“But we did not now stop to gaze, nor indeed did we pay much attention to all this; our first introduction to the monarch and the critical position before us took up all our thoughts. So we paced on alongside of the long blind wall running out from the central keep, and looking more like the outside of a fortress than of a peaceful residence, till we came near a low and narrow gate, the only entry to the palace. Deep-sunk between the bastions, with massive folding doors iron bound, though thrown open at this hour of the day, and giving entrance into a dark passage, one might easily have taken it for the vestibule of a prison; while the number of guards, some black, some white, but all sword-girt, who almost choked the way, did not seem very inviting to those without, especially to foreigners. Long earth seats lined the adjoining walls, and afforded a convenient waiting-place for visitors; and here we took up our rest at a little distance from the palace gate; but Aboo-’Eysa entered at once to announce our arrival, and the approach of the Na’ib.
“The first who drew near and saluted us was a tall, meagre figure, of a sallow complexion, and an intelligent but slightly ill-natured and underhand cast of features. He was very well dressed, though of course without a vestige of unlawful silk in his apparel, and a certain air of conscious importance tempered the affability of his politeness. This was ’Abd-el-’Azeez, whom, for want of a better title, I shall call the minister of foreign affairs, such being the approximate translation of his official style.
“Accompanied by some attendants from the palace, he came stately up, and seated himself by our side. He next began the customary interrogations of whence and what, with much smiling courtesy and show of welcome. After hearing our replies, the same of course as those given elsewhere, he invited us to enter the precincts, and partake of his Majesty’s coffee and hospitality, while he promised us more immediate communications from the king himself in the course of the day.
“If my readers have seen, as most of them undoubtedly will, the Paris Tuileries, they may hereby know that the whole extent of Feysul’s palace equals about two-thirds of that construction, and is little inferior to it in height; if indeed we except the angular pyramidal roofs or extinguishers peculiar to the French edifice. But in ornament the Parisian pile has the better of it, for there is small pretensions to architectural embellishment in this Wahabee Louvre. Without, within, every other consideration has been sacrificed to strength and security; and the outer view of Newgate, at any rate, bears a very strong resemblance to the general effect of Feysul’s palace.
“Aboo-’Eysa meanwhile, in company with the outriders sent from the palace, had gone to meet the Na’ib and introduce him to the lodgings prepared for his reception. Very much was the Persian astounded to find none of the royal family among those who thus came, no one even of high name or office; but yet more was his surprise when, instead of immediate admittance to Feysul’s presence and eager embrace, he was quietly led aside to the very guest-room whither we had been conducted, and a dinner not a whit more sumptuous than ours was set before him, after which he was very coolly told that he might pray for Feysul and retire to his quarters, while the king settled the day and hour whereon he would vouchsafe him the honor of an audience.
“Afterward, the minister of foreign affairs condescended to come in person, and, sweetly smiling, informed us that our temporary habitation was ready, and that Aboo-’Eysa would conduct us thither without delay. We then begged to know, if possible, the king’s good-will and pleasure regarding our stay and our business in the town. For on our first introduction we had duly stated, in the most correct Wahabee phraseology, that we had come to Ri’ad ‘desiring the favor of God, and secondly of Feysul; and that we begged of God, and secondly of Feysul, permission to exercise in the town our medical profession, under the protection of God, and in the next place of Feysul.’ For Dogberry’s advice to ‘set God first, for God defend but God should go before such villains,’ is here observed to the letter; whatever is desired, purported, or asked, the Deity must take the lead. Nor this only, but even the subsequent mention of the creature must nowise be coupled with that of the Creator by the ordinary conjunction ‘w’,’ that is, ‘and,’ since that would imply equality between the two—flat blasphemy in word or thought. Hence the disjunctive ‘thumma,’ or ‘next after,’ ‘at a distance,’ must take the place of ‘w’,’ under penalty of prosecution under the statute. ‘Unlucky the man who visits Nedjed without being previously well versed in the niceties of grammar,’ said Barakat; ‘under these schoolmasters a mistake might cost the scholar his head.’ But of this more anon; to return to our subject, ’Abd-el-’Azeez, a true politician, answered our second interrogation with a vague assurance of good-will and unmeaning patronage. Meantime the Na’ib and his train marched off in high dudgeon to their quarters, and Aboo-’Eysa gave our dromedaries a kick, made them rise, and drove them before us to our new abode.”
In the course of a day or two the travellers discovered what a sensation the arrival of their caravan had produced at court. The old king, Feysul, now in the thirty-third year of his reign, possessed all the superstition and bigotry of the old Wahabees, and the sudden presence of Syrians, suspected of being Christians, Persians, and Meccans, in his capital, was too much for him. He at once left the palace, took up his temporary residence in a house outside the city, and a strong guard was posted around him until the court officials should have time to examine the strangers, discover, if possible, their secret designs, and report them to the king. The first spy was a shrewd and intelligent Affghan, a pretended convert to the Wahabee doctrine, who discovered nothing, and consequently made an unfavorable report. The second was a “man of zeal,” one of a committee of twenty-two inquisitors, appointed by the king to exercise constant espionage upon the inhabitants, with the power of punishing them at will for any infraction or neglect of the Wahabee discipline. Palgrave gives the following account of his visit:
“Abbood, for such was his name, though I never met the like before or after in Arabia proper, however common it may be in Syria and Lebanon, took a different and more efficacious mode of espionage than ’Abd-el-Hameed had done before him. Affecting to consider us Mahometans, and learned ones too, he entered at once on religious topics, on the true character of Islam, its purity or corruptions, and inquired much after the present teaching and usages of Damascus and the North, evidently in the view of catching us in our words. But he had luckily encountered his match; for every citation of the Koran we replied with two, and proved ourselves intimately acquainted with the ‘greater’ and the ‘lesser’ polytheism of foreign nations and heterodox Mahometans, with the commentaries of Beydowee and the tales of the Hadeeth, till our visitor, now won over to confidence, launched out full sail on the sea of discussion, and thereby rendered himself equally instructive and interesting to men who had nothing more at heart than to learn the tenets of the sect from one of its most zealous professors, nay, a Zelator in person. In short, he ended by becoming half a friend, and his regrets at our being, like other Damascenes, yet in the outer porch of darkness, were tempered by a hope, which he did not disguise, of at least putting a window in our porch for its better enlightenment.”
Next day, in the forenoon, while the travellers were sauntering about the market-place, they met the minister ’Abd-el-’Azeez, who had that morning returned to the capital. With a smiling face and an air of great benignity he took them aside, and informed them the king did not consider Ri’ad a proper field for their medical skill; that they had better at once continue their journey to Hofhoof, whither Aboo-’Eysa should conduct them straightway; and that the king would furnish each of them with a camel, a new suit of clothes, and some money. To these arguments Palgrave could only answer that he greatly desired the profit to be expected from a few weeks of medical practice in Ri’ad, since his success there would give him an immediate reputation in Hofhoof, while his departure might deprive him of all reputation at the latter place. The minister promised to present his plea to Feysul, but gave him no hope of a favorable answer. The order to leave was repeated, and then, as a last experiment, Palgrave sent to two of the ministers a pound of the fragrant wood, which is burned as pastilles in Arabia, and is highly prized by the upper classes. The next day he received permission to remain longer in Ri’ad and exercise his profession. He thereupon took another residence, not so near the palace, and within convenient reach of one of the city gates. Before describing the place he gives the following account of the famous Arabian coffee:
“Be it then known, by way of prelude, that coffee, though one in name, is manifold in fact; nor is every kind of berry entitled to the high qualifications too indiscriminately bestowed on the comprehensive genus. The best coffee, let cavillers say what they will, is that of the Yemen, commonly entitled ‘Mokha,’ from the main place of exportation. Now, I should be sorry to incur a lawsuit for libel or defamation from our wholesale or retail salesmen; but were the particle NOT prefixed to the countless labels in London shop windows that bear the name of the Red Sea haven, they would have a more truthy import than what at present they convey. Very little, so little indeed as to be quite inappreciable, of the Mocha or Yemen berry ever finds its way westward of Constantinople. Arabia itself, Syria, and Egypt consume fully two-thirds, and the remainder is almost exclusively absorbed by Turkish and Armenian œsophagi. Nor do these last get for their limited share the best or the purest. Before reaching the harbors of Alexandria, Jaffa, Beyrout, etc., for further exportation, the Mokhan bales have been, while yet on their way, sifted and resifted, grain by grain, and whatever they may have contained of the hard, rounded, half-transparent, greenish-brown berry, the only one really worth roasting and pounding, has been carefully picked out by experienced fingers; and it is the less generous residue of flattened, opaque, and whitish grains which alone, or almost alone, goes on board the shipping. So constant is this selecting process, that a gradation regular as the degrees on a map may be observed in the quality of Mokha, that is, Yemen, coffee even within the limits of Arabia itself, in proportion as one approaches to or recedes from Wadi Nejran and the neighborhood of Mecca, the first stages of the radiating mart. I have myself been times out of number an eye-witness of this sifting; the operation is performed with the utmost seriousness and scrupulous exactness, reminding me of the diligence ascribed to American diamond-searchers when scrutinizing the torrent sands for their minute but precious treasure.