Notes from Egypt

Dearest Alick,

I have been back in my own boat four days, and most comfortable she is. I enlarged the saloon, and made a good writing table, and low easy divans instead of benches, and added a sort of pantry and sleeping cabin in front; so that Omar has not to come through the saloon to sleep; and I have all the hareem part to myself. Inside there is a good large stern cabin, and wash-closet and two small cabins with beds long enough even for you. Inshallah, you and Maurice will come next winter and go up the Nile and enjoy it with me. I intend to sail in ten days and to send back the ‘Urania’ to seek work for the winter. We had a very narrow escape of being flooded this year. I fear a deal of damage has been done to the dourrah and cotton crops. It was sad to see the villagers close by here trying to pull up a little green dourrah as the Nile slowly swallowed up the fields.

I was forced to flog Mabrook yesterday for smoking on the sly, a grave offence here on the part of a boy; it is considered disrespectful; so he was ordered, with much parade, to lie down, and Omar gave him two cuts with a rope’s end, an apology for a flogging which would have made an Eton boy stare. The stick here is quite nominal, except in official hands. I can’t say Mabrook seemed at all impressed, for he was laughing heartily with Omar in less than ten minutes; but the affair was conducted with as much solemnity as an execution.

‘Sheykh’ Stanley’s friend, Gezawee, has married his negro slave to his own sister, on the plea that he was the best young man he knew. What would a Christian family say to such an arrangement?

My boat is beautifully buoyant now, and has come up by the bows in fine style. I have not sailed her yet, but have doubt she will ‘walk well’ as the Arabs say. Omar got £10 by the sale of old wood and nails, and also gave me 2000 piastres, nearly £12, which the workmen had given him as a sort of backsheesh. They all pay one, two or three piastres daily to any wakeel (agent) who superintends; that is his profit, and it is enormous at that rate. I said, ‘Why did you not refuse it?’ But Omar replied they had pay enough after that reduction, which is always made from them, and that in his opinion therefore, it came out of the master’s pocket, and was ‘cheatery.’ How people have been talking nonsense about Jamaica chez vous. I have little doubt Eyre did quite right, and still less doubt that the niggers have had enough of the sort of provocation which I well know, to account for the outbreak. Baker’s effusion is a very poor business. There may be blacks like tigers (and whites too in London for that matter). I myself have seen at least five sorts of blacks (negroes, not Arabs), more unlike each other than Swedes are unlike Spaniards; and many are just like ourselves. Of course they want governing with a strong hand, like all ignorant, childish creatures. But I am fully convinced that custom and education are the only real differences between one set of men and another, their inner nature is the same all the world over.

My Reis spoke such a pretty parable the other day that I must needs write it. A Coptic Reis stole some of my wood, which we got back by force and there was some reviling of the Nazarenes in consequence from Hoseyn and Ali; but Reis Mohammed said: ‘Not so; Girgis is a thief, it is true, but many Christians are honest; and behold, all the people in the world are like soldiers, some wear red and some blue; some serve on foot, others on horseback, and some in ships; but all serve one Sultan, and each fights in the regiment in which the Sultan has placed him, and he who does his duty best is the best man, be his coat red or blue or black.’ I said, ‘Excellent words, oh Reis, and fit to be spoken from the best of pulpits.’ It is surprising what happy sayings the people here hit upon; they cultivate talk for want of reading, and the consequence is great facility of narration and illustration. Everybody enforces his ideas like Christ, in parables. Hajjee Hannah told me two excellent fairy tales, which I will write for Rainie with some Bowdlerizing, and several laughable stories, which I will leave unrecorded, as savouring too much of Boccaccio’s manner, or that of the Queen of Navarre. I told Achmet to sweep the floor after dinner just now. He hesitated, and I called again: ‘What manner is this, not to sweep when I bid thee?’ ‘By the most high God,’ said the boy, ‘my hand shall not sweep in thy boat after sunset, oh Lady; I would rather have it cut off than sweep thee out of thy property.’ I found that you must not sweep at night, nor for three days after the departure of a guest whose return you desire, or of the master of the house. ‘Thinkest thou that my brother would sweep away the dust of thy feet from the floors at Luxor,’ continued Achmet, ‘he would fear never to see thy fortunate face again.’ If you don’t want to see your visitor again you break a gulleh (water-jar) behind him as he leaves the house, and sweep away his footsteps.

What a canard your papers have in Europe about a constitution here. I won’t write any politics, it is all too dreary; and Cairo gossip is odious, as you may judge by the productions of Mesdames Odouard and Lott. Only remember this, there is no law nor justice but the will, or rather the caprice, of one man. It is nearly impossible for any European to conceive such a state of things as really exists. Nothing but perfect familiarity with the governed, i.e. oppressed, class will teach it; however intimate a man may be with the rulers he will never fully take it in. I am à l’index here, and none of the people I know dare come to see me; Arab I mean. It was whispered in my ear in the street by a friend I met. Ismael Pasha’s chief pleasure is gossip, and a certain number of persons, chiefly Europeans, furnish him with it daily, true or false. If the farce of the constitution ever should be acted here it will be superb. Something like the Consul going in state to ask the fellaheen what wages they got. I could tell you a little of the value of consular information; but what is the use? Europe is enchanted with the enlightened Pasha who has ruined this fine country.

I long so to see you and Rainie! I don’t like to hope too much, but Inshallah, next year I shall see you all.