The Defterdar was fond of justice, after a fashion, and his mode of administering it was characteristic. A poor woman came before him and complained that one of his kawasses had seized a cup of milk and drunk it, refusing to pay her its value, which she estimated at five paras (a para is the fortieth part of a piastre, which is worth about twopence-halfpenny). The sensitive justice of the Defterdar was roused by this complaint. He asked the woman if she should know the person who had stolen her milk were she to see him again? The woman said she should, upon which the whole household was drawn out before her, and looking round she fixed upon a man as the thief. "Very well," said the Defterdar, "I hope you are sure of your man, and that you have not made a false accusation before me. He shall be ripped open, and if the milk is found in his stomach, you shall receive your five paras; but if there is no milk found, you shall be ripped up in turn for accusing one of my household unjustly." The unfortunate kawass was cut open on the spot; some milk was found in him, and the woman received her five paras.
Another of his judicial sentences was rather an original conception. A man in Upper Egypt stole a cow from a widow, and having killed it, he cut it into twenty pieces, which he sold for a piastre each in the bazaar. The widow complained to the Defterdar, who seized the thief, and having without further ceremony cut him into twenty pieces, forced twenty people who came into the market on that day from the neighbouring villages to buy a piece of thief each for a piastre; the joints of the robber were thus distributed all over the country, and the story told by the involuntary purchasers of these pounds of flesh had a wholesome effect upon the minds of the cattle-stealers: the twenty piastres were given to the woman, whose cows were not again meddled with during the lifetime of the Defterdar. But the character of this man must not be taken as a sample of the habits of the Turks in general. They are a grave and haughty race, of dignified manners; rapacious they often are, but they are generous and brave, and I do not think that, as a nation, they can be accused of cruelty.
Nothing can be more secure and peaceable than a journey on the Nile, as every one knows nowadays. Floating along in a boat like a house, which stops and goes on whenever you like, you have no cares or troubles but those which you bring with you—"cœlum non animum mutant qui trans mare currunt." I can conceive nothing more delightful than a voyage up the Nile with agreeable companions in the winter, when the climate is perfection. There are the most wonderful antiquities for those who interest themselves in the remains of bygone days; famous shooting on the banks of the river, capital dinners, if you know how to make the proper arrangements, comfortable quarters, and a constant change of scene.
The wonders of the land of Ham, its temples and its ruins, have been so well and so often described that I shall not attempt to give any details regarding them, but shall confine myself to some sketches of the Coptic Monasteries which are to be seen on the rocks and deserts, either on the banks of the river or in the neighbourhood of the valley of the Nile.
The ancient Egyptians are now represented by their descendants the Copts, whose ancestors were converted to Christianity in the earliest ages, and whose patriarchs claim their descent, in uninterrupted succession, from St Mark, who was buried at Alexandria, but whose body the Venetians in later ages boast of having transported to their island city.[3]
The Copts look up to their patriarch as the chief of their nation: he is elected from among the brethren of the great monastery of St. Anthony on the borders of the Red Sea, a proceeding which ensures his entire ignorance of all sublunary matters, and his consequent incapacity for his high and responsible office, unless he chance to be a man of very uncommon talents. Like the patriarch of Constantinople, he is usually a puppet in the hands of a cabal who make use of him for their own interested purposes, and when they have got him into a scrape leave him to get out of it as he can. He is called the Patriarch of Alexandria, but for many years his residence has been at Cairo, where he has a large dreary palace. He is surrounded by priests and acolytes; but when I was last at Cairo there was but one remaining Coptic scribe among them, whom I engaged to copy out the Gospel of St Mark from an ancient MS. in the patriarchal library: however, after a very long delay he copied out St. Matthew's Gospel by mistake, and I was told that there was no other person whose profession it was to copy Coptic writings.
The patriarch has twelve bishops under him, whose residences are at Nagadé, Abou Girgé, Aboutig, Siout, Girgé, Manfalout, Maharaka, the Fioum, Atfeh, Behenesé, and Jerusalem: he also consecrates the Abouna or Patriarch of Abyssinia, who by a specific law must not be a native of that country, and who has not the privilege of naming his successor or consecrating archbishops or bishops, although in other respects his authority in religious matters is supreme. The Patriarch of Abyssinia usually ordains two or three thousand priests at once on his first arrival in that country, and the unfitness of the individual appointed to this high office has sometimes caused much scandal. This has arisen from the difficulty there has often been in getting a respectable person to accept the office, as it involves perpetual banishment from Egypt, and a residence among a people whose partiality to raw meat and other peculiar customs are held as abominations by the Egyptians.
The usual trade and occupation of the Copts is that of kateb, scribe, or accountant; they seem to have a natural talent for arithmetic. They appear to be more afflicted with ophthalmia than the Mohamedans, perhaps because they drink wine and spirits, which the others do not.
The person of the greatest consequence among the Copts was Basileos Bey, the Pasha's confidential secretary and minister of finance. This gentleman was good enough to lend me a magnificent dahabieh or boat of the largest size, which I used for many months. It was an old-fashioned vessel, painted and gilt inside in a brilliant manner, which is not usual in more modern boats; but being a person of a fanciful disposition, I preferred the roomy proportions and the quaint arabesque ornaments of this boat, although it was no very fast sailer, to the natty vessels which were more Europeanised and quicker than mine. The principal cabin was about ten feet by twelve, and was ornamented with paintings of peacocks of a peculiar breed and nondescript flowers. The divans, one on each side, were covered with fine carpets, and the cushions were of cloth of gold, with a raised pattern of red velvet. The ceilings were gilt, and we had two red silk flags of prodigious dimensions in addition to streamers forty or fifty feet long at the end of each of the yard-arms: in short, it was full of what is called fantasia in the Levant, and as for its slowness, I consider that rather an advantage in the East. I like to take my time and look about me, and sit under a tree on a carpet when I get to an agreeable place, and I am in no hurry to leave it; so the heavy qualities of the vessel suited me exactly—we did nothing but stop everywhere. But although I confess that I like deliberate travelling, I do not carry my system to the extent of an American friend with whom I once journeyed from the shores of the Black Sea to Hungary. We were taking a walk together in the mountains near Mahadia, when seeing him looking about among the rocks I asked him what he wanted. "Oh," said he, "I am looking out for a good place to go to sleep in, for there is a beautiful view here, and I like to sleep where there is a fine prospect, that I may enjoy it when I awake; so good afternoon, and if you come back this way mind you call me." Accordingly an hour or two afterwards I came back and aroused my friend, who was still fast asleep. "I hope you enjoyed your nap," said I; "we had a glorious walk among the hills." "Yes," said he, "I had a famous nap." "And what did you think of the view when you awoke?" "The view!" exclaimed he, "why, I forgot to look at it!"