Within the last few years an immense amount of talent and science has been brought to bear upon diet; and contrasting the works that have been produced with anything that has gone before, one remains in astonishment at the advantages which in this respect we possess. Yet what is the profit? A few persons may read these speculations in their library chairs; but what are the advantages even to these at the dinner-tables? Come here and you will see economic food and the healthiest people, who have no “animal chemistry,” and yet illustrate in their practice that which we reason about in books.
One of the weightiest utensils to transport is the handmill, and one of the heaviest occupations of the tent is grinding. How large a share it occupied in the domestic life of Judæa, the repeated allusions to it in the Sacred Writings bear testimony. Travellers are always struck by the amount of labour thus thrown away. A learned commentator selects the long continuance of this practice to illustrate the stupidity of the human race. This is to suppose an Arab tent in the same row with a baker’s shop, or with a farm-yard and a granary attached to it. If they used a windmill they would have to carry it about with them; and if a water-mill, they would require the rivulet’s attendance in their peregrinations. The only variety in the landscape of the Zakel, is here and there the tomb of a saint: the only houses are those appointed for all living. Have they then no stores of grain?
On the spot where it is harvested it is thrashed, winnowed, and treasured up. Holes are dug in the earth and lined with straw; these are called Matmores: there the grain may be kept a hundred or a thousand years, protected from rot, mildew, and man. By this practice they are secured against the uncertainties of the seasons and fluctuation in price. These reservoirs, when forgotten, may be discovered by examining the verdure in spring, when it begins to lose its freshness. Over the matmore the change is first perceptible, as it is dryer beneath. Twenty years ago, four or five successive harvests were destroyed by drought and locusts; famine and pestilence ensued; and but for these stores the country must have been depopulated.[266] There is an exportation of corn making at present to Dublin;—permission has been granted for 50,000 fanegas, or little more than a bushel;—it would cost 6s. 6d. landed at Dublin, or under 40s. a quarter. The last exportation of grain was ten years ago, when Spain being in great need, permission was granted; and from the roadstead of Dar el Baida alone, 45,000 quarters were exported without sensibly augmenting the price.
To effect the change from the handmill to the water or windmill, the matmores would have to be replaced by standing granaries: standing granaries would require fixed habitations; fixed habitations would require walled cities. In the country where I am writing, the land would not suffice to support these, and, consequently, the extinction of the population would be the consequence. Elsewhere, where the land is more fertile, it would place the tribes at the mercy of the governor, and the whole fabric would fall to pieces.
The aim of the political economist is to accumulate profit—to make money; to turn, every way, soil and toil into the banker’s books. The end of the legislator is exactly the reverse. He knows that the danger to society is from the accumulations of profit. He knows that wealth draws wealth, and engenders power, and brings the fall of states. By legislators I mean those who have proved themselves such by their works—the states which they have built up.
In early times we always find the chiefs possessing the greatest ascendancy over their people. How is it they lose this authority? Is it not when, to the influence of blood and station, they have added the influence of wealth? Institutions, therefore, calculated to make a people happy, and preserve it long, must effect the very reverse of modern science, and must prevent the accumulation of capital, and equalize the distribution of food.
This end is obtained amongst the Arabs, not by laws or institutions, but simply through hospitality. No human creature enters an Arab douar and goes without a bellyful, and of this the charge falls upon the chief. When I obtained a new method of preparing wheat, of cooking a dish and eating it; I also observed a new method and manner of distributing it. The tent was like a tavern without bells. Half of Sheik Tibi’s substance goes in kuscoussoo. It is an extraordinary thing to see; it is slowly that the mind takes it in; it is difficult to convey it to another—and testimony is requisite. In Mr. Davidson’s Journal there is a corroboratory passage, which is all the more valuable as coming from one who had no conception of the value of the fact he recorded. Speaking of the great Sheik of Suz, he says, “The Sheik, rich and powerful as he is, dares not shut his door against the dirtiest beast who thinks proper to enter. The kuscoussoo, or teapot, is a general invitation, and all may come in and feed.” This is the interpretation of those words of Isaiah, “Thou hast clothing—be thou our ruler,” as of the reply, “In mine home there is neither bread nor clothing—make me not a ruler.” Of the patriarchal period in our own state, we have a record in the title, Lord, which meant the giver of bread. The word “government” is itself derived from the same source, and to-day in the streets of Athens a beggar will approach you with these words, “χηβερνισὲ μου—govern me, i.e. give me food.” Amongst the Turks, where ceremonial is the bond, rank is given to bread. If a Mussulman sees a bit of bread on the ground, he reverentially picks it up, kisses it, and then places it in some position where it may be seen and used, if requisite, by man or beast.[267] If the Sultan were to come into a room where the humblest were sitting at food, they would not rise to receive him—his dignity is effaced in presence of the “gift of God;” thus, a mendicant may place himself at the table of the Vizir. A person who could not be asked to partake of coffee, who could not presume to be seen with a pipe, may be invited to sit down to dinner. The breaking of bread, the most solemn mystery of our faith, has, in this respect, a meaning which we cannot read. In the East, the injunction of Christ to turn not away from him who asketh, is universally observed.[268] We cannot observe that rule, because we have produced such an amount of pauperism that no private charity can suffice, and we have destroyed the practice of charity, so that it shall not suffice; then we reconcile faith and disobedience by treating the injunction as a metaphor.
In the Moorish government, the practice of the tribes is now reversed,[269] but still the traces are not all lost. “The Kings of Fez,” says Marmol, “have a custom to have their food brought publicly to the Hall of Audience, where, every morning, they receive the compliments of the princes and the great men. After the king has eaten two or three mouthfuls—for he never eats more in public—the dish (of kuscoussoo) is turned from before him, and his children, or his brothers, if they are present, approach, and each take a mouthful and return to their places. Then the great personages and the common come by order of their degrees, till, at last, the very porters and the guards; for all those who are in the hall, great or little, must taste much or little, because they believe that it is a sin to eat alone, without offering to those who look at you. The princes and governors in the province do each the same thing. Every one eats once a day of kuscoussoo, because it costs little and nourishes much.”[270]
“Fill not thy belly in presence of the longing eye.” What are all our homilies on charity to this? What all our constitutions? This is not a proposition; it is a maxim, a rule of conduct; it is a habit—that is, a self-enforcing law.
What is the evil eye? How should such a fancy have taken root? I once commended a child’s beauty: the nurse immediately spat in its face. I asked the reason; she answered, “Against your evil eye.” Pride was there the spell, humiliation the fascinum. The figure of a hand is the ordinary talisman.[271] The open hand denotes generosity, the closed one firmness. The hand so used is neither closed nor open, two fingers being doubled, two extended. What can this signify, if not a measured participation of what you enjoy to prevent the longing, from becoming the “evil,” eye? Associated as the hand is with kuscoussoo, the emblem is appropriate. That superstition has cheered many a heavy spirit and relaxed many a girded heart, and is cheaper than a poor-law.