The Story Teller of the Desert—"Backsheesh!" / or, Life and Adventures in the Orient

by Thomas Wallace Knox

Polygamy is growing unpopular, and the natives are becoming content to live with one wife each, according to the Western custom. And, still following the Western custom, they abuse her, and stay out late of nights, at the club or the theatre, or somewhere else, and are not over liberal in supplying her pecuniary wants. Slavery is not altogether suppressed, but is greatly restricted, and has no legal protection. Gambling houses abound, not only for native, but for foreign patronage, and to judge by the number of these places, the foreigners that come here are fond of combats with the tiger.

I might name many other indications of the change that has come over Egypt, but the foregoing must suffice.

One of our first excursions was to the Citadel. Its character is shown by its name; it was built in 1166, by Saladin, as a defence to the city, but the site was rather unwisely selected, as it is dominated by the Mokattam—a hill directly behind it—and has once been taken by batteries, stationed on the latter eminence. It is strong enough to resist an attack by small arms, and some of its towers are quite massive and picturesque. It is quite extensive, and contains a palace and a mosque, the latter built almost entirely of alabaster. The interior of the mosque is particularly rich, in consequence of the material used in its construction, and the arches have a curious effect, quite impossible to describe in writing. The palace also abounds in the same material, and contains some very handsome rooms.

But the great charm of the citadel is the view from the platform. One can look upon the Nile and a portion of its rich valley, and on nearly the whole city of Cairo. The roofs of the houses are below the feet of the observer, and there are only the highest minarets of the mosques to approach him in elevation. In the west are the Pyramids, standing in the edge of the desert, and looking more grand than when one sees them from the bank of the river.

The best time for this view is at sunset, and if the air is clear there are few pictures anywhere in the world to surpass it. There is a wonderful contrast between the flat roofs and domes and minarets of the city, and the rich green of the open country beyond. Altogether the view from the Citadel at sunset is one that should not be missed by a visitor to Cairo, and once enjoyed it is not likely to be speedily forgotten.

We were shown the spot where one of the Mamelukes saved himself, by jumping his horse over a wall and down upon a pile of rubbish thirty or more feet below. The horse was killed, but the rider was not hurt.

Mohammed Ali found the Mamelukes troublesome, just as the Janizaries were in Constantinople, and he determined to get rid of them. He invited them to a banquet at the palace, and they came in their richest suits, and when they were all in the courtyard of the palace, his Albanian body guard opened fire upon them from the surrounding windows and from the crenelated walls. The gates had been shut, and there was no chance of escape, and all were slaughtered except Emir Bey, the one who saved himself in the way mentioned. This little incident occurred in 1811, and put an end to the disturbances that the Mamelukes frequently created.

Mohammed Ali loved peace and quietness and was willing to do anything in reason to secure them. The Mamelukes were constantly making trouble, and rendering the throne insecure; in fact they had the power of saying who should or should not be the ruler of the land. Is there anything more natural, than that he should study how to get rid of them, and in such a way that his motives could not be questioned? If he had asked them to come to his palace and be killed, there is every reason to believe they would have remained away; at any rate some of them would have been fastidious, and declined his polite invitation, so that his scheme for bagging them all would have failed. It was much better to invite them to a banquet; a man is much more likely to go to a good dinner, than to accept the honors of a butchery in which he is to occupy an objective place. Some men are so particular.

Why didn’t he poison them at the banquet, some one may ask. Poisoning isn’t respectable, and besides, you always run a risk of changing glasses with somebody, and getting into your own stomach the arsenic you intended for his. Servants are careless at dinner, and then you always have some guests, who don’t drink and are quite likely to detest the particular kind of soup or pie where you have placed your medicine. Besides, when you poison a man, he has no time to prepare for death, while in a massacre like this he has lots of it. The Mamelukes that were not shot at the first fire had at least a quarter of a minute for preparation, as it would take quite that time to open the windows and level the rifles. Then you must add the period required for the bullets to go from the rifles to the Mamelukes, and altogether you will conclude that the time must have hung heavy on their hands. Those not killed at the first fire, had the additional time required for reloading, and you must remember, before condemning Mohammed Ali for taking them unawares, that the rifles of that day were charged at the muzzle and were much slower to load than the Sharps, and Mansers, and Chassepots of our time.

The more you study this massacre of the Mamelukes, the more you must admire Mohammed Ali for the way he managed it He attended to the details, and did no bungling work.