Mentone, Cairo, and Corfu

by Constance Fenimore Woolson

Near the city gate named the Help of God, on the northeastern border of Cairo, is the old mosque El Hakim. Save its outer walls, which enclose, like the mosques of Touloun and Amer, a large open square, there is not much left of it; but within this square, housed in a temporary building, one finds the collection of Saracenic antiquities which is called the Arab Museum.

This museum is interesting, and it ought to be beautiful. But somehow it is not. The barrack-like walls, sparsely ornamented with relics from the mosques, the straight aisles and glass show-cases, are not inspiring; the fragments of Arabian wood-carving seem to be lamenting their fate; and the only room which is not desolate is the one where old tiles lie in disorder upon the floor, much as they lie on broken marble pavements of the ancient houses which, half ruined and buried in rubbish, still exist in the old quarters. Why one should be so inconsistent as to find no fault with Gizeh, where rows of antiquities torn from their proper places confront us, where show-cases abound, and yet at the same time make an outcry over this poor little morsel at El Hakim, remains a mystery. Possibly it is because the massive statues and the solid little gods of ancient Egypt do not require an appropriate background, as do the delicate fancies of Saracenic taste. However this may be, to some of us the Arab Museum looks as if a New England farmer's wife had tried her best to make things orderly within its borders, poor soul, in spite of the strangeness of the articles with which she was obliged to deal. It must, however, be added that the museum will not make this impression upon persons who are indifferent to the general aspect of an aisle, or of a series of walls—persons who care only for the articles which adorn them—the lovers of detail, in short. And it is well for all of us to join this class as soon as our feet have crossed the threshold. For we shall be repaid for it. The details are exquisite.

The Arab Museum has been established recently. Every one is grateful to the zeal which has rescued from further injury so many specimens of a vanishing art. One covets a little chest for the Koran which is made of sandal-wood. It is incrusted with arabesques carved in ivory, and has broad hasps and locks of embossed silver. There are many koursis, or small, stool-like tables; one of these has panels of silver filigree, and fretted medallions bearing the name of the Sultan Mohammed ebn Kalaoon, thus showing that it once belonged to the mosque at the Citadel which was built by that Memlook ruler—the mosque whose minarets are ornamented with picturesque bands of emerald-hued porcelain. The illuminated Korans are not here; they are kept in the Public Library in the Street of the Sycamores. Perhaps the most beautiful of the museum's treasures are the old lamps of Arabian glass. In shape they are vases, as they were simply filled with perfumed oil which carried a floating wick; the colors are usually a pearly background, faintly tinged sometimes by the hue we call ashes of roses; upon this background are ornaments of blue, gold, and red; occasionally these ornaments are Arabic letters forming a name or text. These lamps were made in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries; the glass, which has as marked characteristics of its own as Palissy ware, so that once seen it can never be confounded with any other, has a delicate beauty which is unrivalled.

HELIOPOLIS

Like the pyramids, Heliopolis belongs to Cairo. On the way thither, one first traverses the pleasant suburb of Abbasieh. How one traverses it depends upon his taste. The most enthusiastic pedestrian soon gives up walking in the city of the Khedive save in the broad streets of the new quarter. The English ride, one meets every day their gallant mounted bands; but these are generally residents and their visitors, and the horses are their own; for the traveller there are only the street carriages and the donkeys. The carriages are dubiously loose-jointed, and the horses (whose misery has already been described) have but two gaits—the walk of a dying creature and the gallop of despair; unless, therefore, one wishes to mount a dromedary, he must take a donkey. But the "must" is not a disparagement; the white and gray donkeys of Cairo—the best of them—are good-natured, gay-hearted, strong, and even handsome. They have a coquettish way of arching their necks and holding their chins (if a donkey can be said to have a chin), which always reminded me of George Eliot's description of Gwendolen's manner of poising her head in Daniel Deronda. George Eliot goes on to warn other young ladies that it is useless to try to imitate this proud little air, unless one has a throat like Gwendolen's. And, in the same spirit, one must warn other donkeys that they must be born in Cairo to be beautiful. Upon several occasions I recognized vanity in my donkey. He knew perfectly when he was adorned with his holiday necklaces—one of imitation sequins, the other of turquoise-hued beads. I am sure that he would have felt much depressed if deprived of his charm against magic—the morsel of parchment inscribed with Arabic characters which decorated his breast. His tail and his short mane were dyed fashionably with henna, but his legs had not been shaved in the pattern which represents filigree garters, and whenever a comrade who had this additional glory passed him, he became distinctly melancholy, and brooded about it for several minutes. There is nothing in the world so deprecating as the profile of one of these Cairo donkeys when he finds himself obliged, by the pressure of the crowd, to push against a European; his long nose and his polite eye as he passes are full of friendly apologies. The donkey-boy, in his skull-cap and single garment, runs behind his beast. These lads are very quick-witted. They have ready for their donkeys five or six names, and they seldom make a mistake in applying them according to the supposed nationality of their patrons of the moment, so that the Englishman learns that he has Annie Laurie; the Frenchman, Napoleon; the German, Bismarck; the Italian, Garibaldi; and the Americans, indiscriminately, Hail Columbia, Yankee Doodle, and General Grant.

In passing through the Abbasieh quarter, we always came, sooner or later, upon a wedding. The different stages of a native marriage require, indeed, so many days for their accomplishment that nuptial festivities are a permanent institution in Cairo, like the policemen and the water-carts, rather than an occasional event, as in other places. One day, upon turning into a narrow street, we discovered that a long portion of it had been roofed over with red cloth; from the centre of this awning four large chandeliers were suspended by cords, and at each end of the improvised tent were hoops adorned with the little red Egyptian banners which look like fringed napkins. In the roadway, placed against the walls of the houses on each side, were rows of wooden settees; one of these seats was occupied by the band, which kept up a constant piping and droning, and upon the others were squatted the invited guests. Every now and then a man came from a gayly adorned door on the left, which was that of the bridegroom, bringing with him a tray covered with the tiny cups of coffee set in their filigree stands; he offered coffee to all. In the meanwhile, in the centre of the roadway between the settees, an Egyptian, in his long blue gown, was dancing. The expression of responsibility on his face amounted to anxiety as he took his steps with great care, now lifting one bare foot as high as he could, and turning it sidewise, as if to show us the sole; now putting it down and hopping upon it, while he displayed to us in the same way the sole of the other. This formal dancing is done by the guests when no public performers are employed. Some one must dance to express the revelry of the occasion; those who are invited, therefore, undertake the duty one by one. When at last we went on our way we were obliged to ride directly through the reception, our donkeys brushing the band on one side and the guests on the other; the dancer on duty paused for a moment, wiping his face with the tail of his gown.

The road leading to Heliopolis has a charm which it shares with no other in the neighborhood of Cairo: at a certain point the desert—the real desert—comes rolling up to its very edge; one can look across the sand for miles. The desert is not a plain, the sand lies in ridges and hillocks; and this sand in many places is not so much like the sand of the sea-shore as it is like the dust of one of our country roads in August. The contrast between the bright green of the cultivated fields (the land which is reached by the inundation) and those silvery, arrested waves is striking, the line of their meeting being as sharply defined as that between sea and shore. I have called the color silvery, but that is only one of the tints which the sand assumes. An artist has jotted down the names of the colors used in an effort to copy the hues on an expanse of desert before him; beginning with the foreground, these were brown, dark red, violet, blue, gold, rose, crimson, pale green, orange, indigo blue, and sky blue. Colors supply the place of shadows, for there is no shade anywhere; all is wide open and light; and yet the expanse does not strike one in the least as bare. For myself, I can say that of all the marvels which one sees in Egypt, the desert produced the most profound impression; and I fancy that, as regards this feeling, I am but one of many. The cause of the attraction is a mystery. It cannot be found in the roving tendencies of our ancestor, since he was arboreal, and there are no trees in the strange-tinted waste. The old legend says that Adam's first wife, Lilith, fled to Egypt, where she was permitted to live in the desert, and where she still exists:

"It was Lilith, the wife of Adam;

Not a drop of her blood was human."

Perhaps it is Lilith's magic that we feel.