At Present, As I Have Already Mentioned, Most Of The Hadjys Arrive By
Sea At Djidda:
Those who come from the north embark at Suez or Cosseir,
and among them are a large proportion of the Barbary pilgrims, many
Turks from Anatolia and European Turkey, Syrians, and numerous dervishes
from Persia, Tartary, and the realms watered by the Indus.
The want of
shipping on the Red Sea, occasioned by the increased demand for ships to
accommodate the Turkish army of the Hedjaz, renders the passage
precarious; and they sometimes lose the opportunity, and arrive too late
for the pilgrimage, as happened to a party in 1814, who reached Mekka
three days after the Hadj, having been long detained at Suez. From the
bad quality of the vessels, and their crowded state, the passage is very
disagreeable, and often dangerous. Nothing has yet been done by Mohammed
Aly Pasha to make this voyage more commodious to the pilgrims; but, on
the contrary, be has laid a tax upon them, by forcing a contract for
their passage to Djidda
[p.255] at a high price, (it was eighteen dollars a head in 1814), with
his governor at Suez, who distributed them on board the Arab ships, and
paid to the masters of the vessels only six dollars per head. Formerly
hadjys were permitted to carry with them from Suez as great a quantity
of provisions as they chose, part of which they afterwards sold in the
Hedjaz to some profit; but at present none can embark with more than
what is barely sufficient for his own consumption during the pilgrimage.
The advantage of carrying along with them their provisions, chiefly
butter, flour, biscuits, and dried flesh, purchased at cheap prices in
Egypt, for the whole journey, was a principal reason for preferring a
sea voyage; for those who go by land must purchase all their provisions
at Mekka, where the prices are high.
If the foreign pilgrims, on their arrival at Cairo, cannot hear of any
ships lying in the harbour of Suez, they often pursue their way up the
Nile as far as Genne, and from thence cross the Desert to Cosseir, from
whence it is but a short voyage to Djidda. In returning from the Hedjaz,
this Cosseir route is preferred by the greater part of the Turkish
hadjys. The natives of Upper Egypt go by Cosseir; likewise many negro
pilgrims, after having followed the banks of the Nile from Sennar down
to Genne. The usual fare for hadjys from Cosseir to Djidda, is from six
to eight dollars.
In the last days of the Mamelouks, when they held possession of Upper
Egypt, while the lower was conquered by Mohammed Aly, many Turkish
hadjys who repaired to the Hedjaz in small parties, though it was then
in the hands of the Wahabys, suffered much illtreatment from the
Mamelouks, on their return to Egypt; many of them were stripped and
slain in their passage down the Nile. The sanguinary Greek, Hassan Beg
el Yahoudy, boasted of having himself killed five hundred of them.
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