The Only
Society We Found, Excepting An Occasional Visitor, Was That Of A Party
Of Egyptian Women, Who With Their Husbands And Families Occupied Some
Rooms Adjoining Ours.
At first they were fierce, and used bad language,
when the boy Mohammed and I,-whilst Omar Effendi was engaged in prayer,
and the rest were wandering about the town,-ventured to linger in the
cool passage, where they congregated, or to address a facetious phrase
to them.
But hearing that I was a Hakim-bashi-for fame had promoted me
to the rank of a "Physician General" at Suez-all discovered some
ailments. They began prudently with requesting me to display the
effects of my drugs by dosing myself, but they ended submissively by
swallowing the nauseous compounds. To this succeeded a primitive form
of flirtation, which mainly consisted of the demand direct. The most
charming of the party was one Fattumah[FN#18], a plump-personed dame,
fast verging upon her thirtieth year, fond of a little flattery, and
possessing, like all her people, a most voluble tongue. The refrain of
every conversation was "Marry me, O Fattumah! O daughter! O female
pilgrim!" In vain the lady would reply, with a coquettish movement of
the sides, a toss of the head, and a flirting manipulation of her
head-veil,
[p.175]"I am mated, O young man!"-it was agreed that she, being a
person of polyandrous propensities, could support the weight of at
least three matrimonial engagements. Sometimes the entrance of the male
Fellahs[FN#19] interrupted these little discussions, but people of our
respectability and nation were not to be imposed upon by such husbands.
In their presence we only varied the style of conversation-inquiring
the amount of "Mahr," or marriage settlement, deriding the cheapness of
womanhood in Egypt, and requiring to be furnished on the spot with
brides at the rate of ten shillings a head.[FN#20] More often the
amiable Fattumah-the fair sex in this country, though passing frail,
have the best tempers in the world-would laugh at our impertinences.
Sometimes vexed by our imitating her Egyptian accent, mimicking her
gestures, and depreciating her country-women,[FN#21] she would wax
wroth, and order us to be gone, and stretch out her forefinger-a sign
that she wished to put out our eyes, or adjure Allah to cut the hearts
out of our bosoms.
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