The Mohammedan Woman.
When first one visits Egypt, romance seems to peer from beneath the veil of each black-robed figure, and mystery lurks behind the intricate carving that covers the windows where one is sure some languid beauty sits waiting for the moment when her lord and master will be gone, that she may wave a white hand to the passionate suitor below. This idea of Egypt is generally derived from highly coloured and erotic novels which always make this country alluring and often sensual. To one who has been given this highly seasoned food for his imagination to feed upon the modern Egypt, with its great glaring hotels, its motor-cars, its shops that might be in London or New York, is a great disappointment.
Illusions will again be lost if one is permitted to enter the beautiful homes on the fashionable drives of Cairo, for they are not Eastern in any sense, nor is there anything about them to indicate that their owners are Orientals. They express no individuality, and might belong to any person of means whether in the East or the West. The drawing-rooms are furnished in French fashion, with gilded chairs, a grand piano, hangings and curtains made in England or France. Great glass chandeliers holding the glaring electric lights express the cosmopolitanism which the mistress feels she must show the world, in order that she may not be considered as belonging to the old school of Egyptian womanhood.
One hears the word harim and instantly conjures up an Arabian Nights picture of rare hangings, subdued lights, beautiful odalisques lounging on soft divans, slaves, incense, and a general air of sensuousness pervading the entire place. I read a book not long ago written by a well-known woman writer who says, “I am thankful to say that I have never been within a harim except twice, and the memory of that dreadful place will rest with me for many years.” Yet she admits that on her first visit to this “dreadful place” she had no interpreter and could only draw upon her imagination to give the women she saw their position in the elaborate household. This imagination was evidently a vivid one, as she believed that many women she saw were “the poor deluded slaves” of the master of the house, while quite likely they were the innumerable relatives and woman-servants that always throng the rich man’s home.
In reality, in present-day modern Cairo, if one enters the harim of the better class, or of the official class, one is greeted by a hostess dressed in the latest French creation, tea is served, while the politics of the world are discussed easily in either French or English by the polished, up-to-date Egyptian women.
The word harim is much misunderstood by the people of the Western world. The Arabic word harim simply means the women’s quarters. The selam-lik are the apartments in which the men of the household have their business offices, receive their friends, and pass their time, while the harim-lik are the apartments reserved for the female members and children of the family. The literal meaning is exclusiveness, seclusion, privacy. In its restricted sense it embodies the two meanings of the women of the household and their exclusive apartments. In the wider acceptance of the term we understand by harim an established social system deriving its sanction from a body of laws promulgated by the Arabian prophet Mohammed. When a woman is harim it means that she is secluded, and we hear the expression in regard to schoolgirls. “Yes, my daughters go to school,” a mother will say, “but they are kept harim.”
In Persia and Turkey the word zenana is used, and in India the common form of expression for the woman who is not seen by any male except those of her immediate family is, “She is purdah-nashim, or simply purdah.” The purdah is the screen that shuts her from the outside world, and the Oriental, whatever his race, whether in Egypt, Turkey, or India, whether he calls it the harim, purdah, or zenana, speaks of it in his literature and poetry as the “Sanctuary of Conjugal Happiness.”
One can live years in the East and get little idea of the life of the Moslem woman of the better class. In Egypt ten million out of the twelve million inhabitants are followers of the prophet Mohammed, and to understand at all the Eastern woman one must learn something of the religion that dominates the entire life of the Mohammedan. The actions of the Moslem woman, whether in India, Arabia, Egypt, Persia, or Algiers, are controlled and forced to comply with the laws made by the Arabian prophet of the seventh century, and even to-day his word practically governs each act of the domestic life as well as the world outside the home.
Before Mohammed’s time there were no social, religious, nor educational institutions in Arabia, as we understand them. Unlimited polygamy, slavery, drunkenness, polytheism, gambling, child murder, and plunder existed. He taught that there was but one God, forbade child murder, limited the number of wives to four, forbade the use of intoxicating liquors, gambling, usury, and gave women a definite legal status.
The reforms inaugurated by this wonderful man effected vast and marked improvement in the position of the women of the Eastern world. Her status had degenerated from that held in ancient times until her position was extremely degraded. She was the chattel of her father, brother, or husband, like his camel or his sheep, and could be bought and sold as any other chattel. She was an integral part of her husband’s estate and was inherited by his heirs. The son inherited his father’s wives and often married them. This Mohammed severely censured, and laid down most exacting laws in regard to the women lawful for a man to marry. He says:—
And marry not them whom your fathers have married; for this is a shame and hateful, and an evil way—though what is past may be allowed. Forbidden to you are your mothers and your daughters, and your sisters, and your aunts, both on your father’s and your mother’s side, and your foster-mothers and your foster-sisters, and the mothers of your wives, and your stepdaughters who are your wards, born of your wives, and the wives of your sons, and ye may not have two sisters.
He is severely criticized that he authorized polygamy, but when one remembers the wild, lawless people whom he governed, it seems that he showed extreme moderation in limiting the number of wives to four. He added that a man might possess the slaves within the household, and his followers say he was compelled to put in this postscript in order to quiet the unrest that was caused by the new domestic regulation which was so contrary to all ideas then controlling his immediate world.
He expressly stated that if a man could not deal justly and love equally all his wives, he must then marry but one. All true believers quote this as meaning that Mohammed really intended his people to be monogamous, as it was fully known that no man could love four women with equal ardour. The husband is also enjoined to partition his time equally amongst his families, and there is a saying that if a man inclines particularly to one of the women of his household, in the day of judgment he will incline to one side by being a paralytic.
He allowed women to inherit property, although he gave a girl only half the inheritance of a boy. A wife may inherit one-fourth of her husband’s estate if there are no children, and one-eighth if there are children; if there is more than one wife, the eighth is divided equally amongst them. A man may inherit one-half of his wife’s property in the event of her being childless, but only one-quarter if she leaves children, and neither one can disinherit the other.
Yet the laws show clearly that a woman was not legally the equal of a man, as it takes the testimony of two women to equal that of one man, and the price of a woman’s life was only fifty camels instead of the hundred camels demanded for the life of a man. There is a reason for this other than the mere disregard of women. Those days were lawless days, when tribe was fighting tribe and the non-fighting women were naturally not held in such esteem as were the men who were needed to fight in the continuous tribal wars.
Moslems claim that the Mohammedan woman is more truly protected by the laws of Mohammed than are the women of Western countries. She can dispose of any property that she may receive, either from her family or her husband, as she sees fit. She is not responsible for the debts of her husband; she can sue and be sued; or she can make contracts or enter into any business undertaking without consulting her husband; and she may even take him before the courts if he does not live up to an agreement he may have made with her.
Yet this wily Eastern prophet did not believe in the absolute equality of women; as he says:—
Men are superior to women on account of the qualities with which God hath gifted one above the other, and on account of the outlay they make from their substance for them;
and he warns his followers from making too large settlements on them or in giving them too many valuable gifts:
And entrust not to the incapable the substance which God hath placed with you for their support; but maintain them therewith, and clothe them, and speak to them with kindly speech.
A Moslem woman is supposed to share the responsibilities of life as well as its pleasures. In the case of destitute parents, sons are required to contribute two-thirds towards their support, while the daughters must add their third. This is a very wise law, because Egypt, like practically all Oriental countries, makes no provision from its public funds for the maintenance of the poor or old. Each family must care for its own helpless.
Many reasons are given for the laws compelling the women of Mohammedan lands to be veiled and to pass their life within the inner apartments reserved for their especial use. Some say that Mohammed caused women to be veiled because of his jealousy of his young wife Ayesha; others claim that the prophet, becoming enamoured by the beauty of his adopted son’s wife, caused her to be divorced, afterwards marrying her, contrary to the laws he himself had made; he wished to protect men from being subjected to the temptation which had overtaken him and had brought upon him the displeasure of his people. But the seclusion of women was found in Asia, in ancient Rome, in Syria, and even in Athens, long before the time of Mohammed. It was in practice amongst many Oriental nations from the earliest times, and quite likely Mohammed simply adopted the customs of the people with whom he came in contact on his conquering tours.
The seclusion of women, especially among the nomads, can be traced to the warlike habits of the people. In times of war the enemy would first of all carry away the women, children, and cattle of the tribe with whom they were fighting. In order to protect the helpless they were kept in inner rooms. The richer and stronger the family, the more secluded were the women, and it became a mark of caste to be kept within the women’s quarters, or protected. Thus what first originated as a necessity became afterwards a matter of aristocracy, and the man who could keep his women strictly harim was looked upon as higher in the social scale than one who was compelled, from economic reasons or otherwise, to allow the females of his household to come and go freely in the world.
An Egyptian woman, from the time when she is seven or eight years old, never shows her face unveiled to any man except her father, her brother, or her husband. No chance is given the followers of the Arabian prophet to have the little flirtations that are so dear to the heart of many of her Western sisters. Mohammed says:—
And speak to the believing women that they refrain their eyes and display not their ornaments, except those which are external; and that they throw their veils over their bosoms, and display not their ornaments except to their husbands, or their fathers, or their husbands’ fathers, or their sons, or their husbands’ sons, or their brothers or their brothers’ sons, or their sisters’ sons, or their women, or their slaves or their children. And let them not strike their feet together so as to discover their hidden ornaments.
The present-day Mohammedan woman observes this law more strictly than was at first intended, even to not being seen by the father of her husband. I know an Egyptian woman who is never seen by her father-in-law except on the first day of the year, when he calls upon her to wish her the joys of the coming year. She enters the room closely veiled and offers him the season’s greetings, then leaves without further conversation. I was calling upon an Indian Mohammedan woman who could not enter the room until her father-in-law had left it, as it would have been a serious breach of etiquette for him to see her.
This seclusion does not rest heavily upon the Mohammedan woman, as she considers it the desire of her husband to protect her, and she would be the first to resent the breaking of her seclusion, as showing that she had lost value in his eyes. She lives for no one except her family, is supposed to be of no interest to any one else, it being a great breach of social decorum for any male member of a family to even inquire about her. A man would never say to another man, “Is your wife well?” He would say, “Is your household well?” And the husband would never speak of his “wife” to another man, but would speak of his “house,” which would naturally include the female occupants.
The harim is the “Holy of Holies” in the Moslem world. Even a police official would hardly dare to penetrate the women’s quarters in search of a criminal. When a man has retired to his harim he is free from any disturbing influence from the outside world. If a friend or enemy should call and servants would say that the master was in the harim, the caller would be compelled to leave or wait until the master was disposed to enter again the selam-lik, or rooms assigned to the male members of the household.
The greatest evil in the harim life lies in the dreadful seclusion and the paralysing monotony. Many of the older women are unable to read and write, and they pass their days in weary idleness and a vacuous routine which is only broken by visits to women friends as mentally impoverished as themselves. Not being allowed the friendship of the opposite sex, they are denied the stimulation of the mind which would no doubt result from the interchange of ideas with men who come in contact with the outside world. Naturally the intellectual development is restricted, and this starving of the mentality of the women must have a result detrimental to the rising generation.
Seclusion also makes a woman very much more the actual possession of her husband than she would be if allowed to come and go in the world, to know her rights and the means by which to enforce them. Although the laws are very much in her favour, in regard to property rights especially, it takes a woman of more than ordinary courage and intelligence to break away from the walls which encircle her and parade her troubles in open court. We are told of the wonderful laws allowing the woman to dispose of her property as she wishes; but we are not told that she may give this property to her husband, and when once within the harim, pressure is often brought compelling the woman to give all that she possesses to her husband, making her doubly helpless and wholly within his power.
They have a proverb that a woman must always answer the call of her husband, “even if she is at the oven.” Her happiness depends entirely upon the treatment she receives from him. His visits to the harim are the only breaks in the monotony of her life, and he brings to her the only touch she may have with the great man-world outside. By a few men the wives are treated as if they were intellectual equals, but these are few and far between. The average Oriental treats his womenfolk as if they were upon a lower plane than himself, “brought up amongst ornaments and contentious without cause.”
One would judge that, handicapped as they are, Moslem women would take no part in the political or social life of their country, but facts prove that they can rise to great heights and exhibit rare courage and executive powers in time of need. Ayesha, the favourite wife of Mohammed, showed an instance of bravery and courage that might belong to women of any land. When Ali, the cousin of the prophet, rebelled against the successors of Mohammed, Ayesha took the field against him, commanding the troops in person at the “Battle of the Camel,” and in later days they have shown that the restrictions of the harim do not deaden the fires that burn in women’s breasts when tyranny or oppression rules their land.
In Persia, where Mohammedanism in its strictest sect has sway, the women have been known to rise in force and demand the rights of their people when all the efforts of the men have failed. In 1861, at the time of the great famine, foodstuffs rose to an exorbitant price, because of a few greedy officials who were enriching themselves at the expense of their starving countrymen. It was impossible to bring the matter before the Shah by the methods generally employed, but the women rose, and one day thousands of them surrounded his carriage as he was returning from a hunting trip, and stating the wrongs of his people, demanded that he should make an investigation. The Shah was thoroughly frightened at the sight of this unprecedented exhibition on the part of his usually unseen subjects, and promised all they asked, and, what was more wonderful, kept his promise. The leaders of the party who were causing the distress were beheaded, and the price of bread was diminished by half within twelve hours. It is only a few years ago that the women of Persia confronted the President of the Assembly in his hall, and tearing aside their veils and producing revolvers, confessed their decision to kill their husbands and sons and add their own dead bodies to the sacrifice if the deputies should waver in their duties to uphold the liberties of the Persian people.
A WATER-CARRIER.
To face p. [36].
These Moslem women display a fortitude and courage that is almost fanatical in times of persecution. Thousands in Persia have given their lives for their faith in Baha Ullah, the leader of a sect of reformed Mohammedans. They have been dragged from the harims to the public market-places, where they have been subjected to unheard of indignities before having the privilege of dying for their faith. They have also been compelled to sit in rows facing the public execution grounds while their husbands and sons were beheaded before their eyes, but even the torture and death of those they loved did not cause them to waver from what they believed to be right. The story of one woman exemplifies the fanatical courage that will dominate such a shut-in woman, when in some dim, tragic hour she has been compelled to give her contribution in the life she loved to her religious cause. In Tabriz one day a crowd of women were seated facing the executioner’s block, and amongst them a delicate, dainty woman who had been protected all her life within the harim of one of the prominent men of Tabriz, but whose death had left his women helpless to bear the brunt of his enemy’s wrath. Chance had made this enemy the city Governor, and he remembered that the family of the man he hated even in death were followers of Baha Ullah. On this morning in June the mother was brought to see the death of her fourteen-year-old son, her only child. When the executioner had done his work, the head was tossed into her lap, and she was told “Take back your son.” She stood up, and holding the loved head in her hands, held it towards the sky, as if to give it as an offering to the God who seemed to have deserted her in her hour of need, looked long into the closing eyes, then threw it to the official’s feet, saying, “I do not take back what I give my God!” and turning quickly, took her place among the sorrow-maddened women.
Her cousin, who told me the story and who was a witness to the scene, said to me: “It is impossible for a Western woman to understand a Moslem woman. Perhaps because of our exclusion and the lack of means of self-expression, we have over-developed our inner emotional natures, which at times of sorrow burst forth like a hidden flame. We not only gave our lives in those dread days of Tabriz, but what is worse, we gave the lives of those we loved—and still lived on.”
The women of Egypt have as yet had no reason to rise up en masse and show what they may do in times of national distress. It is unusual for the women of any Mohammedan land to usurp the prerogatives of men. They are fundamentally intensely feminine, the home their only domain. Sa’adi, the Persian poet, said:—
No happiness comes to the house of him whose hen hath crowed like a cock.
It will be many years before the Egyptian woman joins the ranks of the militant suffragettes, and tries to blow up the Pyramids or deface the walls of Egypt’s famous temples in the spirit of emulation and zeal for the Cause.
CHAPTER II
THE MODERN EGYPTIAN WOMAN
The conservative woman of Egypt prides herself that she never leaves her home. I know several ladies well advanced in years who say they have never been outside their homes since they were brought there as brides. An Eastern household is composed of many people, and this seclusion of the women does not cause such loneliness as would be felt by a Western woman if thus closely confined always to the home. In the East the patriarchal life prevails, and the financially fortunate member of the family finds himself supporting an immense army of poor relations, who act in all capacities, from maids in the kitchen to the servants at the door. They expect little or nothing as wages, but they do expect that the prosperous member of their clan or family will provide clothing, food, and a roof beneath which they may live.
In all Egyptian homes of the better class there are many servants. They are not the competent, trained servants to which we are accustomed, and it takes many of them to accomplish what one well-trained servant will do in England or America. They have no system, each servant doing his task in his own appointed time and in his own way. Within the harim the servants are generally women, and they are on much more familiar terms with the inmates than are servants in the West. They take on a feeling of equality with their mistresses, taking part in the conversation when guests are present, entering doors without knocking, and generally considering themselves as part of the family. Mohammed taught that all true believers are free and equal—the servant the equal of his master. This is one of the reasons that the traveller is often surprised by having the donkey-boy offer his hand when saying good-bye. He does not intend it as an impertinence; he simply wishes to bid his patron “God speed” in the Western manner.
The women of the harims take much time to dress, and spend long hours in the public baths, if they do not possess that luxury at home. They take great care of their skin, using all the arts to keep it soft and unwrinkled. They have not yet learned the charm of beautiful hands, and the manicurist has not yet penetrated the harim, but it is only a question of time when she will arrive, as the Egyptian woman seizes with avidity every means of improving her personal appearance.
Many of them tint their straight black locks with henna, by making a paste which is allowed to dry on the hair for twenty-four hours, then removed. This, when used not too freely, gives a charming glint of reddish gold to the thick hair, and utterly obliterates any trace of age. The henna-tinted locks are not seen as much as formerly, as the custom is passing out with the advent of the newer generation, and is mainly to be seen on the older women or the women of the desert. In former times the nails of the hands were tinted a deep orange, but this also is being relegated to the “things that were,” as the young girls are beginning to see that instead of a beautifier, it makes the hands appear most untidy. I have seen an old lady with her fingers stained a deep brownish yellow to the first joint, the palms of her hands, the toes, and even the bottoms of the feet coloured with the henna paste.
The house dress of the Egyptian woman is a long négligé made in an empire form or what we used to call a “Mother Hubbard,” with the fullness of the cloth gathered to a much-trimmed yoke, and ending in a train that sweeps the floor. The wearer may follow her fancy in the choice of goods with which these dresses are made. The ordinary dress worn every day is of some material easily laundered, but the gown for gala occasions is often most elaborate, made of rich silks, satins, or brocades with great figures in gold or silver. Many of them appear as if made of cloth originally intended for furniture covering. If she has a wide range from which to select the material for her dresses, she also is not restricted in the choice of colours, as each woman indulges in whatever shades she most admires, and a party of women with their red, blue, yellow, and mauve creations look like a party of animated dolls dressed for a fancy bazaar.
The hair is braided in one or two braids and allowed to hang down the back, sometimes tied with strings on which dangle gold coins or balls. A veil is always worn over the head, hanging down to the waist line. It is very graceful and adds to the dignity of the Egyptian woman. With the poor this head covering is a large piece of cotton with a gay-coloured border, and even ladies wear in the morning a cotton veil, but on dress occasions it is of chiffon or net elaborately bordered with gold or silver, or in some cases sewn with sequins, very similar to the shawls offered by the vendors in front of the big hotels.
The feet are slipped into toe slippers that can easily be removed when entering the living-rooms or when sitting upon the divans. In the matter of footwear there is a wide range from which to choose. From the wooden bath clog to the tiny heelless covering for the toes, embroidered in gold or silver or even tiny seed pearls, the Egyptian woman’s slipper is a thing of beauty and dainty femininity. Stockings are considered a superfluity while in the house, except by those influenced by the customs of foreign lands.
If the lady wishes to make a call she dons a black silk or satin skirt with a long train, and over it ties a piece of black goods shaped like a large apron hanging down the back instead of the front. The lower end is brought up over the head and tied under the chin, acting as hat and shoulder covering, completely disguising the form. Over the face below the eyes is tied a piece of white chiffon. This is really an addition to the woman’s charming appearance, as the present-day Egyptian woman is wearing the veil so thin that the shape of the features can be dimly seen, softened and refined by the delicate chiffon, until even a plain woman takes on an appearance of beauty that perhaps vanishes when the veil is removed. She is allowed to show her chief attraction, her great black eyes, which peer at one curiously over the folds of white. They are not so large as are the Indian woman’s eyes, but they are very expressive, shaded by long straight lashes, which are generally touched up by kohl, since even with the advent of modernism the Egyptian woman cannot be persuaded to relegate her kohl-pot to the lumber-room.
The woman of the labouring class, seen on the street, is dressed in a long gown hanging straight from the shoulders, over which, when she leaves her home, she drapes a large black shawl covering her from head to feet. The veil of this class of woman is of black cloth, so thick that it is impossible to distinguish the features beneath it, and often weighted at the bottom with gold or silver coins. Covering the nose is the disfiguring piece of wood which holds the veil in place. The picture of this sombre-clad woman, with her ugly veil and grotesque nosepiece, is taken by the average tourist as representing the Egyptian woman, while, in fact, she represents only the lower class, such as the wife of the labourer, the small artisan, or the petty merchant. These women may be seen on the streets walking with the stately grace that is given to the woman who carries a burden on the head, or five or six of them may be seen sitting on a flat-bottomed cart drawn by a much decorated donkey en route to visit relatives or watch the festivities connected with a marriage, or going to the cemeteries. This last seems to be a favourite excuse for an outing with women of this class, as it gives them a chance to have a good gossip on the way, and opportunity of strolling in the open air, which must be a great boon to the poor in the large cities, as their homes are small, dark, dirty, and most unsanitary. Yet as one lives in the Orient and sees the conditions under which the great majority of the population live, one grows to believe that there are no such things as microbes, else all these people would have been dead long ago.
THE TAILOR.
To face p. [44].
Even in modern Cairo one rarely sees a lady except as she passes in a closed carriage or limousine. Women do not go to the mosques, as Mohammed said that women in places of public worship distracted men from the real business which brought them there. They are also never found in restaurants, hotels, nor coffeehouses. In fact, an Egyptian woman never goes to a place where she might be looked upon by men other than those of her immediate family. Even the most modern product of the present system of education would hardly dare to be seen in any place that was not harim. At the bazaars held for charity and other public functions a day is set apart when the women may visit them without danger of being looked upon by men. An Egyptian woman told me that these men must be educated and elevated before Egyptian women will dare to go freely upon the street. Even a foreign woman dreads passing the outdoor cafés, where the men turn noisily in their chairs and stare rudely at the woman who has the courage to pass them. In the case of an Egyptian lady, I was told that these men do not confine their rudeness to stares, but that the low remarks made to her confirm the belief that the time is not yet ripe for the Egyptian woman to try to enter the world, so long closed to her.
These harim women are just beginning to learn the joys of shopping. Formerly the husbands or fathers bought the goods for their dresses, or the shopkeepers sent their assistants, who laid the gay stuffs and jewels on mats within the courtyards, where the women could make their choice. But now in some of the larger shops parties of veiled ladies may be seen fingering the soft silks and satins, looking with curious eyes at the hats, and selecting the jewels with which they love to adorn themselves. Cairo is the happy hunting ground of the Parisian jeweller, as Egyptian women are noted for their love of bracelets, ear-rings, necklaces, and pins. The old-time heavy gold chains and hoops are losing their charm, and now the lady whose husband has a purse easy to open buys long pendant ear-rings set with many diamonds, bracelets of pearls and rubies, rings of turquoise and sapphires, and necklaces of emeralds. Quantity, not quality, she desires, and the colour and purity of a stone are not so much to be desired as the size or number. The women who make no claim to modernism are still seen in the goldsmiths’ shops in the native streets, sitting in front of the tiny cupboard-like holes in the wall, weighing, pricing, trying on the great barbaric hoops of gold for the ears, or the chains with large hammered pendants, made in the same form and with the same design as those worn by their mothers and their grandmothers. The merchant does not need to originate new designs to attract the conservative Egyptian woman who still clings to her native jewelry. It has been the same shape and design from time immemorial.
Another product of the West has penetrated the harims of Cairo—the French dressmakers. Many of the rich merchants’ wives and the wives of the officials who cannot get their gowns direct from Paris, and who are discarding the straight empire pattern for clothes more à la mode, get their dresses fashioned by these clever French women, who come to the women’s courtyards loaded down with fashion books, tape measures, and a running stream of flattering talk, leaving with many orders written in their little books. It must be admitted that the Egyptian woman looks best when dressed in her native costume, which mercifully disguises the over-abundant flesh with which most women who spend their lives within the harims are blessed. Sweets, a sedentary life, and many sweetened drinks conspire to make the lady of Egypt extremely fat, after the first flush of youth is past. This is not a sorrow to her as it would be to her Western sister, and when she has arrived at the age of thirty, and the pounds that she feels should come with the advancing years have not been added to her figure, she sends to the chemist for a mixture to convert her into the present ideal of Egyptian beauty. This ideal in the olden time, if we may judge of the pictures seen upon the walls of the tombs and temples, was that of a slight, willowy figure. But that ideal has changed. The woman now seems to strive to be as wide as she is long, and because of this fact and also because stays are not looked upon with joy by the Egyptian woman, who has always been allowed an uncompressed figure, the modern dress is not adapted to her style of beauty.
Women are not prisoners in any sense of the word, nor are they pining behind their latticed windows as we are sometimes led to believe by writers of fiction. They visit freely amongst each other, and their visits are not confined to the passing of a few senseless platitudes that generally mark conversation of Western women making afternoon calls upon each other. They do not “call,” they go for a visit of several hours or even days.
When a lady enters the home of her friend, she takes off the veil and the cape-like covering of her head, steps out of the long black skirt, and stands arrayed like Solomon in all his glory. They dress as elaborately for their women friends as if to meet admirers of the opposite sex, and they spend hours drinking the delicious coffee, sipping sherbets, eating fruits or confectionery, and chatting over the gossip of the day. When time for serving the meal arrives, a large tray is brought into the room and placed upon a low stand, around which the women group themselves in comfortable attitudes on rugs. From these trays they help themselves to the deliciously cooked mutton or chicken, the vegetables and desserts with which it is laden. Pork is never served, as it was forbidden by Mohammed. They eat with their fingers, using only the right hand, as the left hand is ceremonially unclean, and after the meal a servant pours water over their hands from a long-spouted brass ewer, the water falling into a brass basin. Many of the ladies smoke, but it is not a universal habit. If they indulge in the habit with which we always associate the Eastern woman, it is by using a large water pipe with an extraordinarily long, supple stem, the smoke passing through perfumed water and becoming cool before reaching the user’s lips.
The Eastern woman loves perfumes and prefers them much stronger than we of the Western world think agreeable. A hostess will pass around the little wooden scent-bottles, and each guest may add as much as she wishes to her already over-perfumed body. The mixture is not always pleasant to sensitive nostrils. Incense and sweet-smelling woods are often burned in little braziers and add to the congeries of odours.
Many of the old-time Egyptian women cannot read; indeed, it is stated that only three out of a thousand women could read ten years ago; their conversation is therefore confined to the gossip of the neighbourhood: who is married, who is engaged; the social and financial standing of the families involved; the presents and the trousseaux. Society is divided into cliques, as in any other part of the world, and there is a decided “Who’s Who,” especially in Cairo and in the larger towns.
The woman’s life seems to centre around her children, since it is this evidence of Allah’s blessing that makes her greatest happiness. A great part of their talk is involved in the discussion of their children’s ailments, the remedies, their children’s education and life in general. There are no nurseries in Egypt, and both boys and girls live within the harim until they are seven years old, when the boy, if he does not go to school, has a tutor and lives in the selam-lik. When, as at present, Government schools are established in every small town and village in Egypt, both boys and girls go to school. The girl is kept strictly harim even in the school, and the teachers are women, who guard carefully from men’s eyes the girls who are entrusted to them for the day.
Besides visiting with their friends or relatives, the Egyptian women go to weddings, where they look upon the dancing and hear the singing from their places behind the screens, or they make pilgrimages to the tombs of saints or holy men, where they pray for the health of their children; or, if they have not been so fortunate as to have children, they pray for that blessing. They do not pray to the saints, as even Mohammed himself cannot answer prayers, but they believe that the austere lives passed by these holy men will intercede for them with the Great and One God.
An Egyptian friend of mine, telling me of the efficacy of one of the places of pilgrimage in the cure of eye troubles, said:—
“Yes, I believe in these charms obtained at the tomb of some of the marabouts, and I have been on several pilgrimages, although it is not much encouraged in our family. You saw my brother’s wife to-day. She has visited the tomb of every saint in the vicinity of Cairo, but it is just because she is restless and wants to get out. She cares no more about the saints than you do, but it gives her an opportunity to get away from my mother. My life, that you think so restricted, is wildly exciting to what it was when I was a girl at home. Mother is most conservative, and will not even allow a man-servant near the harim. Her cook has never seen her, although he has been in the family since I was a baby. Here in the country I have men-servants who see me unveiled, but they are the descendants of slaves who were in the family of my husband for generations, and that is permitted if we are not too orthodox.”
I noticed while visiting friends in the country with this progressive, educated Egyptian woman that if we passed an ordinary fellah, or workman, she did not take care to cover her face. If we met an overseer or a man above the farmer class, she very carefully drew her veil across her face, leaving only the eyes visible.
The women are very superstitious, and believe in the efficacy of charms and amulets for every known disease. Nearly every woman wears around her neck, lost to sight amidst the innumerable chains with which she covers the upper part of her body, an amulet or charm of some kind. Perhaps it is a silver box containing a few words of the Koran, or a small piece of parchment with mystic letters written on it, guaranteed to guard her household from harm. All Egyptian women know of charms and lotions and shrines or mystic words to give the wife who has not presented a son unto her lord. One of the first questions asked by Egyptian women is, “How many children have you?” If the answer is “None!” they cannot keep the looks of pity from their eyes, nor the sympathetic words of condolence from their lips. They are also most generous in giving talismans to remedy this defect, and will wax enthusiastic over the beneficial effects of some favourite pilgrimage, amulet, or prayer.
I have a piece of sheepskin with the ninety-nine names of Allah written upon it in gold, intended to insure, not only the advent of a son, but also, if bound upon his arm, to guard him from all danger throughout his lifetime.
At the opera in cosmopolitan Cairo one may hear rustlings and low laughter from behind the closely screened boxes, and know that an Egyptian Bey or wealthy merchant is there with his family, allowing them to enjoy the play and watch the people in the house, themselves unseen. But this joy is given usually only to the women of Cairo, as the smaller towns have not as yet become sufficiently modernized that the women may go to the public theatres. In the conservative homes, if a hostess wishes to entertain her guests with professionals, she sends for the singing girls or dancing women to come to her home, and there they perform before the ladies, who watch them from the divans, and talk and laugh with their entertainers, getting far more amusement from them than by simply looking at them on the stage.
Fortune-tellers are often brought into the women’s quarters, and blind men who chant the words of their sacred book, the Koran. This latter is a popular form of entertainment, and even to Western ears the sad, minor music has a charm, although after a time it becomes monotonous to one who cannot understand the Arabic in which the Koran is written.
Even the conservative Egyptian mother is now beginning to see that she must educate her daughter as well as her son, if she wishes her to make a good marriage. The modern Egyptian youth does not care for an ignorant wife who can only entertain him with household gossip when he comes from office or shop.
There is ample opportunity given the Egyptian girl to obtain an education, as the Government has established schools in every city, town, and village. One sees also a great number of private schools for girls, supervised by every imaginable type of mistress. The Italian, Spanish, French, and English woman is taking advantage of this craving on the part of young Egypt for education. Many of these schoolmistresses are unfitted for their work, but as yet her pupils are not able to judge of the quality of information they are so eagerly absorbing. The mission schools, next to those provided by the Government, are perhaps the best equipped with trained teachers from England and America. These latter schools are filled with bright-faced young girls, who are taking the newer ideas to their secluded mothers, who shake their heads dolefully over the new spirit of independence so swiftly creeping into the lives of their children, and which they fear, but to which they must accede.
Egypt, in common with the entire world, is experiencing vital changes, and her younger women, although walled in by custom, tradition, and habit, are eager to get into step with their advancing sons and husbands. It is only the older woman who is the implacable foe of progress, as she fears a change may mean the destruction of her little world. Yet she is fast losing the power as well as the wish to resist it, and the number of schools for girls shows that a real awakening to Egypt’s greatest need is being felt and met. At first the mother feared her daughter would be led astray from the true Faith, but the English Government bore this well in mind when establishing the educational system. The Koran and the practical observances of its tenets are taught by faithful followers of the prophet in the schools, and this has induced mothers to look with complacent eyes upon the new learning.
Infinitely better daughters and prospective mothers come each year from the Government and mission schools, if for no other reason than that they are intelligently trained in domestic economy and in the laws of hygiene. The frightful waste of infant life which heretofore has been caused by the ignorance of mothers will stop. The present training of the young girl strikes directly at this huge infant mortality and in the coming mother, educated and equipped for her duties, lies the hope of Egypt.