhere a picture of sharper contrasts. + +Out from the deserts in the southern horizon comes the Nile, freighted with the mud which makes the wealth of Egypt. It is more than +that--it _is_ Egypt, and were it not for this river, the land of the Pharaohs, the Caliphs, and the Khedive would not exist. You +can trace the river as it winds away through the Delta and separates into the branches and canals which enable it to distribute its +blessings over a wide area There is no point where you can better realize how much the Nile is Egypt than when you look from the +summit of the great pyramid. + +While we were at the summit, an Arab proposed to run from where we stood to the top of the second pyramid in ten minutes, a feat +which at first glance seemed impossible. We finally agreed to give him five francs if he would do it, and away he started. He jumped +from block to block with the agility of a monkey, at {522}about the rate that an able-bodied boy descends an ordinary staircase, +when he is in a hurry to get something at the bottom. He ran across the space between the pyramids and up the other, but I observed +that he made the ascent with less appearance of hurry than when descending the first. He made the journey in a little more than ten +minutes, and I have heard of an Arab doing it inside of eight minutes. + +This is one of the stock amusements of the trip to the pyramids, and I have a book, written thirty years ago, in which the same feat +is mentioned. + +[Illustration:9537] + +We offered to give the whole crowd of Arabs five francs each if they would stand at the edge of the platform and then turn a +somersault downwards and outwards; they were inclined to consider the matter at first, but one of them, after a moment’s thought, +exclaimed, “It would kill us; we no do it.” + +We explained that this was exactly what we wanted. The fellow laughed, and replied, “It do you no good; plenty more Arabs left. They +come here and take our place, and they not good Arabs like us.” + +We had nothing more to say. + +In descending the pyramid, my two Arabs stepped ahead and took my hands as I jumped from step to step. I found it much easier than +the ascent, as I had my weight, which is not that of a feather, to assist me. + +There is a difference of opinion about the descent, some affirming that it is much worse than going up, while others are equally +vehement in saying that it is much easier. It depends upon a + +{523} + +[Illustration: 0538] + +{525}variety of personal circumstances, such as weight, age, condition of muscles and lungs, and upon the manipulations of the Arabs +that have you in charge. The same conditions in every respect will not be found in any two persons. + +In any event, unless much accustomed to climbing, you will have a realizing sense of weariness for the rest of the day, and when you +attempt to rise next morning, and move your stiffened limbs, you can easily imagine yourself to be your own grandfather. + +The great pyramid was built by Cheops, one of the kings of Memphis, who ruled about twenty-seven hundred years before Christ--some +say nearly four thousand years--and was intended for his monument. Three hundred thousand men are said to have been employed twenty +years upon its construction, and some authorities say it was not completed till after his death. When his mummy was ready, it was +put inside the granite sarcophagus intended for it, and the entrance was carefully walled up and concealed. It remained thus closed +for many centuries. In the year 820 of our era, one of the Caliphs of Cairo ordered a search for the opening, and it was finally +discovered at quite a distance up from the ground on one side. Nothing of consequence was found there, and the Caliph was greatly +disappointed, as he had expected a vast treasure which tradition said was concealed there. + +It is quite as wearisome work to go inside as to climb to the top, and many persons think it is worse. + +From the opening, you descend about sixty feet, at an angle of 26°, through a passage way three ft. five in. high, and three ft. +eleven in. wide. Then, after a slight detour, you have an ascent at the same angle for nearly three hundred feet, some parts of it +being quite low, and others expanding into a high gallery. At the end of this passage is the sepulchral vault known as the King’s +Chamber, and containing nothing but an empty sarcophagus of red granite. The sides and roof of the chamber are of polished granite; +the room measures thirty-four ft. by seventeen, and the height is a little over nineteen feet. + +Below it, and reached by a horizontal gallery from the main entrance, is another apartment called the Queen’s Chamber, {526}somewhat +smaller than the upper one, and there are three or four other insignificant apartments whose use has not been clearly determined. + +The passage by which we enter the pyramid continues three hundred and twenty feet downwards, at the same angle as at the +commencement, and so straight is it that when you are at the lower end you can see the sky as if looking through the tube of a huge +telescope. At the end of it there is a small chamber, and in this a well has been dug thirty-six feet, without finding any signs +of water. The statement of Herodotus, that this chamber was filled by the inflow from the Nile, is probably on a par with other +statements of this reliable gentleman. + +Most travellers are satisfied with a very brief examination of the interior of the pyramid, and are glad to scramble out without +delay. The heat is pretty high, the air is close, and the dust almost stifling. Then there are the smoke of the candles and the +glare of the magnesium wire, used for lighting up the interior of the chambers, and the noise made by the Arabs, which is ten times +worse than the same amount of din in the open air. + +Formerly, they had a trick of frightening timid persons into the payment of heavy “backsheesh,” to secure a safe return to the +outside, and not unfrequently they attempt the same thing now. Some persons have been very roughly handled by them, and on a few +occasions they have verified the American proverb about waking up the wrong passenger. + +Early this season, an Englishman and an American went together to visit the pyramid, and, while they were inside, the Arabs began +to threaten them. One Arab was knocked senseless, and the others were told that they would have the same fate, if they did not +instantly and safely take the strangers outside. + +They obeyed, and when the outer air was reached were told that they would not receive anything for their services. + +They became importunate, and two more of them were knocked down. A squad of soldiers from a surveying party happened to be near; the +officer in charge of them was appealed to successfully, and the offenders were severely thrashed. Since then, there has been less +rudeness to persons visiting the interior of the pyramid. {527}About a quarter of a mile southeast of the great pyramid is the +famous work of antiquity known as the Sphinx. It is much mutilated about the face, and is buried up to the breast in the sand. Its +origin and meaning are unknown; volumes have been written about it, and for more than two thousand years it has been the subject of +much learned controversy, of which I have not space to give even the outline. It has the body of an animal in a crouching position, +and the head of a man. The body, a hundred and forty feet long, is formed of the natural rock, with pieces of masonry here and there +to fill up the cavities. The head is cut out of the solid rock, and was originally about thirty feet from the top of the forehead to +the bottom of the chin, and about fourteen feet broad. + +Originally, it had a cap, wig, and beard; the cap is gone, but the wig is still there, and the beard, which has fallen, lies on the +ground below. As it now stands, only the head, shoulders, and back of the Sphinx are visible, the sand being everywhere drifted and +piled around the rest. There was, originally, a temple and altar between its paws, and there was a flight of steps that descended +from a platform in front of the temple to the plain below. + +The nose and most of the lips are gone, as though the Sphinx has been the party of the second part, in a prize-fight for the +championship, but, with all its disfiguration, the statue retains much of the comeliness and grandeur for which it has long been +famous. + +What must have been its beauty before time and man placed their spoiling hands upon it, and before the encroaching desert heaped the +sand around it, burying the platform, the steps, and the temples, and converting the whole scene into one of desolation! Could any +pageant of modern times surpass the spectacle of the processions of Memphis, arranged after the manner of the most brilliant period +of Egyptian history, and coming to offer adoration at the temple guarded between the paws of that figure hewn from the living rock +and overshadowed by that mysterious and immobile face? Shall we ever know who was its architect, and what was the purport of this +remarkable statue? Who will explain the riddle of the Sphinx? {528}Proceeding southerly from the Sphinx, we reach a temple which +was discovered and excavated a few years ago. It is lined with red granite, porphyry, and alabaster, and the stones of which it is +composed are very nicely joined together. + +Its history is unknown, but, from certain inscriptions and statues found there, it is supposed to owe its erection to Cephrenes, or +Shafra, the builder of the second pyramid. + +The Arabs broke off pieces of the stone to sell to us, but we declined to buy. Part of a statue lies buried in the sand; a statue +of Cephrenes was discovered here, and is now in the museum at Cairo. There are many tombs and small temples all around the pyramids, +but they have no great, interest after one has seen the great pyramid and the Sphinx. All the tombs, as far as known, have been +opened and examined, and their contents, if of any value, carried away. Doubtless there are some yet undiscovered, but at present +there are no explorations in progress. + +[Illustration: 5543] + + +{529} + +[Illustration: 0544] + + + + +CHAPTER XLII--A VOYAGE UP THE NILE.--THE MYSTERIES OF EGYPTIAN ART AND WORSHIP. + + +_Up the Nile in a Sail-Boat--Starting for the Cataracts--Advantages of a Drago man--A Tricky Lot--Frauds on Travellers--Our +Party--Rather Cosmopolitan--Getting Ahead of Mr. Cook--Our Little Game, and How it Worked--A Bath with Spectators--Decidedly +Cool--Getting Aground--A Picturesque Landscape--Last Glimpse of the Pyramids--Spending Night on Shore--Among the Ruins of +Memphis--The Wonders of Egyptian Art--What Marriette Bey Discovered--Laying Bare a Mysterious Sepulchre--Ancient Egyptian +Worship--Sacred Bulls and Beetles--A History Written in Stone--Bricks Made by the Israelites._ + + +A JOURNEY to Egypt without a trip up the Nile is something like Hamlet without the melancholy Dane. Time and money are the +insignificant requisites for the excursion, and it is necessary to be pretty well provided with both, in order to make the journey a +comfortable one. + +The proper way to do the Nile trip is in a sail boat or _dahabeeah_, as it is called there; this is the way that most travellers +have made it, and the way in which all were obliged to make it until a few years ago, when steamers were introduced. For a +_dahabeeah_ voyage you must be prepared to take your own time, and not be restricted to getting back to Cairo at a certain date, +unless you make that date so far distant as to cover all contingencies. You can hire the boat by the day or by the course; either +way is not altogether satisfactory, as I have heard that no matter which mode you select, you will afterwards advise intending +voyagers to take the other. If you go by the day, it is for the {530}interest of the boatman to be on the river as long as possible, +and he will invent all sorts of excuses for delays. + +[Illustration: 0545] + +If you go by the course, you are hurried along as fast as he can crowd you, and if you wish to stop at a place while ascending the +river, he will make a variety of objections to your doing so, unless there is an adverse wind or some other cause to prevent the +advance of the boat. Most travellers charter the boat by the course, and, all things considered, this is the best plan,--with +a stipulation for a certain number of days for stoppages at various points. From fourteen to twenty days delay are the ordinary +stipulation, and the whole journey can be made from Cairo to the First Cataract and back in about fifty days. Three weeks must be +added if the trip is prolonged to the Second Cataract. These periods are approximations, as the trip has been made to the First +Cataract and back inside of forty, and in excess of eighty days, and to the Second inside of sixty, and beyond a hundred. + +A few years ago the Egyptian government placed some steamers on the Nile, and arranged to run them to the First Cataract {531}and +back at stated intervals during the winter season. For a sailboat journey, much preparation is required, as you must hire a boat, +stock it with provisions, engage a dragoman, and do a variety of things before you start, and the preparations will take from a week +to a fortnight, according to circumstances. Sometimes a dragoman will take you for a stipulated sum per day, and supply you with +boat and everything, but in this case you can be sure that you will not be well supplied, unless you pay a high price. + +With the steamboat trip you have no trouble at all; you have only to buy your ticket, and go on board at the appointed time; you are +fed, lodged, furnished with guides and donkeys, told when to admire, and how much you can admire, and have a given number of days, +hours, and minutes in which to do everything. If no accident happens, you will be back in Cairo twenty days and five hours from +the time of your departure, and will have been put through the Nile trip, as though you were a trunk or a bale of goods. You have +a printed programme of the places to be visited, and of the time to be devoted to each, and also of the sights at each of those +places. You are instructed not to stray from the party, but to follow the dragoman and observe the orders he gives. + +There is in London a man, named Cook, who has been for a quarter of a century or more a dealer in excursion tickets for England +and the Continent. A few years ago he extended his excursion business to the East, and latterly he has extended it to America, and +around the globe. He has a rival named Gaze, and they are very savage on each other. Gaze says (in polite phraseology) that Cook is +a liar, and Cook (in equally polite phraseology) says Gaze is a liar. + +I have read both their pamphlets, and have come to the conclusion, when perusing their personal anathemas, that they both tell the +truth. + +Cook sells tourist and single tickets for almost everywhere, and Gaze does likewise. To travel on one of the tourist tickets is +beautiful in theory, but to me, at least, a great nuisance in practice. I always avoid the tourist tickets when I can, but sometimes +you find a line of transit monopolized by one of these enterprising agents, and are obliged to take his ticket or not go {532}at +all. Cook has managed to obtain the appointment of sole and exclusive, agent for the Nile steamers, and consequently the traveller +who cannot spare the time and money for a _dahabeeah_ journey, must patronize Cook. + +To ascend by sail-boat to the First Cataract, and return to Cairo, will cost two persons about fifteen hundred dollars, and four +persons about two thousand dollars. To go to the Second Cataract will cost about five hundred more in each case. If the party is +larger, the charge is somewhat lower for each person. For these figures one can get a large, well-fitted boat, and be entitled to +live with every possible comfort; lower rates can be made for smaller boats, and less luxury; the best terms I heard of when I +was in Egypt, were sixty-five Napoleons (two hundred and sixty dollars gold) each for a party of five to the First Cataract, and +allowing them fourteen days for stoppages on the return trip. I was several times offered a contract at seventy or eighty Napoleons +each, for a party of five or six to the First Cataract, and for a hundred Napoleons each, to the Second. But this was late in the +season (early in January), in fact too late to have a reasonable chance of reaching the Second Cataract. To go there, one should +start in the latter part of November, or early in December, and for the First Cataract one should start in December. Early in the +season the prices are high; later on they are more reasonable, as the dragomen and owners of boats begin to be doubtful of securing +an engagement. + +The price by steamer is forty-six pounds sterling, including everything except saddles for donkey-riding and one or two +insignificant items, which rouse the temper much more than they deplete the purse. After you have paid an exorbitantly high price, +and are told that it includes everything, you are then told that you must pay five shillings extra for a saddle, and eight shillings +for a chair; then when you reach the First Cataract, you are told it will cost from two to five shillings more to see the cataract, +although the advertisement specially says “The ticket includes the trip to the First Cataract and back.” These petty frauds are of +course inseparable from the tourist business, as I never yet knew of a person who had bought a ticket to include everything who was +not called on to pay something more. The nearest one can {533}come to it, is on an ocean steamer, and on some of the river boats +in America, but even there you are liable to be bled considerably in the course of your journey. You are sometimes very forcibly +reminded of the story of the traveller, who said that the terms of a certain hotel out west were four dollars per day, with meals +and lodging extra. + +We were a party of thirty persons altogether, and included six nationalities,--American, English, French, German, Danish, and +Italian. + +Every place on the boat was occupied, and there might have been a dozen more, had there been any place to put them in. The boats +leave every two weeks from the first of December to the end of March, and if at any time there are passengers enough to fill an +extra boat, one is sent off. + +Three o’clock was the hour for starting, so we left the hotel at two, sending our luggage on a _charette_, and taking donkeys, (for +ourselves,) to the landing. + +Gustave and I thought we would get ahead of Mr. Cook a little, by taking our own wine along, as the wines on the boat were extra, +and sold at a very high price, and we found that we would save about fifty per cent, by taking wine from the shop, and paying Cook +a shilling a bottle, the advertised price for corkage. So we bought three cases and put them with our baggage, but they were stopped +on the deck of the steamer, by the Chief Steward of the line, who said he would examine the wine, fix a price upon it, and then +charge us fifty per cent, on its value. We had about five minutes of very lively talk, which ended in our triumph, as we had taken +care to bring a copy of the advertisement, with the proper paragraph ready marked for inspection. + +It turned out that Cook had bought a large quantity of wine from the steamboat company, at the time he took charge of the business, +and was anxious to sell it. Under such circumstances it was very natural that he should object to a passenger supplying himself +with wine to drink on the voyage. It reminded me of the enterprise of train boys on American railways who neglect to fill the +water-coolers in the cars, in order that they may be able to assuage the thirst of passengers, by selling them lemonade at five or +ten cents a glass. {534}Of course there were some passengers who came late, so that we were not off until half an hour beyond the +appointed time. We amused ourselves, while waiting, by watching the movements of the people on shore. Troops of women and girls came +down to the river to fill water jars, which they poised on their heads and then carried away. Occasionally a man came down to fill +a pig-skin, and I observed that the men never carried water in anything else than a pig or goat-skin, while the women as invariably +carried it in jars. In several places, men and women, some of them very scantily dressed, were washing clothes in the river, and +some of the water for drinking purposes was scooped up unpleasantly near the scene of their operations. One man came to the bank +about twenty feet from the stern of our boat, removed his garments, and took a bath with as much _sang froid_ as if he were the only +person present. + +The human form divine, without superfluous adornment or encumbrance, is a frequent object in an Egyptian landscape. A student of +living figures, _a la nature_, would here find a good field for his observations. + +We had not been ten minutes under way before there was an alarm of fire, and the boat was stopped. It was nothing very serious, only +the awning over the upper deck had taken fire from a spark from the chimney, and a hole about six inches across was burned in the +canvas. A little while afterward we went aground, but we did not stick there long; half an hour later there was something wrong +about the engine, and we had to run to the shore. None of these things wasted much time, but they didn’t promise well for the +future. Luckily, however, they were the only events of the kind in the voyage, except that we went aground occasionally, and the bad +beginning proved like many other similar affairs in life, a good ending. + +We steamed past the city, watching the grey walls of Cairo, the domes and minarets of the mosques, the palaces and hovels, the +gardens of the Island of Roda, the building containing the famous Nilometer, the green fields of the valley, the glistening sands +of the desert, the yellow hills of the Mokattam, bounding the Lybian waste, the palm-trees stippled here and there, singly and in +clusters, the _dahabecahs_, with their long-sloping sails and {535}their trim and jaunty appearance, the native boats sunk deep with +cargoes of food destined for digestion in the great stomach of the city, the camels and donkeys and buffaloes, on the bank of the +river the half-dressed or almost undressed natives working the _shadoofs_ to raise water for irrigating the land, the groups of +natives scattered here and there at work or lazily idling away their time, and over all, the clear sky of Egypt, with scarcely a +touch of color and with no mist or haze to keep back the rays of the sun. Away to the west were the pyramids of Gizeh, and south of +them were the pyramids of Sakkarah, among the burning sands and overlooking the site of Memphis. Eastward were the hills that border +the Lybian desert, and in the north was the spreading valley of the Nile. As we steamed on, the broad valley disappeared, and the +hills seemed to shut in close upon the river. The great pyramids grew faint in the distance, and when the sun went down, they were +just perceptible through the tops of the palm-trees. + +We stopped for the night at Badresheyn, a village about fifteen miles above Cairo; we were to lie there until daylight, as these +steamers do not run at night. From this point passengers on the _dahabeeahs_ generally make an excursion to the site of Memphis, and +to the Apis Mausoleum. + +As for Memphis there is very little of it. A half buried statue lying on its face is shown you, and there are a few substructions +and some heaps of ruins. There are some statues and statuettes in the Museum at Cairo, that were discovered at Memphis, and i the +sites of two temples have been traced. I went to Memphis with a party early in January, and at that time the water was so high +that most of the famous statue was invisible. This statue was originally about fifty feet high, and hewn from a single block of +limestone; it stood in front of a temple and is supposed to be the one mentioned by Herodotus. Memphis was used as a quarry for +supplying stone for the construction of Cairo, and hence the disappearance of the ancient city. + +The ride from here to the Apis Mausoleum, or Serapeum as it is frequently called, is partly through a grove of palm trees and partly +through the desert. This was only recently discovered, and rather curiously we are indebted to a passage in Strabo, for {536}the +mention of its site. M. Mariette, conservator of the Monuments of Ancient Egypt, found it in 1860, by one day discovering the head +of a sphinx in the sand, and beneath the head was the body. Mariette then thought of a passage in Strabo which says, “There is also +a Serapeum in a very sandy spot where drifts of sand are raised by the wind to such a degree that we saw some sphinxes buried up to +their heads and others half buried.” + +Mariette took this as a clue and went to work. The labor was most discouraging as the sand kept falling in almost as fast as it was +taken out. An avenue six hundred feet long was cleared out, and sometimes it was necessary to dig the trench sixty or seventy +feet deep. A hundred and fifty sphinxes were discovered, besides the pedestals of many others. The foundations of the temple were +discovered and laid bare; many statues were found, and at last in 1861 the Apis Mausoleum or Burial place of the Sacred Bulls was +opened. The avenue and the foundations of the temple are again covered with sand, and so is a portion of the Mausoleum, but the most +interesting part is still kept open. + +We left our donkeys at the house where M. Mariette lived during the excavation, and accompanied an Arab guide to the tomb. Entering +through a door and descending some steps, we were in the vaults, which consist of parallel galleries, each more than two hundred +yards long and united at the ends. The galleries are hewn out of the solid rock, and were evidently cut with great care, but there +is nothing very remarkable about them. The wonderful feature of the place is the stone coffins in which the sacred bulls were +buried. There are twenty-four of them in recesses, on the sides of the galleries, but never opposite each other, and they are about +the heaviest things in the coffin line that anybody has ever seen. They vary a little in size, but the average may be taken at +thirteen feet long, seven feet six inches wide, and eleven feet high. + +Now stop and think before you go on; stop and think how large a room it would take to hold one of these coffins; well, each coffin +is one solid piece of granite, from the quarries at Assouan, five hundred and eighty miles up the Nile, and is finished as nicely as +you ever saw anything in the granite line. Four or five persons can sit comfortably inside, and one of them contains the + +{537} + +[Illustration: 0552] + +{539}table and chairs where the Empress Eugenie, and the Prince and Princess of Wales took lunch when they came here. The lid of +each coffin is in proportion to the rest of the work, and like it is of a single piece of granite. An effort was made a few years +ago to remove one of the coffins, but it was unsuccessful. + +The Egyptians knew some things that we don’t. We can’t move these stone coffins; they moved them along the Nile nearly six hundred +miles, and from the East to the West bank, and put them in these galleries underground and exactly in the recesses where they wanted +them, and they used them as the burial places of the sacred bulls of Memphis; the bulls that they worshipped as the incarnation of +divinity. + +All the region around here was a burial place, and many excavations have been made among the tombs. Thousands of mummies have been +found, and doubtless thousands more might be discovered if further researches were made. It is four thousand years since some of +these mummied gentlemen were pickled and preserved, and they have kept well; you may find them to-day as fresh as when they were +planted, and they reflect creditably upon the mummy-sharps that put them up, and also upon the wonderfully dry climate of Egypt. I +half suspect that the climate is responsible for the religious faith of the ancient Egyptians, and particularly for that part of it +which bade them bestow so much care upon their tombs and the preservation of the body. + +Had their climate been like that of London or New York, they would have constructed a different religion, as they would have known +they could not successfully carry out the mummy part of it. + +Not far from the Bull-Pits, as they are irreverently called, is a portion of a tomb of a very early date, which is known as the Tomb +of Tih. The body of Mr. Tih was buried in the rock below, and the portion now visible is the entrance chamber to the establishment. +The interesting feature about it is the mass of sculptures and paintings on the walls. Most of them are done in low relief, and very +well done too. The drawing and execution show great artistic skill, and some of the groups evince a knowledge of perspective. The +scenes represented are supposed to be incidents in the life of Tih; they represent him at home and in the field, and also at the +chase. {540}Tih was a priest who lived at Memphis about the Vth dynasty of the ancient empire; that is to say, about thirty-seven +hundred years before Christ, or fifty-six hundred years ago. We wont be particular about a year or two. He is dead now, or at all +events they buried him here. To describe all the scenes pictured on the walls of this tomb, would keep me writing for a week, +and then I shouldn’t be through. In some of them Tih is hunting crocodiles and hippopotami; in others he is looking on, while his +servants till the fields; in others he is superintending the building of a wall; and so on through all the incidents of a life of +that period. The life of the Ancient Empire can be studied from the pictures on this and other tombs of the locality, and we can +learn what they did and how they did it, what animals they used, and what most delighted them to engage in. Some of the pictures on +the Tomb of Tih have a comic touch about them, and show that there was fun even so far back as fifty-six centuries ago. + +There is one picture which shows some donkeys, brought up to be laden, and they are raising their heels in a miscellaneous sort of +a way, and making things rather lively for those who are trying to control them. In another picture, where some men are fishing, one +has fallen from the boat, and his friends are pulling him out of the mud. In another, a man has evidently been pulling at a rope, +which has broken, and left him to fall in an attitude which is decidedly comical. + +Evidently Tih was no slouch. He got up his tomb regardless of expense, and made it the best of the kind. The Egyptians often spent +more money on their tombs than on their houses; they considered that they were only temporary occupants of their houses, but that +the tomb was to be their eternal dwelling place. The tomb was the real home, and hence the effort to surround the occupant with the +scenes he had witnessed on earth. + +One of the pyramids of Sakkarah is built in degrees or terraces, is nearly two hundred feet high, and, next to Gizeh, is the largest +of the pyramids. It is supposed to belong to the period of the First Dynasty of the Ancient Empire, and to be the oldest monument, +not only in Egypt, but in the whole world. According to several archaeologists, it was erected five thousand years {541}before +Christ. It is built, not of stone, but of sun-dried brick, and though portions of it had crumbled, they have not altered the general +appearance of the pyramid. Could you wish for better evidence of the preservative qualities of the climate of Egypt? This pyramid +was opened in 1825, but nothing of consequence was found in it. I had had quite enough of climbing at Gizeh, and therefore did not +attempt to ascend here, and I have not heard of any other person trying to climb it. + +Some of the archaeologists say that the bricks of which this pyramid is composed were made by the Israelites, during their +captivity. I shouldn’t be surprised if this was the case. I certainly don’t know that the bricks were _not_ made by them. + +[Illustration: 0556] + + +{542} + +[Illustration: 0557] + + + + +CHAPTER XLIII--LIFE ON THE BANKS OF THE NILE.--COPTS, JUGGLERS, AND THIEVES.--AMUSING EXPERIENCES. + + +_Through an Arab village--Creating a Sensation--The “Doubter” alarmed--The li Professor perpetrates a hoax--The Egyptian +Saratoga--An Oriental Post-Office--A queer Town--Specimens of Ancient Art--A wooden statue three thousand years old--A Coptic +Convent--“Backsheesh, Howadji!”--Carrying money in their I mouths--Sturdy Beggars--An expert Swimmer--The Copts, who are +they?--Skilful swindlers--Sugar Mills on the banks of the Nile--Egyptian Jugglers--A Snake-Charmer--Adroit Thieves--A Melancholy +Experience in Donkey-riding._ + + +I WAS up early on the first morning out from Cairo, and found the sun rising through a thin mist, which cleared away very speedily. +Our dragoman went ashore to get a supply of milk for the breakfast table, from the village opposite, and Gustave and I followed him, +and were soon in a tangle of narrow lanes, that were very crooked and would greatly puzzle a stranger to find his way among them. + +Three or four times we brought up into _culs-de-sac_, or blind alleys, and had to force our way back and try again. Dogs barked and +children gathered around us, and some buffalo cows took fright at the apparition of a couple of Europeans and fled into one of the +houses. Chickens on a house top flew away, as if we had come to eat them, and some of the Arabs came out with expressions on their +faces the reverse of pleasant, Evidently we had created a sensation, but not a very agreeable one. + +The milk was soon obtained, and we obeyed the warning whistle and went on board. The voyage through the day was {543}not specially +interesting, as there are no ruins of interest on this part of the river, and the banks are rather monotonous. One hour was much +like another, and the sights were nearly the same--crumbling banks, shadoofs, donkeys, camels and Arabs, sand-bars and islands, palm +trees fringing the horizon or standing out in front of the grey hills of the desert, the sandy waste in the distance, and the river, +covered more or less thickly with Arab boats. + +These boats, when laden, were sunk rather deeply, and boards were placed along the sides to prevent the water breaking over. The +“Doubter” was puzzled to know why they always put these boards at the sides of the boats. The Professor (this was the name we +sometimes gave to Gustave) came to his relief with the following explanation: + +“The Nile rises every year, and they put these boards up while the river is high to prevent the water coming into the boats, just as +they build up the banks to keep the fields from being drowned out.” + +The “Doubter” was satisfied for a moment, but only for a moment. + +“But will the boats float on the water, whether the river is high or low,” he asked, “and if they do, what is the use of the +side-boards at one time more than another?” + +The Professor was equal to the emergency, and explained that the rise of the river was so rapid, and the boats were so slow in their +motion, that the flood frequently overtook and swamped them. There was no further conversation on this topic. + +One of the points passed early in the morning was Helwan, which contains some remarkable springs of sulphur. They were known to the +early Egyptians, and it is recorded that one of the kings used to send leprous persons there, in the hope of curing them, or, at all +events, of separating them from the rest of the people. They have been quite neglected in later times, until a few years ago, when +their virtues were discovered and a bathhouse and hotel were erected there. They are much visited by Europeans and Turks, and some +persons have been benefited by them. An omnibus runs there twice a week from Cairo, and much of the time the hotel is full. The +place is in the desert, {544}a little distance from the river, and the absence of shade trees, grass, or anything of the sort, makes +the spot rather dreary for a lengthened stay. But the place is gradually growing fashionable, and when it becomes the _mode_ to go +there I fancy they will have more hotels and society enough to make the time pass without too much stupidity. + +In the afternoon we reached Beni-Soef, and took a stroll through the town, which has a population of about five thousand, and can +boast of a fairly-stocked bazaar. We saw nothing of importance in our walk that we had not already seen at Cairo. I strayed from the +party and hired a boy to direct me to the post-office, where I posted a letter for America. The place was closed, but luckily I had +the proper stamps on the letter, so that there was nothing to do beyond dropping the missive into the box. + +The Egyptian postal department is quite well managed; the postmaster general is an Italian, and the most of his employés are of his +nationality. The office at Cairo is in a large building, specially erected for it, and you have no trouble in finding the delivery +windows and in obtaining the proper stamps, when you want them. They pay great attention to the delivery of letters to foreigners, +and a placard in all the hotels informs persons about to ascend the Nile, that by leaving their addresses at the office, they +can have their mail matter forwarded to any point on, the river they may designate. The steamboats carry letters to parties on +dahabeeahs, and several times the boat was stopped to deliver such parcels. + +The pyramid of Meidoon in this vicinity is supposed to be older than any of the pyramids of Gizeh, as it was probably erected by the +predecessor of Cheops. All around it are tombs, and some of them have been explored with the most gratifying results. In one of them +two stone statues, in perfect preservation, were found in 1872, and are now in the Museum at Cairo. + +They belong to the Hid Dynasty, and are consequently more than six thousand years old. The work on them is admirable, and they are +evidently likenesses, and excellent ones too. The eyes are made of crystal, with a piece of black porphyry for the pupils, and this +combination gives them a remarkably life-like + +{545} + +[Illustration: 0560] + +{547}appearance. I have several times lingered in front of them in admiration of their excellence, and one day, while I was standing +there, the director of the museum said: + +“You should see them late in the afternoon, when the slanting rays of light fall upon them; they sometimes look as if ready to step +out and speak, and seem much more human than inanimate.” + +The art of sculpture has not advanced as much as many persons imagine. + +There is in the museum another statue of about the same age, but it is made of wood; it represents a man standing erect, and is +about half the natural size, and as life-like as any piece of work that ever issued from a Greek or Roman studio. Its eyes are +inserted within a closing covering of bronze, which serves for the lids; the eye itself consists of opaque, white quartz, with a +piece of rock crystal in the centre, as a pupil; there is a glittering point beneath this crystal, so that the resemblance to +life is almost perfect. The head and body are remarkably well executed, and evidently the figure is a good likeness of the person +represented, who was not a king, or a divinity, but simply a _sheik-el-beled_, or village chief. The statue was complete when found, +with the exception of the feet, which have been supplied, to enable the figure to be placed on a pedestal. Originally, the statue +was covered with a slight coating of stucco, painted red and white, but this is nearly gone now. + +On a bluff, on the east bank of the river, there is a Coptic convent, many of whose inmates are accustomed to visit passing +boats, and beg for “backsheesh.” We had a visit from them; the first that was known of their coming was by a rush of two or three +passengers to the after part of the steamer. They were followed by all the others then on deck, and the cause of the movement was +seen in the small boats, which we towed astern. + +A tall, muscular fellow, perfectly nude, was standing there and gesticulating to the passengers with the explanation, “backsheesh, +howadji; ana Chritiané” (“a present, gentlemen, I am a Christian.”) + +His dress, or the absence of it, caused the ladies to make a precipitate retreat, and to fall again to their reading, with {548}an +appearance of deep absorption. Soon another beggar joined the fellow, and we tossed a few coppers into the boat. They took the money +in their mouths, as they had no other way of carrying it, and one of them got so much copper that it nearly strangled him. About a +dozen made the attempt to board the steamer, and more than half of them succeeded. Remember that the steamer was going at full speed +against the stream and you will wonder how they got on board. I watched one fellow, and here is his mode of operations. + +These men swim, not after the Occidental manner, but with a hand-over-hand motion, analagous to the swimming of a dog. When a man +wanted to board the steamer, he took a position near her supposed track, so that when she passed him the wheels were not more than a +yard from his head. The instant the wheel had gone by, he struck out most vigorously towards the stern of the steamer, and by great +effort was able to climb into the small boat, towing behind us. Formerly they came on the steamer itself, and rendered it necessary +for the ladies to retreat to the cabins, but at present they can come no further than the small boats. + +The Copts are supposed to be the descendants of the ancient Egyptians, but they have become so mixed with the Arabs and others, that +it is hard to say what they are. They form about one-sixteenth of the population, and the most of them are Christians; the name is +generally applied only to the Christian natives, but there are many Copts who are Mohammedans. + +Their ancient language is almost lost; it is used in the churches for reading the prayers, in the same way that the Catholics use +Latin, and the Russians the Slavonic. Their language in daily life is the Egyptian Arabic of the rest of the country; as a rule, +they are better educated than the rest of the people, and are extensively employed as clerks and bookkeepers, not only in shops, but +in various government offices. They have a cleaner and better kept appearance on the whole than the Moslem Arabs, and some of +them are such great rascals, and show so much skill in swindling, as to indicate considerable familiarity with the principles of +civilization. + +The Copts were among the earliest converts to Christianity, {549}but they embraced heretical doctrines, which received the +denunciation of the Church in the sixth century. Several of their churches may be seen in the Fostal quarter of Cairo. + +We passed in this part of the river a great many sugar-mills, most of them in full operation, as it was then the proper season of +the cane-harvest. The boat stopped at Minieh long enough to allow us to visit one of these mills. + +[Illustration: 0564] + +The mill is on a grand scale, the machinery for crushing the cane and reducing the piece to sugar is all of French manufacture, +and is of the most perfect character. I was unable to ascertain what amount of sugar is made there, or at the other points, but the +product ought to be very large, to judge by the size of the mills and their number. The mill at Minieh covers a large area, and is +so arranged that from the time the cane enters {550}the crushers until the dry sugar is ready, there is no occasion for lifting or +handling the material, except in a few instances. The sugar culture ought to pay a handsome profit, but I was told that it is really +a loss, and that the Khedive would gladly sell it out to private parties. The cause of this unprofitableness is due, I was told, +to the frauds of the managers of the mills. Such a state of affairs is not confined to Egypt alone; there are many countries where +government factories have been run at a loss, but when turned into private hands, have yielded a handsome profit. + +One of the great wants of Egypt is the discovery of coal. At present fuel is costly, and all the coal used in the mills and on +railways and steamers, must be imported, and, of course, at heavy expense. Explorations have been made on the upper Nile, +and elsewhere, in the hope of finding coal, but they have not yet been successful. Small deposits have been found in isolated +localities, but none that could be profitably worked. Lower Egypt does not offer much hope to the coal-searcher, but there are parts +of the Soudan where the prospect is better. A wide coal-bed, accessible from the river, so as to ensure a low cost, would be a great +boon to the country. There is very little wood for fuel, and among the peasants, dry camel-dung is extensively used. + +After looking at the sugar mill, we strolled through the town of Minieh, and at the farther side, found a large crowd of people. +They were looking at a juggler, who was performing a variety of tricks, none of them specially interesting, and compelling a couple +of small boys to go through a comic dialogue, that evidently pleased the people very much, to judge by their immoderate laughter. +The fellow had a large snake, which he wound around his neck, and had taught to dance, but his snake-charming was evidently the +least of his performances. + +Occasionally he allowed the snake to run on the ground, and when thus free, the reptile went around the circle with his head raised, +and created a great deal of disturbance among the boys in the front row. + +The snake-charmers are a peculiar class in Egypt; they will go to houses, and for a stipulated sum, will charm snakes from the walls +or other localities, and they perform their work so well {551}that nobody has ever succeeded in detecting them in a fraud I do not +mean to say that they can find snakes where none exist; their art consists in enticing snakes that may be in a house to come out +from their concealment, and allow themselves to be put in a bag and carried away. They do this by burning a sort of incense, and +playing a doleful tune on a reed flute. + +Our introduction to sight-seeing, at Beni-Hassan, in upper Egypt, was not prepossessing. There were donkeys on the bank, without +saddles or bridles, and the worst donkeys that I ever saw offered for anybody to ride. The people were as bad as the donkeys, and +presented a forlorn appearance; the inhabitants of this locality were formerly famous for their thieving propensities, and so bad +were they in this respect that Ibrahim Pasha sent a military force to destroy their village and scatter its occupants. It would not +be safe for a small-boat to lie there now over night, except with a very watchful guard. They beset us when we went on shore, and +there was a crowd around me, with a dozen donkeys offering at once. I found a donkey that was fairly decent, but, while my back was +turned, somebody else mounted him, and I was forced to take another and a poorer beast. + +The donkey that I obtained must have been one of those possessed by the Beni-Hassanites when their village was destroyed by the +Pasha’s order, forty years ago, and I am not sure but that he dated from one of the dynasties of ancient Egypt. He had much less +hair than mud on his back, and I suspected that he passed his time in a mud-hole when not otherwise engaged. The saddle fitted him +in a manner fearful and wonderful to behold, and there was some doubt as to whether it touched him anywhere. When I mounted him, he +sat down in a manner perfectly natural for a dog, but not altogether so for a donkey. The result of this performance was to send +me over backwards and leave me with my shoulders on the ground and my feet in the air. I found this position inconvenient, and also +provocative of mirth in others, and therefore did not long maintain it. Even the donkey boy laughed, a proceeding which showed how +little he knew of polite society. + +The next time I mounted I sat on the beast’s shoulders and prevented his sitting down. But I could not prevent his kneel{552}ing, +and I leave you to imagine the result. A regard for my personal feelings prevents my giving a detailed description of this harrowing +tale. + +[Illustration: 9567] + +It was nothing else, and I think I must have harrowed, with my hands, feet, and nose, not less than a square rod of land in the +vicinity of that donkey, and I also harrowed him and the donkey boy, and would have served the bystanders likewise, if they had not +been more numerous than I was. I didn’t feel a bit amiable. + +At last we were off. I rode my donkey on foot most of the time, and we went along very well in this way, he walking about two yards +behind me, and very amiable and patient, while I was as cross as a man whose shirts haven’t come home from the wash-woman. + +We did about six miles altogether that day, and I think I walked altogether about seven miles. To sit on him was a toil worse than +walking, and his best gait was when he was standing still. He was splendid on that part of the business, and I don’t think there was +ever a donkey that could stand stiller than he. + +He was about the size of a Newfoundland dog, so that when I mounted him, my feet touched the ground on both sides. And yet he was +one of the best, or rather one of the least bad, of the lot. There were only two or three that surpassed him in personal appearance +and strength. + +Not one of our party will ever forget that donkey-ride to see the “Antiquities of Egypt;” and when at last the hardships of the +journey were over, and we arrived at the Ancient Tombs--the handiwork of man centuries ago--we forgot our sore spots {553}and lame +bones, and our ill-nature gave way to curiosity and wonder at the scene around us. + +These tombs, or grottos, are hewn in the solid rock, part of them on the bluff, fronting the river, and the rest in a ravine, +or valley, that runs inland from the alluvial land of the Nile. The rock is a soft limestone, not difficult to quarry, and quite +possibly when these grottos were made, the stone may have been softer than now. The excavations belong mostly to the eleventh and +twelfth dynasties, and therefore are not as old as the pyramids of Gizeh and Sakkarah, but older than the temples and monuments at +Thebes. They are old enough for all practical purposes, and are very much out of repair. + +The walls are covered with paintings and inscriptions, that throw much light on the manners and customs of the time, and it would +take more space than I can spare to describe them. Among the most interesting is a series of paintings representing the arrival of +some strangers in Egypt; they were at first supposed to be Joseph and his brethren, but this can hardly be, as the tomb was made +several hundred years before Joseph’s arrival. In one of the tombs there are representations of various tradesmen at work, and among +them are barbers, shoemakers, painters tailors, glass-blowers, and goldsmiths. There are also people playing ball, wrestling, and +throwing heavy stones, and in one place a couple of patrons of the prize ring are indulging in the noble art of manly disfiguration. + +The tombs, or grottos, are square or oblong chambers, cut in the rock, and the most of them are so well lighted through their +door-ways, that candles are not needed. In some instances several chambers are connected, and some of them have wells leading to +pits, below where was the real tomb. They are well above the valley, out of the reach of the highest inundations, and from their +front there is quite a pretty view. In front of some of them the rock is hewn into pillars and columns, that look at first glance as +though brought from elsewhere. + + +{554} + +[Illustration: 0569] + + + + +CHAPTER XLIV--ADVENTURES IN UPPER EGYPT.--FUN AND FROLIC WITH THE NATIVES. + + +_Siout, the Capital of Upper Egypt--The Pasha’s Palace--An Egyptian Market-day--A Swift Boat--Going the rounds on a Donkey--Town +Scenes--The Bazaars--Buying a Donkey--Tinkers, Peddlers, and Cobblers at work--A Curiosity Shop--Three Card Monte in the land of the +Pharaohs--Fighting the Tiger--The Professor takes a Hand--An ignominious Defeat--A doleful Tale--A River where the Wind is always +fair--The Temple and Tablet of Abydos--“Backsheesh” as a Medicine--Arab Villages in an Inundation--The Garden of the Valley--Fun +with the Natives--A constant resource fora Practical Joker--Scrambling for Money--A severe Joke._ + + +SIOUT, or Assiout, is a large town, with about twenty-five thousand inhabitants, among whom there are said to be not far from a +thousand Christians. Its bazaars are quite extensive, and some of them reminded me of those of Cairo. + +The town stands a couple of miles from the river, and there is a broad avenue leading to it, with a border of fine shade trees. The +entrance to the town is through an old gateway, that is quite picturesque, and evidently formed a strong defence at the time it was +erected. + +Siout is the capital of the province of the same name, and the most important town of Upper Egypt. It contains some handsome +mosques, several baths and some fine houses, all in the Arab style. It was formerly a great resort for caravans from Darfoor and +other places in the interior of Africa, but latterly the trade with those regions is much reduced. + +It was an hour before our mid-day meal when we reached the town, and immediately after lunch we mounted the waiting donkeys--much +better than those at Beni-Hassan--and started out. + +{555} + +[Illustration: 0570] + +{557}Our first visit was to some tombs cut in the side of the mountain, overlooking the valley; they are quite extensive, and were +the burial places of Lycopolis, the ancient city, which occupied the place where Siout now stands. + +The present city is modern, only about twenty-five hundred years old, and it has borne its present name through that period. + +One of the effects of travelling in Egypt is, that you get in the way of regarding nothing as ancient that has less than three +thousand years of age. + +[Illustration: 9572] + +When you get back to Rome and Athens, the ruins there seem like those of a house of a first settler in Chicago or St. Louis. Nothing +under thirty centuries will be regarded as antique. + +It happened to be market day when we reached Siout, and as we rode into the town, we found the public square crowded with people. +In the square there were large quantities of sugarcane, palm stalks, squashes, peas and beans exposed for sale, and the natives were +squatted around them, or walking slowly about. + +The edge of the square was fringed with a lot of solemn old Arabs, smoking their pipes and giving their whole minds to the business, +as they squatted in front of the wall. Smoking is universally enjoyed by all classes of the Egyptians. There are many men who are +rarely seen without a pipe in their hand, and many of the wealthy people may be seen on the street, attended by a servant, who +solemnly walks behind carrying his master’s pipe. The flexible tube of the “_Nargeeleh_” is often seven or eight feet long, and its +great length allows the smoke to cool before entering the mouth. {558}Camels and donkeys were very numerous, and you had to look +sharp to prevent being run over. + +[Illustration: 9573] + +The Professor was nearly overturned by one of the camels, or rather by the load of sugar canes that protruded on each side of the +animal’s back, and if I had not pulled him out of the way suddenly, he would have gone into a basket of eggs, with great detriment +to both the merchandise and himself. + +Just outside the town was the market place for donkeys, and dozens of these animals were standing there, awaiting purchasers. We +enquired the prices of some, but the Arabs knew we were not likely to be purchasers, and so they named exorbitant figures. A fair +donkey can be bought for twenty-five or thirty dollars, and a good one for forty or fifty Prices range considerably above that, but +they are for fancy animals of extra fine appearance. Twenty pounds will purchase a donkey of much style and many fine qualities. + +I have a confession to make, which is to be confidential. I gambled that day at Siout, and have felt badly about it ever since. The +way of it was this. + +The Professor and I were walking in the market place, looking at the crowd of country people and their wares, and at the tinkers, +cobblers, and blacksmiths at work in the open air, at the cafés with their patrons smoking their long pipes and sipping coffee’ from +little cups, at the peddlers of cakes and oranges, and other edible things, and at the general confusion and bustle that went on +with the most perfect good nature. + +While the Professor was bargaining for some old coins--he had’ a mania for them and was always ready to buy cheap--I made a table, +and he threw the cards with the skill that comes from long practice. + +I thought I could name the winning card, and so I ventured a copper piastre--about a cent--on my opinion. Many a man in America has +thought he could name the card, and his faith has been lost in sight and cost him a great deal of money; I never ventured to try it +among the sharpers of my native land, {559}discovery which recalled California, Pike’s Peak, the Mississippi River, and Coney Island +all at once. + +[Illustration: 0574] + +An Arab of unusually dark complexion had a crowd around him, and was playing three card monte, the regular game, just as I have +seen it many times in America. He was squatted in front of a strip of cloth, which he spread on the ground and used as a {560}but I +supposed that an Arab ought not to know how to deceive a New-Yorker. + +To my surprise I found that my calculations were wrong, and my piastre went into the pocket of the card thrower. Then I tried to +get back the money I had lost---just as many another has tried to do--and my stake went the same way. I kept on a piastre or half a +piastre at a time, watching the fellow closely, and thinking I ought to be equal to him in shrewdness. I must have tried as many as +twenty times, losing altogether about a franc, and not once did I win. + +I gave it up at last, and by this time the Professor came up and concluded to try his hand. He fared no better than I did, but kept +on until he lost twice as much as I. We gave the fellow half a franc “backsheesh” for his skill, and credited him with being fitted +for his business. If he lives and can find plenty of patrons, he will get rich in the course of time. + +Most of the games of the Egyptians are of kinds which suit their sedate dispositions. Games partly or wholly hazardous are very +common among all ranks of this people. The game of cards is almost always played for money or for some other stake, and is called by +way of distinction “the game of hazard.” Persons of the lower orders in the towns of Egypt are often seen playing at this and other +games at the coffee shops; but frequently for no greater stake than that of a cup of coffee. Many of them play chess, draughts, and +backgammon. Their chess men are of simple forms, as they are forbidden by their religion to make an image of anything that has life. + +Siout is famous for the manufacture of pipe-bowls, coffee cups, and other things out of a fine clay that abounds in the +neighborhood, and most of our passengers supplied themselves in the bazaars. We had to bargain a great deal to save ourselves from +being swindled, and even then we paid some pretty high prices. Another article they offered us, was fans of ostrich feathers, and +their prices were about half what the same things would bring in Cairo. There are some manufactories of cotton goods at Siout, but +the most of the articles sold in the bazaars come from other places. + +At Siout we met the boat that ascended the Nile two weeks {561}ahead of us, and was now on its return. We were regaled with stories +of quarrels, and it seemed that almost from the day of starting there had been a row of some kind on board. The disturbance had not +quite reached the point of pistols and coffee, but was very near it, and one of the passengers told me he expected to fight a duel +before reaching Cairo. One of the misfortunes of these vexed parties is the liability to quarrel; persons are thrown so closely +together, that there must be a great deal of forbearance and concession on the part of everybody to avoid trouble. + +The river above and below Siout winds considerably, and sometimes the _dahabeeahs_ are greatly retarded, going around the bends. +Nature has very well arranged the navigation of the Nile. The general course of the stream is nearly due North; during the winter +the wind blows almost steadily from the North, so that you can be quite sure of reaching your destination without great delay. You +can sail up stream with the wind, and in going down the boat floats and is rowed just enough to give her steerage way. + +When an ascending boat is becalmed, the crew is sent on shore with a tow rope, to which they are harnessed like so many oxen. They +can make twelve or fifteen miles a day by this sort of work, and we frequently saw them engaged at it. + +The first of the temples of ancient Egypt as we ascend the river, is the one known as that of Sethe I, and called also the temple +of Abydos. All along the river above Siout, there are the remains of temples and traces of ruined cities, and every year fresh +discoveries are made, which throw light upon the history of the country. + +We landed at Girgeh--named after St. George of Dragon notoriety--to make a visit to Abydos. Girgeh was once at quite a distance +inland, but the river has worn away the soil, so that the town has been reached by the stream, and a portion of it has fallen in. +It was once an important place, but is now of little consequence, and the inhabitants were not particularly pleasing in appearance. +They flocked to the bank with various things to sell, and the Professor was in his element, as he found a good supply of old coins. +{562}One man had a scorpion which he wished to sell, and after he had hung around me for some time, I offered him a piastre if he +would eat the venomous insect. He indignantly refused, much to the amusement of the rest of the crowd. + +It was about breakfast time when we arrived, and as the donkeys had been telegraphed for, they were already waiting for us. We +started soon after breakfast, as we had a ride of three hours before us, and it was necessary to get to Abydos before the sun was at +meridian. + +The road lay through fields of peas in blossom, through other fields of beans, and others of sugar cane and doura stalks. Everywhere +the verdure was thick and luxuriant, and remember that we were in the month of January. + +We passed several villages and saw many groups of natives at work in the fields, and here and there we saw camels and buffaloes tied +to stakes, and feeding upon the rich grass. An animal is tied where he can have a range of forty or fifty feet, and he is not moved +until he has eaten the herbage down to the roots, so that there shall be no waste. + +The villages consisted of little groups of mud houses, that possessed no attractions, and when one sees the dirt and general +wretchedness about them, the surprise is that the inhabitants do not die before reaching a dozen years of age. + +The villages are built on mounds to keep them out of the way of the inundation which covers all the flat country and makes it +difficult to move about. + +I had on this ride a donkey boy, who was the most persistent beggar that I ever encountered in all the course of my life. + +When I started on a ride in Egypt, I made it a rule to inform the driver that I would give him a present when the journey was +concluded, and this promise was generally satisfactory. If he asked for it at the start, I informed him that he would not get it +till we were through with each other, and it was rare indeed that this statement did not quiet him. + +The boy that drove my donkey from Girgeh began his appeal as soon as I mounted, and I thought to quiet him with the usual promise. +He was silent for five minutes or so, and then he broke out with the same appeal; I repeated my promise, and scolded him {563}him +into silence; ten minutes later he broke out again, and this time I threatened to thrash him. + +Next I did thrash him, and that insured peace for awhile; then I was bothered again, and thrashed him again, so that I had some +pretty fair exercise for my arms. + +[Illustration: 8578] + +He was not a large boy, so that I was entirely safe in thrashing him, and every time he renewed his begging, I gave him a cut with +the whip. + +We kept up this fun all the way to the temple, and after I had dismounted, he followed me with a further appeal, and indicated that +he specially wanted to buy something to eat. I gave him some coppers, and when the lunch was spread I gave him a part of mine, in +the hope of silencing him. But it was no use; the instant we started back to the river, he began again to beg, and I I thrashed him +as usual. Halfway back he began to breathe short, his tongue protruded, and he lay down on the grass. Thinking something was the +matter with him, I dismounted and felt his pulse, which seemed to be all right. + +“_Aos, eh?_” I asked (“what is the matter with you?”). + +“Backsheesh,” was the faint response, and he held out his hand to receive the cure. + +I mounted and rode off, and he was up and after me without any sign of illness. + +After that he did not try the sick dodge again, but he kept on begging all the way to the boat; and when I had given him a liberal +gratuity, he asked for more. + +If the beggars of the whole globe ever want to choose a king, I recommend them to hunt out this youth at Girgeh, and offer the crown +to him, for he certainly deserves it. + +The temple stands on the edge of the desert, quite near some {564}palm trees, and in the midst of heaps of ruins. It was almost +completely buried in the sand until a few years ago, when it was cleared out by M. Mariette, and the sculptures it contains were +brought to light. + +To the ordinary visitor, the attractive features of this temple are its massive proportions, the solidity of its structure, the +care shown in all the details, and not least of all, the vast quantity of sculptured scenes and hieroglyphic records that abound +everywhere. But the historian of Egypt fixes his eye on the eastern wall of a narrow passage way, leading from the second hall to +one of the smaller chambers. + +Here King Sethi, and Rameses, his son, are represented making offerings to seventy-six kings who have preceded them, the name of +Sethi being the last of the list. The names are there, and apparently in chronological order. This is the famous tablet of Abydos, +which has made so much sensation among the students of the history of Ancient Egypt, as it has enabled them to make up the list of +the kings from Menes, founder of the First Dynasty, down to Sethi, the second king of the XIXth Dynasty. + +Its discovery in 1865 has removed much of the mystery surrounding the old empire, and surpasses in importance any single discovery +that has been made. The tablet of Thebes, now in the British Museum, is of far less consequence than this. + +There is another temple not far from this, but in a much more ruined state. It was evidently of great beauty at the time of its +construction, as the walls were lined throughout with alabaster, and covered with sculptures richly painted with colors that still +remain. + +All around there are tombs and heaps of rubbish, marking the site of the city and of its necropolis; and whenever the excavations +are renewed on an extensive scale, we shall doubtless hear of some important discoveries. + +We returned to the river at Bellianeh, the boat having moved on around the bend during our absence. It was late in the afternoon +when we came there, and we were ready for dinner. Lunch had been taken among the ruins of the temple. While picking the leg of a +chicken, and washing it down with the water of the {565}Nile, I sat with my back against a column whereon was sculptured the figure +of a king offering a tribute to one of the divinities of his time. He had had no chicken or anything else for many hundred years, +but he stood there perfectly composed, and never once hinted that I ought to divide with him. He was a patient old oyster, and I +wanted to shake hands with him at parting, but couldn’t find his flipper. + +One of our favorite amusements at each landing-place was to make the natives scramble for money. They came down in large numbers, +sometimes two or three hundred of them, and kept up a continual howl of “Backsheesh, O, Howadji!” that sounded very much like the +murmurs of a mob. They gathered on the bank opposite the stern of the boat, and were ready to catch all the money we would throw to +them. We had a supply of copper for just such cases, and by a judicious use of it, we made a franc go a great ways, and this was the +way we would distribute it. + +One of us would take a copper, and after balancing and aiming it several times, would give it a toss. A mass of hands would be +stretched to receive it, and the crowd would sway in the direction of the falling coin. If it struck in the dirt, a dozen Arabs +would spring upon the place where it fell, and there would be a scramble for it. Sometimes the struggle would be so fierce, that the +cloud of dust raised thereby would completely conceal the combatants, and they would emerge with torn garments. + +Our best fun was in tossing the money so that it would fall just at the river’s edge; the rear of the crowd would sway forward to +seize it, and their swaying and surging would press the front rank into the water, so that in a little while we would have half +the crowd dripping from an involuntary bath. The small boys were generally on the lookout for this, and removed their clothes at +an early part of the performance, so that we had them in _puris naturalibus_. The men and girls were generally more modest, but not +always so. + +Usually we had half an hour’s sport before the departure of the steamer from a village, and sometimes the entire population, +with the exception of a few dignified elders, joined in the scramble. At Bellianeh, the heads of the village thought the affair +{566}undignified, and determined to put a stop to it. Two of them appeared on the scene, armed with _courbashes_--whips made from +hippopotamus hide--and caused a very lively scattering. + +The boys were whipped into their clothes, and public decency was thereby protected, but only for a short time. The boat was to lie +there half an hour longer, and we wanted the fun to continue. + +[Illustration: 9581] + +So we sent one of the waiters to convey our compliments to the city fathers, and ask them to go home, and to emphasize the request +with an offer of “backsheesh.” + +They saw the point at once, each accepted a franc, and suddenly remembered that he had business elsewhere. In two minutes they had +disappeared up a street, and we had the yelling crowd once more in front of us and once more naked. Evidently bribery is cheap at +Bellianeh. + +Just back of the landing-place was a heap of loose dust, like a small mountain. It was not less than forty feet from top to bottom, +and the sides were at an angle of about fifty degrees. To project a copper into this heap was the height of our ambition, and there +were only two men on the boat who could do it. When a coin was fairly landed there the rush was interesting. There was a lot of +Arabs at the foot of the heap, and another at the top. Those below scrambled up, and those above scrambled down, and the cloud they +created was something fearful; but luckily the wind blew it away from us. Sometimes they rolled in a tangled mass of arms and legs +from top to bottom, and the youngsters who had just emerged all wet from the river were speedily veneered with the adhering dust. +It may have been the ruins of an ancient city that they rolled in, and not impossibly {567}the ashes of a king may have stuck to the +body of one of these begging natives. Little they cared for that; they have no more respect for the old kings than we have for the +beggars themselves. + +The process of disrobing was not an elaborate one. A boy would peel himself in about ten seconds, as he had only a single garment, +a sort of long shirt, to remove. This shirt is almost invariably made of blue cotton, like the material which we call “denims” in +America, and such as the hod-carrying Celt and other laboring men generally use for overalls. + +All the boys appeared to know how to swim, and they had no hesitation at rushing into the river. We had swimming matches among them, +by attaching coppers to doura stalks and throwing them out into the stream, where they were instantly pursued and overtaken. + +One of the passengers heated a piastre at the cook’s galley, and then threw it out; the boy who took it immediately dropped it, +and it was seized by another and larger boy, who dropped it in turn. It didn’t burn them, but was just warm enough to feel +uncomfortable. + +[Illustration: 5582] + + +{568} + +CHAPTER XLV--THE DANCING GIRLS OF KENEH.--THE TREASURES OF DENDERAH. + + +_The Dates and Dancing Girls of Keneh--The Almeh and the Ghawazee--The Dalilahs of Cairo--Going to the Dance-Hall--An Outlandish +Orchestra--The Drapery of the Dancers--The Cairo Wriggle--Curious Posturing--A Weird Scene--Dress and Undress--Miracles of Motion--A +Fête at the German Consulate--Models for Painters and Sculptors--Arab and Nubian Nymphs--The Temple of Denderah--History Hewn in +Stone--Cleopatra and her Portrait--The Fatal Asp--A Bit of Doggerel--The Coins of Old Egypt--The Professor’s Bargain--Digging for +Treasure--Arrival at Luxor--Taking in Strangers._ + + +THE first place of importance above Bellianah is Keneh, which stands about three miles inland from the river, and occupies a pretty +situation. It is celebrated for its dates and dancing girls; we bought some of the former, and were invited to attend a performance +of the latter at the house of the English. + +We declined the invitation, for the reason that we had sent the dragoman to arrange a dance at the residence of the fair maidens and +did not wish to impose upon the representative of Her Britannic or any other Majesty. + +The dates were excellent, the best, in fact, I have ever tasted; they are packed in drums like figs, but are not pressed down into a +solid mass like the dates we get in America. They are very sweet and soft, and each one of us laid in half a dozen boxes for his own +use. + +As for the dancing girls, a word in your ear. These ladies are not of the vestal sort, but, on the contrary, quite the reverse. They +were known in Egypt in ancient times, and one can see pictures of them on the walls of some of the tombs in the valley of the Nile. +In modern times they became so numerous at Cairo that Mohammed Ali banished them from that city and sent whole boat-loads of them +to Keneh, Esneh, and other towns of upper Egypt. Those that he banished are not now on the stage of life, but their descendants or +imitators are numerous, and have lent a sort of infamous fame to the places they inhabit. + +{569}Their Arabic name is _ghawazee_; they are sometimes improperly called _Almehs_, and there is a French painting of considerable +celebrity which represents the _Almeh_ dancing before a party of men. + +The _Almeh_ is a professional singer, and dancing is neither her profession nor practice; the _ghawazee_ dance, but do not sing. + +[Illustration: 0584] + +{570}The dragoman had arranged the whole affair, and early in the evening we left the landing-place and travelled the somewhat rough +road to Keneh. There were fourteen of us, and there were six nationalities represented in the auditory, or rather _viditory_, as we +had come to see rather than to hear. + +Under the guidance of the dragoman we went to an obscure house in a narrow street, and were shown up a flight of somewhat rickety +stairs, and into a room that was anything but palatial. + +There were divans on three sides of the room, and on these we were seated; the dancers and the musicians occupied the floor in the +centre, and as soon as we were seated, the performance began. The music consisted of a couple of drums, shaped like a squash, with +the large end cut off and covered with a piece of drum-leather, and of a sort of violin or guitar, and a kind of reed flute. There +was also a tambourine, but it had less prominence than the drums, which were the real _pieces de resistance_. The drums were beaten +with the fingers in rather a slow measure; the music was of a melancholy, barbaric character, and consisted mainly of time without +much melody. Some of the musicians were men, I think only two of them, but as they were all squatted on the floor, and there was a +general similarity of dress, it was hard to distinguish the sexes. + +The dancing girls wore white dresses that flowed down to the heels and were very short in the waist On the upper part of the body +is a jacket, cut very short, and frequently separated an inch or two from the dress below it. The jacket is sometimes richly +embroidered, and I saw several dresses that were rather regal in appearance. + +The head-dress consists of the natural hair braided in ringlets, and where this is small in quantity it is supplemented with store +hair, as our own belles supplement theirs. In either case there is a liberal decoration of small coins and pendants braided into the +hair or attached to it, and the display of jewelry is generally quite profuse. + +The drums which were all the time kept in operation, was quite unlike anything in the ballet as seen in Europe or America. There was +none of the dancing of the kind for which Fanny Ellsler and Taglioni are famous, and from an occidental point of view it was +rather disappointing as a dance. But the strangeness of the scene, in many of its features, made up for the absence of saltatorial +activity. Certainly the dance was a new {571}The musicians struck up, and the girls--six in number--took their positions in a +circle. + +[Illustration: 0586] + +At the sound of the music they began to move about the room with a sort of gliding motion, accompanied by a curious wriggle of the +body at the hips, while all the rest of it remained still. It was a motion from side to side performed quite rapidly, and with due +deference to the sound of {572}one to us, and the dancers were of a type unknown in America. Their dress was strange, and stranger +still were the musicians squatted on the floor and keeping time with that monotonous barbaric sound. + +Two or three Arabs were peering in at the door, the room was wholly Arabic in character, and the only occidental suggestion was the +party of spectators squatting or sitting on the divans. There was a dim light from half a dozen candles, and outside a small fire +occasionally sent up a weird flash. The scene was a fine one for an artist. + +For a quarter of an hour the dance went on, and gradually the movements became more and more excited. Then there was a pause and +then a re-commencement, and then another pause at which the ladies retired for a few moments while we took a fresh filling to our +pipes or lighted fresh cigars. When the dancing girls returned they were in a much lighter costume than the preceding one, a costume +that permitted one to see the full development of the form, as it did away entirely with the long dress and with other garments that +hindered the movements. I doubt if the manager of any theatre ever dared to go quite as far in dressing or undressing his ballet +troupe as did the manager of the Ghawazee at Keneh. With the exception of their head dresses of false hair and jingling coins, and +their necklaces and rings, the whole half dozen of girls didn’t have clothes enough about them to fill a snuff box. You could have +sent their entire lot of garments by mail with a single postage stamp. + +Immediately on their re-appearance the music re-commenced, and this time with a more vigorous measure, so that the scene became +enlivening. + +This time the movements of the dancers were more free, and they whirled about in a narrow space with such rapidity that there was +quite a maze of the performers. There was a repetition of the gliding, whirling, and twisting motions combined, and sometimes they +were all performed together. We looked on attentively for half an hour, and now and then as the air was getting stifling from the +occupancy of a small room by so many persons we called for an adjournment and went out into the light of the moon. {573}As we passed +by the German consulate we heard the sound of music, and one of the Germans of our party led the way inside-The consuls of France +and Germany are brothers and their consulates are in one building; during the Franco-German war the consul for Germany was also +consul for France, and is supposed to have performed his duty impartially, especially as there is very little duty for him to +perform. + +The place into which we were ushered was a large hall, and the same sort of dance given in honor of some German visitors was going +on. The girls were more richly dressed than at the performance we had just witnessed, and the room being much larger they had more +space for their movements. The musicians were more numerous, and as there was a better light in the room the scene was brighter. +But the spectators were sitting on chairs instead of divans and the host was dressed _a la_ European, with the exception of the +everlasting fez which covered his head. + +Altogether the scene was much less Oriental, and it lacked the careless abandon that had made one of the attractions of the dance at +the home of the _Ghawazee_. So after a short stay we thanked our host, the Consul, and returned to the boat. + +Many travellers have praised the beauty of the dancing girls, and several artists of note, among the Germans, have visited Egypt to +paint them. I had formed such a picture of their beauty that I was rather disappointed at the reality. Of the six that danced before +us two were positively ill-looking, and two others, though not uncomely in features, had grown rather too fat to be attractive. The +other two were pretty and well formed, and had the others been like them, or had we seen only these two we might have shared the +feelings of many who have gone before us. + +Of the two beauties one was a pure blooded Arab, and the other evidently of mixed blood Arab with a streak, and a broad streak too, +of Nubian. Their forms were exquisite and would have filled the eye of the sculptor of the Greek Slave. Their limbs were full and +rounded, and every muscle so far as we could see was of the proper development. Their eyes were full and liquid in their tenderness, +and the long lashes set them out like a lustrous frame. The dark skin was smooth and the necks were flung from side to side in a +shower of ebony spray as its wearers glided and swung around the apartment, where we looked upon them. Fortunate indeed had we been +had these been the only dancing girls to meet our eyes at Keneh. + +Everywhere through Egypt water is filtered in large jars, some of them holding nearly a barrel, and it is carried on the heads of + +{575} + +[Illustration: 0590] + +{574}rently soft as velvet, and had a freshness that not all the paint and powder of the French toilet can imitate. + +[Illustration: 0589] + +A pleasant smile played constantly around the mouth and eyes and seemed to run from the one to the other, the luxuriant hair decked +with golden ornaments fell in copious folds around the plump and well-formed lin {577}women in lesser jars that contain from four +to six gallons. It is brought to the table in bottles holding a quart or more, and whenever and wherever you call for water it is +served in these bottles and never in a pitcher. + +The filtering jars and the drinking bottles come from Keneh, or rather the most of them do, and the large jars come from Balias, a +town a few miles above. They are made of a peculiar clay which is mixed with the ashes of _halfa_ grass and turned on an ordinary +potter’s wheel. They are dried in the sun, and when complete require a little soaking to remove the taste of the earth. They are +very porous, water passes easily through them, and when placed in the open air the transformation and constant evaporation that +follows keep the contents very cool. + +We met many rafts of these _ballasee_ on their way down the river, and some large ones were tied to the bank at Keneh. The men +in charge of the rafts are obliged to remove the water from the half immersed jars every few hours to prevent their absorption of +enough to sink them. The same kind of drinking bottle can be found in Spain and in Mexico, and also in some of the South American +countries. They are used all through Egypt, and their manufacture employs a considerable number of persons. The man who introduces +them in the Mississippi valley will confer a boon upon the inhabitants of that region. + +An hour’s ride from the river on the side opposite Keneh is the temple of Denderah. + +Compared with the other temples of Egypt, this one is modern as it was built less than two thousand years ago, at the time the +Romans held possession of the country. Egyptian sculpture had long been on the decline and the figures are far less graceful than +those of a much older period, but the architecture retained its grandeur, and one cannot admire too much the magnificent proportions +of the halls and columns of Denderah, especially in the grand portico and in some of the inner apartments. + +The temple is the best preserved that has yet been discovered; its walls and columns are all in place and the roof is almost entire, +so that it presents the best specimen of a complete temple. It contains a zodiac which was the subject of much controversy on +account of its supposed antiquity, but a careful reading of {578}some of the surrounding inscriptions has exploded the theory that +the ancient Egyptians were the authors of the zodiac. + +On the side wall of the temple is a portrait of Cleopatra, which is interesting for the reason that it is cotemporaneous with the +existence of that estimable but warm blooded lady, whose habits were not such as to make her a model for the guidance of young women +of the present day. We looked at the portrait for the beauty for which she was renowned but could not find it though we all admitted +that her face was not unhandsome. Her figure does not possess the grace of her Greek portraits, and altogether the picture was a +disappointment. + +On several places on the walls of the temple there are sculptures representing the asp, the serpent which was once worshipped as a +divinity. Asp-headed gods were frequent among the Egyptian sculptures, and their worship extended over a long period. And it was by +one of these serpents that Cleopatra, of whom we have just been speaking, was stung to death. The event is recorded in a pathetic +poem which begins thus: + + “She took a nasty, pison snake, + + And hid it in her gown, + + It gave its little tail a shake + + And did its job up brown. + + She went into her little bed, + + In dreadful agony; + + Then tore her chignon from her head, + + And followed Antony.” + +Denderah was a big thing for the Professor as he was able to buy there an abundance of coins. He bought a lot of them, about a quart +altogether, for a couple of francs; they were covered with rust, mould, and verdigris, but they were coins and he paid little more +than what they were worth as old copper. He was a good deal of a coin-sharp and understood their value, and when he looked them over +on the boat he was so happy that he wanted to go back again to buy more. He said he wouldn’t take five hundred, no, not a thousand +francs for the lot, and he was ready to dance with joy. And I add this by way of foot note, that when we returned to Cairo he had +the coins cleaned and examined by a numismatist. Every coin was pronounced genuine and some were of silver. Most of them were of a +kind + +{579} + +[Illustration: 0594] + +{581}that is abundant and consequently they had not much value, but there were several very rare specimens. One in particular was so +rare that only one like it was known to exist in Egypt, and it was worth any sum of money that a seller would ask and a buyer would +give. + +He was sure they were genuine, and he scouted the notion that they were fabrications for the reason that he had paid less than +it would cost to fabricate them. These coins were found around Denderah, and we saw the natives digging in the rubbish in several +places in search of them. Occasionally a native makes a good find, but he never knows its value, and will sell his prize cheaply. A +coin collector who knows his business would do well to make the voyage of the Nile. + +We had half a day’s steaming from Keneh to Luxor, and turned some pretty bends in the river where the scenery was quite picturesque. +We passed several _dahabeeahs_ on their way up stream and greeted them with our steam whistle and by dipping our flag to which they +responded by dipping theirs. Every dahabeeah carries a flag showing the nationality of the parties on board; this is an inflexible +rule, and a very good one, and often leads to friendly acquaintance among persons of similar nationalties. The steamboat saluted +every _dahabeeahs_; she was not proud because she was a steamboat, and we were glad to perceive that the others were not proud +because they were _dahabeeahs_. + +In this part of the river we observed a great number of pigeons flying around; these birds abound all along the Nile but are +specially numerous in this locality. The pigeon houses are built over the dwellings and are two or three stories high; they have +a likeness to the battlements of old castles, as they are narrower at top than at bottom, and the entrances for the birds have a +strong resemblance to port holes. Branches of trees are put near the holes to assist the birds in alighting, and they give rather a +curious appearance to the houses. Hundreds of these pigeons can be seen in the air at once, and sometimes the flocks are very large. +The birds are kept for the sake of their manure; pigeon dung is the only kind of manure used on the fields in Egypt, and it is quite +an article of commerce. + +In Cairo a great many pigeons are kept on the roofs of houses; {582}they fly around and pick up their food where they can find it, +and their owners make a very fair revenue from the sale of the manure as well as from that of the birds. Mohammedans do not eat them +but the large number of Christians in Egypt ensures a good market. The hotels have them very often in their bills of fare. + +It was about noon when we reached Luxor and tied up to the bank in front of the American Consulate. There was a crowd of +donkey-boys, guides, and miscellaneous citizens to meet us, and as soon as we were on shore they surrounded us at once. + +The Professor was happy as he found plenty of old coins, but he did not find them as cheap as at Denderah. The most numerous +speculators were the dealers in antiquities, such as fragments of mummies, pieces of coffins, scarabées, and bits of marble and +other stones cut into the shape of ancient statues. + +They have an odd way of offering their stuff to you; without saying a word they come up and hold out the thing they have for sale, +and sometimes if it is a skull they hold it disagreeably near to your face. Ask the price and then make an offer, and be sure to +make the offer small enough. They refuse and turn away; in a few minutes they come up again with the same thing and offer it in the +same manner as if they do not know you have seen it before Refuse and refuse again; they depart, or at all events put their things +in their pockets at each refusal, but they return again in a few minutes. + +There was one man with a string of scarabees and another with a miniature bust of one of the old kings that I think offered their +wares as often as once in five minutes during all the time I was accessible to them. They do not talk under such circumstances +unless you talk first; they glide silently in front of you, and then hold up what they have to sell, as though endeavoring to secure +your admiration. + +The articles mostly dealt in are scarabee,--those imitations in hard stone of the Egyptian beetle that are found in many of the +mummy coffins. Some of them make pretty finger rings, and I have one that makes a capital seal, as it bears the signet of one of +the kings of the XIXth Dynasty. They are of all sizes, from the small stones placed on the finger of a mummy or strung into +{583}necklaces, up to some as large as a goose egg, and even much larger. Some of these large ones are simply marvellous. They are +of very hard stone,--porphyry, feldspar, basalt, serpentine, carnelian, and the like, and are covered on the under side with finely +cut hieroglyphics, generally passages from the Ritual of the Dead. + +There is one in the museum at Cairo that I would walk twenty-three miles to own. It is about as large over as a two-cent piece, and +the back is cut as neatly as that of the beetle it imitated, while the under side is covered with fine hieroglyphics. And the +stone is green feldspar, one of the hardest things in the world for cutting, and how they managed to finish it so beautifully is a +mystery. + +The Arabs at Luxor have a liberal supply of these scarabees but they are nearly all modern imitations. They have some genuine ones +for which they ask a high price, but it sometimes happens that a really good one is sold for a trifle. They declare that every-thing +they have is “_antika_” and ask proportionate prices, but you are not expected to offer anywhere near the sum demanded. + +When a man exhibited something that I thought I would buy, I asked his price. If he said two pounds, I might offer sixpence, and +very often they would come down to one or two shillings for something that they originally asked two pounds for. I bought a scarabee +for a franc that was offered to me for thirty francs, and one of my friends paid two francs for something for which one hundred and +fifty francs was the first price. + +In other countries an article is supposed to be worth somewhere near the price put upon it, but any such rule is erroneous in Egypt. +I have no hesitation in offering a silver piastre, (five cents,) for a scarabee whose holder demands two pounds; in New York or +London a similar offer would be an insult, but in Luxor it is not so regarded. + +A great many people are foolish enough to buy these antiquities at the prices demanded, and the Arabs in this business are able +to make a good living. They are reputed to make many of the articles, and I was told that others are made in Cairo, and others in +Birmingham--like the famous Waterloo relics. One fellow was pointed out as the owner of a _fabrique d’ antiquities_ {584}and we +asked him to show us his shop. He denied having any factory, and then we offered him five francs, ten francs, a napoleon if he would +show us through it. He finally grew indignant and said: + +“No, no, no; not for ten napoleons will I let you see it.” + +The fabrications are very skillful, and even the experts are sometimes deceived by them. The safest parties to deal with are the +Consuls; they are all merchants of antiquities, but even they are not always to be relied upon, as they have families to support and +human nature is weak. What wonder if a consul who has to maintain dignity and an office, should take advantage of circumstances and +drive a sharp transaction whenever he finds a rich flat. + +[Illustration: 5599] + + +{585} + +[Illustration: 0600] + + + + +CHAPTER XLVI--LUXOR, THE CITY OF GIANTS.--AMONG THE MUMMIES OF ANCIENT THEBES. + + +_Luxor on the Site of Ancient Thebes--A City with a Hundred Gates--Enjoying a Consul’s Hospitality--An American Citizen of African +Descent--A Dignified Rhinoceros--Karnak--A City of Wonders--Promenading in an Avenue of Sphinxes--A Gigantic Temple--Monster +Obelisks--A Story in Stone--A Statue Weighing Nine Hundred Tons--The Sitting Colossi--A Singing Statue--Mysteries of +Priestcraft--Lunching in the Tomb of Rameses--A Wonderful Treasure--How They Made Mummies--A Curious Process--The “Doubter” and the +Mummy Sellers--The Judge Comes to Grief._ + + +LUXOR is now an insignificant town of four thousand inhabitants, occupying the site, or a small portion of it, of the ancient city +of Thebes, from whose hundred gates twenty thousand armed chariots could be sent to the battle-field. What a’ melancholy decline +from the days of Thotmes and Rameses to the present! + +A crowd of dirty Arabs, and a collection of hovels, with here and there a house having some pretence of respectability and comfort +are the Thebes of to-day. Were it not for the ruins that lie around us we should have only to write “Thebes was,” and the story of +to-day would be complete. But the city which fills bright pages in the history of Egypt was too great and glorious in her time, +and the monuments she built were too stupendous to be easily removed. So grand were her temples that the work of destruction was an +enormous one, what then must have been the labors of erection! {586}In the present town of Luxor there is little to be seen beyond +the temple which is now greatly fallen and of which much of the sculptures lie buried. There is no effort made to remove the rubbish +that lies around the walls and upon all the floors; in one part the English Consul has his office, and in others the Arabs have +built their mud hovels among the columns and against the sculptured walls. The magnificence around them has not served in any way +to elevate the thoughts of these natives; they live in a superabundance of dirt, and the contemplation of the works of art ever in +their sight has been no more to them than to their chickens or donkeys. They regard the ruins solely as a source of profit, and they +persistently beg from strangers who come to visit Thebes. Most of the Arabs believe that the strangers who come here are pagans, and +that they make pilgrimages to Thebes, Denderah, and Esneh, just as good Moslems make pilgrimages to Mecca. + +We devoted an hour to calling on the consul, where we were treated to pipes and to coffee, and were seated on the divans that filled +part of the official rooms. The American Consul is of a dark hue, something more than a mulatto, and one of our party whose notions +were formerly in sympathy with slaveholding, was rather disinclined to accept the hospitality of a gentleman of African descent. But +we pacified him by the information that we were in Africa and approaching the region where white men were at a discount, and with +this view of the case he subsided and smoked his pipe in silence. + +The “Doubter” was rude as he always was when among gentlemanly natives, and as he had not the vice of smoking he wondered what we +were staying for. The Judge reproved him for his incivility, and for a minute or two there was a fair prospect that the consul would +be able to collect a fee for suppressing a row in his own office. During the turmoil the Professor and I slipped out and called upon +the German Consul, who was as dignified as a rhinoceros in a menagerie. He speaks hardly anything but Arabic, and knows of only one +man--Bismarck--in Germany and of only one city--Berlin. The Professor passed as a resident of Berlin and a relative of Bismarck, and +with this view of the case he was most cordially received. The American + +{587} + +[Illustration: 0602] + +{589}Consul speaks English quite fairly. The vice-consulate was formerly held by Mustapha Agar, who is also English Vice-Consul, +and his removal has soured him somewhat so that he is not over-polite to Americans. He is the oldest consul at Luxor, and one of the +oldest residents, and has grown wealthy in the service of other countries than his own. He has been so often petted by travellers +and praised by authors who have been here, that he has become spoiled, and has the pomposity of a turkey-cock. He deals in +scarabees, mummies, coins--everything that you like,--and he showed us as did the other consuls, quite a collection of antiquities. +They can furnish you with the head of a king or the foot of a princess at short order, and as for old coins the Professor found +enough at Luxor to set up a museum of numismatics. + +We hired donkeys and went to Karnak--something more than a mile from Luxor--and we went not only once but three times. + +Karnak is more than marvellous; to do justice to it one requires to have a dozen or so superlative words specially invented for the +place. You remain silent in contemplating it as you find that you have no word to express your feelings; you are sensible that to +speak of it in ordinary terms would be like the cockney’s expression of “neat” applied to Niagara, and though I am intending to make +the attempt I am satisfied that I shall fall far short of portraying the full grandeur of the scene to the reader. + +As you approach the temple you enter an avenue of ramheaded sphinxes (huge fellows carved in stone), on opposite sides of the +avenue. Formerly this street extended all the way to Luxor--six thousand feet away. What a splendid promenade it must have been! +Only a few of the sphinxes are here now, and of those every one has been more or less mutilated. Passing the avenue you reach a +pronaos, or pylon,--a gateway with two enormous towers large enough of themselves to make a temple. There were no less than six of +these entrances. Just to give an idea of their size I will give the dimensions of one of the peristyles. Its total length is three +hundred and seventy feet, its depth is fifty feet, and its height one hundred and forty feet. The temple faces the river, and the +towers can be seen from a long distance. One of these fronting the river is partly fallen, but the other is nearly perfect. {590}A +detailed description of the temple at Karnak would be dry reading, and I will simply state that from end to end the length is eleven +hundred and eighty feet, and that it is about six hundred feet in breadth. The whole was surrounded by a wall twenty-five feet +thick and from sixty to a hundred feet high. All this space inclosed by the wall is filled with ruins of an architecture of the most +magnificent character. In one place there are the fragments of a fallen obelisk, and close by it is a standing obelisk ninety-two +feet high and eight feet square at the base, the largest obelisk now known. There is another, seventy-five feet high, a little from +it, and there is another obelisk standing at Luxor, the mate of it having been removed to Paris. The French government removed the +Luxor obelisk only after many attempts and failures. The obelisk at Karnak--the great one--was given to the English government, but +they never attempted to take it away. + +How did the Egyptians manage to move these masses of stone from the quarries at Assouan, and to put them in place? I give it up. + +Do you know where is the most stupendous hall in the world? It is in the temple at Karnak. It is three hundred and twenty-nine feet +long and one hundred and seventy feet broad; it has down its centre, twelve columns, each sixty feet high (without counting capital +and pedestal), and twelve feet in diameter. Then besides these there are one hundred and twenty-two other columns (arranged in +fourteen rows, seven on each side of the central rows), forty-two feet high and nine feet in diameter. Thus there are one hundred +and thirty-four columns in this great hall, and all of them are covered with sculptures. There was once a roof over the hall, but +it is mostly gone now, and some of the columns have fallen. Seven of us, with our outstretched hands touching each other, were just +able to encircle one of the great columns. Compared with this hall of the temple, the Parthenon at Athens becomes of dwarfish size. +All around are stones of great size that once formed parts of the temple; everything around is so great that the stones do not +appear large till you stand close beside them, and then you realize their extent and your littleness. {591}As at Abydos and Denderah +the walls of the temple, the faces of the pylons, the columns, the pillars, the sides of the encircling wall, everything and +everywhere, were covered with sculptures. The most of the sculptures were battle scenes, but there were many that represented +offerings to the deities. In the historical pictures the campaigns of the kings were represented, and one who has time and patience +to study them can read the story of a campaign. Here the king is marching out with his army, and next he is attacking a fortress; +next he is routing the enemy and driving them across a river; next he is returning in triumph, and there is a long series of the +cities he passes through on his return. + +On the front wall of a tower of a pylon, the king is represented striking off the heads of a group of captives, and these +representations are so frequent as to make it pretty certain that the Egyptians were accustomed to offer human sacrifices. The +hands, and sometimes other portions of the bodies of the slain enemies, are cut off and piled before the king; and some of the +pictures are of a kind that could hardly be reproduced in a family album of the present time. The king is nearly always represented +of much greater stature than those that surround him, and the Egyptians were generally so doubtful of the faces of their rulers +reaching posterity, that they were careful to engrave their names on most of the pictures and to detail the incidents described. + +This temple was not the work of one but of several kings, and there is a chronological difference of two hundred and fifty years +between the earliest and latest sculptures. There is much dispute as to the antiquity of the edifice, but it is generally conceded +to have been completed not less than fifteen centuries before the Christian era. + +One of our visits was made by moonlight, and the effect of light and shade, especially in the great hall, was beautiful beyond +description, and therefore I forbear attempting to describe it We disturbed several jackals and bats, the only occupants of the +ruins. + +There is an Arab village close to the temple, but it does not extend into the great structure. The water of the Nile enters {592}the +ruins at the time of the inundation, and is eating away the base of the columns, so that several have fallen from its effects. The +Egyptian architects, while producing magnificent superstructures, were curiously negligent of the foundations. + +On the west bank of the Nile are several temples, the most prominent of them being the Memnonium or Rameseum, and Med in et Aboo. + +Both were on the same general plan of Egyptian temples, and second only to Karnak in greatness; there are other temples around +here--half a dozen or more--and each has its peculiar historical and religious sculptures covering the walls. + +In the court yard of the Rameseum is an overturned and broken statue of Rameses III, the builder of the temple. It was destroyed by +the Persians at the time of the invasion of Egypt, but they did not succeed in obliterating it. The figure was a sitting one like +many of the statues of Egypt. The throne and legs were reduced to comparatively small fragments, but the upper part, broken at the +waist, lies comparatively perfect and enables us to judge of the great size of the figure. It is not sufficient to say that it was +the largest statue ever hewn from a single block and transported two or three hundred miles. It is calculated to have weighed (when +entire) not far from nine hundred tons. It was nearly twenty feet across the shoulders of the statue, and the foot of the figure was +eleven feet from toe to heel. From the shoulder to the elbow was nearly five yards, and the other measurements were in proportion. + +On the plain toward the river and quite a distance in front of the Rameseum are the sitting Colossi. They were made to represent one +of the Kings, and one at least was cut from a single block. The height of the figures is about fifty feet, and they originally had +pedestals ten feet high. The soil has risen considerably since their erection and is now about seven feet above their base. + +There they sit as they have sat for centuries looking out upon the plain of Thebes and across the Nile to Luxor. What stories they +might tell were they possessed of memory and the power of articulation; more than thirty centuries of the world’s history rest +behind those stony lips; more than three thousand years have come and gone since first {593}these forms were fashioned. + +[Illustration: 0608] + +History and tradition say that sounds issued from it when the rays of the rising sun fell upon its face; one authority says these +sounds were musical, and others that they resembled the snapping of a bow-string or a blow upon a piece of metal. The statue was +very fastidious in its youth, and many times when distinguished persons came {595}hands of man and placed where we find them to-day. +The city they once adorned has crumbled to dust and disappeared, and they sit alone and uncared for, save when some passing stranger +drawn by curiosity comes and gazes irreverently upon them and glances at the ground they have watched and guarded so long. + +[Illustration: 0610] + +One of these statues is the famous Vocal Memnon which orators and poets have frequently drawn upon for illustrations and {596}from +distant lands to see it, not a sound could be heard from it. Sometimes when Grand Moguls like the Emperor Hadrian and other +heavy swells came along it was more complaisant, and ventured to let itself out, and on a few occasions it even sounded twice, a +circumstance which ought to have been regarded with more suspicion than the absence of a date to Mr. Pickwick’s note announcing his +non-return to dinner. + +There can be but little doubt that the sound was a trick of the priests, as there is a stone in the lap of the statue and behind it +is a niche where a person could be completely concealed from the view of the crowd below. + +We hired an Arab to climb up and strike the stone, and we had the performance not only once but half a dozen times, all for half a +franc for the entire party, or less than a third of a cent each. Some things are dearer now than in the olden time, but the +Memnon business is cheaper. Two thousand years ago you had to be there at sunrise and sometimes you had to go two or three days +in succession, before you heard the sound, as the priest who struck the stone would happen to be off on a drunk or neglecting +his business. But now a little “backsheesh” will settle the matter at any hour of the day and it would keep on a week if you were +willing to pay for the fun. + +We spent a day among the tombs of the Kings, which are in a valley four or five miles back from the river; there are lots of tombs +there, fifty or more, some of them being the burial places of the kings, and others those of queens, of priests, of common people, +and even of cats, dogs, ibises, crocodiles, and other beasts, birds, and reptiles. + +I have said fifty, I might better have said there are four times that number as nobody seems to know how many tombs there are in the +hills back of Thebes, and every one admits they are very extensive. + +The most interesting are the tombs of the Kings, and also those of the priests; we entered half a dozen of the first and one of the +latter and made as thorough an investigation as was possible. Some were discovered by Bruce and some by Belzoni, and some by more +modern explorers. Every few years a fresh tomb is opened and important revelations are made. Any person who {597}wishes to dig among +these tombs can obtain the permission of the proper authorities and an officer will be sent to superintend his work and see that he +gives a proper account of the treasures he finds. Most of the tombs that have been opened have been stripped of their contents +and nothing remains except the mural sculptures and paintings. Some of these are of a most exquisite character and show that the +Egyptians were well advanced in the art of drawing. The tombs consist of long passages cut into the rock, some of them horizontal; +some descending and some with one, two, or it may be half a dozen lateral chambers and apartments. Passages, halls, and chambers are +all decorated with the same profusion as are the temples, and in some of them the colors are laid on with great care. Egyptian life +and its manners and customs, the arms and implements in use, the employments of the people, their religious belief, the ceremonies +of burial, and many other things can be learned by a study of these tombs, and they have probably been more useful in this +respect than have the temples, which are generally devoted to religious subjects and incidents in the life of the King whom they +commemorate. + +We lighted them up with candles and magnesium wire; we wandered through the halls and chambers, and we took lunch one day in the +entrance of a tomb which was once the post-mortem house of Rameses III. Did the old fellow ever suspect that a party of travellers +would in the present century devour cold chicken and ham sandwiches, and smoke cigars and pipes and cigarettes at his door? + +Most of the tombs that have been opened have been found rifled of their valuables, and the modern explorer has to be contented with +the granite coffins, and is very fortunate if he can find a royal mummy. M. Mariette discovered and opened in 1859 the coffin of +Queen Aah Hotep, which contained a remarkable collection of jewelry. + +She is thought to have been one of the Queens of the XVIIIth Dynasty, and to have lived about thirty-five hundred years ago. There +were bracelets and other ornaments of lapis lazuli, carnelian, feldspar, and turquoise set in gold, and there was a gold chain +nearly a yard long and framed of fine wire intricately woven. {598}The collection was in the Paris exhibition of ‘67, where it took +the prize. The French jewellers said it would be difficult for them with all their skill to mend this chain if it were broken, and +they admitted that the goldsmith’s art in the days of Queen Aah Hotep was little inferior to that of to-day. + +The body of an Egyptian was prepared for burial by the removal of the brains, intestines, and viscera generally; it was then soaked +in nitre for seventy days, and afterwards filled with salt and aromatic herbs. It was then carefully bandaged, every finger and +toe being separately wrapped, and there is not a bandage known to modern surgery with which the Egyptians were not familiar. The +bandages were soaked in preservative gums and the body thus carefully prepared was placed in a wooden coffin, shaped to the body, +and covered with hieroglyphics, which were generally passages from the Book of the Dead. Then this was placed in a stone coffin, +this again in a larger one, and sometimes the whole was enclosed in another. The number of the coffins and the care of preparations +depended upon the rank and wealth of the deceased very much as do the funeral ceremonies of today. The jewels of the deceased were +enclosed with him, and this practice has led to the opening of so many tombs since the decline of the ancient Empire. + +You can buy whole mummies, or parts of them, of the Arabs, around Thebes, but they are all the remains of common people. The supply +of Kings was limited from the outset and has long been exhausted. The demand is far greater than the supply. I asked repeatedly +for a king or for a live mummy, but in every instance was told that I could not be gratified I would give a good deal for a genuine +monarch, and was in the market for one all the time I was at Luxor, but in vain. + +All the way back to the river the Arabs kept near us trying to sell antiquities, but we were not inclined to purchase. One fellow +had a mummy head that had a remarkably fresh look, and I was told by the dragoman that when the supply of mummies runs short, the +natives dig up the skulls and arms from their own cemeteries and offer them for sale. I accused this merchant of endeavoring to +dispose of the head of his grandfather, but he denied the imputation, and said it was a real mummy. I promised {599}him a piastre +if he would walk by the side of the “Doubter” and continue to offer the head to him all the way back to the river, and to assist the +offer by holding the skull in front of the old fellow’s face. + +[Illustration: 8614] + +He earned his money, and the “Doubter” afterward said that he never saw an Arab so persistent as that one. I was sorry that we could +not hire the native to go along with us and keep his bone-yard ever in view of our crusty and penurious companion. + +The road from the tombs to the river winds among the limestone hills, and in the middle of the day the heat is great. Rain falls +here very rarely, but there are indications of great torrents through these ravines at some remote day. + +Rain was evidently not unknown to the ancients, as the temples of Denderah and other places were supplied with water spouts to carry +off the showers that evidently fell there. + +We crossed the river in a small boat. The water is shallow at the shore on the western bank and we had to be carried to and from the +boat. The Arabs transported us with ease, and were rewarded very fairly for their work, but of course they wanted more. Some of them +handled their burdens very carefully, and others tumbled them in with little ceremony. The Judge came in over the side much like +a sack of wheat, and went into a lump at the bottom of the boat. He was rather disconcerted at the performance as it rended his +already dilapidated garments and caused him to seek the seclusion of his own room as soon as we were on board the steamer. Another +of the party was dropped into the water but was saved without any worse mishap than a good wetting and a provocation to profanity. + + +{600} + +[Illustration: 0615] + + + + +CHAPTER XLVII--A VISIT TO A HAREM IN UPPER EGYPT.--LIFE AMONG THE NUBIANS. + + +_A Visit to a Harem--Among the Daughters of the Nile--How they Looked and What was Done--Painted Eyelids--The Use of Henna--A +Minute Inspection of Garments--Mustapha Agar “At Home”--Arab Astonishment--A Dinner a l’Arabe--Fingers vs. Forks--An Array of Queer +Dishes--Novel Refreshment--Dancing Girls--Truck and Decker at Luxor--More “Ghawazee,” Pipes and Coffee--“A Love of a Donkey”--Song +of Arabs--Arab Cruelty--A Nation of Stoics--Endurance of Pain--Among the Nubians--Ostriches, Arrows and Battle Axes--A Nubian +Dress--A Very Small Dressmaker’s Bill--A Scanty Wardrobe._ + + +THE ladies of the party did not accompany us to the Tombs of the Kings, as the day was hot and the ride a long one. Besides, they +had what was more attractive to them, an invitation to visit the harem of the English Consul. + +I volunteered to accompany them, but my escort was declined, for the reason that gentlemen were not admitted any more than they were +to the studios of some of the fortune-tellers of New York. When we returned to the boat, they were in great glee, and it was not +long before we had all the details, or at any rate, all that they chose to give us. We hardly recognized them, as their eyelids had +been stained with henna, after the Arabic manner, giving a great prominence and lustre to the eye. The result is the same as that +obtained by actresses and others, who apply red paint around the eyes and not upon the lids. + +I will try to give the story as nearly as possible, in the words {601} + +[Illustration: 0616] {603}of one of the fair visitors. I endeavored to induce her to write it out for me, but she shrunk from the +effort as something herculean, and all my prayers were of no avail. + +“We went to the consulate,” said the narrator, “and there we found Mustapha Agar waiting for us. We walked from there to his house, +which is quite pretty when you get inside, and has a sort of garden on a balcony, and from this balcony we went into the harem. +The consul staid outside with Mr. ---------- (the husband of one of the visitors), and we were shown in by one of the slaves. The +consul’s son, who speaks English, went in for a few moments and interpreted, but for the rest of the time we had to talk by signs, +as the women spoke nothing but Arabic, There were half a dozen women, some the wives of the consul, and some the wives of his son, +but we didn’t know which were which. + +“They saluted us in Arabic as we entered, and asked us to sit down on the carpet with them, and we squatted as best we could. There +were divans at the side of the room, and a rich carpet in the centre, and we sat on the carpet more than on the divans. The women +wore the loose dress of the Arabs and had no veils on their faces; one of them, a young girl of fifteen or about, had a very +richly-embroidered dress, much better than that of any other, and I thought she must be the favorite of either the j consul or his +son. They began at once to examine us, to look at our faces, our boots, our clothing, and everything, and we returned the compliment +by examining them. What most excited their curiosity was Mrs.------‘s hair. They pinched it and looked at it in all sorts of ways, +took it down, and were not easy till they had satisfied themselves that it was natural, and even then they kept examining it and +feeling it in their fingers every few minutes until we came away.” + +I remark by way of explanation that the lady referred to was English, and her hair was of the pure blonde type. It was of a golden +hue, rich and glossy, and was no doubt the first of its kind that these Arab women had ever seen. I do not wonder that their +curiosity was aroused. + +“Before we knew what they were about, they had our heads in their laps and were staining our eyelids; they wanted to stain {604}our +finger-nails and tattoo our chins, but we declined. Several times they renewed the request, but we thought it was enough to have our +eyelids stained in this way. They had their hair loose, with the exception of bands around their heads; the young girl had a rich +head-dress, with a great many pieces of gold attached to it, and her hair was of a jet black. They served us pipes and coffee, and +were much surprised that we didn’t smoke. We drank the coffee, and they made us take a few whiffs from the _narghileh_, and were +much amused when Mrs. ---------- swallowed some of the smoke and began to cough. + +“We staid there about half an hour. When we came away they embraced us, but did not kiss us, and they didn’t let us off until they +had taken another pinch at Mrs. ----------‘s hair. They followed us to the door and intimated by signs that they would like to go to +see us on the boat.” + +The next evening a party went to dine _a l’Arabe_ at the Engglish consulate, but as a part of them were masculine they were not +admitted to the harem. The party was seated on the carpet, and the table was about two feet high, just high enough to be comfortably +reached from the seat on the floor. Hands were washed before and after the meal, and sometimes between the courses, the water being +brought by a servant and poured upon the hands after the Eastern manner. + +There were about twenty courses in all,--soup, meats, and _pates_ of various kinds,--and all were eaten with the hands except the +soup, for which spoons were supplied. The consul presided at the table, and his sons supervised the service, which was quite rapid. +The bones were piled on the table in front of each guest, and were afterward removed. Some of the viands were so hot that one or +two of the guests found their hands somewhat burned. There was an abundant supply, enough for a party four times as large, and the +cooking was said to be very good. The most prominent article was a turkey which was brought on whole, and from which each person +tore off what he wanted. There were no knives or forks at the table, and some of the visitors made rather awkward work getting along +without them. + +All ate from the same soup-dish without hesitation, and luckily {605}they did not have time to continue at it long. The etiquette +was to take only a few mouthfulls of each dish, and whether good or bad, the dishes were not allowed to stay. Roasts, _entrees, +pâtés_, pilaufs, succeeded each other rapidly, and before the party was aware that the end had come, the host gave the signal by +rising and the table was removed. + +After the disappearance of the festive board, there was an Oriental dance. Four _gliawazee_ with their musicians were brought into +the parlor, and the dance began at once. Pipes and coffee had been served the instant the table disappeared, and the party took its +position on the divans where they could look on with complaisance. + +The Orientals understand dancing in its true sense, and cannot comprehend why we should caper through a waltz or a cotillion, when +we can hire somebody to do it for us. + +“Why don’t you make your servants do this?” was the wondering inquiry of a Chinese official, when invited to a ball given by some of +the English residents of Hong Kong. + +The day at length arrived for our departure from Thebes, and as the boat steamed away from the landing the crowd on shore sung a +farewell chorus, the consuls fired guns and pistols, and the whole town in fact seemed bent on making as much noise as possible. + +The market for antiquities declined rapidly before our departure, and articles were offered at less than half the figures that ruled +on the day of our arrival. + +We tied up as usual during the night, and next morning about breakfast time we were at Esneh, a town of six or seven thousand +inhabitants and containing a temple of which only a small portion has been cleared out. The remainder is quite covered by the houses +of the modern town, and is thought to be quite extensive. The portico, the only portion visible, is reached by a stairway which we +descended to the floor. The columns are well preserved but the sculptures are injured somewhat, and in places are hardly legible. + +Most of the features of the gods are broken, and this is the case in a large number of the temples of Upper Egypt. The injury is +attributed to the Persians, but a large portion of it is {606}due to the early Christians, who sought in their religious zeal to +destroy the evidences of pagan worship. In some temples they plastered over the sculptures, and thus unintentionally preserved them. +The plaster has been removed in modern times, and the sculptures are found in excellent condition. + +Esneh is famous, like Keneh, for its dancing girls, and there is quite a colony of them at the southern side of the town. We visited +their quarter in the evening, and were beset by the young ladies with appeals for “backsheesh” and invitations to visit their +households and witness a dance. + +There are several cafés on the bank just above the river, and we found quite a collection of Arabs in them. They were smoking their +pipes, sipping coffee, and singing and looking very dignified and disinclined to move. The Arab song may be best described as a +monotonous chant, consisting of about four measures and a chorus like a prolonged “ah-ah”. They sing everywhere, but more especially +when at work together. Men engaged in rowing or pulling a boat are constantly singing; one sings the measure and the whole join in +the chorus. The song may be on any subject, like popular airs everywhere, and frequently are extemporized by the singers. I was much +struck with their resemblance to the songs of the negro deck hands on the Mississippi steamers, and also to those of the Canadian +_voyageurs_ on the St. Lawrence and its tributary rivers. The boatmen of the Volga and the Dwina have also similar songs while +rowing or pulling their craft. + +One of the prettiest things I saw at Esneh was, not a girl, but a donkey. He was a beauty, and I would have given more for his +photograph than for that of any human being I saw there. His color was white, but according to the Arab custom his hair was closely +shaven. He was plump, round, and large; his ears were perfectly erect, and his trappings were rich and evidently selected with +taste. He belonged to the governor, who was pleased at the admiration bestowed upon his property, and stood approvingly by while one +of the artists of our party took a sketch of the animal. I ventured to ask how much such a donkey would be worth. + +“I paid twenty pounds for him,” replied the governor, “when {607}he was a year old. I have since refused a hundred pounds, and I +should refuse two hundred if anybody should offer it.” + +Above Esneh there are several places containing the ruins of temples, of which the most interesting is that of Edfou. Only since +1864 has it been visible; up to that time it was covered by rubbish and the houses of the modern village so that only the propylon +tombs were visible. + +[Illustration: 8622] + +The long-accumulated rubbish had helped to preserve it so, that when it was cleared out the sculptures were found in better +condition than in most other temples. + +The temple greatly resembles that of Denderah and has numerous small chambers that were used for the storage of valuable articles +used in the sacred ceremonies. + +The sanctuary contains a _sanctum sanctorum_, a large cage cut from a single block of granite, and once enclosing the hawk I which +was the emblem of the divinity to whose worship the temple was dedicated. + +That night while we lay at the landing, one of the ladies came to induce us to perform a work of charity. She had discovered that +the cooks in preparing chickens for the table did not kill the birds until after plucking the feathers, and sometimes a featherless +chicken would get loose and run around the bank. We went out to the place on shore where the picking was in progress and found +that her story was correct. We called the dragoman and had him explain to the Arabs that such a custom was not pleasing and that +hereafter they must kill the chickens before picking them. They were astonished at the suggestion, but promised compliance. {608}The +Orientals are thoughtlessly cruel, and this arises partly from a lack of nerves in their own organization. A Chinese will, sit in +a chair or ride in a cart that would be torture to a European, and a Turk or an Arab will sleep on a hard bed when he could have +an easier one if he chose. A native of any part of the Orient is less sensitive than an Occidental to a cudgeling, and he is quite +indifferent to the sufferings of animals. No dog in London or New York would be regarded as indifferently by the inhabitants of +those cities as are the dogs of Constantinople and Cairo by the Mohammedans. They beat their donkeys and, buffaloes with great +cruelty; one of the unpleasant features of riding on a donkey is the pounding that the brute receives from his driver, and when he +is doing his best he will frequently get a blow that would floor a man. Many of the donkeys have large sores where their hips +have been punched with sharp sticks, and these sores are kept open by a continuance of the punching. I don’t think the Arabs are +intentionally cruel; it is difficult to make them understand the sufferings of animals when they themselves are quite indifferent to +pain and discomfort. + +As we approached Assouan the sandstone formation disappeared and granite came into view. Along this part of the river there were +numerous boulders in the stream; they change their places through the action of the current and make navigation somewhat dangerous. +A steamer that left Cairo after we did struck one of these boulders while going at full speed and was of no use as a steamboat after +that. Passengers, crew, and baggage were saved, but the boat went to what Mr. Mantalini would call the “demnition bow-wows.” + +We made several windings with alternate views of fertile ground and sandy desert, rocky hills and huge boulders, and a last on a +rounded summit there appeared a dome that overlookes Assouan. We made a sharp bend to the left passing more boulders and with the +island of Elephantine on our right swung in towards the town and made fast to the bank. + +The river seemed to end here; we were enclosed in an amphitheatre variously composed of sand, granite, town, and verdure from which +there appeared to be no egress save by the route through which we had advanced. Steam was blown off and the upward journey of our +boat was ended. {609}As we went on shore we met a crowd of Arabs and Nubians with ostrich feathers, Nubian dresses, old coins, +arrows, silver ornaments, battle axes and the like for sale. + +[Illustration: 0624] + +The Arabs were like those we had seen down the river, but the Nubians were another lot. + +Their black skins were covered with scanty clothing, and their woolly hair was done into small ringlets about the size of lead +pencils and plentifully saturated with grease. To trade with them required as much bargaining as with the Arabs, and sometimes a +little more. + +They had high prices for their ostrich feathers, but we gradually brought them down. One article dealt in here was the {610}whip of +hippopotamus hide which goes by the name of _courbash_. Some of the passengers bought each a dozen or more; I contented myself with +one whip and a cane as I did not wish to affect the market. + +[Illustration: 9625] + +It was late when we arrived so that there was only time to take a stroll through the bazaars which contained nothing of special +importance. + +Assouan is a town of about four thousand inhabitants, and occupies the site of the ancient Sy-ene. At certain seasons it presents +many curious features as the trade from Nubia centres there and the product of the Soudan and Central Africa which has been sent by +camels around the cataract is reloaded here. Ostrich feathers, ivory, gum arabic, lion and leopard skins and the like are the chief +articles from those countries, and may sometimes be seen at Assouan in considerable quantities. + +In front of Assouan and in the middle of the river is Elephantine’ Island, so named probably, because no elephant was ever seen +there. We went there in a small boat rather rickety and leaky in its character, and which stuck in the mud at twenty feet or more +from the land. The island has been famous through many hundred years, and once contained a city of considerable importance. We +visited the ruins of this city and also of a temple which was destroyed about fifty years ago to furnish stone for the construction +of some modern buildings in Assouan. + +The island has a fertile appearance and is kept in a luxuriant condition by several _sakkiehs_ which are worked not by men as on the +lower Nile but by oxen. A pair of oxen turn a wheel by which a quantity of buckets are made to lift water from the + +[Illustration: 0626] + +{611}river. We visited one of these sakkiehs, but the driver did not greet us kindly as his team took fright at our coming and +nearly wrecked the machine before he could stop and pacify them. + +The inhabitants of the island are all Nubians, and as we landed they flocked down to meet us. They offered for sale old coins, +agates, spears, arrows, and Nubian dresses, but they did not drive a lively trade. The Nubian dress is not an extensive affair; one +of the passengers bought one and put it in his coat pocket, and several were offered to me that weighed only a few ounces each. They +were the costumes of ladies, not of men, and consisted of a fringe of strips of leather like shoe strings attached to a strap. This +strap was fastened around the loins, and the strings hanging down constituted the dress. + +This custom is quite unfit for the climate of America; it is better for Nubia where the thermometer ranges high during the entire +year and rain never falls. I saw several young ladies dressed in these airy garments and they did not appear at all uncomfortable. + +If a lady wants to get herself up gorgeously, she adds a string of beads to the above apparel and her toilet is complete. One dusky +maiden of about sixteen summers took off her string of beads and proffered them for sale. I gave her a franc for the lot and she +then removed the rest of her apparel and proposed selling it for two francs. + +What a country,--where a feminine wardrobe in the height of fashion can be bought for three francs! + +[Illustration: 5628] + + +{612} + +[Illustration: 0629] + + + + +CHAPTER XLVIII--CAMEL RIDING.--ADVENTURES AMONG THE NUBIANS. + + +_How they made the Royal Coffins--Splitting Blocks of Stones with Wooden Wedges--An Ingenious Device--A Ride on a Camel--A +Beast indulging in Familiarities--Lunching on Trowsers--Mounting in the Saddle--Curious Sensation--An Interesting Brute--A +Camel Solo--Sitting in a Dish--Camel Riding in a Gymnastic Point of View--Secondary Effects--Nubian Ferry-Boats--P. T. and his +Paint-Pot--Labors of an Enthusiastic American--Mr. Tucker on his Travels--“A Human Donkey”--Visiting the Cataract--Paying Toll to a +Sheik--The Professor and his Camel--Crocodiles of the Nile--Starting back to Cairo._ + +WE arranged to go around the cataract and visit the Island of Philæ the day after our arrival at Assouan. On our way we took in +the granite quarries, where for thousands of years blocks of stone were taken out for various building purposes and for making those +enormous sarcophagi used in so many Egyptian tombs. The stone is of the red character known as syenite and admits of a high polish. +In one of the quarries there is an obelisk not quite detached, which would have been ninety-five feet high and eleven feet broad at +the base. Why it was abandoned and under what king it was begun are not known. + +The quarries are interesting from the fact that they show the ancient method of removing stone. Holes were cut to receive wooden +wedges, which were driven firmly in and then wet with water until their swelling broke away the stone by the equal and powerful +pressure it exerted. The same plan is still in use in, some parts of India; the quarries at Jerusalem whence was, {613}taken the +stone for building Solomon’s temple show similar marks of the wedge. + +We were offered the choice of camels or donkeys for the ride to Philæ and back, and for the novelty of the thing I selected a camel. + +[Illustration: 8630] + +I went out early in the morning before any other passenger was stirring, and examined the beasts with the eye of a connoisseur. They +were all lying down and chewing the cud of content or some other kind of grass, and I endeavored to get on friendly terms with them. +I patted one on the head and he resented the familiarity by endeavoring to bite a section from the seat of my trowsers. + +This kind of performance was not calculated to secure my friendship and I moved on to another which the boy in charge insisted was +_tayb kateer_ (very good). He did not try to bite and as he was of goodly size I chose him. Then I proceeded to mount and took my +seat in the saddle which had a strong resemblance to a wood-sawyer’s “horse” with a blanket over it. Now was the critical moment. + +I grasped firmly the pommel of the saddle and also the cantle; as I did so, the boy pulled the camel’s halter and uttered something +like “_Hey da! Hey da!_” + +The camel lifted his shoulders and came up to his knees; then he brought up his hind quarters to the full height of the legs there, +and finally he arose from his knees to his fore feet. The motion, so far as I was concerned, was a surge backward, then a surge +forward, and finally a backward surge that subsided into a level. {614}Here is the formula: Half the fore-legs, then all the +hindlegs, then half the fore-legs. From a level you are pitched backward so that you could easily fall on your shoulders; an instant +after, you find yourself inclined forward, and the next instant you are on the backward lean again, and subside into a level. I held +on firmly, or I should have come to grief. I fancy the camel boys who stood around had several laughs at my precautions to prevent +falling. + +The camel kneels in the reverse of the motions of rising, _i. e._, half the fore-legs, all the hind-legs, and then half the +fore-legs. When he is lying down his back is easily accessible for loading or mounting, but when he is up in the air he is a long +way off. + +I selected one of the largest beasts on purpose to know the sensation of being elevated. I expected to have a sense of insecurity +and possibly of giddiness, but on the contrary experienced nothing of the kind. + +On the score of beauty the camel has no reason to be proud. His neck and head are ill-shaped and suggest an overgrown turkey; his +feet move awkwardly and with an appearance of gout, rheumatism, and spring-halt; his skin looks like an old boot that has been +exposed to wind and rain for half a year; and his shape generally is as beautiful as that of a gnarly apple. My camel had a +grotesquely colored skin; he had hair in spots and spots without hair, and what he had was of the shade of a very old buffalo +robe. He had a sort of wool on his neck, but it was rather bunchy and looked as if his brother camels had browsed upon it; and his +under-lip hung down like that of a boy who is about to whimper in expectation of a flogging. + +When I mounted him, he arched his neck around like a snake and brought his head quite near mine, and at the same time began a noise +that was a combination of screaming, bellowing, and groaning. He kept this up about half the time I was on his back, and altogether +he made the journey a musical one. + +The regular saddle for riding a camel is a sort of dish, in which you sit with your legs crossed over the animal’s neck or hanging +down at will. You can have stirrups if you like, as a rest for the feet, and for a long journey the best plan is to sling a pair of +well-filled saddle-bags or a couple of boxes over a common pack {615}saddle, and arrange them in such a way that they form a level +surface about six feet from side to side. Cover this with blankets, shawls, and a mattress, and roll up the sheets and pillow of +your bed, and strap them to the back of the saddle so as to form a comfortable rest. Fasten a pair of stirrups to the saddlebow and +have everything well strapped and corded so as to prevent slipping. + +[Illustration: 8632] + +With this arrangement you can lean, lie down, sit sideways or cross-legged, or with your feet in the stirrups; and if you want to be +luxurious, you can fasten a huge umbrella so as to shade you from the sun. A suggestion of my own is that you add a soda fountain, a +billiard table, and a fish-pond, and also a light carriage for driving around your platform. Other comforts would doubtless occur to +the imaginative reader. + +There is a peculiar rocking motion to the camel, and the experienced rider moves his body backwards and forwards, bending at the +hips, at each step of the beast. + +The night after my camel ride, I dreamed that I had a backbone of glass, and could not move without breaking in two; and when I got +up in the morning it seemed as if I was all backbone and that an iron rod had been passed through it for purposes of rigidity. I +went around rather pompously for all that day, and I couldn’t have made a bow if I had been in front of the king of the Cannibal +Islands and threatened with instant death for any appearance of incivility. I dropped my cane while walking on shore and had to hire +an Arab to pick it up, and as for putting on my boots it was as great an effort as to turn a somersault in a peck measure. {616}My +camel was an ordinary baggage beast, and the saddle was such as they use for transporting freight around the cataract. The two round +sticks that run from pommel to cantle were painfully perceptible beneath the blanket that hid them, and the rubbing, rocking motion +over them made a couple of abrasions of the skin as large as a soda cracker. + +The result of my camel riding was to teach a great deal of dignity, and to cause me to sit as little as possible in the presence of +my elders or of any body else. What with stiffness and soreness I was not agile in my movements, and it took as long for me to sit +down or rise from a seat, and was about as laborious, as to lay the corner-stone of an eight-story building. + +From Assouan to the quarries the scenery was wild and striking, especially so at the point where we caught sight of the river and +had Philae in the midst of the Nile as the centre of the picture. We had at one view the desert, black rocks and white sand, green +trees, a flowing river, and the beautiful island with its coronet of temples. Under the tall trees on the river bank, there was a +crowd of Arabs and Nubians, waiting for us to dismount, and beyond them lay the boats which were to ferry us over. The scene was +unlike that of any other part of the Nile that we had yet encountered, and we readily realized that we had passed the frontier of +Egypt and had entered Nubia. + +Leaving my camel in the hands of his driver--a scantily-dressed boy of Nubian origin,--I entered the boat and waited till the rest +of the party were on board. Half a dozen merchants of ostrich feathers and ornaments of silver were trying to strike up bargains, +but did not create much business. In the river some Nubian urchins were sitting astride of logs and paddling about, and they showed +great dexterity in balancing themselves. These logs are generally a foot in diameter and six or eight feet long, and you can +see them lying around on the banks; they appear to be common property for use as ferry boats, but whether they are supplied by +government I am unable to say. A native comes to the Nile and wishes to cross; he removes his clothing and makes it into a bundle +that he places on the top of his head, and thus prepared he takes a log, strides it, plunges into the river and paddles over. On the +other side he draws the log well on {617}the land, and as soon as his body is dry he dons his clothing and moves on. Sometimes and +generally he does not happen to have any clothing, and in this event he is saved a great deal of trouble. + +Philæ has always excited the admiration of travellers, many of whom have characterized it as the most lovely spot they ever beheld. + +[8634] + +To the ancient Egyptian it was the most sacred place on earth. It was the resting-place of his god of gods, the all-powerful Osiris, +who was identified with the annual overflow of the Nile, and the consequent fertility of the land. + +Hence arose the fable that his body was deposited in the cataract, whence he arose each year to enrich the earth. + +Isis was the sister and wife of Osiris. On the monuments she is variously styled the “Mistress of Heaven,” the “Regent of the Gods,” + the “Eye of the Sun.” A veil always hung before her shrine, which, said the well known inscription, “None among mortals have ever +lifted up.” Sometimes she represented the land of Egypt, just as Osiris did its fertilizing river, the Nile. + +Such were the deities to whose mysterious worship, Philæ, the Sacred Island, was solemnly dedicated. + +The temple was beautifully situated, as it covered a considerable part of the Island, and must have appeared in the days of its +glory very much as though it rose out of the water. It is comparatively modern, as the dates upon it do not go back beyond the XXXth +Dynasty--about four hundred years B. C. The building was very irregular, and the indications are that it was the work of several +architects at different periods. The propylon towers are massive, and rise to a height of nearly sixty feet above their base, +affording a fine view of the island and its surroundings. {618}The colors on the walls and towers are wonderfully preserved,--better +than in most of the Egyptian temples,--and they present a beautiful effect. + +The sky was clear and the air soft and balmy; a slight breeze shook the leaves of the trees and roughened the water of the river. +To the north were the black rocks that marked the locality of the cataract, while to the south the Nile made a short bend among the +Nubian hills and was speedily lost to view. + +There is a sentimental poem on the “Long Ago” by an American author, which contains the following stanza: + + “There’s a musical isle up the river Time, + + Where the softest of airs are playing; + + There’s a cloudless sky and a tropical clime, + + And a song as sweet as the vesper chime, + + And the tunes with the roses are straying.” + +[Illustration: 9635] + +It may have been, and at all events it is pretty and poetical enough for the uses of anybody who ever ventured upon verse-making. If +I wanted to cure anybody of the poetic mania Philæ would be the last place to which I should send him. + +There are inscribed on the temple, chiefly on the pylon towers, the names of many persons who have visited the place within the past +two hundred years. On the side of one of the doorways is an inscription in French, announcing that the army of Desaix reached the +island of Philæ, at the time of the occupation of Egypt by the French under Bonaparte. The inscription remained untouched until +1848, when some English visitors effaced the words _Buonaparte_ and _Armée Française_. An enthusiastic Frenchman, who had been up +the river + +{619} + +[Illustration: 0636] + +{621}to the second cataract, happened to visit the island on his return and found that the mutilation had occurred during his +absence. He procured a pot of paint, restored the names and wrote beneath the inscription: “_Une page d’histoire ne s efface pas!_” + +One of the most enterprising of modern travellers--so far as recording the fact of his visit is concerned--is a somebody from New +York. He came here in 1870 and travelled, literally, not figuratively, with a paint pot and brush in his hand. On the pyramids, on +the tombs at Sakkarah, on the walls of the temple at Karnak, at Edfou, Esneh, in fact everywhere along the Nile I saw his initials, +“P. T., N. Y., 1870” I was told that his full name is Tucker; I hope it is at any rate, as it is not proper that such a genius +should rest in obscurity. He smeared those initials where they were sure to be seen, and was not at all particular if he defaced +a fine mural painting or sculpture by so doing. In the temple at Karnak, for example, he painted them in such a way as to deface +a mural sculpture, and he did likewise at other places. If he could come here again, and under another name accompany a party like +ours up the Nile, he would no doubt listen with pleasure to the compliments passed upon him. + +Nearly everybody called him a first-class ass, an idiot, a fool; and some prefixed an adjective of a participial character to the +word; and I heard several persons wish to wring his neck. I endeavored to reprove them, but it was of no use; and lest he should go +down to the obscurity that he evidently dreaded, I embrace this opportunity to make known his name and valorous deeds. + +An Englishman said to me one day while looking at the above inscription, “We have a good many human donkeys in England, but I +think your countryman who did that is the grandest ass in the world.” My heart was so full just then that I could not rush to my +compatriot’s defence, and I fear that my British friend believed I shared his opinion. + +From the island we went to see the cataract, which is nothing more than a succession of rapids. In the time of the highest flood +boats can ascend the cataract with the aid of a strong wind by their sails alone, but in ordinary stages they must be taken up by +means of tow-ropes. From forty to sixty men are {622}required, and the passage through the five miles of distance will take a whole +day. The scene is quite picturesque and full of animation, especially when the rope breaks and lets the boat back over a distance +that has been gained with much toil. + +There is a sheik who has entire control of the passage of the cataract, and the contract must be made with him. It costs from ten to +fifteen pounds to take a boat up from Assouan to Mahatta, a small village at the head of the falls, and sometimes the work will take +three or four days. + +At Mahatta we found our camels and donkeys, and returned by the bank of the river to Assouan. The Professor was on a camel of +enormous size--so large in fact that I suggested the addition of a pilot house and steering gear to keep the animal in the road. +We passed two or three villages where the natives offered us necklaces and polished agates for sale, and a few old coins. Skins of +crocodiles were offered, and one native tried hard to palm off a lizard on us as a young crocodile. + +Crocodiles, by the way, are quite scarce on the Nile below the First Cataract. We saw but one on our whole voyage; twenty years ago +you might see two or three dozen of them in a day. In Nubia they are abundant enough, and further up the Nile you can see plenty of +hippopotami. Not one of these beasts exists now below the second cataract, though less than sixty years ago one was killed in the +delta below Cairo. + +After several day’s stoppage at Assouan, we started back for Cairo. All steamboat travellers and most _dahabeeah_ parties do not go +beyond Philæ, and nearly all tourists who go further, end their voyage at Wady Haifa, the foot of the Second Cataract, two hundred +and forty miles beyond Assouan. + +Above Wady Haifa the river makes a wide bend into Dougoula; parties intending to proceed to Khartoum, at the junction of the Blue +and White Nile, generally leave the river at Korosko, a hundred miles below Wady Haifa, and make a journey of eight days by camel +across the desert to Aboo Hamed, where they take boats again on the river and save going around the bend After passing Khartoum +there is good navigation on the Nile, for a long distance, and then-- + +Well, that is what explorers are endeavoring to find out. + + +{623} + + + + +CHAPTER XLIX--IN THE SLAVE-COUNTRY--SIR SAMUEL W. BAKER’S EXPEDITION. + + +_The Egyptian Slave Trade--How carried on--An Army of Kidnappers--A Slave King--Frightful Scenes--Sir Samuel Baker’s Expedition--A +Shrewd Move--Breech-loaders as Civilizing Agents--A Missionary Outfit--Starting for the Slave Country--Reluctant A lies--The “Forty +Thieves”--Running against a Snag--The Sacred Egyptian Flower--The Lotos-Eaters, Who were They?--The New York Lotophagi--The Papyrus +or Vegetable Paper--Capturing a Cargo of Slaves--The Plague of Flies--A few more “likely Niggers”--Marrying by Wholesale--A Fight +with the Natives--The result of the Expedition._ + + +I HAVE already alluded to the efforts of the Khedive to put an end to the slave trade in Central Africa, and to give that benighted +part of the world some of the advantages of civilization. + +Under some of the former rulers of Egypt the slave trade had been openly encouraged, while under others it was restricted, but not +very forcibly. In 1869 the Khedive determined to make a formidable effort for its suppression. At that time the reports from Central +Africa showed that the trade was mainly carried on by Egyptian subjects, most of them merchants of Khartoum. They were working on +an extensive scale. They had organized companies of well armed brigands, and they sent out regular expeditions of these fellows into +the country whence the slaves were drawn. Ostensibly these expeditions were for trading in ivory, but the chief and frequently the +sole article of commerce sought was of a color quite the reverse of ivory. To such an extent was the business carried that large +tracts of country were rendered almost desolate; whole villages were burned and their {624}inhabitants killed, dispersed or +captured, and sold into slavery, and all legitimate business seemed to be at an end. It was estimated that not less than fifteen +thousand subjects of the Khedive were employed in trading inhuman flesh. Nearly the whole of the Nile basin beyond Khartoum was +parcelled out among the traders, who worked together for the common good and conducted their _razzias_ by means of their armed +followers. + +One of the traders claimed jurisdiction over ninety thousand square miles of territory, and could do as he pleased within its +borders. The estimate of the number of slaves annually captured and sent out of the country was not less than fifty thousand. As the +traders could penetrate into all the populous country and make their raids at will there was great insecurity of life and property. +The Khedive determined to strike a blow for the suppression of this infamous business, and for this purpose an expedition was +organized and Sir Samuel White Baker was assigned the supreme command for four years from April 1st, 1869. + +This expedition was expected to subdue to the Khedive’s authority the countries situated to the south of Goudokoro; to suppress +the slave trade; to introduce a system of commerce; to open to navigation the great lakes of the equator; and to establish military +stations and commercial depots throughout Central Africa. + +Baker was given absolute control of the men under him and of the country designated in the Khedive’s decree. He had even the power +of life and death, and from his decisions there was no appeal. + +It was decided that one of the first steps necessary in suppressing the slave trade was to “annex” the country of the Nile basin to +Egypt. This would make it subject to Egyptian laws and would tend to the establishment of commerce more surely than if the region +should remain independent and uncivilized. The inhabitants could learn to read and write, and could buy whiskey and tobacco; they +could get drunk and steal, and otherwise be honored citizens, as if they were subjects of the Queen of England or the President +of the United States. Instead of going about in nakedness they would have strings of beads to wear {625}around their necks, and if +prosperous and obedient they might hope for rings on their fingers, and in time for bells on their toes. Christianity and contagious +diseases would be introduced; they would have debating societies, spelling matches, and caucusses, and all kindred institutions of +a free people, and they might look forward to that millennial period when city halls and courthouses, and prisons, and jails, would +rise in their midst to enrich the Ethiopian Tweeds and Sweeneys of that happy time. The heathen should no longer live in blindness +and bow down to wood and stone. He should go to a fine church on Fifth avenue, listen to a popular preacher, and sing his hosannas +by proxy through the mouths of a carefully selected and liberally paid quartette. It was expected that the natives would rush +anxiously forward to listen to the proclamation of annexation. + +To aid them to come to a favorable decision Sir Samuel was provided with a suitable number of breech-loading rifles with plenty +of fixed ammunition, and with about sixteen hundred men to handle the rifles properly. This military force included two hundred +irregular cavalry and two batteries. With such a missionary outfit as this it was thought there would be no trouble in convincing +the untutored savages that it was a good thing to be annexed and civilized. The arms and equipments were carefully selected, and +for the further purpose of convincing the natives three steamboats--built in sections so that they could be carried on camels--were +taken along. Then there was a large supply of English cloth of different kinds, all sorts of tools and toys, musical boxes, cheap +watches, and odds and ends of different kinds enough to stock a variety store at Christmas time. + +After many delays and difficulties the expedition was off for Khartoum where it arrived in course of time. The official and other +residents of Khartoum were not over friendly to the expedition, as the most of them had an interest in the slave trade, directly or +otherwise, and some of the principal operators were on intimate terms with the governor. The latter had done nothing toward getting +ready the vessels necessary for the expedition, but he went to work soon after Baker’s arrival and displayed considerable activity. +After a while the expedition moved on with the two steamers which had been put together, and with a {626}fleet of thirty-one sailing +vessels. Altogether the command of Baker Pasha was somewhat more than a thousand men, the original number having been diminished by +sickness, death, and desertion. + +He had a special corps of forty-six men selected as a body guard and commanded by an Egyptian lieutenant-colonel. As the most of +them were originally convicts sent from Cairo to the Soudan the contingent was known as the “Forty Thieves.” They were a brave lot +of rascals and did most excellent service. + +In this army of enterprise commanded by Baker Pasha, it did not appear necessary that the men that went out for soldiers should be +of the best quality. Anything will do as food for powder, and when they prove as courageous as did the “Forty Thieves,” the wisdom +of the selection is to be commended. + +Baker proceeded up the Nile from Khartoum as fast as the winds and steam could carry him, and had no trouble for some days. His +difficulties began when he reached a point where the river was blocked with a mass of reeds and vegetable matter through which the +water managed to soak. But the boats could not find any passage and the expedition was compelled to halt. + +At length thirty vessels were ordered to form in line single file, to cut a canal through the high water grass, but the operation +was very fatiguing to the men and put a goodly number of them on the sick list. They made about a mile and a half the first day, +and on the next the whole fleet was pushed forward about five miles, the mass of vegetation having diminished in quantity. But +on subsequent days they were not so fortunate, and finally were forced to stop altogether. The mass of vegetable matter steadily +increased, and finding the passage impossible Baker gave the order to return. + +Among the plants that formed part of this, vegetable mass was the lotos, the flower that was considered sacred among the ancient +Egyptians, and was cultivated in the little ponds at the sides of their temples. It is a species of water lily. Eleven varieties +of the lotos are known; but only one is now found in lower Egypt, the leaves and flowers of which float upon the water. From +representations on the walls of temples and tombs it is supposed that the sacred flower of ancient Egypt generally grew + +{627} + +[Illustration: 0644] + +{629}in the edge of the water or in a moist place. The leaves and flowers were upheld above the surface by strong stalks. The pods +and seeds of the lotos are eaten by the natives in Central Africa, and sometimes form their only article of food. + +The Lotos-eaters, or Lotophagi, were described by Herodotus, who was vainly urged to eat of the plant. It was supposed that one who +had eaten of the lotos would lose all desire to return to his native land, and be content to pass the rest of his days in dreamy +rest. Tennyson has made use of this idea in one of his most charming poems. + +A club known as the Lotos was formed in New York some years ago, and is yet in successful operation. But the digestive organs of its +members and their guests are exercised upon beefsteak, potatoes, and kindred edibles much oftener than upon the African plant. In +fact, I have never yet seen the article on their _menu_. + +Further up the Nile its banks are covered with a dense vegetation which includes many kinds of tropical plants. The lotos rises from +the water’s edge, and close beside it may be seen the papyrus, the plant whose name is preserved in the word “paper.” + +As the expedition went back the channel which had been cut with so much labor was found to be freshly choked so that the return +movement was nearly as slow as the advance. + +On the advance up the river the governor of Fashooda, a station on the White Nile, had warmly commended the Khedive’s plan for +suppressing the slave trade, and wished Baker the best of success. On the latter’s unexpected return he found the governor shipping +a cargo of slaves down the river, and that several villages in the vicinity had been robbed of their inhabitants in order that +the governor could make up his cargo. Baker captured the boat containing the slaves and had the captives brought out. There were +seventy-one of them in all, and an examination of the shore revealed eighty-four additional slaves guarded by the governor’s +soldiers! + +The governor tried to explain that the prisoners were held as hostages until the rest of the people should pay their taxes. But +as there was no fixed tax in the country the whole story was rather lacking in texture, in fact, was altogether “too thin.” The +{630}governor was somewhat annoyed at having been caught, and his principal consolation was that slave dealing was the chief +business of the Soudan country, and that therefore he was no worse than his fellows. + +Baker now descended the Nile to the mouth of the Sabat river, where he established a camp on a piece of high ground. + +[Illustration: 0647] + +A garden was formed and planted, and in a short time a dozen varieties of vegetables were in rapid growth. Millions of white ants +appeared and created great havoc among the stores of the expedition, and they were gallantly assisted by the rats which abound +around the White Nile. Flies were very troublesome, and compelled the erection of dark stables for the horses, and even in these +stables it was necessary to make smudges of burning horse dung to expel the annoying insects. The donkeys suffered likewise, but in +spite of the flies they were found to keep their condition best in the open air, though their hair fell off and their skins assumed +the appearance of India rubber. After a time they became accustomed to the situation; with all their persistence the flies were +unable to appeal to the moral nature of the beasts. + +Gristmills and sawmills were erected, and for the first time in the history of the world this part of the Nile basin resounded +to the {631}music so familiar to the valleys of the Penobscot and Kennebec. A small machine shop was opened, and there was much +activity in the preparations for the next campaign to the south. The natives looked on wonderingly, and established the most +friendly relations with the expedition. But it took them a long time to understand why the government should send an armed force +to break up the slave trade, when its local officials were more or less engaged in that commerce. The untutored savage is quick at +comprehending anything which an educated white man could not easily get through his head. + +One day a sail-boat was discovered descending the river. It attempted to pass, but was brought to land, and at first glance appeared +to be laden with corn. The captain and super-cargo protested that they had no slaves on board. An examination was made resulting +in the discovery of a. hundred and fifty stowed away in the hold like sardines in a can. They were brought out--boys, girls, and +women--all perfectly naked; their shackles were removed and the captain and supercargo were put in irons. + +Next morning Baker gave free papers to the negroes, and gave them the choice of returning to their homes or making themselves useful +about the camp. He told the women that if any of them wished to marry, they could possibly find husbands among his soldiers. + +In the afternoon the officer in charge of the negroes came to inform Baker that all the women wished to marry, and had already +selected their husbands. There was some difficulty about arranging the details, as the black women refused to marry the brown men of +the Egyptian regiment. They didn’t want any dirty white trash, but had no objection to such soldiers as had the good fortune to be +negroes. + +Months were consumed in tedious and vexatious delays before the expedition arrived at Gondokoro. Here a station was established, a +garden was planted, and the natives were made by various means to understand that the expedition had come there to stay, and occupy +the country in the interest of freedom. + +The natives were hostile, and were particularly enraged when told that the country was to be annexed to Egypt. On the 26th {632}of +May the ceremony was performed that added many thousand miles of territory to the dominions of the Khedive. + +A flagstaff eighty feet high had been erected. The whole military force, consisting of twelve hundred men with ten pieces of +artillery, was marched out and formed in a square around the flagstaff. + +[Illustration: 9649] + +The official proclamation was read, and as the last words were pronounced, the Ottoman flag was run up, the officers saluted with +their swords, the infantry presented arms, and the artillery fired a salvo which woke the echoes of Gondokoro and the surrounding +country. But the soldiers of the expedition had become discouraged, and the mutinous spirit among the men finally broke out in the +shape of written protests signed by all the officers, except those belonging to “The Forty Thieves.” + +These protests were to the effect that the officers and soldiers were weary of the expedition, and wished to return to Khartoum. + +Fights with the natives became of almost daily occurrence, and some of them assumed the importance of battles. But the arrows and +spears of the natives and the few muskets they had obtained from the traders, were no match for the rifles of the Egyptians, and the +fights invariably resulted in the defeat of the savage. But the movements of the expedition were retarded, and the little camp at +Gondokoro was kept in a state of frequent alarm. Though the rebellious officers were silenced, their feelings were unchanged, and +they did not rush eagerly into the fight when the bugle called to arms. + +Still Baker persevered, and by his bravery and indomitable + +{633} + +[Illustration: 0650] + +{635}energy the expedition was kept together. The sick and wounded were sent back to Khartoum, and the command was soon reduced +to less than five hundred men of all ranks and occupations. Numerous expeditions were sent into the surrounding country, to the +consternation of the natives, who were astonished at the appearance of the soldiers, especially as they were accompanied by music +from the bugles of “The Forty Thieves” and the band of the Egyptian regiment. + +At the expiration of his term of service, Baker descended the Nile and arrived at Cairo in August, 1873, where he was warmly +received by the Khedive and decorated with the order of the “Medjidie.” + +Colonel Gordon, whose name had become well known through his connection with the wars in China, and his organization of the army +that received the title of “Ever Victorious,” was appointed to succeed Baker Pasha. Late in 1873 he proceeded to the Soudan, where +he took command of the troops which had been left at Khartoum and Gondokoro. The expedition was reorganized, and in 1874 was ready +to proceed. Fresh soldiers were sent from Cairo, a better equipment was given to the soldiers, and several of the foreign officers +in the Khedive’s service were transferred to the Soudan. Arms, ammunition, goods, provisions, and all needed supplies were liberally +provided, and the work of exploration and the suppression of the slave trade was actively pushed. + +While I was in Egypt I became acquainted with two of the American officers who were to accompany Colonel Gordon, and they departed +for the south during my stay at Cairo. They were Lieutenant-Colonel Long and Major Campbell, and both impressed me as able and +efficient officers thoroughly devoted to their duty. As I write they are still in Equatorial Africa; the work of the expedition was +expected to continue for three years from January, 1874, and is therefore far from complete. + +The Khedive shows a determination to put an end to the barbarous traffic in humanity and to discover the sources of the Nile, thus +setting at rest a question which has vexed the scientists from the days of Herodotus to our own. He has followed up his policy of +annexation by taking the rich country of Darfoor under {636}his standard and proclaiming it the territory of Egypt. Darfoor has +long been at war with Egypt, and it is to be hoped that the annexation of the country will bring a lasting peace that will tend to +agricultural and commercial development. The moral influence of breech-loaders and rifled artillery in the hands of Gordon and his +energetic assistants is actively at work, and the results can be confidently expected at no distant day. The whole of Equatorial +Africa will come under the sway of Egypt, and the old kingdom of the Pharaohs will assume an extent never dreamed of in the days of +Isis and Osiris. + +[Illustration: 5653] + + +{637} + +[Illustration: 0654] + + + + +CHAPTER L--SUNSET IN THE ORIENT.--VOYAGING DOWN THE NILE. + + +_An Egyptian Sunset--A Gorgeous Spectacle--The Sky that bends above the Nile--Singular Atmospheric Phenomena--A Picture for an +Artist--Shadows from History--Napoleon and the Pyramids--Our Voyage back to Cairo--Scenes by the Way--“Cook’s Tourists”--An +Amusing Sight--Night-Fall on the Nile--A Flame of Rockets--“What does it Mean?”--The Marriage of the Khedive’s Son--Feminine +Disappointment--Jumping Ashore--Aboard of Donkeys--Gustave’s Somersault--Practical Sympathy--In the Pasha’s Garden--A Magnificent +Sight--The Wedding Pageant--Elbowing an Arab Crowd--A Pyrotechnic Shower._ + + +THE tenth of February was the last day of our journey on the Nile. Both gladly and reluctantly we hailed the end. + +The sun went down according to his usual custom and at the time set by astronomers for him to do so. There was nothing remarkable in +the fact that sunset occurred at the close of the day, but there _was_ something remarkable in the coloring of the sky, and in the +lights and shadows of the hour. An Egyptian sunset is about the finest thing of the kind that can be found anywhere, and it is no +wonder that poets rave about it and artists make long pilgrimages and endure many hardships in order to transfer it to canvass. +I have seen the glorious orb of day leave the world “to darkness and to me” in many lands and climes of this terrestial ball--in +unsentimental English I have seen the same sun set in many places--but I have never found it making a spectacle more gorgeous than +the Egyptian one. The Egyptian morning has some color, but not much; in the middle of the day every particle of tint disappears +altogether, and the sky is perfectly clear--a sort of grayish blue in which there is only the very faintest suggestion of +cerulean. An hour or two {638}before sunset a close observer will discover faint outlines or ghosts of clouds--cirrus and +cirro-cumulus--streaming up from the western half of the horizon, and furtively gaining little by little until they are at the +zenith. At first these clouds are colorless, but as they grow and take definite shape, and the minutes roll on, they become purple +and scarlet, and crimson and golden, until the whole western heavens from north to south, and from south back to north again seem to +be aglow with lurid flames. The sands of the Desert have absorbed during the middle of the day all the effulgent beams of the sun; +now they are giving them back in all their prismatic variety and painting a picture of rarest beauty. The colors are brightest as +the sun drops into the waste of sand in the west. If we are standing on the Mokattam Hills overlooking Cairo we have the pyramids of +Gizeh between us and the declining sun and their outlines become more and more distinct as the day wanes. The colors linger on the +clouds but gradually they fade and disappear till at last we see only a bright line of light along the horizon. This in turn melts +away and the day is done. + +“Soldiers,” said Napoleon, as he formed his army in line to resist the desperate charge of the Mamelukes, “soldiers,--from the +lights of yonder pyramids forty centuries look down on you.” + +Forty centuries and more have rolled away since Cheops and Cephren built these monuments on the banks of the Nile. Could those stony +masses be endowed with speech what stories might they not tell us of the glories of ancient Egypt, of the rise and fall of dynasties +and kingdoms, of the horrors of war and the blessings of peace, and of the many events which their existence has embraced. They +could tell us of many thousand sunset scenes like the one we have just witnessed; of gorgeous pictures painted on cloud and sky in +colors that fade not as time rolls on but remain to-day as brilliant as when the morning stars first sang together ages and ages +ago. + +Our return voyage was not marked by any special incident. At sunset we just caught a glimpse of the citadel that overlooks Cairo and +commands with its black-mouthed cannon the city of the Caliphs and the Mamelukes. The arrowy minarets of the mosque of Mohammed Ali +were faintly discernible against the {639}sky, and the orange groves of the Island of Roda filled the foreground of the picture with +their dark foliage. + +We were on deck and busily engaged in studying the scene. There was a gentle breeze blowing up the Nile and we met numerous boats +taking advantage of the wind that favored their southward journey. Most of them were empty; they had been at Cairo and a market, and +were now homeward bound. Some were filled with men and women,--villagers from the banks of the river, and every few moments we heard +sounds of music and merriment from these densely laden craft. One boat was so crowded that there were not seats for all, and the +gunwale of the craft was not more than two inches above the water. + +“What can they be?” asked a young lady who was generally the leader in questioning. + +“Don’t you know?” was the prompt reply, “it is a party of Cook’s tourists on a pleasure trip.” Despite the untruth it contained the +reply caused a laugh on the part of all who heard it, including the fair maiden who sought to be informed as to the character of the +party. + +Darkness gathered over us and the stars came out in a moonless sky as we moved slowly down the stream. Out of the gloom came a +white-winged _dahabeeah_, or Nile pleasure boat, and sailed directly in the track we were pursuing. There was much running and +shouting by the Arab crews: the long sails were hastily swung around but not soon enough to save us from collision and attendant +excitement. + +Happily there was no damage done, and happily too there was none of the emphatic conversation such as we might have heard had the +crews been of the English speaking race. + +Just as we swung clear of the upward bound boat and were once more under way, a rocket shot up in the distant darkness and exploded +into a constellation of stars not to be found in any celestial atlas. + +Another and another followed in quick succession, and then there arose a tongue of flame that brought the palm trees into bold +relief. + +A wild shout was wafted to us on the northerly breeze, and it redoubled when several rockets rose from the Citadel as if +an{640}swering the more distant ones that first appeared. Then a hundred or more rockets rose almost together and the heavens that +before were calm and silent, and luminous only with the bright dottings of myriad stars became resonant with explosions and flashing +with the corruscations of the flying pyrotechnics. ‘The stars were paled by the nearer and more brilliant lights of man’s handiwork, +and we saw again the sunset colors released from the serene glory of sky and cloud, and darting here and there as if the sun had +burst and the clouds were being chased away by a dozen opposing winds. + +“What does all this mean?” came from the lips of our inquisitive maiden. + +This time her question was seriously answered. + +“It is the beginning of the festivities in honor of the marriage of one of the sons of the Khedive,” was the reply. “The ceremony +took place this morning, and the affair terminates with a round of festivities that include fireworks, and dinners, and a good time +generally.” + +“We are just in time,” exclaimed all the male voices in the party. “We are just too late,” was the exclamation from all the female +mouths. + +Did you ever see a woman who wouldn’t give all her antiquated bootees to attend a wedding ceremonial, and did you ever see a man who +wouldn’t give quite as much to stay away from one--(his own included)--if there was any social regulation requiring his attendance? +Of course there are exceptions but they only affirm the correctness of the rule. I know of no subject on which there is more +divergence of opinion between the sexes than on that of attending other people’s weddings. In the present instance all the women of +our party thought we had missed everything in missing the ceremony, while every man thought we were fortunate in getting there for +the festivities. As a spectacle in a strange land the wedding might have been interesting, but from a social and matrimonial point +of view it was of no consequence to a single beard-wearer. + +“The rockets’ red glare and the bombs bursting in air” continued as we descended the stream, and tied up to the east bank of the +Nile, just above the new iron bridge that spans the river {641}and enables you to take a carriage drive whenever you wish to the +Geezereh palace, or to the pyramids. + +It was so late that the ladies concluded not to leave the boat, but we masculines were not so particular. + +[Illustration: 8658] + +We jumped ashore and quickly clambered up the bank, and before many minutes elapsed, Gustave and I had secured donkeys and were +scampering away in the direction of the fireworks. Gustave was lighter than I, and urged his beast so fast that I could not keep up. +I was striving to overtake him, when suddenly I heard a thud in the dust-cloud just ahead of me and a remark that was not altogether +evangelical in its character. I had no difficulty in overtaking Gustave then. + +He and his donkey were lying all in a heap, and it was difficult to say how much was donkey and how much was Gustave. + +Both were covered with dust and looked as if they had been the principal attendants of a country flouring mill, or stevedores +engaged in the stowage of a cargo of plaster of Paris. + +My tendency to risibility was suddenly terminated by the fall of _my_ donkey, and there we were in an indiscriminate mass, two men +and two donkeys. Some rude jester may remark that there were four donkeys and no men in the heap, but I shall take no notice of such +impertinence. + +We righted ourselves and shook the dust from our feet as a testimony against such accidents. I dusted Gustave with my riding-whip +and he dusted me, and we did it so vigorously that {642}a policeman came to arrest us for fighting. An explanation in English, +French, and German, which he did not understand, with a small silver coin, which he did, made it all right. He went his way +rejoicing and left us to go ours. Our drivers got the donkeys up and put them together; we remounted and proceeded, this time at a +more solemn pace. Gustave had suddenly remembered that the show was to last ten days, and there was no occasion for us to be in a +hurry. We had no more falls that evening. + +Moral: When you ride a donkey in Cairo, take your time and go slow. If you attempt to push things, you will suddenly find yourself a +greater ass than the other one. + +The fantasia, as the natives call it, was on a large open space where were formerly the plantations of Ibrahim Pasha. It is outside +the city, on the road from Cairo to Old Cairo, and is studded with trees that bear many marks of antiquity. The road is broad, +macadamized, and modern, and for a mile or more is as straight as a sunbeam. Along this straight portion there was a framework of +posts and horizontal planks, hung with Chinese lanterns, in great variety of colors and in number about as countable as a political +meeting on election night. + +There were thousands of these lights, but whether five, ten, or twenty thousands, I will not pretend to say. There was a four-inch +candle in each lantern, and the aggregate of illumination was sufficient to make the way unmistakably clear. + +The open field as we approached it, was on the left of the road, and opposite, on the right hand, was the vice-regal palace known as +the Kasr-el-Ali. + +Over the road or street in front of the palace, was a sort of arch of triumph, and this was covered with a profusion of lanterns. +There were four or five rows of them; the lower one red, the next green, and the rest of other colors, so that the combined effect +was quite picturesque and had a great deal of Oriental brilliancy about it. + +The street was full of carriages, and the policemen had no easy work to keep the double files in place. Then there were crowds of +pedestrians and equestrians, _i.e._, if a man mounted on a donkey can be called an equestrian--and it was no easy {643}matter to +work one’s way through the struggling mass. But luckily it happens that an Arab crowd is a good-natured and non-pushing one, and by +a use of time and patience we managed to get along. We were borne on the current into the field where carriages were not allowed to +penetrate, and once inside we dismounted and left the donkeys and their drivers to wait till we were ready to return to the boat. + +Two sides of the field were bounded by fences, and the other two by tents, each tent quite open at the end next the field. There +were three or four bands of music in as many places, and each band played without much regard for the others. + +The heavens were ablaze with the glare of rockets, and there were Catherine wheels and composite pieces on frames in countless +numbers. On every side you heard expressions of astonishment and delight, just as you hear them under similar pyrotechnic +circumstances in New York or elsewhere. + +The contrast between the solemn stillness which reigned amid the mighty ruins of the temples, tombs, and cities of the upper Nile, +which we had so lately visited, and the brilliancy of the scene we were now gazing upon, excited tumultuous emotions, which I will +not stop to analyze. We hastened forward, and in a few minutes succeeded in pushing our way into the centre of the crowd. + +[Illustration: 5660] + + +{644} + +[Illustration: 0661] + + + + +CHAPTER LI--THE WEDDING OF THE KHEDIVE’S SON.--ENJOYING A MONARCH’S HOSPITALITY. + + +_High Jinks in the Egyptian Capital--Dancing Horses--Arabian Blooded Steeds--Treading the “Light Fantastic Toe”--Bedouin Riders--The +Mysterious Cage--Egyptian Prima Donnas--A Spice of the Arabian Nights--A Silken Palace--Headquarters of the Khedive--Thoughtless +Intruders upon Royalty--A Glimpse of the Princes Royal--The Heir of the Throne of Egypt--His Appearance, Dress, and Character--A +Cordial Invitation--Partaking of the Khedive’s Hospitality--A Turkish Comedy--A Free Lunch--End of the Festival._ + + +NEAR the entrance of the field, of which I have spoken, there was a platform twelve or fifteen feet high, and twenty-five or thirty +feet square, where a dozen acrobats were performing by the light of a row of open pots of burning oil. + +A little farther on there was an exhibition of dancing horses. A pace was set off with a surrounding of ropes and stakes, and +into this space the horses were led, two or three, sometimes half a dozen, at a time. The rider then took his place in the saddle, +flourished a spear, and the dance began. You remember what Dr. Johnson said about a dog that walked on his hind legs: It was a very +bad imitation of upright walking, and you wonder not at the way he does it, but that he does it at all. It was so with this equine +dance. The animals were of pure Arabian stock and had been well trained, and showed great intelligence; but after all, when you +considered the performance from a terpsichorean point of view, it wasn’t much. Some Arabic music was played, and the horses seemed +to be keeping time to it, though the real fact was that the time was kept by the rider. It was the {645}sort of thing that most of +us have seen at the circus, and not equal to what we sometimes see in that entertainment. The riders were dressed like Bedouins +of the desert, but were really some of the Khedive’s cavalry, attired for the occasion, to make them more picturesque. A very few +moments sufficed to satisfy us with the performance. + +The next thing that attracted our attention was a large crowd around a sort of cage about ten feet square, and near the cage several +musicians were standing, and playing an Arab air of a rather doleful character. Guards with rattan canes kept the assemblage from +approaching too near, and I must do the crowd the credit to say that the native portion of it did not make any attempt to overstep +the bounds. Not so the strangers, of whom we were two; we wanted to investigate and didn’t heed the guards until they called us to +order and motioned for us to fall back. + +The sides of the cage were of lattice-work, and not unlike the lathed walls of a room before the plaster is laid on. We could +see forms moving within, but could not make out whether they were men, women, or beasts. The instrumental music ceased what was +evidently an overture, as it soon struck up again, and this time there was an accompaniment of voices from the interior of the cage. +Now the mystery was explained. + +In the Orient it is not considered proper for women to speak in public on the stage, or even to sing there. They have no Nilssons or +Pattis there, and neither have they a Miss Anthony or Mrs. Stanton. The Orient does not trouble itself about women’s rights; in fact +there are very few women’s rights there of any sort, and as for the men’s rights, they are scarce enough. This cage that we saw was +a Steinway Hall or Academy of Music, and the women that sang there were inside, where the eyes of men could not reach them. They +could peer through the openings and see the crowd, but the crowd couldn’t peer through the openings to see them. The guards were +very watchful, and kept the masculine eyes from approaching too near the sacred enclosure. We couldn’t throw bouquets or kiss our +hands to the fair singers, and there was no obliging usher who would undertake to convey a note to the _prima donna_, begging the +honor of an introduction. I don’t think much of the Oriental opera. The music had no {646}charms to soothe my Occidental breast, and +even had such been the case, it would have lost much by the concealment of the singers. Think of going to a concert in New York or +London, where the performers are hid behind a grating or obliged to sing through a curtain impervious to vision! Give me the opera +of the Occident, where you can see the singers. + +In all parts of the field the people were collected in crowds, particularly around the tents, which seemed to be the centres of +attraction. + +I may as well say something about all the tents, and what they were there for. They were supposed to be tents of repose and +refreshment, and each person who visited the field of the festivities was supposed to be the guest of the Khedive. Readers of the +Arabian Nights will remember that the rulers whose careers are there recorded, were constantly giving entertainments to the people, +just as the Roman emperors did in their day, and just as some of the rulers in Europe are accustomed to do at the present time. Many +of the customs of the time of the Arabian Nights are continued in Mohammedan countries at the present day, but the fêtés are less +magnificent than of old, for the reason that money is less abundant. + +Everything was free in the show I am describing; lamps, music, fireworks, acrobats, dancing horses, and tents, were paid for out of +the Khedive’s purse, and it was emphatically _his_ blowout. + +The tents were a part of the entertainment; that on the extreme left of the field was of silk, and had rich divans and carpets in +the interior, and the one next to it was nearly but not quite as magnificent in material and decorations. As we moved towards the +right we found the tents steadily diminishing in luxury; the last of the lot was fitted with common chairs and uncushioned divans, +and had the earth for a carpet. A placard or sign in front of the entrance indicated the use of each tent and the persons to whom it +was appropriated. + +Beginning on the left, the tents were appropriated as follows: First, the Khedive and his sons; second, the corps diplomatique; +third, judges and law officials. Then there was a tent each to the ministers of war, navy, foreign affairs, finance, etc. Then +{647}there was a tent for each of the following departments and classes: Military and naval officers; court and staff officers; +engineer’s staff; custom-house officials; higher courts; clergy--Mohammedan clergy, Arab and Coptic clergy, Christian clergy; city +officials; police officials; school officials; railway officials; merchants of higher class; builders and architects; medical men; +merchants of Cairo; merchants of Alexandria; merchants of other parts of Egypt; officials of small towns; gentlemen of upper Egypt; +gentlemen of lower Egypt; and last, the public in general, to whom four tents were assigned. + +Each tent had several attendants, one of whom--the chief--was supposed to represent the Khedive, and to entertain visitors in his +name. We thoughtlessly endeavored to enter the first tent, where the Khedive’s sons had just arrived with a numerous following of +staff officers, but the guards kept us back. The two youths were sipping coffee and chatting with those around them; the elder, the +heir to the throne, has a pleasing face, and appeared quite vivacious, but the second was a trifle too fat and stout to have any +very expressive lines about his features. A few evenings later I had an introduction to both of them, followed by a chat of a +quarter of an hour, principally with the elder. He speaks French fluently, and has an easy, polished manner quite unlike the +traditional gravity of the Oriental. His dress is entirely European, with the exception of the _fez_, and his general appearance +reminds one more of Europe than of the drowsy East. Great care has been bestowed on his education, and when he comes to the throne +he will not be unaware of his duties and responsibilities. + +Several officers of the diplomatic corps were in the tent appropriated to them, and were sipping coffee and smoking cigars and +cigarettes in an easy, unconcerned way. A few screens had been set up at one side of the tent to form an extempore theatre, where +half a dozen actors were giving a Turkish comedy. I say _actors_ for the reason that though two women were in the piece, their +characters were sustained by men so well disguised in dress, voice, and manner, that their sex would not be suspected. + +The diplomats paid very little attention to the play, and the most appreciative part of the audience was that which stood +out{648}side the ropes and could not get in. We endeavored to gain admission to tent after tent, but were politely but firmly kept +back until we reached the one appropriated to the engineer staff, where the representative of the Khedive spoke to us in French and +invited us to walk in. An attendant was ordered to bring us coffee and another to bring us cigars or cigarettes at our choice, and +we were shown to seats on the divans. We crossed our legs in Oriental style, and thus made a favorable impression that secured us a +second cup of coffee before we left. + +From this tent onward we were welcomed at all, but we were quite satisfied after visiting three or four, as etiquette required that +we should take coffee whenever we sat down, and the coffee of the East is like Sam Weller’s veal pie, “werry fillin.” We had a good +taste of Oriental hospitality, and were not at all displeased with the courtesy that was shown us. + +All foreigners who were on the ground were treated with similar liberality and coffee, but the general populace was not allowed to +enter any of the tents except those specially assigned to it. + +Returning to the front of the Diplomatic tent I found the Turkish comedy still in progress and the diplomats as inattentive as +before. While we were standing near the ropes our Consul-General, Mr. Beardsley, caught sight of me and came out to shake hands. The +instant he spoke to me the guards made way and escorted Gustave and myself into the tent and were as civil to us as to any of the +accredited occupants. The attendants brought coffee and cigars on the instant; the coffee was better and the cigars were of much +finer quality than those we had received in the tents further down the line The divans were softer and the carpet was real Turkey +that must have cost many piastres to the square yard. We reclined in front of the improvised theatre, and pretended to be much +interested in the play, thinking that was the proper thing to do. Mr. Beardsley explained that we would offend nobody, not even +the actors, by paying no attention to the show, and as we could not understand the dialogue, we very soon became as careless and +unobservant as anybody else. + +Turkish comedy must be a tame affair according to Western ideas, and I would not advise any enterprising manager to import {649}a +company from Constantinople or Cairo under the belief that he could make a sensation and with it a fortune. The recitations were +monotonous and the plot was exceedingly simple as Mr. Beardsley explained it, and had the usual mixture of love and jealousy that we +find in comedies all over the globe. + +“It is fortunate for you,” said he with a smile, “that you do not understand Turkish dialogue. Your sensibilities might receive a +shock from some of the allusions which are rather too indelicate for the English or American stage.” + +“Where ignorance is bliss ‘tis folly to be wise,” saith the old proverb. We drank our coffee and smoked our cigars undisturbed by +the improprieties we could not comprehend. + +Cakes and sweetmeats were brought but we declined them, and soon followed Mr. Beardsley to the outer gate where his carriage awaited +him. Bidding him good night we returned to the enclosure and stumbled upon a large tent standing apart from the rest. Investigating +this we found that it was a restaurant with what a New Yorker would call a free lunch standing ready, for those who were hungry. The +bill of fare was not extensive, but consisted of Arab stews of mutton and goat’s flesh, and of two or three dishes in which rice was +a prominent ingredient. We were invited to enter but declined as we had had all the Arab dishes we wanted during our Nile journey. + +When the hereditary prince was married the restaurants were more numerous and better supplied than on the present occasion, and I +was told that in one of them there was a free service of champagne to all foreigners. No really good Mohammedan drinks wine--his +religion forbids it--but they are not very straight-laced in Egypt, and you not unfrequently find steady drinkers who between their +glasses repeat reverentially the Moslem formula “_La illah, il Allah; Mohammed yessul illah!_” (There is no God but God and Mohammed +is the Prophet of God.) The East is fast becoming civilized. As I have before said, many Orientals who would have been horrified +at the thought twenty years ago will now treat their wives as though they were human beings, and do not hesitate to get drunk when +occasion offers. New England missionaries and New England rum are more popular in the Orient than they were formerly. {650}But while +I have been talking, the pyrotechnics have burned out, the musicians--Arab and Occidental--have ended their strains, the tent-lamps +are burning dimly, the candles in the Chinese lanterns are flickering, the acrobats and singers have disappeared, and the crowd +is dispersing. So we will to our donkeys and gallop back to our boat moored against the bank of the lotos-bearing Nile, and in the +quiet of its cabins will fall into a well-earned sleep to be filled with dreams of a gala night in Egypt. + +[Illustration: 5667] + + +{651} + +[Illustration: 0668] + + + + +CHAPTER LII--WOMEN AMONG THE MOHAMMEDANS--LIFE IN THE HAREM. + + +_Polygamy Among the Turks and Arabs--A Full-Stocked Harem--Unveiling the Women--Romantic Adventure--A Brief Flirtation--The “Light +of the Harem”--Love at First Sight--How Egyptian Women Dress--Some Hints to the Ladies--Wearing Trowsers--Robes, Caftans, and +Peaked Shoes--Rainbow Colors--How they Dress their Hair--Crowned with Coins--A Walking Jewelry Shop--The Pretty Egyptienne Orange +Girl--Street Costume--Paris Fashions in the Khedive’s Ilarem--Beauties Riding Donkeys Man Fashion--How they Go Shopping--Animated +Bales of Dry Goods--Black Eyes in a Bundle of Silks--Marriage Brokers--How they Dispose of their Daughters in the East--A Turkish +Courtship--A Donkey Driver Gives an Opinion--The Wedding and the Honeymoon--Divorces in Egypt--An Easy Process--Many-Wived Men._ + + +THE Mohammedan religion allows four wives to each masculine believer, but there is no limit to his number of brevet or spiritual +wives. Twenty-five years ago every well-to-do Turk considered it necessary for him to have the legal complement in the matrimonial +line, and he was not up to the social high water mark unless he had a well-stocked harem. But the West and its customs have invaded +domestic, as they have invaded commercial life Many respectable Turks have adopted monogamous habits, and live happily with one +wife. True, they may have a liberal number of slaves in their harems, and these slaves may be pretty and attractive to an extent not +approved by the lady of the house. + +But the fact that monogamy is endurable, and has no social stigma attached to it, shows to what an extent the East has been +influenced by western ideas. All Oriental women must go veiled {652}in public, but it is observable that the veil is thinner than of +old, and a woman of the upper classes may now go abroad with perfect propriety, wearing a veil so diaphanous that the features are +clearly discernible through it. + +Here is a little story--you may call it a confession if you like, but please consider it confidential. + +One afternoon two of us--my companion was a handsome young man--were taking a stroll in one of these Oriental cities, and came upon +a blockade of vehicles, equestrians, donkeys, and pedestrians, just as we might happen upon a blockade in Broadway or Fourteenth +street. There was a gay carriage, with a gorgeous driver managing a pair of spirited horses, and in the carriage were two +richly-dressed and veiled ladies. A heavy and rather stupid looking eunuch was on the box by the driver’s side, and both he and the +driver had their attention diverted by the blockade. We edged up to the carriage under pretence of dodging a passing camel, and, +rude foreigners that we were, peered inside. + +Through the faint gauze I could see that both women were pretty. I said so in French to my companion; the ladies laughed and one +of them made an inclination of her head toward the black fellow on the box. I nodded to indicate that he was not looking, and when +satisfied that all was right, she quickly raised her veil and showed us a face as pretty as any we had seen for many weeks. We had +only a momentary glance, but it was enough to photograph that pretty face on our memories. + +There was a clear, transparent skin, finely-cut features of true Circassian type; there were rounded cheeks, eyes of melting +softness, and eye-brows that slightly pencilled, gave the eye a fullness it would not have otherwise possessed. She smiled as she +raised her veil, and the smile produced the most exquisite dimple and revealed a set of teeth that a belle of London or New York +might have envied. + +“_Bien merci, Madame_,” said I, in a low tone; “_Comme vous êtes belle?_” + +She smiled again and nodded as she dropped her veil. Just then the colored gentleman on the box caught sight of us, and shouted +“_Empshy!_” in no pleasing voice. Fearing to bring {653}trouble upon the fair lady who was destined to be the subject of our +thoughts and dreams until another pretty face should come in our way, we moved off and left the carriage to emerge from the +blockade. + +But we looked back once and caught the flutter of a handkerchief, and a glimpse of the delicate hand that held it. + +Is not the East becoming civilized when such an incident as this is possible? No fashionable girl in American society could show +more readiness for a flirtation with a stranger than did that pretty Orientale. + +While in Egypt I received a letter from an American lady, in which I was thus commanded: + +“How do the Egyptian women dress? I want to know all; and if you don’t tell me, you shall never be forgiven.” + +To hear, under such circumstances, is to obey. + +Before receiving that letter I had contented myself with looking at the pretty faces of the Egyptian women, for many of them _are_ +pretty. They are rather vain of their beauty, and thus unlike their sex in all other countries. Many of them keep the word of +promise to the ear, but break it to the hope, as I have already explained, by wearing veils of such a slight texture that the +features are clearly discernible through it. + +It is not considered polite to look at Moslem ladies when out for a promenade; at any rate, such is the Koran’s injunction to the +faithful, and they are generally careful to observe it. But I was of the infidel race, could not read the Koran, and furthermore was +carried away by that fatal attribute of my sex, curiosity. What wonder, then, that I violated the Egyptian code of etiquette, and +embraced every opportunity to see the faces of the Oriental beauties? + +On the receipt of that letter I invoked the aid of an American lady residing in Cairo, and set about the study of Egyptian fashions. + +The Egyptian women display considerable taste in their dress, quite as much as one could expect in a country where there is very +little change of fashion from year to year. + +They wear an under garment, with very full sleeves reaching to the wrist, made very loose and full, and which does not in the +{654}least impede the movements of the wearer. Then comes a pair of very wide trowsers, such as we see in pictures; they are held +around the waist by a running string, and the lower ends are fastened in the same way just below the knee. The trowsers are made +very long, so that when fastened in the way described they hang down to the feet. They are of colored, striped, worked, or plain +material, and may be of silk, cotton, or muslin, according to the taste and ability of the wearer. + +The next article of apparel, is a vest or wrapper of the same material as the trowsers. It fits the body with reasonable closeness, +and is made to button down the front to a little below the waist, from which point it is open, and it is also open at the sides from +the hips downward. According to the strict rule of the Orient, this garment should reach to the floor when the wearer stands erect, +but many ladies wear it in the form of a loose jacket reaching only to the waist and gathered in rather loosely. + +For the girdle a shawl or embroidered kerchief is folded diagonally, and tied loosely in such a way that the knots are not visible. +The sleeves of the vest are made much larger than the arm, but are cut open below the wrist so that they do not interfere with the +movements of the hands. Sleeves not much unlike them, are sometimes the fashion in Occidental countries. + +Outside of the foregoing they wear a long dress or _caftan_ of cloth, silk, or velvet, entirely open in front, hanging loosely +and open at the sides like the vest, but having sleeves that reach only to the wrist. It is sometimes plain, but is more generally +embroidered with gold thread or colored silk, and it should be of sufficient length to trail on the floor when the wearer walks +about. Sometimes a short jacket or sacque of the same material as the above garment, and embroidered in a similar manner, is worn +instead of the _caftan_, particularly in the warm weather when the latter would be too heavy. + +Shoes are of red morocco, pointed and turned up at the toes. Stockings or socks are not generally worn, but in place of them the +Egyptian ladies make use of slippers that fit quite closely. The outer shoes are large enough to go on over the slippers, and +whenever a lady has occasion to step off the carpet or matting of the inner rooms of the house, she thrusts her feet into the + +{655} + +[Illustration: 0672] + +{657}large shoes, or into pattens or clogs that elevate her four or five inches, and thus lift her skirts from the ground. These +pattens are very difficult to manage, and give the wearer an awkward mincing gait. Adult novices find them especially inconvenient. +In the few times I attempted to wear them, I think I was never able to walk more than a dozen steps, without falling down and +bringing my head so near them as to illustrate the French proverb, _Les extremes se touchait._ + +The hair is cut short over the forehead, and hangs on each side of the face to a level with the chin. The rest of the hair is combed +so as to hang down the back, and it is divided into braids. These are from eleven to twenty-five, according to the wearer’s taste, +but the number is always uneven, since the Egyptian ladies share the belief of Rory O’More, as recorded in the familiar song. Each +braid sustains three cords of black silk, and to the cords are attached beads or scales of coral, gold, or silver, and sometimes +pearls or even diamonds. Coins are attached to the ends of the cords, and the general effect is not unpleasant. + +The cords are sometimes attached to a band of silk, concealed by the hair, and when thus arranged they can be removed without any +disturbance of the braids. The metal or other ornaments begin just at the base of the neck, and the cords terminate about a foot +farther down. + +Among the lower classes other ornaments are attached to the head, and hang down over the forehead and at the side of the face, +and sometimes there is such a profusion of them as to make you think a whole jewelry store has started on its travels. There was +a pretty Egyptienne who used to peddle oranges around the hotel where I stopped. Her entire head was spangled around with little +_plaques_ of gilded silver, that rattled as she moved, and made a brilliant effect when she stood or walked in the sunshine. + +The head-covering of an Egyptian lady consists of a _fez_ or _tarboosh_--the little red cap with a silk tassel which is worn from +one end of Mohammeddom to the other. A kerchief of colored muslin or crape is wound round the _fez_ and forms a turban something +like that worn by the men, but higher and more conical. On the top of the turban they frequently place a sort of inverted saucer +{658}of gold or silver gilt, embossed or in filigree-work, and ornamented with precious stones, or imitations of them. Every +Egyptian lady that can afford the expense has a supply of diamonds, often of a very poor quality, and those who have not the genuine +stones make a display of artificial ones. Vanity and envy are not unknown in the land of the Pharoahs. + +So much for the indoor dress--the “at home” costume. Let us follow our lady out of the house and into the street. + +Outside of what we have seen her wearing, she puts on a loose gown with very wide sleeves, and of rose, pink, or violet silk. Then +she dons her veil, a strip of white muslin covering the face below the eyes and reaching almost to the ground. The corners are +attached to a band that passes round the head, and the middle is kept well up over the nose by a narrow strip that goes over the +forehead and is fastened to the encircling band. Then she puts on, if she is married, an outer covering of black silk that conceals +everything but the white veil and the eyes above it. An unmarried lady wears a similar garment of white, not black silk, or she may +wear a shawl instead of it. This outer garment is exceedingly inconvenient for a pedestrian excursion, and its use is obligatory +only when the promenade is not to be made on foot. + +For an out-door excursion the shoes give way to morocco boots, at least in. theory. But the customs of Europe are gaining ground in +the Orient to the extent that many ladies of Cairo and Constantinople have adopted the French boot and discarded the Oriental one +altogether. Even in Damascus, the centre of Islam, and far more fanatical than the other cities of the Orient, the French boot has +found a foot-hold, (joke, poor and not intentional,) and its popularity is increasing. And this may be a good place to remark that +the ladies of the Khedive’s family get a great many of their fashions from Paris, and very often the _yashmak_, or veil, is the only +thing about them of a truly Oriental type. And this veil is not the muslin one that I have described, but the light Turkish veil, +descending only a little below the chin and wound loosely about the face. Very many of the women of the lower order never conceal +their faces, and many of the water-carriers and those who sell bread, oranges, and other edibles, in {659}the streets of Cairo, go +barefoot, their dress consisting only of a long gown reaching to the ankles, and a loose cloak thrown over the head and shoulders. + +[Illustration: 0676] + +When our lady whose costume we have been examining goes out for a promenade, she generally rides upon a donkey. Of late years +carriages have intruded upon the donkey’s domain, and the natives use them considerably, but the patient animal is still regarded +with respect, and is a fashionable beast of burden. The saddle for Egyptian ladies’ use is high and broad, and covered with a small +carpet, and our heroine is seated astride with both feet in {660}the stirrups. She appears to sit very high above the animal’s back, +and to be in danger of falling off, but is really quite safe and secure. + +The donkeys are trained to their work, and move along very easily, with a motion that inspires confidence in the rider. There is +always a man on one, and frequently on each side of the beast, and he is very watchful, knowing the trouble that would come to him +should any accident befall his precious charge. + +Generally all the ladies of a single harem go out together, so that the sight of two, three, or four persons thus equipped is more +frequent than that of one alone. I do not mean that all the women of a single group are necessarily wives of one man; they may be +his wife’s sisters, or mother; in fact, the same relation may exist as among the feminine members of an English or American family. + +Many Mohammedans are monogamous, and the notions of the Occident in regard to plurality of wives are every year becoming more and +more in vogue through the Orient. Many of the Cairene gentlemen have their mothers and sisters in their families, and some few have +their mothers-in-law. It is proper to remark that the views of the Orient on the mother-in-law question do not differ materially +from those of the Occident. + +A lady in her out-of-door dress, and mounted on a donkey, appears far more like a bale of goods than like a human being. Especially +is this the case if a slight wind is blowing and she is riding against it, or if the air is still and she rides faster than a walk. +The silken wrapper is puffed out like a balloon, and sometimes appears to be three or four feet in diameter. + +At my first view of a private harem taking its promenade, I asked a friend what those donkeys were laden with. + +“The most valuable goods in Cairo,” he replied. “Without them Egypt would soon cease to exist.” + +“Really!” I said. “And what are they?” + +Before he could answer, one of the bundles turned in my direction, and I saw a pair of lustrous black eyes above a veil. I was +enlightened, and had no more questions to ask. + +A stranger in a Mohammedan city is sure to have his curiosity aroused, before he has been there many days, on the subject of +{661}marriage. Wedding processions are quite numerous; in a single afternoon’s promenade in Cairo I have seen as many as half a +dozen. Naturally, the sight of such a procession leads one to ask about the marriage customs. + +Among the Moslems, marriages are generally arranged by brokers, though not always so. There are some love-matches in which the +parties become attached to each other without the introduction of a third party, but they are by no means common. When a man has +reached the marrying age he is expected to enter the matrimonial state, unless prevented by poverty or some other impediment, and it +is considered improper, and even dishonorable, for him to refrain from so doing. + +If a marriageable youth has a mother, she describes to him the girls of her acquaintance, and enables him to decide whom to take to +his house and home. If he has no mother, and frequently when he has one, he engages a woman whose profession is that of _Khat-beh_, +or marriage-broker; she has access to harems where there are marriageable women, and is employed by them quite as often as by the +men. She receives fees from one party and frequently from both. + +Observe the superiority of Christendom over Islam. In our own country feminine match-makers are numerous, but they work without +pay. The only reward they expect or desire is the satisfaction of having made two people happy--or miserable. For the result of the +marriages they cause, they generally care as little as do their Moslem sisters. + +The Moslem broker goes to the harems, accompanied by the mother or other feminine relations of the young man; she introduces them as +ordinary visitors, but gives a sly hint as to the object of their call. If they do not like the appearance of the maiden they plead +many calls to make, and cut short their stay, but if satisfied, they come to business at once, and ask how much property, personal +or otherwise, the young lady possesses. When these facts are ascertained, they depart, with the intimation that they may call again. + +It is a strange peculiarity of Moslem countries that a rich girl can find a husband more readily than can a poor one. I am sure such +a thing was never heard of in England or America. {662}The young man hears the report of the broker, and, if satisfied, he sends her +again to the harem to state his prospects in life, and give a personal description of himself. + +[Illustration: 0679] + +The broker is not particular to confine herself to facts, and indulges in that hyperbole for which the Orient is famed. Her client +may be a very ordinary youth, with no property of consequence, and whom she has never seen three times in her life. She strikes an +attitude before the maiden, and says: + +“O, my daughter! he has heard of you, and his heart is heavy for love of you. He is handsome as the moon, and his eyes sparkle like +the stars; he has a form and figure which all the world envy, and he has wealth surpassing all that Aladdin’s Lamp could bestow. He +will buy the finest house in Cairo; you will be his {663}thought by day and his dream by night, and his whole time will be devoted +to loving and caressing you.” + +It is customary for parents to obtain a daughter’s consent to a marriage, but this is not at all necessary, and very often is +considered a mere trifle not worth regarding. Sometimes the father interferes when he discovers that the proposed husband is +poor, or has a bad temper; any slight objection of this sort makes _pater familias_ whimsical, and serves as a stumbling block. He +frequently insists that a younger daughter shall not be married before an elder one, and sometimes the broker describes a young and +charming maiden to the anxious youth while she negotiates the match for her elder and less attractive sister. If he subsequently +complains, she assures him that it is all in the family, and says he can imagine that he has wedded the beauty by wedding her +sister. + +Among the middle and upper classes the man never sees the face of his bride until the marriage ceremony is concluded. This excellent +custom greatly facilitates business, as it does away with any absurd notion he may have about beauty. + +When the preliminaries are settled, the bridegroom calls upon the girl’s “_Wekeel_,” or deputy, and concludes the contract. This +deputy is her nearest male relative, or her guardian, and his special duty is to fix the terms of the dowry which the husband is to +pay. This varies according to the wealth and position of the parties; the least sum allowed by law is equal to about five English +shillings, and this is indispensable. + +Among respectable tradesmen and people of the middle classes, fifty or seventy-five dollars will suffice, and there is almost always +a great deal of haggling before the amount of the dowry is fixed. From the necessity of paying something to the bride’s family, +the youths not unnaturally speak of marriage as “buying a wife.” A donkey-driver whom I employed occasionally in Cairo, used to +discourse upon the matter as follows: + +“I save money for buy wife. When I save three pounds I buy wife, one wife. I now have save two pounds. I have wife next year.” + +The contract between bridegroom and deputy is nearly always verbal, but in presence of three or more witnesses. The first +{664}chapter of the Koran is recited by them in unison, and certain prayers or other formulae are repeated, and the bridegroom is +fairly “hooked.” Before they separate they fix the night when the bride is to be taken to the bridegroom’s house. + +Eight or ten days pass away. He sends presents to _her_, and she and her family are busy preparing linen, carpets, clothing, and +other items of an outfit for the bride, so that all the dowry and generally much more is expended for her use. The articles thus +bought belong to her under all circumstances, and she takes them away in case she is divorced. + +Two or three nights before the wedding the bridegroom hangs lanterns in front of his house to indicate what is coming, and these +lanterns remain there till after the wedding. On the last night of his bachelorhood he gives a party, and it is a pleasing custom of +the country that the persons invited to this party are expected to bring or send presents, so that the entertainment generally pays +for itself, and very handsomely, too. + +Traces of this custom are found in American weddings, where the relations and friends of the victims are expected to “come down” + with valuable articles that may be useful in housekeeping, and at the same time will “spout” well at the pawnbroker’s. + +The day before the bride is to be brought home she goes to the bath; her feminine friends and relatives accompany her in procession. +In front are the musicians; then come married relatives; then unmarried girls and then the bride. + +She walks under a canopy of bright colored silk, carried by four men who sustain a pole at each corner. The canopy is open in front, +but closed on the other sides and the bride walking beneath it is completely concealed by her dress which generally consists of red +silks or a red cashmere shawl over her ordinary clothing. Two of her friends walk with her under the canopy, one on each side and +the procession is ended by a couple of musicians and the rag-tag of small boys that adhere to processions in all parts of the globe. + +The party remains several hours in the bath which is generally hired for the occasion, and they sometimes have a grand feast there. +Then they return to her house and have another feast, and on the following afternoon she is taken to the bridegroom’s {665}house in +a procession similar to that of the bath. She is conducted to the harem; her friends sup with her and then depart. + +The same evening the bridegroom submits himself to the manipulations of his barber, and then goes to one of the mosques accompanied +by musicians, torch-bearers, and friends. + +[Illustration: 8682] + +He says his prayers, goes home, sups with his friends and leaves them after a time to their pipes and coffee while he proceeds to +the harem. There he finds the bride and her attendant. The latter retires; the bridegroom lifts the veil from the bride’s head and +for the first time sees her face. + +So much for the forms of courtship and marriage. + +Another important element of matrimony is divorce, and it is more prevalent than in our own country for the reason that it is +easier. Indiana and other states famous for their facilities for unsplicing married couples might learn something from benighted +Egypt and something in the language of the popular advertisement “to their advantage.” Divorce is fashionable and every respectable +man must indulge in it. + +The first few days of my stay in Cairo our party employed a guide whom we found at the hotel. He was an intelligent Mohammedan +speaking French quite well, and his certificates of character were most flattering. While I was questioning him about marriage +customs he declared with no appearance of regret in any form: {666} “I have had nine wives and am now living with my tenth. When I +don’t like a wife I divorce her.” + +The whole story is told in the last sentence of his remark--“When I don’t like a wife I divorce her.” The only form of divorce +necessary is for the husband to say to the wife in the presence of a single witness, “I divorce you.” No residence in Chicago +or Indianapolis is necessary; there are no lawyers to be engaged and no fees to be paid; no troublesome affidavits about +im-compatibility of temper and the like are to be signed, nor must one stretch his conscience in making oath to any document. Say +only “I divorce you,” and the work is accomplished. + +As a consequence of these facilities the people of Egypt are very much married. Men can be found in Cairo by the hundred who have +had as many as twenty or thirty wives in half that number of years, and women who have had the same plurality of husbands in a +similar time. But divorced women are not considered as desirable as those who have never been married, and consequently these +frequent divorces fall more heavily on them than upon men. The Khedive is well aware of the debasing effect of the marriage laws and +has improved them in several ways. + +Polygamy is becoming less popular every year, and would probably die out altogether in course of time if it were not expressly +sanctioned by the Koran. + +The legal number of wives is four, but not one man in five hundred in Cairo or Constantinople avails himself of the privilege. A +Mohammedan whom I questioned one day on the subject of polygamy made the following reply: + +“I have one time two wife. Now I have one wife. One wife make house enough warm. Two wife make house so hot you bake bread in all +times and no fire. You have three wife,--Bismillah,--house hot so no man live there.” + +The mother-in-law has the same popularity among husbands in Moslem countries that she enjoys in more western lands. Most men there +prefer to marry women whose mothers are dead and who have no near relatives of their own sex, and some husbands forbid their wives +to see any women except those who are related to the lord and master of the house. But this latter rule is very seldom enforced. + + +{667} + +[Illustration: 0684] + + + + +CHAPTER LIII.--WINTER ON THE NILE--THE KHAMSEEN AND ITS EFFECTS--BEDOUIN LIFE. + + +_Winter in Egypt--A soft and balmy air--A Rainstorm on the Nile--An Asylum for Invalids--The Month of Flowers--The “Khamseen” + What is it?--A blast as from a Furnace--Singular effects of the South Wind--A Sun like Copper and a Sky like Brass--A cloud of +Sand--Eating Dirt--Fleeing from the Khamseen--How the Laboring classes live--Hungry but not Cold--Oriental Houses--An Excursion to +Heliopolis--Habits of the Bedouins--A Fastidious People--Life in a Bedouin Encampment--Among the Obelisks--How they were brought +Five Hundred Miles--The Madonna-Tree._ + + +THE winter climate of Egypt is one of the most charming in the world and some persons say it is the most delightful to be found +anywhere. I met invalids there who had been at all the famous resorts of the West Indies, at the Sandwich Islands, in the south of +France, in Spain, anywhere and everywhere, and they give the credit of superiority to Egypt. + +Unfortunately the winter of 1873-4 was very bad, the worst ever known in Cairo, so the old residents said. There was a great deal of +rain; altogether during the winter it rained on seventeen days; sometimes only for a few minutes, and again there were several hours +of pouring rain. Ordinarily there will be from six to ten showers in the course of the winter, and for the rest of the time there +is the clear sky of Egypt, day after day, and night after night. I was there nearly four months and aired my umbrella only twice in +that time though there were two other occasions when I would have been glad to air it; I was caught in heavy showers with no better +protection than my cane, and {668}was forced to go home in a condition like that of a cat after an involuntary bath. + +While I was up the Nile there was one slight shower of five minutes or so one evening and that was all; at the same time there was a +heavy rain in Cairo that converted all the streets into lanes of mud and made it very difficult to get around. And in Alexandria it +is much worse as the rain falls there many a time when not a drop is known in Cairo. The farther you go to the South in Egypt the +drier you find the climate until you get beyond the desert country and into the region of the tropical rains. + +Among the invalids who go there there are some who are greatly benefited, while others find no relief or are positively injured. At +my hotel there were several ailing persons; some with difficulties of the chest, others with bad circulation of the blood, others +with cerebral affections, others recovering from broken or sprained limbs, and others with a shortness of bank account. For the last +Cairo is not to be recommended, as it is an expensive place and the habits of the country require cash payments unless you can find +somebody willing to give you credit. + +As for the other sufferers, some grow rapidly better, and some grow rapidly worse until sent away by the doctors, and I have known +two cases of chest difficulty where one man recovered almost entirely, and the other afflicted almost exactly as his neighbor was +obliged to leave in a fortnight under penalty of furnishing a fee to the coroner if he remained longer. + +A resident physician says that bronchial affections, chronic diseases of the mucous membrane, debilitated circulation and scrofulous +diseases of all kinds are more likely to be subdued in Egypt than most other maladies. Some consumptives have been entirely restored +by a voyage on the Nile and where a man is in search of a dry atmosphere he can find it for three or four months without trouble, +provided he can undertake the voyage on the river so as to spend a fortnight or three weeks in Nubia about the beginning of the +year. He will thus avoid the few rains of Cairo and get back to the city in season for the delightful weather at the end of March. + +There is an end to the delightful winter climate of Cairo, a climate with which I was enchanted and regretted exceedingly to +{669}leave. In all the winter I did not need an overcoat except when going out for a carriage ride, I did not need a fire in my room +and there was no place for making one even had I wanted it. Every day I was able to sit at an open window and write--sometimes with +my coat off--and the thermometer from eleven o’clock till an hour before sunset was rarely lower than 68°. The nights are cool and +the mornings particularly so, but as I do not rise early except upon compulsion the morning freshness did not incommode me. + +It is necessary to be very cautious about the night air, and one should not go out in the evening without wrapping the throat in +something that will keep off the dew. But whatever the nights may be, the days are warm and one can sit in the open air, without +danger and with positive comfort, provided there is no wind blowing! The trees were in full leaf, and during the month of March +there was an abundance of flowers. But early in April comes the _Khamseen_. + +“What is that?” you may possibly ask. + +Well, early in April, though sometimes not till the middle or end of that month, there comes a wind from the south, a hot +debilitating wind that makes you feel as stupid as a dead horse, and as cross as a bear whose ears and tail were cropped yesterday. +The mercury goes above par in the shade, and is at a premium of twenty-five or thirty per cent, in the sun. Every drop of moisture +has been wrung from the atmosphere in its passage over the desert, and the blast upon you feels like the breath of a furnace. +Everything dries up--furniture cracks; the leaves fall from the trees; the hair crackles and emits sparks in combing; your newspaper +will rustle and crack as though held over the flame of a lamp; the sheet of the letter you are writing will curl up, and before +you are at the end of a word of three syllables, the first part of it will have the ink as dry as though baked in a kiln; and a wet +cloth hung at the window dries up almost instantaneously. If you are in the house, you think you will walk out, and if you walk out +you will wish you had staid in. It is time for you to settle your hotel bill, and get away from Cairo. + +This wind is called here the “_Khamseen_,” but is better known to the outer world as the _simoon_ or _sirocco_. It begins generally +{670}by blowing a single day, and then you have several days of pleasant weather; then you will have two, three, or four days of +wind in succession, and then an interval of about the same length before another blast sets in. The natives say there are usually +about fifty days of it altogether, and hence its name, _Khamsecn_ being the Arabic word for fifty. Some years it is very mild--not +more than thirty days of it--and the next year it may be mild or it may be worse. I didn’t propose to stay there to find out. I had +one day of the _Khamseen_, and that satisfied my curiosity. + +In addition to the heat, the air is full of the finest sand so that the sun looks like a ball of burning copper, and the sky becomes +yellow. The sand finds its way everywhere; the furniture of the room will be covered with it; you find it in your soup and in nearly +every dish that you eat; and I was told that it will get inside your watch-cases, even though you wrap your timepiece in buckskin, +and lay it away in the bottom of your trunk till the sirocco is over. If you have a hollow tooth you can take enough sand out of it +at the end of the _Khamseen_ to fill an hour-glass. + +Dost thou like the picture? Methinks I hear your emphatic negation. + +Strangers generally leave when this desert wind comes, and those of the residents who can afford it make a trip to Europe, or if not +there, to Alexandria. On the sea-coast there is less wind, and the air is several degrees cooler than at Cairo. + +Alexandria is quite a pleasure resort in the summer; the court generally goes there to put in the warm weather, and sniff the +breezes of the Mediterranean, and the foreign representatives do likewise. The season at Cairo ends when the court takes its +departure; the city of the Caliphs becomes dull and uncomfortable. What a contrast to the most delightful winter on the face of the +globe! + +A great deal has been written about the sufferings of the lowest classes in Egypt, and we have had some wonderful pictures of native +distress painted by travellers. The house of the _fellah_ is a mud hovel, his clothes are scanty and his food is coarse. He is not +liberally paid for his labor, and he eternally begs for “backsheesh,” not that he expects always to get it, but from + +{671} + +[Illustration: 0688] + +{673}force of habit. He might have a cleaner house if he would, but as for his clothes they are more superfluous than necessary. If +it were not for the prejudices of education, he might go in nakedness and would not suffer; he would be warm enough in the day time +without any clothing, and if he remained in doors at night he would be equally comfortable. A strip of cloth around his loins would +be enough to protect him under ordinary circumstances, and if he wants to get himself up luxuriously, he can mount a long shirt of +blue cotton, and the thing is accomplished. + +[Illustration: 0691] + +The laboring classes doubtless suffer from hunger--were there ever any laboring classes anywhere that did not?--but they do not +suffer from cold and wet. Hunger here is not accompanied by its two great allies, cold and rain, and to my mind it is robbed of much +of its terror. Is not the condition of the poor ten times as bad in our great cities in winter as in summer, solely for the reason +that there must be heat and shelter along with food to keep away suffering? When I look upon this careless people and remember the +advantages of their climate, I think they are to be envied perpetually by the poor of London or New York. + +The court is one of the characteristics of an Oriental house. Even the meanest hovels of the lowest classes have something of the +kind. The passage from the doorway into the court is {674}usually so contrived that no view can be had from the street into it; +this is sometimes done by the erection of a wall, or by giving a turn to the passage that leads into the court. Some houses have +one court, others two, and three are not uncommon. If a house has but one court, it is generally an open space or quadrangle, round +which the apartments for the inmates, and in country places also the sheds for the cattle, are arranged. In the very poorest of +these there is merely one apartment, and a shed for cattle, and the court or yard is surrounded with a hedge of thorny boughs, +having only one court, of a far superior kind. Entering into the courtyard you see around you a number of little buildings, not +deficient in convenience, and occasionally presenting a certain air of elegance--though frequently constructed on no regular plan. +In these are found various little chambers, one piled upon the other, the half-roof of which always forms a terrace for walking, +from which a little flight of steps or ladder leads to the dwelling-house, or to the upper terrace. This court is well paved; on one +side doors lead to the apartments of the family, and on the other to those of the servants. They are often beautified with a number +of fragrant trees and marble fountains, and compassed round with splendid apartments and divans. The divans are floored and adorned +on the sides with a variety of inlaid marbles wrought in interlacing patterns. They are placed on all sides of the court, so that +at one or other of them, shade or sunshine can always be enjoyed at pleasure. In the summer season, or when a large company is to be +received, the court is usually sheltered from the heat and inclemencies of the weather by a curtain or awning, which, being expanded +upon ropes from one wall to the other, may be folded or unfolded at pleasure. + +I spent a day delightfully and profitably in making an excursion from Cairo to Heliopolis, where, in remote antiquity an imperial +city stood, but whose site is now only marked by a few mounds, and by an obelisk supposed to be the oldest in Egypt. The road leads +through fertile gardens, and irrigated fields of corn and rice, and past many Bedouin encampments. + +The Arabs are peculiarly sensitive to noisome smells, and in a city they may frequently be observed hurrying along with their +{675}nostrils closed by a corner of the kerchief, to avoid the effluvia which surrounds them. This is one reason why they always +prefer pitching their tents without, to residing within the walls. + +[Illustration: 0693] + +The real Bedouin visits the city only to make purchases at the bazaars, and he is the most picturesque of all the moving figures in +an Eastern crowd. Strong, but slender in frame, his striped abba hangs easily in heavy folds over his shoulder, and his dark skin +and prominent features, and keen black eye, all mark the unchanged son of the desert, who belongs not to the city, but passes +through it, indifferent to its conveniences and luxuries, and despising its customs like his ancestors. In my journey up the Nile +I saw many encampments of genuine Bedouins, and I always found that an Arab in his encampment is a different being from what he is +when wandering in the desert. Within the former his time is idly passed, smoking, drinking coffee, and sleeping; yet his steed was +always ready caparisoned at the door of his tent; beside him in the sand was planted his spear, and at the call of his chief he was +ready to vault into his saddle, and rush forth to battle with all the fire of his nation. + +From Cairo to Heliopolis the distance is only five or six miles, and a donkey ride of less than two hours brought us to the foot +of the solitary obelisk that exists to remind us of the once famous “city of the sun.” The obelisk is of red granite, and must have +come from the quarries of Syene five hundred miles away. It measures sixty-seven feet in height, and its base is buried several feet +in earth, gradually deposited by successive overflows of the Nile. It is covered with hieroglyphics and bears the name of Osirtesen +I., the most illustrious member of the XIIth Dynasty, who reigned over both Upper and Lower Egypt. Who executed it, or sculptured +it, or how it was transported to its present site, and erected, are questions not yet answered. + +{676}A taste for story-telling is still one of their leading characteristics. They know no greater pleasure than to assemble +together in their encampment, and seated in front of one of their number, smoke, and listen with the most intense interest to the +exploits of warriors, the adventures of lovers, or the enchantment of sorcerers, until want of breath and want of sleep put an end +to the tales. + +[Illustration: 0694] + +{677}Hard by there is an old sycamore tree--called the Madonna’s tree--under which, tradition says, Mary rested with her infant +when flying from Herod. It looks like a stunted tree of enormous growth, as if several trees springing up side by side had grown +together. That the tree as it now stands is of very great age, there can be no manner of doubt. + +[Illustration: 5695] + + +{678} + +[Illustration: 0696] + + + + +CHAPTER LIV--LAST DAYS IN EGYPT. + + +_The Last Stroll around the Mooskee--Talking to the Donkey-Boys and Dragomen--A Queer Lot--A Pertinacious Customer--The Judge’s +Expedient--A Little Humbug--Rich American Tourists “in a Horn”--The Dragoman’s Salutation “Sing Sing!”--Getting Rid of a +Nuisance--Buying Keepsakes--Out of the Desert into a Garden--Curiosities for Farmers--A Mohammedan Festival--Curious Sights--Snake +Charmers--How they do it--Music-Loving Reptiles--On an Egyptian Railroad--Pompey’s Pillar--A Ludicrous Accident--Alexandria, its +Sights and Scenes--Climbing Pompey’s Pillar--A Daring Sailor--An Arab Swindle--Going on Board the Steamer--Farewell to Egypt._ + + +THE hot wind from the desert made itself manifest early in April, and said in terms that were not to be mistaken “Get out of this.” + +I took a farewell stroll around the Mooskee, the Esbekeeah, and the Shoobra road and skirmished for the last time with the donkey +boys and dragomen who infest those places. Among the tribes of ragged, dirty, vagrant urchins who swarm in the streets of Cairo, the +donkey boys head the list. Every traveller knows them and you hear them spoken of as “Confounded rascals” or “Bright little fellows” + according to the luck the Frankish traveller has happened to meet among the species. Occasionally you see boot-blacks with kits +similar to their cousins in more civilized countries, and the two who used to hang around my hotel in Cairo always ready for +“backsheesh” whether they gave my boots a “shine” or not, were the most unprepossessing little gamins I ever met. + +One fellow used to annoy two of us greatly with propositions to enter our employ; and half a dozen times every day he used to pester +us with proposals, and we endeavored to hire him to let us alone but all to no purpose. He had performed a slight service for us for +which he would take nothing and he felt that this service entitled him to hang around, and ask us for recommendations, and try to +make a contract with us. We could not shake him off and one day the Judge hit upon a neat expedient. + +{679}On the whole I had no regret at parting with the donkey boys and dragomen, particularly with the latter, who hang around the +the hotels at Cairo in great numbers, and were always ready to agree to take you anywhere you wish to go. + +[Illustration: 0697] + +One of them answered “yes” to my question as to the possibility of accompanying me to the moon, and offered to undertake the job for +thirty shillings a day and furnish everything. As I was not then ready {680}for an aerial voyage I did not pursue the subject, and +as he left me alone after that I conclude that he must have felt offended. + +“I shall be much obliged,” said the dragoman, “if you will get me a good party of Americans to go to Jerusalem. I take them cheap +and very well.” And twenty times a day he made this proposal. + +One day when we saw him standing on the veranda of the hotel--he had not caught sight of us but was evidently waiting for our +appearance--the Judge walked forward as if he were anxiously looking for the dragoman, and said, “I have a good thing for you. There +may be a party of rich Americans coming down the Nile, and if you can find them and make a bargain with them to pay a high price you +will be lucky.” + +“Yes, yes,” said Mohammed, his eyes glistening with delight, “I make good bargain with them, I take them cheap and very well.” + +“Never take them cheap. High price, the highest,--fifty shillings a day each, and there ought to be ten of them.” + +Mohammed clapped his hands with delight as the Judge continued, + +“They will pay fifty, yes sixty shillings a day if they agree to. They are very rich and would like to own half the money in +America.” + +“Bismillah! and that be so?” + +“Yes, and you must do the thing in style; silver plated camel for the old man, and dromedary with six legs for his daughter the +princess.” + +“I give them everything, everything. I take them cheap and very well. They pay me one hundred shillings a day and shall have what +they just want. When they come?” + +“I don’t know,” said the Judge doubtfully. “But you had better go to the landing at Boulak and wait for them.” + +“No, I waits here in the hotel for them. They come here.” + +“Doubtful,” said the Judge, “very doubtful. I don’t know what hotel they will come to and don’t think they will come to this. You +had better go to the landing and wait for them, and then you will be there all the time you stay in Boulak.” {681} “I understand, I +go to Boulak and find ze rich American. And what shall I ask his name?” + +“The Grand Duke of Chicago; about fifty years old, lost his left ear in a duel, and wears three pairs of eye-glasses. Was decorated +by the Prince of Hoboken five years ago, and always wears his decoration. You will know him by that--as large as a soup-plate and +twice as greasy. When you see him, step up and say “Sing-Sing,” and he will understand you know all about him. Sing Sing is one of +his palaces.” + +“I understand and he pay a hundred shillings a day and extra for ze camels.” + +“Yes, a hundred shillings and camels, food, tents, and dragoman extra. Will give five hundred pounds “backsheesh” to you before you +start.” + +Mohammed could wait no longer. The prospect of such a mine to explore was too good to be lost. He went to Boulak immediately, and +during the rest of my stay I saw him only once, and then he was walking in the morning toward Boulak to take up his waiting station. +I understood afterward that we really did him a good turn as his stay at Boulak was rewarded with a customer,--not as good as the +Grand Duke of Chicago, but yet a remunerative one. + +The day at length arrived for my departure. So I paid a farewell visit to our excellent representative, Consul-General Beardsley, +and to a few other friends and acquaintances, and in other ways made ready for departure. + +I spent a last morning in the bazaars and devoted an hour to the purchase of an oriental necklace and a few other trifles. An hour +was the least time in which I could do the necessary bargaining; in London or Paris it would have been all over in two minutes. + +In buying the necklace I left the shop four times and gradually beat the fellow down to a decent price; he asked less on each +occasion that I approached him, and if I had devoted half a day to the business I might have done better than I did. I paid him +for my purchase a little more than fifty per cent, of what he demanded at the outset and probably quite as much as he expected +to receive. {682}I left Cairo by the slow train as I wished to see the stations along the road, and was in no hurry to be +whisked through by express. Two of us offered a rupee, (fifty cents,) to the conductor if he would give us the exclusive use of a +compartment, and to make sure that he would carry out his agreement we suggested that we would pay him at the end of the journey. + +[Illustration: 9700] + +He was entirely content with the arrangement and carried out his part of it to perfection. He came to us at every station to see if +we wanted anything, and when we left the car at places where the stops were long, he carefully locked the compartment and stationed +a brakeman to watch it and make sure that nobody else should enter it. We gave him his rupee at the last station before reaching +Alexandria and saw him no more. + +He was an Arab with a good-natured face, and as soon as the money was promised him he appeared to regard it as a sure thing. It +is somewhat uncomplimentary to the natives of this country, that they are more inclined to trust strangers than each other. If an +Egyptian official or merchant had made a promise like ours the conductor would have paid little heed to it as the chances would have +been against fulfillment, but he accepted the word of a stranger without hesitation. {683}Carriage drivers, donkey boys, and boatmen +repeatedly told me “the foreigners always pay what they agree to, but the natives don’t.” + +“We like to deal with you even when you make very close bargains because we feel sure of the money, but it isn’t so with the +Egyptians and Turks.” + +[Illustration: 0701] + +Cairo faded in the distance. We watched the arrowy spires of the Mosque of Mohammed Ali till they became the faintest of lines +against the sky, and then went out altogether; we traced the group of mosques that cover the tombs of the Caliphs and are backed by +the sandy hills of the Mokattam, and we studied the ensemble of mosques and minarets, and palm-trees, as long as study was possible. +Then we turned to the grand old pyramids away on the western horizon, and when these disappeared we fixed our eyes on the course of +the Nile, and the line that marked the termination of the fertile land and the beginning of the Desert. + +The Desert soon disappeared, and we rode through the flat plain, carpeted with the richest of verdure, and furrowed here and there +with great and small and medium canals. In some fields the crops appeared half grown; in others they were just beginning, and in +others the plows--rude implements which the most careless farmer in America would disdain--were at work. {684}The plow of Egypt +is the same in appearance, and it may be the same identically, that was in use before the Pyramids were built, and before the +foundation of Thebes, with her hundred gates. It is a billet of wood, pointed at the forward end, and furnished with a beam and +an upright, the latter serving as a handle. A pair of oxen, or buffaloes, are the propelling power, and the yoke that fastens them +together is a straight stick held in place by ropes or wooden pins. + +Numerous _sakkiehs_, turned by oxen or buffaloes, were at work, and in nearly every instance the animals were blindfolded with pads +of coarse straw-work over their eyes. Frequently we passed villages with mud walls, and with the general aspect of uncleanliness and +discomfort that I had observed in upper Egypt, and that one observes in nearly all the native villages. + +The thermometer stood at 100° in the shade and 118° in the sun, but so long as we kept in the shade it was not uncomfortable. The +dryness of the Egyptian air makes the heat far more supportable than the same temperature in New York. I have suffered more at 85° +on Manhattan Island than in Egypt at 100°, and I found it easier to move about there than in an American atmosphere fifteen degrees +cooler. The natives were at work in the fields without any appearance of discomfort, but I observed that the buffaloes, where at +liberty to do so, had sought the water and were lying there with only their heads visible. + +At every station children came out to peddle water, which they carried in _goolchs_, or bottles of porous earth. For half a franc we +bought one of these, _goolch_, water, and all--the girl excepted, though it is quite possible that a franc or two would have secured +her. + +Our train was long, and consisted of one first-class, one second-class, and eight third-class carriages. The first and second-class +carriages were only moderately filled, but the third-class were crowded, so that it must have been anything but comfortable to ride +in them. The sides of the third-class coaches are quite open, so that the passengers get the full benefit of dust and rain. + +The most important town passed on this line of railway is Tantah, a place with many handsome houses and a viceregal palace, and +known as the capital of one of the Delta {685}provinces. Many of our third-class passengers stopped there and many others joined us, +as it happened to be the time of one of the three fairs or festivals held here each year. + +The railway station was crowded with people, the streets were full, and on the outskirts of the town we could see tents, booths, +and crowds, just as one sees them elsewhere at great gatherings of a rural population for a fair that is to last several days. There +were not a dozen Europeans visible in the crowd; all were natives, chiefly from the surrounding region, though many had doubtless +come from Cairo and Alexandria. + +The tents were of all sorts, sizes, and colors, and there were horses, donkeys, and camels, picketed around them or grazing in the +meadow close at hand. The people were generally in their best clothes, and there was quite a variety of turbans and flowing robes. +The delay of our train for an hour or more gave us an opportunity to study the crowd and its peculiarities. + +January, April, and August, are the months for these festivals, each of which lasts eight days, and brings together sometimes +as many as two hundred thousand people. Ostensibly they come to pray at the tomb of a celebrated saint of Islam, none other than +Seayyid-Ahmed el-Bedawee, a sort of Moslem Big Indian, who flourished about seven hundred years ago, and was buried at Tantah. The +pilgrims recite a few prayers at his tomb, and then attend to fun and business. A large trade is carried on in horses, camels, and +other merchandise, and formerly there was an extensive commerce in slaves. The sound of Oriental music was borne to our ears, and +we strolled through row after row of tents or booths occupied as _cafés_, and the resort of singing and dancing girls, jugglers, +story-tellers, and performers of all kinds. + +Among the sights, none seemed to draw larger crowds than the snake-charmers, several of whom were displaying their skill before +admiring audiences. + +The snake-charmers of Egypt are much like their confreres of the extreme Orient, but are less famous in the matter of skill and +daring. An Egyptian snake-charmer carries his pets in a bag, and is ready to give a performance whenever and wherever he can secure +a patron. One afternoon, while in Cairo, I was enjoying my after-dinner cigar and strolling through the Esbe{686}keeah Gardens, when +along came a man with a sort of satchel over his shoulder and a girdle confining his frock to his waist. He stopped, and I did +the same. He then took two or three large snakes out of the satchel and hung the empty receptacle on the fence. The snakes slowly +unwound, and to my astonishment I perceived that they were cobras, the dreaded _cobra de capello_ of India, one of the most deadly +serpents on the face of the globe. He struck them with a small stick as they were standing erect with their heads puffed out with +rage, and their tongues darting rapidly from their mouths. He had an attendant who played a sort of rude flute, and the serpents, +who had been trained with the stick, kept an imperfect time to the music in the undulations of their bodies. The performer picked up +the snakes and allowed them to wind around his arms and neck, and when he had put them through their paces he restored them to the +satchel and asked for “backsheesh,” as a reward for his and their labors. + +But the show was not over. I observed that his blue cotton frock bulged out just above the girdle; and what do you suppose he +carried there? + +He opened the front of his frock or shirt and thrust his hand into the opening and down to his waist. When he withdrew it he had +a dozen or more small snakes in his grasp, and very deliberately placed them on the ground. Then he produced another and another +handful, until a peck or so of small serpents were crawling and wriggling before our wondering eyes! + +The snake-charmers I saw at the festival at Tantah went through pretty much the same performance as that I witnessed in Cairo, and a +very few moments sufficed to satisfy my curiosity. + +A great deal of wine is consumed at these festivals, and in the evening one can see many things to interest and amuse him, as the +manners and customs of the frequenters of the fair are of a very unrestrained character. It is the right and privilege of a barren +woman to visit the fair at Tantah and pray at the tomb of the saint, and her devotion, continued through the week of the fair, is +generally rewarded as she desires it should be. Her wish to go to Tantah is one that cannot be denied without the violation of a +custom that has existed for many centuries. There are other {687}fairs throughout Egypt similar to the one at Tantah, but none of +them succeed in bringing together such a large number of people. + +After leaving Tantah we crossed upon iron bridges the Rosetta and Damietta branches of the Nile, and sped along over a line of +railway as straight as a sunbeam. There was not much engineering work in building the road, nothing more than to lay down the track +after the construction of a bed high enough to keep the rails above the height of the annual inundation. As we approach the coast +the country becomes more marshy and unproductive, and the scenery is decidedly monotonous. For several miles the track is through +a marsh, and on nearing Alexandria we catch sight, on our left hand, of Lake Mareotis, a shallow body of water much like Lake +Lenzalah, through which the Suez Canal runs after leaving Port Said. + +We pass near the bank of the Mahmoodieh Canal, which connects Alexandria with the Nile, and was constructed by order of Mohammed Ali +in less than a year’s time. It cost about three hundred thousand pounds sterling, and employed a quarter of a million men, of whom +twenty thousand died of plague, hunger, and cholera. The average width of the canal is about one hundred feet, and its total length +is fifty miles--a reasonably gigantic operation for less than a twelvemonth. + +The canal was full of boats as we passed it; we could not see them on account of the high bank, but their masts and sails were +visible, and so we argued that the boats were there. Near Alexandria the banks of the canal are bordered with pretty villas and +gardens for some distance, and some of the villas are quite picturesque. It has become the fashion for wealthy Alexandrians to have +their residences in this locality, and there is a watering-place and popular resort known as Ramleh about half an hour’s ride from +the city. The Viceroy has a palace there, and generally resides in it during a portion of the summer. + +Our train swept toward the city, passing in sight of Pompey’s Pillar, and through a collection of houses that form a sort of +industrial suburb. The station is at the extreme west of the town, and is sufficiently large for all practical purposes, and +contained, at our arrival, the usual array of dragomen, porters, and {688}other hangers-on. The streets are quite a contrast to +those of Cairo, as they are paved with huge blocks of stone that have so worn away in places as to make them very rough, and quite +unpleasant for carriage-driving. The pavement was once excellent, but it has received no attention, and the dust indicates that it +is very rarely swept. The dust flew about in clouds, and my companion said that when he was last here there were some heavy rains, +and where we found dust, he had found a regular Slough of Despond of mud. I can well believe the mud must have been something +frightful, and a ride through it upon a donkey would prove to be something serious. + +One of my acquaintances tells me of being pitched head foremost into six or eight inches of it after putting on his best clothes +and starting out to make a call, which he indefinitely postponed and returned to his hotel, where he hung up to dry. He had the +satisfaction--on the ground that misery loves company--of seeing, while on the way back from his mishap, a gaudily-dressed French +woman undergo a similar tumble where the mud was deeper. Her feathers, and flounces, and laces, and general finery were sadly +bedraggled, and when she emerged, with the aid of a couple of Arabs, she resembled a canary bird that has passed through a +street-sweeping machine. + +The city founded by and named for Alexander the Great contains very few traces of its former magnificence. Cleopatra’s Needle and +the so-called Pompey’s Pillar are the stock sights; the former is a granite shaft, covered with hieroglyphics, and is far inferior +every way to the obelisks at Karnak and Luxor. More beautiful and better placed is the Pillar, standing on an elevation near the +Mohammedan burying-ground, and consisting of a base, shaft, and capital, the whole nearly a hundred feet high, and the shaft alone +seventy feet long and nearly ten feet in diameter. The shaft is a single piece of red granite, highly polished and elegantly made, +the workmanship being far better than that of base or capital. It is probable that a statue once stood on the pillar, and there are +some old pictures of Alexandria in which the Pillar is represented with a statue upon it. There is no way of reaching the summit +except by a considerable outlay for ropes and ladders, and also for the necessary labor of arranging + +{689} + +[Illustration: 0707] + +{691}them. It has been twice ascended in the present century, once by a party of English sailors, and once by an enterprising woman. +In each instance a string was stretched over the capital by means of a kite; the string was then used to draw up a stout cord, the +cord to draw up a rope, and the rope to draw up a ladder. By the ladder the ascent is easy enough, but it requires a cool head and a +sure grasp. + +A paragraph with the heading “Ancient Alexandria” might be about as brief as the famous chapter on the snakes of Ireland. Of the +capital that contained a population of half a million, a library of I don’t know how many thousand volumes, temples, palaces, and +piles stupendous, there are little more than vestiges remaining. Here and there may be found a few relics; walls and foundations of +buildings may be traced in a few localities, and there are some mutilated statues and other fragments that have survived the touch +of Decay’s Effacing Fingers. + +From ancient times Alexandria steadily declined, so that at the end of the last century it had a population of six thousand; during +the French and English occupations it began to improve, but it made its greatest progress under Mohammed Ali. The successors of that +prince have continued to foster it, and at the present day it is a busy, bustling city of nearly a quarter of a million inhabitants, +of whom one-fourth are Europeans. + +There is an air of commerce everywhere, and when one arrives at the railway station and drives through the streets, he realizes that +he is in a seaport long before he has caught sight of the sea, or of the forest of masts that rise in the harbor. + +Near the Great Square you can visit the bazaars or shops, where you will see a reproduction of the sights and scenes of Cairo. + +The Great Square is a sort of public park, filled with shade-trees and seats, and having in the centre an equestrian statue of +Mohammed Ali. At each end there is a fountain, and around the square are buildings of a very substantial character, quite worthy of +any great city of modern times. Everything is modern. There is nothing to remind you of antiquity, and even the Arabs that cluster +around the fountains are nearly all boys, and seem more modernized than their brethren at Cairo. {692}As soon as we were quartered +at the hotel, we went to the steamship office to engage our passage, and having paid for our tickets, concluded it would be well to +visit the ship and examine our quarters. We hired donkeys for a ride to the Marine, or landing-place, and away we cantered through +the streets of the Arab quarter. There was a crowd of boatmen that wrangled a long time to secure us, and with such effect that we +found a boat to take us to the ship and back again for sixpence each. + +The boatmen were mostly Arabs and Maltese, strong, active fellows, whose rowing abilities are much better than their manners. There +are no docks or wharves to the harbor; the ships must lie out and discharge their cargoes by means of lighters, and passengers must +land and embark in small boats. The harbor is good without being excellent; the entrance is difficult and tortuous, and the sea +frequently rolls in very uncomfortably. There is an outside harbor, where most of the foreign ships lie, as the inner one is rather +shallow for them. The outer one is subject to winds and a heavy sea, but will be greatly improved when the new breakwater, now +constructing, is finished. Hitherto the government has not cared to improve the entrance of the harbor, as a bad entrance is easier +defended than a good one, but a better sentiment prevails at present, and the harbor is to be made as good as possible with a fair +outlay of money. + +When we came back to the landing, we had a fair instance of the swindling tendencies of the Arab donkey-drivers. We had left our +beasts there, and as we had not paid for them, we felt that there was no danger that the owners would take them away. The instant we +touched the steps an urchin appeared, and behind him was another, each holding a donkey. + +“Your donkeys is gone,” said the foremost, “and you is to ride back on this donkeys.” + +We were about mounting in acceptance of this reasonable statement, but took the precaution to look around before doing so. Our own +beasts and drivers were a little distance away, and the story of the boy who announced their departure, proved to be of the most +piscatorial character. The boatmen and donkey-drivers of Alexandria have a worse reputation than those of any other Egyptian city. +{693}On the shore of the Eastern harbor there are several cafés, so as to command the marine air and view. We sat a while in one of +these on our return from the ship, and found the breeze very grateful and refreshing after our hot experience in Cairo and on the +railway. From the covered balcony we could see Cleopatra’s needle on the right, among a lot of houses, while away to the seaward +rose the lighthouse which occupies the site of the ancient “Pharos,” one of the earliest lighthouses known to mariners--the earliest +in fact--and once known as one of the seven wonders of the world. Its name is perpetuated in the appellation of lighthouses in the +French and other languages, (phare,) and its cost at the time of its erection by Ptolemy Philadelphus was something very great. + +History says it was a square building, of white marble, several stories high, each story smaller than the one below it, and there +was a road winding round it with so gentle a slope that chariots could be driven to the top. The fair, but imprudent Cleopatra, is +said to have handled the ribbons over a pair of animals somewhat better than omnibus horses, and driven them to the summit of the +Pharos, where she rested a few moments, and then drove them down again. What a pity she did not break her neck in the descent, so as +to save some of us an unpleasant bit of scandal and that horrid story of the asp. + +Much care and attention is bestowed upon the gardens, and one of them, belonging to a Greek resident, proved to be exceptionally +handsome. It was adorned with statues, and marble pavements, and in one corner there was a charming little Kiosque where four chairs +around a table suggested a pleasant breakfast or lunch for the master and his family or friends. There are many of these gardens in +and around Alexandria, and they contain a bewildering array of African and other plants. + +At the appointed hour we went on board the steamer, and to avoid trouble we made a contract with a fellow to transport our baggage +from the hotel to the ship and ourselves with it. One condition of the contract was that our trunks were not to be opened at the +Custom House; I don’t know how much “backsheesh” he paid to the officials, but he had it arranged beforehand so that nothing was +disturbed. It is forbidden now to take {694}antiquities out of Egypt, and anything of the sort found in the trunk of a departing +stranger is liable to confiscation. + +And behold us now on the deck of a Malta-bound steamer, prepared, when she lifts her anchor, to say good-bye to Egypt. + +Farewell to the land of the purest sky, and the most lovely winter climate that the world can boast; to the temples and tombs that +tell us of a people far back in the misty past--a people whose mechanical skill surpass that of all those who have followed them, +and before whose monuments we stand with bowed and reverential heads; and to the shrines of Isis and Osiris to whose mystic worship +the most powerful nation of its time was devoted, and for whom the most gigantic temples were erected. + +And farewell to the Nile, that mysterious river whose sources are yet unknown, and on whose banks have been written through sixty +centuries many important pages of the world’s history. Mighty and brilliant empires have there risen and fallen; great cities have +flourished and disappeared. Persian and Greek and Roman have come and gone; Pagan and Jew and Christian and Moslem have built their +temples, and have seen the glory and decline of their religions; on its sleepy waters floated the frail bark that held the infant +Moses, and beside them rested the Holy family when it fled from Bethlehem that the Saviour child might escape the fury of Herod. + +Farewell to the desert with its glowing sands, and to the rich valley whose fertility six thousand years of assiduous cultivation +have not been able to exhaust; to waving palms and kneeling camels; to the city of the Caliphs, the Mamelukes, and the Khedive, +where the bustle and activity of the Occident have not altogether changed the dignified mien or opened the eyes of the sleepy +Oriental; where he sits to-day as he sat in the time of Haroun Al-Raschid, and waits in his little shop till Heaven chooses to send +a purchaser for his wares. + +To the land where Pharaoh ruled, and Cleopatra loved and died; where Past and Present stand face to face, and where the opposing +waves of Eastern and Western civilizations are met we utter a hearty good-bye. When shall we see you again? + + +FINIS. + + + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Story Teller of the +Desert--“Backsheesh!”, by Thomas W. Knox + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK STORY TELLER OF THE DESERT *** + +***** This file should be named 50700-0.txt or 50700-0.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/5/0/7/0/50700/ + +Produced by David Widger from page images generously +provided by the Internet Archive + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions will +be renamed. + +Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright +law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, +so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United +States without permission and without paying copyright +royalties. 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