Our Road Lay Northward Across The
Plain Towards A Long Narrow Strip Of Date Ground, Surrounded By A
Ruinous Mud Wall.
After a ride of two or three miles, we entered the
gardens, and came suddenly upon the Hammam.
It is a prim little Cockney
bungalow, built by Abbas Pasha of Egypt for his own accommodation;
glaringly whitewashed, and garnished with diwans and calico curtains of
a gorgeous hue. The guardian had been warned of our visit, and was
present to supply us with bathing-cloths and other necessaries. One by
one we entered the cistern, which is now in an inner room. The water is
about four feet deep, warm in winter, cool in summer, of a
saltish-bitter taste, but celebrated for its invigorating qualities,
when applied externally. On one side of the calcareous rock, near the
ground, is the hole opened for the spring by Moses' rod, which must
have been like the "mast of some tall
[p.204] Ammiral[FN#22]"; and near it are the marks of Moses' nails-deep
indentations in the stone, which were probably left there by some
extinct Saurian. Our Cicerone informed us that formerly the
finger-marks existed, and that they were long enough for a man to lie
in. The same functionary attributed the sanitary properties of the
spring to the blessings of the Prophet, and, when asked why Moses had
not made sweet water to flow, informed us that the Great Lawgiver had
intended the spring for bathing in, not for drinking. We sat with him,
eating the small yellow dates of Tur, which are delicious, melting like
honey in the mouth, and leaving a surpassing arriere gout. After
finishing sundry pipes and cups of coffee, we gave the bath-man a few
piastres, and, mounting our donkeys, started eastward for the Bir
Musa,[FN#23] which we reached in half an hour. It is a fine old work,
built round and domed over with roughly squared stones, very like what
may be seen in some rustic parts of Southern England. The sides of the
pit were so rugged that a man could climb down them, and at the bottom
was a pool of water, sweet and abundant. We had intended to stay there,
and to dine al fresco, but the hated faces of our companions, the
Maghrabis, meeting us at the entrance, nipped that project in the bud.
Accordingly we retired from the burning
[p.205] sun to a neighbouring coffee-house-a shed of palm leaves kept
by a Tur man, and there, seated on mats, we demolished the contents of
our basket. Whilst we were eating, some Badawin came in and joined us,
when invited so to do. They were poorly dressed, and all armed with
knives and cheap sabres, hanging to leathern bandoleers: in language
and demeanour they showed few remains of their old ferocity. As late as
Mohammed Ali's time these people were noted wreckers, and formerly they
were dreaded pirates: now they are lions with their fangs and claws
drawn.
In the even, when we returned to our tent, a Syrian, one of our party
on the poop, came out to meet us with the information that several
large vessels had arrived from Suez, comparatively speaking, empty, and
that the captain of one of them would land us at Yambu' for three
dollars a head. The proposal was tempting. But presently it became
apparent that my companions were unwilling to shift their precious
boxes, and moreover, that I should have to pay for those who could not
or would not pay for themselves,-that is to say, for the whole party.
As such a display of wealth would have been unadvisable, I dismissed
the idea with a sigh. Amongst the large vessels was one freighted with
Persian pilgrims, a most disagreeable race of men on a journey or a
voyage. They would not land at first, because they feared the Badawin.
They would not take water from the town people, because some of these
were Christians. Moreover, they insisted upon making their own call to
prayer, which heretical proceeding-it admits five extra words-our
party, orthodox Moslems, would rather have died than have permitted.
When their crier, a small wizen-faced man, began the Azan with a voice
"in quel tenore
Che fa il cappon quando talvolta canta,"
we received it with a shout of derision, and some, hastily
[p.206] snatching up their weapons, offered him an opportunity of
martyrdom. The Maghrabis, too, hearing that the Persians were Rafaz
(heretics) crowded fiercely round to do a little Jihad, or Fighting for
the Faith. The long-bearded men took the alarm. They were twice the
number of our small party, and therefore they had been in the habit of
strutting about with nonchalance, and looking at us fixedly, and
otherwise demeaning themselves in an indecorous way. But when it came
to the point, they showed the white feather. These Persians accompanied
us to the end of our voyage. As they approached the Holy Land, visions
of the "Nabbut" caused a change for the better in their manners. At
Mahar they meekly endured a variety of insults, and at Yambu' they
cringed to us like dogs.
[FN#1] Men of the Maghrab, or Western Africa; the vulgar plural is
Maghrabin, generally written "Mogrebyn." May not the singular form of
this word have given rise to the Latin "Maurus," by elision of the
Ghayn, to Italians an unpronounceable consonant? From Maurus comes the
Portuguese "Moro," and our "Moor." When Vasco de Gama reached Calicut,
he found there a tribe of Arab colonists, who in religion and in
language were the same as the people of Northern Africa,-for this
reason he called them "Moors." This was explained long ago by Vincent
(Periplus, lib. 3), and lately by Prichard (Natural History of Man). I
repeat it because it has been my fate to hear, at a meeting of a
learned society in London, a gentleman declare, that in Eastern Africa
he found a people calling themselves Moors.
Enter page number
PreviousNext
Page 73 of 154
Words from 73740 to 74752
of 157964
