Harriet Martineau's Writing on the British Empire, vol 2

Deborah Logan, Antoinette Burton, Kitty Sklar, Patrick Brantlinger

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2021
• eBook ISBN: 9781000558869
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Literature
• Subtopic: Literary Criticism
• Index: Literature

The literary presence of Harriet Martineau pervades 19th-century English and American culture. This edition makes her work available, and focuses on her writings on imperialism. It should be of interest to scholars of colonialism, women's writing, Victorian studies, sociology and journalism.

EASTERN LIFE, PRESENT AND PAST

DOI: 10.4324/9781003113522-1

BY HARRIET MARTINEAU.

'Joyful to receive the impression thereof, as the eye joyeth to receive light; and not only delighted in beholding the variety of things, and vicissitude of times, but raised also to find out and discern the ordinances and decrees, which throughout all these changes are infallibly observed.' — Bacon, Advancement of Learning. I [1605]

IN THREE VOLUMES

LONDON EDWARD MOXON, DOVER STREET. MDCCCXLVIII. LONDON: BRADBURY AND EVANS, PRINTERS, WHITEFRIARS 1

PREFACE.

In the autumn of 1846, I left home for, as I supposed, a few weeks, to visit some of my family and friends. At Liverpool, I was invited by my friends, Mr. and Mrs. Richard V. Yates, to accompany them in their proposed travels in the East.¹ By the zeal and kindness of those who saw what a privilege this journey would be, all obstacles in the shape of business and engagements were cleared away; and in a month, I was ready to set out with my kind friends. — At Malta, we fell in with a Mr. Joseph C. Ewart, who presently joined our party, and remained with us till we reached Malta on our return. There is nothing that I do not owe to my companions for their unceasing care and indulgence: but one act of kindness I felt particularly. They permitted me to read to them my Egyptian journal; (there was no time for the others) that I might have the satisfaction of knowing whether they agreed in my impressions of the facts which came under our observation. About these facts there is an entire agreement between them and me. — For the opinions expressed in this book, no one is answerable but myself.

It is by permission of my companions that I have thus named them here, and spoken of them in my book as occasion required. I am truly obliged to them for granting me this freedom, by which I am spared much trouble of concealment and circumlocution which, in their opinion and mine, the personal affairs of travel are not important enough to require and justify. — Not having asked a similar permission from our comrades in our Arabian journey, I have said as little as possible about them, and suppressed their names. I shall be glad if they find anything in my narrative to remind them pleasantly of that remarkable season of our lives, — our five weeks' abode in the Desert.

Sir G. Wilkinson² must be almost tired of the testimonies and thanks of grateful travellers: but I must just say that he was, by his books, a daily benefactor to us in Egypt. It is really cheering to find that any one can be so accurate, and on so large a scale, as his works prove him to be. Such almost faultless correctness requires an union of intellectual and moral powers and training which it is encouraging for those who are interested in the results of travel to contemplate. After making the fullest use of his 'Modern Egypt and Thebes,' we find only about half-a-dozen points in which we differ from him.

In regard to that difficult matter, — difficult to those who do not understand Arabic, — the spelling of the names of places and persons in Egypt and Arabia, —I have done what every one will allow to be the safest thing; — I have followed the authority of Mr. Lane³ wherever I could. If any English reader complains of me for altering the look of familiar Egyptian names, it is enough to reply that Mr. Lane knows better than any one, and that I copy from him. If I have departed from his method anywhere, it is merely because I had not his authority before me in those particular instances.

H.M.

AMBLESIDE, 25th March, 1848.

'They are extremely religious, and surpass all men in the worship they render to the gods.' Herodotus, II. 37.

'Wherefore they were highly celebrated by Apollo's oracle (recorded by Porphyrins) and preferred before all other nations for teaching rightly "that hard and difficult way, that leadeth to God and happiness".' Cudworth. Intellectual System, Book I. 4.

'For, as for the uttermost antiquity, which is like Fame that muffles her head, and tells tales, I cannot presume much of it; for I would not willingly imitate the manner of those that describe maps, which when they come to some far countries, whereof they have no knowledge, set down how there be great wastes and deserts there: so I am not apt to affirm that they knew little, because what they knew is little known to us.' Bacon. Interpretation of Nature, ch. V.⁴

EGYPT AND ITS FAITH

Chapter I. First Sight of Africa. — First Sights in Africa. — Alexandria.

DOI: 10.4324/9781003113522-2

My first sight of Africa was on a somewhat lurid November evening, when the descending sun marked out by its red light a group of purple rocks to the westward, which had not been visible till then, and which presently became again invisible when the sun had gone down behind them, and the glow of the sky had melted away. What we saw was the island of Zembra, and the neighbouring coast of Tunis. Nothing in Africa struck me more than this its first phantom appearance amidst the chill and gathering dusk of evening, and with a vast expanse of sea heaving red between us and it.

My next sight of Africa was when I came on deck early on the morning of the 20th of November. A Lybian headland was looming to the south-east. Bit by bit more land appeared, low and grey: then the fragments united, and we had before us a continuous line of coast level, sandy and white, with an Arab tower [minaret] on a single eminence. Twice more during the day we saw such a tower, on just such an eminence. The sea was now of a milky blue, and lustrous, as if it were one flowing and heaving opal. Presently it became of the lightest shade of green. When a tower and a ruined building were seen together, every one called out 'Alexandria!' and we expected to arrive by noon: but we passed the tower and ruins, and saw only a further stretch of low and sandy coast. It was three o'clock before we were in harbour. - When we came on deck after dinner, we found that we were waiting for a pilot; and that we ought to be growing impatient, as there was only an hour of daylight left, and the harbour could not be entered after dark. There was no response from a pilot-boat which we hailed; and one of our boats was sent off to require the attendance of the pilot, who evidently thought he could finish another piece of business before he attended to ours. He was compelled to come; and it was but just in time. The stars were out, and the last brilliant lights had faded from the waters, before we anchored. As we entered the harbour, there was to the south-west, the crowd of windmills which are so strange an object in an African port: before us was the town, with Pompey's Pillar⁵ rising behind the roofs: further north, the Pasha's⁶ palace and hareem, with their gardens and rows of palms coming down to the margin of the sea: further round, the lighthouse; and to the east, at the point of the land, a battery. The Pasha's men-of-war, which do not bear well a noon-day examination, looked imposing amidst the brilliant lights and deep shadows of evening, their red flag, with its crescent and single star, floating and falling in the breeze and lull. But for the gorgeous light, there would have been nothing beautiful in the scene, except the flag (the most beautiful in the world) and the figure of our pilot as he stood robed, turbaned and gesticulating on the paddle-box; - a perfect feast to western eyes: but the light shed over the flat and dreary prospect a beauty as home-felt as it does over the grey rain-cloud when it brings out the bow [rainbow]. As we were turning and winding into the harbour, a large French steamer was turning and winding out, - setting forth homewards, - her passengers on deck, and lights gleaming from her ports. Before we came to anchor, she was aground; and sorry we were to see her lying there when we went ashore.

Before our anchor was down, we had a crowd of boats about us, containing a few European gentlemen and a multitude of screaming Arabs. I know no din to be compared to it but that of a frog concert in a Carolina swamp. We had before wondered how our landing was to be accomplished; and the spectacle of the departure of some of our shipmates did not relieve our doubts. We could not pretend to lay about us with stout sticks, as we saw some amiable gentlemen do, purely from the strength of their philosophical conviction that this is the only way to deal with Arabs. Mr. E. had gone ashore among the first, to secure rooms for us: and what we three should have done with ourselves and our luggage without help, there is no saying. But we had help. An English merchant of Alexandria kindly took charge of us; put our luggage into one boat and ourselves into another, and accompanied us ashore. The silence of our little passage from the ship to the quay was a welcome respite: but on the quay we found ourselves among a crowd of men in a variety of odd dresses, and boys pushing their little donkeys in among us, and carts pulled hither and thither, - everybody vociferating and hustling in the starlight. Our luggage was piled upon a long cart, and we followed it on foot: but there was an immediate stoppage about some Custom House difficulty, - got over we know not how. Then the horse ran away, broke his girths, and scattered some of our goods. At last, however, we achieved the walk to our hotel; - a walk through streets not narrow for an eastern city. All the way we had glimpses of smoking householders in their dim interiors, turbaned artisans, and yellow lamplight behind latticed windows. The heat was oppressive to us, after our cool days at sea. - The rest of the evening was fatiguing enough.

The crowd of Bombay passengers hurrying over their preparations, their letter-writing and their tea, in order to start for Cairo at nine o'clock; the growling and snarling of the camels, loading in the Square; the flare of the cressets;⁷ - the heat, light, noise and hurry were overpowering after the monotony of sea life. I sought repose in letter-writing, and had nearly forgotten our actual position when I was spoken to by a departing ship-mate, and, looking up, saw a Greek standing at my elbow, an Arab filling up the door-way, and a Nubian nursemaid coming in for a crying child. - Before ten o'clock, all was comparatively quiet, the Square clear of omnibuses, camels, and the glare of torches, and our Hotel no longer a scene of crowding and confusion. There was nothing to prevent our having a good night, in preparation for our first day of African sight-seeing.

When I looked out of my window early the next morning, I saw, at the moment, nothing peculiarly African. The Frank Square⁸ is spacious, and the houses large; but they would be considered shabby and ugly any where else. The consular flag-staves on the roofs strike the eye; and the flood of brilliant sunlight from behind the minaret made the mornings as little like England in November as could well be. Presently, however, a string of camels passed through the Square, pacing noiselessly along. I thought them then, as I think them now, after a long acquaintance with them, the least agreeable brutes I know. Nothing can be uglier, - unless it be the ostrich; which is ludicrously like the camel, in form, gait and expression of face. The patience of the camel, so celebrated in books, is what I never had the pleasure of seeing. So impatient a beast I do not know, - growling, groaning and fretting whenever asked to do or bear any thing, - looking on such occasions as if it longed to bite, if only it dared. Its malignant expression of face is lost in pictures: but it may be seen whenever one looks for it. The mingled expression of spite, fear and hopelessness in the face of the camel always gave me the impression of its being, or feeling itself, a damned animal. I wonder some of the old painters of hell did not put a camel into their foreground, and make a traditional emblem of it. It is true, the Arab loves his own camel, kisses its lips, hugs its neck, calls it his darling and his jewel, and declares he loves it exactly as he loves his eldest son: but it does not appear that any man's affection extends beyond his own particular camel, which is truly, for its services, an inestimable treasure to him. He is moved to kick and curse at any but the domestic member of the species, as he would be by the perverseness and spite of any other ill-tempered creature. The one virtue of the camel is its ability to work without water; but, out of the desert, I hardly think that any rider would exchange the willing, intelligent and proud service of the horse for that of the camel which objects to every thing, and will do no service but under the compulsion of its own fears.

When the camels had passed, some women entered the Square from different openings. I was surprised to see their faces hardly covered. They pulled their bit of blue rag over, or half over, their faces when any one approached them, as a matter of form; - but in Alexandria, at least, we could generally get a sight of any face we had a mind to see, - excepting, of course, those of mounted ladies. As we went up the country, we found the women more and more closely veiled, to the borders of Nubia, where we were again favoured with a sight of the female countenance.

The next sight in the Square was a hareem, going out for a ride; - a procession of ladies on asses, - each lady enveloped in a sort of balloon of black silk, and astride on her ass, - her feet displaying a pair of bright yellow morocco boots. Each ass was attended by a running footman; and the officer of the hareem brought up the rear.

By this time, my friends were ready for a cup of coffee and a walk before breakfast: and we went forth to see what we could see. After leaving the Square, we made our way through heaps of rubbish and hillocks of dust to the new fortifications, passing Arab huts more sordid and desolate-looking than I remember to have seen in other parts of the country. We met fewer blind and diseased persons than we expected; and I must say that I was agreeably surprised, both this morning and throughout my travels in Egypt, by the appearance of the people. About the dirt there can be no doubt; - the dirt of both dwellings and persons; and the diseases which proceed from want of cleanliness: but the people appeared to us, there and throughout the country, sleek, well-fed and cheerful. I am not sure that I saw an ill-fed person in all Egypt. There is hardship enough of other kinds, - abundance of misery to sadden the heart of the traveller; but not that, as far as we saw, of want of food. I am told, and no doubt truly, that this is partly owing to the law of the Kurán by which every man is bound to share what he has, to the last mouthful, with his brother in need: but there must be enough, or nearly enough food for all, whatever be the law of distribution. Of the progressive depopulation of Egypt for many years past, I am fully convinced; but I am confident that a deficiency of food is not the cause, nor, as yet, a consequence. While I believe that Egypt might again, as formerly, support four times its present population, I see no reason to suppose, amidst all the misgovernment and oppression that the people suffer, that they do not still raise food enough to support life and health. I have seen more emaciated and stunted, and depressed men, women and children in a single walk in England, than I observed from end to end of the land of Egypt. - So much for the mere food question. No one will suppose that in Egypt a sufficiency of food implies, as with us, a sufficiency of some other things scarcely less important to welfare than food.

We saw this morning a sakia* for the first time, - little thinking how familiar and interesting an object th...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Half Title Page
• Series Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Contents Page
• Introduction Page
• Eastern Life, Present and Past (1848), Part I
• EGYPT AND ITS FAITH
• Endnotes