On the Desert: with a brief review of recent events in Egypt

Front matter

MOUNT SERBAL. Page 62. On the Desert: a IRarrative of travel FROM EGYPT THROUGH THE WILDERNESS OF SINAI TO PALESTINE. By HENRY M. FIELD, D.D., NEW YORK. j^Luthor's JZ.bition. With Illustrations TSiOnbon : T. NELSON AND SONS, PATERNOSTER ROW. EDINBURGH; AND NEW YORK. 1884. preface. HE Peninsula of Sinai has been a favourite ground of Biblical explorers. In their zeal to visit scenes made dear by connection with Sacred History, they have sought to follow the track of the children of Israel from the time of their departure out of Egypt ; to trace their marches in the Desert ; and to fix the place of their encampments, not only around the base of Sinai, but even when wandering and almost lost in the "great and terrible wilderness." The fruit of these researches is a Library of Exploration, which forms a most valuable addition to our Biblical Literature, not only for the knowledge it gives of sacred geography, but of the whole religious, social, and political economy of the Hebrews.

While these great works, the monuments of so much learning, occupy the attention of scholars, other readers may be interested in turning over a Portfolio of Sketches, which claims only to present a few Pictures of the Desert. The Peninsula is as unique in its scenery as in its history, combining the three great features of the desert, the mountains, and the sea — the sands, the cliffs, and the rolling waters ; all which have a peculiar fascination when seen in a pure, transparent atmosphere, with the lights and shadows of sunrisings and sunsettings. Passing through such a country, not as an explorer, but only as a traveller, the writer has been content to accept what came within his personal observation, and to describe only what he could see with his own eyes. The notes which are here written out were all taken on the spot, often in the most difficult circumstances ; — in the tent at the close of

Preface

. VI day, when wearied -with a long march ; or at noon, resting under a cliff, in " the shadow of a great rock in a weary land ; " on the shore of the sea, or on the tops of mountains. Sometimes, as he passed over a point of view which commanded a wide sweep of the horizon, he could only rein in his camel, and sketch the scene from the saddle. Pictures thus taken, if they have no other merit, may have that of a literal fidelity ; and imperfect as they are, may perhaps impart a little of the glow of enthusiasm which the scenes themselves enkindled in him who attempts to describe them, and thus lead some to follow in his steps ; while to others he would hope that these lighter sketches may serve -as an in troduction to those great works, which are not only of absorbing interest, but rich in learning and instruction.

Once only in the following pages is the simple narrative — the detail of incidents of tent-life, of the camp and the march, or the description of scenes on the mountain and the desert — interrupted to introduce a defence of the Hebrew Law. This may be thought quite unnecessary. But it has become such a fashion of the day to question, not only the inspiration of Moses, but his wisdom as a lawgiver, and even his humanity, that one who was loyal to that great name could hardly refrain from some reflections which naturally arose under the cliffs of Sinai. ©Contents. I. CAIRO — PREPARING THE CAMP,... ... ... ... ... 9 II. THE FIRST DAT IN THE DESERT, ... ..'. ... ... IS III. MARAH, ELIM, AND THE CAMP BT THE RED SEA, ... ... 31 IV. OUR BEDAWEEN COMPANIONS, ... ... ... ... ... 40 V. A SABBATH IN THE WILDERNESS, ... ... ... ... 62 VI.

THE ASCENT OF MOUNT SERBAL, ... ... ... ... 60 VII. COMING TO THE FOOT OF SINAI, ... ... ... ... 60 VIII. ON THE TOP OF MOUNT SINAI, ... ... ... ... 78 IX. THE HEBREW COMMONWEALTH FOUNDED ON RELIGION, ... ... 92 X. THEOCRACY AND DEMOCRACY, ... ... ... ... ... 105 XI. THE CRIMINAL LAW: WAS IT WRITTEN IN BLOOD? ... ... 121 XII. LIFE IN A CONVENT, ... ... ... ... ... ... 136 XIII. LEAVING SINAI— PASSING THROUGH THE MOUNTAINS, ... ... 160 XIV. THE GREAT AND TERRIBLE WILDERNESS, ... ... ... 163 XV. NUKHL — ON THE ROUTE OF PILGRIMS TO MECCA, ... ... 176 XVI. THE OLD SHEIK — ILLNESS IN THE DESERT, ... ... ... 188 XVn. PERILS AMONG ROBBERS, ... ... ... ... ... 202 XVIII. RETURNING TO CIVILIZATION, ... ... ... ... ... 214 XIX. THE MOSLEMS OF GAZA — A BRAVE MISSIONARY, ... ... ... 224 XX. THROUGH THE HILL COUNTRY TO BETHLEHEM, ... ... ... 233 XXr.

AROUND THE PLACE WHERE CHRIST WAS BORN, ... ... ... 241 XXII. THE DEAD SEA AND THE JORDAN— JERICHO, ... ... ... 254 XXIII. GOING UP TO JERUSALEM, ... ... ... ... ... of illustrations. mount serbal, .. . . .. .. .. .. Frontispiece MAP OF SINAI AND ITS SURROUNDINGS, .. .. .. .. .. 8 GRAND CAIRO, .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. 10 WELLS OF MOSES, . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22 WILDERNESS OF SIN, .. .. .. .. .. .. .. 38 BEDOUIN ARAB OF MOUNT SINAI, .. .. .. .. .. .. 42 THE CAMEL-BOY, . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44 REPHIDIM, .. .. .. .. .. .. .. 50 wadyfeiran: MOUNT SERBAL IN THE DISTANCE, .. .. .. .. 54 CONVENT OF ST. CATHERINE, .. .. .. .. .. .. 74 PRIOR OF THE CONVENT OF ST. CATHERINE, .. .. .. .. 76 MOUNT SINAI, .. .. .. .. .. .. .. 84 ECONOME OF THE CONVENT OF ST. CATHERINE, .. .. .. .. 146 GAZA, .. .. .. . . .. .. .. 218 THE JORDAN: MOUNTAINS OF MOAB ON THE EAST. .. .. .. .. ON THE DESERT.

Chapter I. Cairo

— PREPARING THE CAMP. HE war had not yet come. For months there had been rumours of trouble in Egypt; the English papers were full of accounts of tumult and disorder; there had been a military revolution; troops had surrounded the palace of the khedive, and compelled a change of ministry ; all power was in the hands of the army ; constitutional authority was destroyed, and the country was drifting into anarchy. Such reports created a feeling of alarm in Europe, and many travellers who had proposed to spend a winter on the Nile, remained in the south of France or in Italy. I left Naples with some apprehension, but as we approached Alexandria on the morning of the 1 6th of February, the sun rose on the same scene as when we had landed there from Constantinople six years before. There was no sign of warlike preparation.

Everything had the look of peace and of commercial prosperity. The ships that crowded the har bour showed that we were entering the great maritime city of the East, while there was a faint revival of the ancient splendour in the palaces on the shore. In all this there was nothing to give token of a city that in four short months was to be the scene of a fearful massacre, and that one month later was to be devoted to destruction. For the present there was nothing to excite apprehension. I CAIRO-PREPARING THE CAMP. landed at Alexandria with no worse fate than that of being pulled this way and that, as every traveller is, by the Arab boatmen, anxious for the honour of carrying his baggage and receiving his money, and drove to the Hotel de l'Europe on the Place Mehemet Ali, which was the scene of the massacre on the 11th of June, and proceeded to Cairo without incident, stopping at Tantah by the way, where, four months later, foreigners were dragged out of trains and butchered in cold blood.

But as yet all was quiet; and when I found myself once more in Cairo, in my old quarters at the Grand New Hotel, where I had been six years before, sitting on the same balcony overlooking the Ezbekieh Square, and listening to the same music floating up from under the palm trees below, I felt as if I were at home, and gave myself up to the full enjoyment of the most delightful of Eastern cities. For a winter's residence there is nothing to equal Cairo. The flood of light, which gives brightness and colour to everything; the soft and balmy air, which it is a luxury to breathe ; the palms, with their tall trunks and tufted crowns ; the old mosques, with their minarets, from which the muezzin calls the faithful to prayer ; the endless bazaars, with long-bearded Orientals sitting at the place of custom ; the picturesque sights of the streets, with dashing carriages and lithe and springy syces, dressed in white, with red girdles and velvet caps, running before them as they ran before the chariot of Pharaoh ; and the long processions of camels, making such a contrast with the donkeys waddling under the weight of fat, turbaned Turks, or of women, sitting astride and covered in black from head to foot, with only a pair of eyes peering out from faces thickly veiled, or ambling along with English riders on their backs, and the donkey-boys, now belabouring the little beasts, and now helping their own slow steps by dragging at their tails;— all these make a variety and change of which one never wearies.

Of course, however short one's visit to Cairo, and however often he has been there before, he must ride out to the Pyramids, to look again with awe and wonder at those mighty monuments of the past ; and to Heliopolis, to see the oldest obelisk in Egypt, still standing, as it stood four thousand years ago, in front of the GRAND CAIRO Page 10. Temple of the Sun; where Joseph saw it when he married the daughter of the priest of On; and where Plato studied philosophy, as Moses had studied before him, and became, like him, "learned in all the wisdom of the Egyptians." To its attractions in the way of antiquities, Cairo has recently had a great addition in the royal mummies lately discovered at Thebes, which have been brought down the Nile and placed in the museum at Boulak, which I visited with Dr. Grant, who is an authority as an Egyptologist.

If it is an honour to stand before kings, even dead kings, I had it to the full that day. There I saw the open sarcophagus which holds the mummied body of Rameses II., whose daughter took Moses out of the bulrushes. Dr. Grant has in his private collection a ring, of which he has good reason to bebeve that it once adorned the finger of Menephtah, the son and successor of Rameses and the very Pharaoh of the Exodus. Not less interesting to me, in a different way, was a visit to Dr. Schweinfurth, the distinguished African traveller, who makes his home in Cairo, as the most convenient point from which to make his journeys into the interior of Africa Here he has gathered his great collections of plants : his walls are Uned with charts and maps, on which he kindly traced for me the outlines of his ex plorations.

I listened with amazement at the simple story. For thousands and thousands of miles he made his way through swamp and jungle and forest, across deserts and over mountains. " And how did you travel?" I asked. "On foot."— "With whom?" " Alone ! " There is nothing in all the history of exploration more touching than the story of the loss of his treasures. When he had travelled more than two years, and amassed a collection of priceless value, it was destroyed in an hour by the burning of an African village. Then indeed he feared that his reason might give way. To keep his mind in action, he began keeping a record of his own footsteps along his lonely and dreary march, and in six months made an actual count of a million and a quarter of steps I Thus he got his mind away from brooding on his loss, and his brain into some sort of regular action.

After this, who shall say CAIRO-PREPARING THE CAMP. that courage of the highest kind has died out from among men, or that even this sordid and selfish age of ours cannot produce heroes equal to any found in story? He reckons the Nile to be the long est river in the world; but in the measurement he includes, as a part of the great river of Egypt, certain affluents of the lakes out of which it flows, — apart from which it might not equal either the Amazon or the Mississippi. There was another man whom it was a pleasure to see walking about the streets of Cairo — M. de Lesseps. He was generally leading a child by the hand, one of his second family, the children of his old age. I had met him in America, and he received me very cordially. To my inquiry as to the comparative difficulties of the two great interoceanic canals with which his name is con nected, he answered without hesitation that the difficulties of Suez were far greater than those of Panama.

The former was built in the desert : there were no means of transportation except the backs of camels, until new approaches were constructed ; new implements of engineering had to be created for the unaccustomed task ; even to the end a large part of the excavations had to be made by the fellaheen taking up the sand or the slime in bas kets, and carrying it away on their heads ! But at Panama a railroad is already built across the mountains, which can trans port men and materials to any point. The old man expressed himself as entirely satisfied with the progress of the work, and spoke with absolute assurance of its complete success : he was going out to America the next year to see how far it was advanced, although he was nearly eighty years of age, and had not a doubt that he should live to see the waters of the two oceans flowing together.

With such a man it seems, indeed, as if all ordinary rules were reversed ; as if the obstacles of time and nature, which daunt and defeat less ardent spirits, were made to bend to his unconquerable will. Cairo has many social attractions in its English and American families, and in strangers that come here for the winter. The only drawback to the pleasure of such residence has been the government, which, with many protestations of reform, has had all the vices of other Oriental states. I think' it is Macaulay who has said that the worst Christian government is better than the best Moslem government. Whatever show of civilization it may present to the world, hidden behind this screen are the two monstrous evils of polygamy and slavery. Slavery is forbidden by the law of Egypt, yet every pasha has slaves in his house, so little force has the law against universal custom.

Visitors to Cairo know the school of Miss Whately, a daughter of the late Archbishop of Dublin, which has been established here many years, and done very great good. Calling upon her one day with a friend, she told us that she had recently added to her school an infirmary for the treatment of those in need of medical aid. Almost the first sufferer to be brought in was a white slave, a Circassian. She had been in the harem of a Turkish master at Smyrna, who, tiring of her, brought her to Cairo and sold her to an Egyptian, who took her to his harem, where she was not only a slave, but virtually a prisoner. So much did the horror of her situation come upon her, that she tried to escape, and one night crept down the stair to the door, where she met the black eunuch who generally keeps guard before such places, who asked her what she wanted, and drove her back again.

She returned to her room in despair, with her brain on fire with the thought of committing suicide if she could not gain her liberty. Opening the window, she threw out her slippers, and then, shutting her eyes, and pray ing God to help her, cast herself out also, and fell on the stone pavement ! It is a wonder she was not killed instantly, but only one of her legs was broken, and she still retained strength to crawl across the street to the Belgian Consul's, and beg his pro tection. He was moved to pity by her misery, and took her in, and the next clay obtained papers declaring her free, when she was removed to the infirmary connected with Miss Whately's school, and for the first time was a free woman, under the protection of an English home. Such incidents, illustrating the horrible crimes that are possible ■1 under even the best Moslem government, make us more than willing to see the 'rule of Egypt pass into the hands of some Christian power.

If the English do but remain masters of the country, even if it be only for a few years, there may be established something like good government, and the great draw back will be removed to the pleasure of a residence on the banks of the Nile. But my purpose in coming to Egypt was simply to take it en route to the Desert. When in the East six years ago, we had planned to sail from Constantinople to Beirut, and make the tour of the Holy Land; but the cholera had broken out in Northern Syria — which caused such a strict quarantine to be kept along the coast, that we were warned that we should be subject to great delay when we came to leave the country to enter Egypt, and so we were obliged to sail direct to Alexandria. We spent six weeks in Egypt, going up the Nile, and then embarked for India.

I consoled myself for the loss of Palestine by inwardly resolving to keep it for another time, when I might be able also to go to Mount Sinai. That time had now come, and I was in Cairo not even to enjoy, except for a few days, its picturesque scenes or its delightful climate, but simply to pass on my way to a very different country. I had come from Naples alone, leaving my family to spend the winter in Italy. But it would have been cheerless to set out on a solitary pilgrimage across the desert. While unsettled in plans, I learned that Dr. George E. Post, Professor of Surgery and Botany in the Syrian Protestant College at Beirut, had for some time desired to make the journey to Sinai, and wrote to him inviting him to share my tent and table. To my great joy he was able to accept the invitation ; and never was a traveller more fortunate in his companion.

I found him the model of a Christian gentleman and scholar. He is one of that corps of young men who, uniting scientific knowledge with missionary zeal, have done so much both for science and religion — and, I may add, for the honour of the American name in the East. For weeks we rode side by side on our camels, and his conversation beguiled the weariness of the way. With such a companion one could never be lonely. He had lived eighteen years in Beirut, w*as master of the Arabic language, and was familiar with all Oriental customs. He joined me in Cairo on the 20th of February, and we were together a w*eek before we set out on our journey. He at once relieved me of all the details of our proposed expedi tion. It is no small thing to make preparation for crossing the desert. One must choose his dragoman, and draw up a formal contract, which has to be signed and sealed before the consul, in which every item is specified — the number of camels and tents, the days of marching, and the provisions of every kind, even to what we should have for breakfast, for luncheon, and dinner, and to the number of our sheets and towels.

Travellers in the East may be pardoned if they are sometimes lifted up with vanity when they see that it takes almost as much to set them in motion as to get a ship under way. Though there were but two of us, it required a considerable outfit for a month in camp. Everything had to be carried on the backs of camels; — our tents, iron bedsteads, mat tresses, table, and camp-chairs ; a stock of household furniture sufficient to begin housekeeping ; to which must be added stores of canned meat and fruits, boxes of eggs, and even a hencoop full of chickens ! Even when thus provided, we could not have a single meal except as we carried sacks of charcoal to cook our food. And not less important than what we were to eat was what we were to drink, of which we must have a large supply ; for though the camels could go for days without water, we could not.

This had to be carried in casks, which were slung on the backs of camels. Altogether, an Arab sheik with his patriarchal family could hardly make a more imposing caravan. We found a dragoman in a Syrian from Beirut, whom Dr. Post had known before — Yohanna (or Hanna) Abeusaab — who was willing and obliging, though not always as energetic as we could wish, yet who served us fairly well, and for whom we had, and still have, a very friendly feeling. As soon as the contract was signed, he began to bustle about with a sense of importance, and in an hour or two knocked at our doors to ask us to come out into an open space behind the hotel to see our tents and to select our camels. The tents were already pitched, and we drew aside the door almost with the feeling that we were penetrating the retreat of some Oriental potentate.

They were ornamented with figures in gay colours and carpeted with Persian rugs, which together made quite a brave show. Yohanna smiled serenely as he saw the pleasure, not unmingled with surprise, with which we regarded such magnificence, and gravely intimated that he was not yet at the end of his resources, but that he would do "more better" for us before he got through. There was also a housekeeping tent, in which the cook would perform his mysterious operations. The Arabs would sleep outside in the open air. The selection of camels is a very nice matter, as on a good beast depends much of the comfort of one's journey. Looking over the number of those lying on the ground, 1 picked out a young drome dary that had rather a sleek appearance. Just then Dr. Schwein furth, who was passing in the street, came up, and gave us the benefit of his experience as an African traveller.

He thought I had chosen rather a pretty creature, but advised me to spread out what she carried broadly on her back, so as to make, not a narrow saddle, but a space on which one could sit in Turkish fashion, with his legs under him, or change his posture at will. I observed that this was the custom of the Arabs, by which they are able to take their long marches in the desert without undue fatigue. As my camel and I were now to be on somewhat intimate relations, I approached to make her acquaintance, and even tendered her some little caressing, attempting to stroke her gently ; but in an instant she swung round her long neck, and gave me a vicious snap, which warned me not to presume on any familiarities. I concluded to make no further advances, but still virtuously resolved to be a kind and indulgent master.

In all this busy preparation, I felt as if I were " only a passenger," although Dr. Post said that the Arabs, recognizing me as the head of the expedition, would give me the title of " Father of Backsheesh." I find that the relation between the giver of back sheesh and the receiver of it is a mysterious and sacred one. Hardly had I left this tent -ground before an Arab, whose camel I was to ride, rushed up to me in the street, and saluted me with the greatest warmth, telling me that " he was my backsheesh man ! " The sternest howadji could not but feel a pitying fond ness for those who looked up to him as their protector, — a feeling which would grow into something more if they served him, as they served us, with the utmost patience and fidelity.

Chapter II. The First Day IX The Desert

HE camels had gone forward to Suez four days before we left Cairo. As we could overtake them in a few hours bv railway, we lingered behind to the last moment to enjoy the animated life of the streets and bazaars. As we sat on our balcony, and listened once more to the music from the square below, it seemed as if the band were playmg a Chant du Depart, and we knew that our time had come. But we both felt regret at leaving the most Oriental of cities, with perhaps the single exception of Damascus ; and as we rolled away we kept looking back at the Pyramids, as with other companions I had looked back at the dome of St. Peter's as we departed from Rome. The Delta is not unlike the Campagna in its broad sweep and limitless horizon, and never did it appear in greater beauty. The spring-time had long since come, and already the land was rejoicing with the joy of its first harvest — a harvest not of grain but of grass.

As far as the eye could reach, the fields were in bloom with clover. These rich, juicy grasses, are the chief dependence of the Arabs for the support of their beasts of burden, and the harvest is gathered with the greatest care. It is not done by patent mowers, as on our Western prairies ; but the Arabs, scattering over the plain with their sickles, clear each a rod or two of ground, just enough to make a load for a camel, and piling them in huge bundles on their backs, a procession of these moving hay stacks goes swinging along the road into Cairo. This clover-harvest lasts only a few weeks, but it is a very pretty sight, presenting a boundless sea of verdure, and illustrating the exhaustless fertility of the Valley of the Nile. And now we leave the great river behind us, and move out on the broad spaces of the Delta, where we find resemblances to other landscapes than the Campagna.

If we could but take away the miserable Arab villages, and in their places introduce a few wind mills and dikes and canals, we might be in Holland ; or if we were to go still further, and strip the landscape of all but what nature has given it, we might be on the prairies of Illinois. But the Arabs and the camels and the palm trees are not Dutch nor American. About fifty miles from Cairo we come to Zagazig — a place which has risen to importance as a centre of the railway system of Egypt, the line from Cairo meeting that from Alexandria and going on to Ismailia and Suez. Soon after leaving Zagazig, the railway runs parallel to the Sweet Water Canal, and after a few miles passes over a spot which six months later was to be made famous by the battle of Tel-el-Kebir. But as we could not anticipate history that was to come, our thoughts were of history long past and remote.

We were here skirting the land of Goshen, where Jacob and his sons settled when they came into Egypt, and from which four hundred years later Moses led the Exodus of the Israelites, then grown to be a nation of two (perhaps three) millions of people. When they rose up in the night to flee out of Egypt, it is not probable that they intended to march by the way of the desert ; for that was far aside from the direct route to Canaan, the land promised to their fathers. At first they moved to the north-east, following the old caravan route to Syria; from which they were turned back by a line of forts which stretched along the border of Egypt — the dividing-line between Asia and Africa. It was then that they turned south ward to make their escape, and that the Egyptians, following hard after them, thought that they had caught them between the mountains and the sea, which had "shut them in;" and it was only when the Israelites had crossed the Red Sea, which not only overwhelmed their enemies, but put a barrier to further pursuit, that they were safe.

At Ismailia we struck the desert, which here appears, not as a level plain, but undulating like the rolling prairies of the West. The wind having an unbroken sweep, makes sport of the sand, as it does of snow in winter, casting it up in huge drifts, like the dunes thrown up by the German Ocean on the coast of Holland. At eight o'clock in the evening we reached Suez (we had left Cairo at noon), and stopped at the hotel where, with another travelling companion, I had rested for a night six years before, when on the way to India. There is hardly a caravanserai in the world which receives within its doors a more miscellaneous company of travellers, coming and going between Europe and Asia. As we sat at table, EngUshmen who had just landed were talking of tiger hunts in India. A gentleman with whom we had made a pleasant acquaintance in Cairo was to leave the next morning for Hong Kong.