DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.12664#0041
34
INCIDENTS OF TRAVEL.
Arabian tales hanging about him, will nowhere
see the Cairo of the califs; but before arriving there
he will have seen a curious and striking spectacle.
He will have seen, streaming from the gate among
loaded camels and dromedaries, the dashing Turk
with his glittering sabre, the wily Greek, the grave
Armenian, and the despised Jew, with their long
silk robes, their turbans, their solemn beards, and
various and striking costumes ; he will have seen
the harem of more than one rich Turk, eight or
ten women on horseback, completely enveloped in
large black silk wrappers, perfectly hiding face
and person, and preceded by that abomination of
the East, a black eunuch; the miserable santon,
the Arab saint, with a few scanty rags on his
breast and shoulders, the rest of his body perfectly
naked; the swarthy Bedouin of the desert, the
haughty janizary, with a cocked gun in his hand,
dashing furiously through the crowd, and perhaps
bearing some bloody mandate of his royal master;
and perhaps he will have seen and blushed for his
own image, in the person of some beggarly Italian
refugee. Entering the gate, guarded by Arab sol-
diers in a bastard European uniform, he will cross
a large square filled with officers and soldiers, sur-
rounded by what are called palaces, but seeing
nothing that can interest him, save the house in
which the gallant Kleber, the hero of many a
bloody field, died ingloriously by the hands of an
assassin. Crossing this square, he will plunge into
the narrow streets of Cairo. Winding his doubt-
INCIDENTS OF TRAVEL.
Arabian tales hanging about him, will nowhere
see the Cairo of the califs; but before arriving there
he will have seen a curious and striking spectacle.
He will have seen, streaming from the gate among
loaded camels and dromedaries, the dashing Turk
with his glittering sabre, the wily Greek, the grave
Armenian, and the despised Jew, with their long
silk robes, their turbans, their solemn beards, and
various and striking costumes ; he will have seen
the harem of more than one rich Turk, eight or
ten women on horseback, completely enveloped in
large black silk wrappers, perfectly hiding face
and person, and preceded by that abomination of
the East, a black eunuch; the miserable santon,
the Arab saint, with a few scanty rags on his
breast and shoulders, the rest of his body perfectly
naked; the swarthy Bedouin of the desert, the
haughty janizary, with a cocked gun in his hand,
dashing furiously through the crowd, and perhaps
bearing some bloody mandate of his royal master;
and perhaps he will have seen and blushed for his
own image, in the person of some beggarly Italian
refugee. Entering the gate, guarded by Arab sol-
diers in a bastard European uniform, he will cross
a large square filled with officers and soldiers, sur-
rounded by what are called palaces, but seeing
nothing that can interest him, save the house in
which the gallant Kleber, the hero of many a
bloody field, died ingloriously by the hands of an
assassin. Crossing this square, he will plunge into
the narrow streets of Cairo. Winding his doubt-