To Complete The Resemblance Between A Moslem And A Christian
Festival, We Have Dishes Of The Day, Fish, Shurayk, The Cross-Bun, And
A Peculiarly Indigestible Cake, Called In Egypt Kahk,[FN#4] The
Plum-Pudding Of Al-Islam.
This year's Id was made gloomy, comparatively speaking, by the state of
politics.
Report of war with Russia, with France, with England, who was
going to land three million men at Suez, and with Infideldom in
general, rang through Egypt, and the city of Mars[FN#5] became
unusually martial. The government armouries, arsenals, and
manufactories, were crowded with kidnapped workmen. Those who purposed
a pilgrimage feared forcible detention. Wherever men gathered together,
in the Mosques, for instance, or the coffee-houses, the police
[p.118]closed the doors, and made forcible capture of the able-bodied.
This proceeding, almost as barbarous as our impressment law, filled the
main streets with detachments of squalid-looking wretches, marching to
be made soldiers, with collars round their necks and irons on their
wrists. The dismal impression of the scene was deepened by crowds of
women, who, habited in mourning, and scattering dust and mud over their
rent garments, followed their sons, brothers, and husbands, with cries
and shrieks. The death-wail is a peculiar way of cheering on the
patriot departing pro patria mori, and the origin of the custom is
characteristic of the people. The principal public amusements allowed
to Oriental women are those that come under the general name of
"Fantasia,"-birth-feasts, marriage festivals, and funerals.
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