[p.227] an umbrella or canopy, of Chinese design, adorned with silk tassels, which he holds over the Sherifs head when the sun incommodes him. This is the only sign of royalty by which the Sherif is distinguished when he appears in public; and even this is not used when he walks in the street. The Wahabys compelled him to lay aside the canopy, and to go on foot to the mosque, alleging as a reason, that it was inconsistent with the requisite humility, to come into the presence of the Kaaba on horseback. But when Ghaleb was in full power al Mekka, he obliged the Pashas who accompanied the pilgrim caravan, to acknowledge his right of precedency on all occasions; and he disseminated throughout the Hedjaz a belief that his rank was superior to that of any officer of the Porte; and that even at Constantinople the Sultan himself ought, in strictness of etiquette, to rise and salute him. I have already mentioned the annual investiture of the Sherif by the Kaftandjy Bashy. According to the ceremonial practised on the arrival of the caravan, the Sherif pays the first visit to the Pasha, or Emir el Hadj. The latter, on returning the visit, receives a horse, richly caparisoned, from the Sherif. After the return of the Hadj from Wady Muna, the Pasha presents him, on the first day, with a similar horse; and they both exchange visits in their tents at Muna. When the caravan is ready to leave Mekka, on its return home, the Sherif visits the Pasha a second time, in his camp outside the town, and is there presented with another horse.
The Sherif is supposed to have under his jurisdiction all the Bedouin tribes of the Hedjaz; at least they are named in his own and the Portes registers, as the dutiful subjects of the Sultan and of the Sherif. When in the full enjoyment of his power, Ghaleb possessed a considerable influence over these tribes, but without any direct authority. They looked upon the Sherif, with his soldiers and friends, in the same light as one of their own Sheikhs, with his adherents; and all the laws of war current in the Desert, were strictly observed by the Sherif. In his late expeditions against the Wahabys, he was accompanied by six or eight thousand Bedouins, who joined him, as they would have joined another Sheikh, without receiving any regular pay
[p.228] for their services, but following their own chiefs, whose interest and attachment Ghaleb purchased by presents.
To those who are unacquainted with the politics of the Desert, the government of Mekka will present some singularities; but every thing is easily explained, if the Sherif be considered as a Bedouin chief, whom wealth and power have led to assume arbitrary sway; who has adopted the exterior form of an Osmanly governor, but who strictly adheres to all the ancient usages of his nation. In former times, the heads of the Sherif families at Mekka exercised the same influence as the fathers of families in the Bedouin encampments; the authority of the great chief afterwards prevailed, and the others were obliged to submit; but they still retain, in many cases, the rights of their forefathers. The rest of the Mekkawys were considered by the contending parties, not as their equals, but as settlers under their domination; in the same way as Bedouin tribes fight for villages which pay to them certain assessments, and whose inhabitants are considered to be on a much lower level than themselves. The Mekkawys, however, were not to be dealt with like inhabitants of the towns in the northern provinces of Turkey; they took a part in the feuds of the Sherifs, and shared in the influence and power obtained by their respective patrons. When Serour and Ghaleb successively possessed themselves of a more uncontrolled authority than any of their predecessors had enjoyed, the remaining Sherifs united more closely with the Mekkawys, and, till the most recent period, formed with them a body respectable for its warlike character, as was evinced in frequent quarrels among themselves; and a resistance against the government, when its measures affected their lives, although they were so far reduced as never to revolt when their purses only were assailed.
The government of Ghaleb, notwithstanding his pecuniary extortion, was lenient and cautious: he respected the pride of the Mekkawys, and seldom made any attempts against the personal safety or even fortunes of individuals, although they smarted under those regulations which affected them collectively. He permitted his avowed enemies to live peaceably in the bosom of their families, and the people
[p.229] to indulge in bloody affrays among themselves, which frequently happened either in consequence of blood-revenge, or the jealousies which the inhabitants of different quarters of the town entertained against each other; sometimes fighting for weeks together, but generally with sticks, lances, and daggers, and not with fire-arms.
The Sherifs, or descendants of Mohammed, resident at Mekka and in the neighbourhood, who delight in arms, and are so often engaged in civil broils, have a practice of sending every male child, eight days after its birth, to some tent of the neighbouring Bedouins, where it is brought up with the children of the tent, and educated like a true Bedouin for eight or ten years, or till the boy is able to mount a mare, when his father takes him back to his home. During the whole of the above period, the boy never visits his parents, nor enters the town, except when in his sixth month; his foster-mother then carries him on a short visit to his family, and immediately returns with him to her tribe. The child is, in no instance, left longer than thirty days after his birth in the hands of his mother; and his stay among the Bedouins is sometimes protracted till his thirteenth or fifteenth year. By this means, he becomes familiar with all the perils and vicissitudes of a Bedouin life; his body is inured to fatigue and privation; and he acquires a knowledge of the pure language of the Bedouins, and an influence among them that becomes afterwards of much importance to him. There is no sherif, from the chief down to the poorest among them, who has not been brought up among the Bedouins; and many of them are also married to Bedouin girls. The sons of the reigning Sherif family were usually educated among the tribe of Adouan, celebrated for the prowess and hospitality of its members; but it has been so much reduced by the intestine wars of the Sherifs, in which they always took part, and by the late invasion of Mohammed Aly, that they found it expedient to abandon the territory of the Hedjaz, and seek refuge in the encampments of the tribes of the Eastern plain. Othman el Medhayfe, the famous Wahaby chief, a principal instrument employed by Saoud in the subjugation of the Hedjaz, was himself a Sheikh of Adouan; and Sherif Ghaleb had married his sister. The other Sherifs
[p.230] sent their children to the encampments of Hodheyl, Thekyf, Beni Sad, and others; some few to the Koreysh, or Harb.
The Bedouins in whose tent a Sherif has been educated, were ever after treated by him with the same respect as his own parents and brethren; he called them respectively, father, mother, brother; and received from them corresponding appellations. Whenever they came to Mekka, they lodged at the house of their pupil, and never left it without receiving presents. During his pupilage, the Sherif gave the name of Erham to the more distant relatives of the Bedouin family, who were also entitled to his friendship and attention; and he considered himself, during his life, as belonging to the encampment in which he had passed his early years: he termed its inhabitants our people, or, our family; took the liveliest interest in their various fortunes; and, when at leisure, often paid them a visit during the spring months, and sometimes accompanied them in their wanderings and their wars.
Sherif Ghaleb always showed himself extremely attentive to his Bedouin foster-parents; whenever they visited him, he used to rise from his seat, and embrace them, though in no way distinguished from any meanly- dressed inhabitant of the Desert. Of course, it often happened that Sherif boys could not easily be induced to acknowledge their real parents at home; and they sometimes escaped, and rejoined the friends of their infancy, the Bedouins in the Desert.