ТОП просматриваемых книг сайта:
.
Читать онлайн.
On the 31st we found ourselves approaching the castle of Alexandria, and were soon hailed by some people in a curious-looking pilot-boat with a lateen sail. The pilot was an old man with a turban and a long grey beard, and sat cross-legged in the stern of his boat. We looked at him with vast interest, as the first live specimen we had seen of an Arab sailor. He was just the sort of man that I imagine Sindbad the Sailor must have been.
Having by his directions been steered safely into the harbour, we cast anchor not far from the shore, a naked, dusty plain, which the blazing sun seemed to dare any one to cross, on pain of being shrivelled up immediately. The intensity of the heat was tremendous: the tar melted in the seams of the deck: we could scarcely bear it even when we were under the awning. Malta was hot enough, but the temperature there was cool in comparison to the fiery furnace in which we were at present grilling. However, there was no help for it; so, having got our luggage on shore, we sweltered through the streets to an inn called the Tre Anchore—the only hotel in Africa, I believe, in those days. It was a dismal little place, frequented by the captains of merchant-vessels, who, not being hot enough already, raised the temperature of their blood by drinking brandy-and-water, arrack, and other combustibles, in a dark, oven-like room below stairs.
We took possession of all the rooms upstairs, of which the principal one was long and narrow, with two windows at the end, opening on to a covered balcony or verandah: this overlooked the principal street and the bazaar. Here my companion and I soon stationed ourselves and watched the novel and curious scene below; and strange indeed to the eye of an European, when for the first time he enters an Oriental city, is all he sees around him. The picturesque dresses, the buildings, the palm-trees, the camels, the people of various nations, with their long beards, their arms, and turbans, all unite to form a picture which is indelibly fixed in the memory. Things which have since become perfectly familiar to us were then utterly incomprehensible, and we had no one to explain them to us, for the one waiter of the poor inn, who was darting about in his shirt-sleeves after the manner of all waiters, never extended his answers to our questions beyond "Si, Signore," so we got but little information from him; however, we did not make use of our eyes the less for that.
Among the first things we noticed, was the number of half-naked men who went running about, each with something like a dead pig under his arm, shouting out "Mother! mother!"[1] with a doleful voice. These were the sakis or water-carriers, with their goat-skins of the precious element, a bright brass cupful of which they sell for a small coin to the thirsty passengers. An old man with a fan in his hand made of a palm-branch, who was crumpled up in the corner of a sort of booth among a heap of dried figs, raisins, and dates, just opposite our window, was an object of much speculation to us how he got in, and how he would ever manage to get out of the niche into which he was so closely wedged. He was the merchant, as the Arabian Nights would call him, or the shopkeeper as we should say, who sat there cross-legged among his wares waiting patiently for a customer, and keeping off the flies in the meanwhile, as in due time we discovered that all merchants did in all countries of the East. Soon there came slowly by, a long procession of men on horseback with golden bridles and velvet trappings, and women muffled up in black silk wrappers; how they could bear them, hot as it was, astonished us. These ladies sat upon a pile of cushions placed so high above the backs of the donkeys on which they rode that their feet rested on the animal's shoulders. Each donkey was led by one man, while another walked by its side with his hand upon the crupper. With the ladies were two little boys covered with diamonds, mounted on huge fat horses, and ensconced in high-backed Mameluke saddles made of silver gilt. These boys we afterwards found out were being conducted in state to a house of their relations, where the rite of circumcision was to be performed. Our attention was next called to something like a four-post bed, with pink gauze curtains, which advanced with dignified slowness, preceded by a band of musicians, who raised a dire and fearful discord by the aid of various windy engines. This was a canopy, the four poles of which were supported by men, who held it over the heads of a bride and her two bridesmaids or friends, who walked on each side of her. The bride was not veiled in the usual way, as her friends were, but was muffled up in Cashmere shawls from head to foot. Something there was on the top of her head which gleamed like gold or jewels, but the rest of her person was so effectually wrapped up and concealed that no one could tell whether she was pretty or ugly, fat or thin, old or young; and although we gave her credit for all the charms which should adorn a bride, we rejoiced when the villainous band of music which accompanied her turned round a corner and went out of hearing.
Some miserable-looking black slaves caught our attention, clothed each in a piece of Isabel-coloured canvas and led by a well-dressed man, who had probably just bought them. Then a great personage came by on horseback with a number of mounted attendants and some men on foot, who cleared the way before him, and struck everybody on the head with their sticks who did not get out of the way fast enough. These blows were dealt all round in the most unceremonious manner; but what appeared to us extraordinary was, that all these beaten people did not seem to care for being beat. They looked neither angry nor affronted, but only grinned and rubbed their shoulders, and moved on one side to let the train of the great man pass by. Now if this were done in London, what a ferment would it create! what speeches would be made about tyranny and oppression! what a capital thing some high-minded and independent patriot would make of it! how he would call a meeting to defend the rights of the subject! and how he would get his admirers to vote him a piece of plate for his noble and glorious exertions! Here nobody minded the thing; they took no heed of the indignity; and I verily believe my friend and I, who were safe up at the window, were the only persons in the place who felt any annoyance.
The prodigious multitude of donkeys formed another strange feature in the scene. There were hundreds of them, carrying all sorts of things in panniers; and some of the smallest were ridden by men so tall that they were obliged to hold up their legs that their feet might not touch the ground. Donkeys, in short, are the carts of Egypt and the hackney-coaches of Alexandria.
In addition to the donkeys long strings of ungainly-looking camels were continually passing, generally preceded by a donkey, and accompanied by swarthy men clad in a short shirt with a red and yellow handkerchief tied in a peculiar way over their heads, and wearing sandals; these savage-looking people were Bedouins, or Arabs of the desert. A very truculent set they seemed to be, and all of them were armed with a long crooked knife and a pistol or two, stuck in a red leathern girdle. They were thin, gaunt, and dirty, and strode along looking fierce and independent. There was something very striking in the appearance of these untamed Arabs: I had never pictured to myself that anything so like a wild beast could exist in human form. The motions of their half-naked bodies were singularly free and light, and they looked as if they could climb, and run, and leap over anything. The appearance of many of the older Arabs, with their long white beard and their ample cloak of camel's hair, called an abba, is majestic and venerable. It was the first time that I had seen these "Children of the Desert," and the quickness of their eyes, their apparent freedom from all restraint, and their disregard of any conventional manners, struck me forcibly. An English gentleman in a round hat and a tight neck-handkerchief and boots, with white gloves and a little cane in his hand, was a style of man so utterly and entirely unlike a Bedouin Arab that I could hardly conceive the possibility of their being only different species of the same animal.
After we had dined, being tired with the heat and the trouble we had had in getting our luggage out of the ship, I resolved to retire to bed at an early hour, and on going to the window to have another look at the crowd, I was surprised to find that there was scarcely anybody left in the streets, for these primitive people all go to bed when it gets dark, as the birds do; and except a few persons walking home with paper lanterns in their hands, the place seemed almost entirely deserted.
The next morning, mounted on donkeys, we shambled across half the city to the residence of Boghos Bey, the Armenian prime minister of Mohammed