"This ridiculous mania for titles which overwhelmed the guide Abhul" is, nevertheless, in M. Cortambert's opinion, "one of the most pronounced characteristics of the boastful and childish genius of the Orientals. The Turks and Arabs cannot believe in the importance of personages without titles of distinction; and hence the smallest prolétaire who can equip a caravan is saluted with the name of excellency. M. de Lamartine was hailed as prince and lord; he was supposed, I believe, to belong to the House of Orleans. One of our friends, an artist of high merit, by no means desirous of being taken for that which he was not, and valuing more highly his personal repute than all the titles in the world, could not shake off the rank of prince, which welcomed him at every village. Since the visit of M. de Lamartine every French traveller seems to be regarded as a seigneur of illustrious lineage. One easily understands that the purse of the tourist was the first to suffer from this circumstance. Several times our friend endeavoured to set his guide right, but in vain; the moukra was unwilling to pass, in the eyes of his companions, for the conductor of a private individual. By elevating his master he thought that he was raising himself."
Frederika Bremer did not allow her supposititious title of Sitti to blind her to the fact that she was before all a poet and a woman of letters. On entering Jerusalem she gave the reins to her imagination, and set herself to work on one of those delightful letters which afterwards formed the basis of a complete narrative of her Eastern tour. "I raise my hands," she says, "towards the mountain of the house of the Lord, experiencing an indescribable thankfulness for my safe arrival here. I am in Jerusalem; I dwell upon the hill of Zion—the hill of King David. From my window the view embraces all Jerusalem, that ancient and venerable cradle of the grandest memories of humanity—the origin of so many sanguinary contests, so many pilgrimages, hymns of praise, and chants of sorrow."
Everybody knows what constitutes a traveller's life in Palestine: a succession of pilgrimages to the several places connected with Old Testament history, or with the life of our Lord; a constant renewal of those touching experiences which so deeply impress the heart and brain of every Christian. Even the freethinker cannot gaze without emotion on the shrines of a religion which has so largely affected the destinies of humanity and the currents of the world's history. What, then, must be the feeling with which they are regarded by those to whom that religion is the sure promise of eternal life? Not Greece, with its memories of poets, sages and patriots; its haunted valleys and mysterious mountain-tops; nor Italy, with its glories of art and nature, and its footprints of a warrior-people, once rulers of the known world, so appeals to the thoughtful mind as does the Holy Land, in the fulness of its sanctity as the home and dwelling-place of Jesus Christ.
But the attention of Miss Bremer was not wholly given to the hallowed scenes by which she was surrounded. In the East, as in the West, she reverted to the question of woman's independence, the restoration of her sex to its natural and legitimate freedom. What she saw was not of a nature to cheer and encourage her. Nowhere else is the condition of woman so deplorable; not so much because she is deprived of her liberty as because she is condemned to the most absolute ignorance. And in this ignorance lies one of the principal causes of Oriental degeneracy; for the young, being brought up in the polluted atmosphere of the harem, undergo a fatal enervation of body and soul, and imbibe the germs of the most fatal vices.
One day, in company with several young persons of her own sex, Frederika Bremer paid a visit of courtesy to the wife of a sheikh, who, when informed that the ladies she had admitted to her presence were unmarried, manifested the liveliest surprise, and added that it was a great shame. The girls laughingly pointed to Miss Bremer as being also a spinster; whereupon their hostess threatened to withdraw, declaring herself overwhelmed, and, indeed, almost scandalized by such a revelation. However, on reaching the threshold she turned back, and desired to know what had induced the European lady to remain unmarried. The reasons given in reply must have been, we suppose, of a shocking character, since she cut them short by a declaration that she did not wish to hear such things spoken of.
To this example of the complete condition of moral dependence to which even the wives of sheikhs are degraded, Miss Bremer adds another and not less characteristic fact. She asked several young women, distinguished by their eager and animated air, whether they had no desire to travel and see Allah's beautiful earth.
"Oh no," they replied, "for women that would be a sin!"
Women bred in this state of mental and moral degradation can never play an important part in the regeneration of the East.
A philosopher first, a poet after, and sometimes a painter, such is Frederika Bremer. She does not often paint a picture, however; when she does, it is brightly coloured, and its details are carefully elaborated; but her skill is more favourably displayed in portraiture. Her palette is not rich enough in glowing colours to reproduce fairly the warm luxuriant landscapes of the East. For this reason she excels in a sketch like the following, where she deals not with sky, and sea, and mountain, but the humanity in those types of it which crowd the streets and lanes of the Holy City:—