Their Favourite
Flesh, As Usual In This Part Of The World, Is Mutton; Beef And Goat Are
Little Prized.[FN#37]"
The people of Suez are a finer and fairer race than the Cairenes.
The
former have more the appearance of Arabs: their dress is more
picturesque, their eyes are carefully darkened with Kohl, and they wear
sandals, not slippers. They are, according to all accounts, a turbulent
and somewhat fanatic set, fond of quarrels, and slightly addicted to
"pronunciamentos." The general programme of one of these latter
diversions is said to be as follows. The boys will first be sent by
their fathers about the town in a disorderly mob, and ordered to cry
out "Long live the Sultan!" with its usual sequel, "Death to the
Infidels!" The Infidels, Christians or others, must hear and may happen
to resent this; or possibly the governor, foreseeing a disturbance,
orders an ingenuous youth or two to be imprisoned, or to be caned by
the police. Whereupon some person, rendered influential by wealth or
religious reputation, publicly complains that the Christians are all in
all, and that in these evil days Al-Islam is going to destruction. On
this occasion the speaker conducts himself with such insolence, that
the governor perforce consigns him to confinement, which exasperates
the populace still more. Secret meetings are now convened, and in them
the chiefs of corporations assume a prominent position. If the
disturbance be intended by its main-spring to subside quietly, the
conspirators are allowed to take their own way; they will drink
copiously, become lions about midnight, and recover their hare-hearts
before noon next
[p.184] day.
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