DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.14563#0095
MANNERS OF THE TEOrLE.
67
and cannot join in sucli oppression of this poor and much
abused people. Oh the contrary, I do not hesitate to say-
that I always found them kind, honest, and faithful, thankful
for the smallest favor, never surly or discontented, and
always ready and anxious to serve me with a zeal that I
have not met in any other people ; and when they came up
in a body to the locanda to say farewell, I felt that I was
parting with tried and trusty friends."
I never met with an American traveller on the Nile, who
mingled with the people, who did not bear the same testi-
mony. They are a remarkably susceptible people, open to
impressions from strangers, and if released from the fear of
the death penalty for a change of religion, they would be
promising subjects for missionary labor. From Mussulmen
generally, the stories of travellers and the spirit of the
Koran had led us to expect uncivil treatment, except where
this might be restrained through the hope of employment or
of trade. But we never received incivility from any quar-
ter ; and I am persuaded that either the unfarorable im-
pressions of some English travellers, respecting the native
population of Egypt, are to be traced to the national hauteur
which Englishmen are apt to exhibit abroad, or the preju-
dices of the common people have been greatly modified by
intercourse with foreigners. The term Hawugee, which is
universally applied to Franks or Europeans, I am sure is
not commonly used as a term of contempt, to denote the
superiority of the Moslem to the Christian, as Sir Gardner
Wilkinson represents it in his " Hand-Book for Travellers
in Egypt." True, the beggar, in asking alms of a true
Mussulman, accosts him " Sidi" (sir) while he calls the
Christian foreigner Hawugee, a term meaning " Christian
merchant," as distinguished from Khowagee, a Moslem mer-
chant. This, Sir Gardner thinks, " answers to the French
marchand," a word sometimes used " to stigmatize the Eng-
67
and cannot join in sucli oppression of this poor and much
abused people. Oh the contrary, I do not hesitate to say-
that I always found them kind, honest, and faithful, thankful
for the smallest favor, never surly or discontented, and
always ready and anxious to serve me with a zeal that I
have not met in any other people ; and when they came up
in a body to the locanda to say farewell, I felt that I was
parting with tried and trusty friends."
I never met with an American traveller on the Nile, who
mingled with the people, who did not bear the same testi-
mony. They are a remarkably susceptible people, open to
impressions from strangers, and if released from the fear of
the death penalty for a change of religion, they would be
promising subjects for missionary labor. From Mussulmen
generally, the stories of travellers and the spirit of the
Koran had led us to expect uncivil treatment, except where
this might be restrained through the hope of employment or
of trade. But we never received incivility from any quar-
ter ; and I am persuaded that either the unfarorable im-
pressions of some English travellers, respecting the native
population of Egypt, are to be traced to the national hauteur
which Englishmen are apt to exhibit abroad, or the preju-
dices of the common people have been greatly modified by
intercourse with foreigners. The term Hawugee, which is
universally applied to Franks or Europeans, I am sure is
not commonly used as a term of contempt, to denote the
superiority of the Moslem to the Christian, as Sir Gardner
Wilkinson represents it in his " Hand-Book for Travellers
in Egypt." True, the beggar, in asking alms of a true
Mussulman, accosts him " Sidi" (sir) while he calls the
Christian foreigner Hawugee, a term meaning " Christian
merchant," as distinguished from Khowagee, a Moslem mer-
chant. This, Sir Gardner thinks, " answers to the French
marchand," a word sometimes used " to stigmatize the Eng-