DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.14563#0123
92
EGYPT, PAST AND PRESENT.
quality. The machinery used in the refinery is of Parisian
manufacture, and of the very highest order. The general
management of the establishment is in French hands, though
many a bagged and turbaned overseer glides about in
pointed slippers, and many a half-clad Arab works among
the cane, at the furnace, or in the treacle, for one piastre or
five cents a day, payable one half in money and one half
in the expressed juice of the cane, with the privilege of
eating sugar-cane when hungry. After the cane is pressed,
it is dried in the sun and used for fuel, and this with the
addition of dry cornstalks, suffices to feed the engine.
Fine grained sugar and pellucid rock candy are manufac-
tured at this establishment.
As we stood by the door, one of the superintendents
accosted us and invited us to enter. He was a Nubian of
the blackest die, but was elegantly attired, and had an air
more gentlemanly than servile. Around him stood two or
three Copts, well costumed also, and wearing in their belts
the " writer's inkhorn " —■ the usual badge of their profes-
sion as scribes. We availed ourselves of the invitation,
and went through the whole factory. Our entrance made
quite a sensation, especially as we were accompanied by a
lady in American dress. As for myself, with a crimson
tarbouch, an unshorn chin, and Joseph's "coat of many
colors," I could not affect to represent any particular nation-
ality. Some waggish boys followed at the heels of the lady,
twisting the faded blue tassel of an old tarbouch into a cari-
cature of her natural and graceful curls; and both men
and boys assailed her vehemently for backslash (a gratuity).
Even the dignified Nubian did not disdain to have an under-
standing with our dragoman for a gratuity, which we, of
course, designed to give him. How inveterate is this na-
tional habit of begging, induced by the beggared condition
of the people! You find the same thing in Italy, from the
EGYPT, PAST AND PRESENT.
quality. The machinery used in the refinery is of Parisian
manufacture, and of the very highest order. The general
management of the establishment is in French hands, though
many a bagged and turbaned overseer glides about in
pointed slippers, and many a half-clad Arab works among
the cane, at the furnace, or in the treacle, for one piastre or
five cents a day, payable one half in money and one half
in the expressed juice of the cane, with the privilege of
eating sugar-cane when hungry. After the cane is pressed,
it is dried in the sun and used for fuel, and this with the
addition of dry cornstalks, suffices to feed the engine.
Fine grained sugar and pellucid rock candy are manufac-
tured at this establishment.
As we stood by the door, one of the superintendents
accosted us and invited us to enter. He was a Nubian of
the blackest die, but was elegantly attired, and had an air
more gentlemanly than servile. Around him stood two or
three Copts, well costumed also, and wearing in their belts
the " writer's inkhorn " —■ the usual badge of their profes-
sion as scribes. We availed ourselves of the invitation,
and went through the whole factory. Our entrance made
quite a sensation, especially as we were accompanied by a
lady in American dress. As for myself, with a crimson
tarbouch, an unshorn chin, and Joseph's "coat of many
colors," I could not affect to represent any particular nation-
ality. Some waggish boys followed at the heels of the lady,
twisting the faded blue tassel of an old tarbouch into a cari-
cature of her natural and graceful curls; and both men
and boys assailed her vehemently for backslash (a gratuity).
Even the dignified Nubian did not disdain to have an under-
standing with our dragoman for a gratuity, which we, of
course, designed to give him. How inveterate is this na-
tional habit of begging, induced by the beggared condition
of the people! You find the same thing in Italy, from the