George Walker At Suez
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Anthony Trollope >> George Walker At Suez
This etext was produced by David Price, email ccx074@coventry.ac.uk,
from the 1864 Chapman and Hall "Tales of all Countries" edition.
GEORGE WALKER AT SUEZ
by Anthony Trollope
Of all the spots on the world's surface that I, George Walker, of
Friday Street, London, have ever visited, Suez in Egypt, at the head
of the Red Sea, is by far the vilest, the most unpleasant, and the
least interesting. There are no women there, no water, and no
vegetation. It is surrounded, and indeed often filled, by a world
of sand. A scorching sun is always overhead; and one is domiciled
in a huge cavernous hotel, which seems to have been made purposely
destitute of all the comforts of civilised life. Nevertheless, in
looking back upon the week of my life which I spent there I always
enjoy a certain sort of triumph;--or rather, upon one day of that
week, which lends a sort of halo not only to my sojourn at Suez, but
to the whole period of my residence in Egypt.
I am free to confess that I am not a great man, and that, at any
rate in the earlier part of my career, I had a hankering after the
homage which is paid to greatness. I would fain have been a popular
orator, feeding myself on the incense tendered to me by thousands;
or failing that, a man born to power, whom those around him were
compelled to respect, and perhaps to fear. I am not ashamed to
acknowledge this, and I believe that most of my neighbours in Friday
Street would own as much were they as candid and open-hearted as
myself.
It is now some time since I was recommended to pass the first four
months of the year in Cairo because I had a sore-throat. The doctor
may have been right, but I shall never divest myself of the idea
that my partners wished to be rid of me while they made certain
changes in the management of the firm. They would not otherwise
have shown such interest every time I blew my nose or relieved my
huskiness by a slight cough;--they would not have been so intimate
with that surgeon from St. Bartholomew's who dined with them twice
at the Albion; nor would they have gone to work directly that my
back was turned, and have done those very things which they could
not have done had I remained at home. Be that as it may, I was
frightened and went to Cairo, and while there I made a trip to Suez
for a week.
I was not happy at Cairo, for I knew nobody there, and the people at
the hotel were, as I thought, uncivil. It seemed to me as though I
were allowed to go in and out merely by sufferance; and yet I paid
my bill regularly every week. The house was full of company, but
the company was made up of parties of twos and threes, and they all
seemed to have their own friends. I did make attempts to overcome
that terrible British exclusiveness, that noli me tangere with which
an Englishman arms himself; and in which he thinks it necessary to
envelop his wife; but it was in vain, and I found myself sitting
down to breakfast and dinner, day after day, as much alone as I
should do if I called for a chop at a separate table in the
Cathedral Coffee-house. And yet at breakfast and dinner I made one
of an assemblage of thirty or forty people. That I thought dull.
But as I stood one morning on the steps before the hotel, bethinking
myself that my throat was as well as ever I remembered it to be, I
was suddenly slapped on the back. Never in my life did I feel a
more pleasant sensation, or turn round with more unaffected delight
to return a friend's greeting. It was as though a cup of water had
been handed to me in the desert. I knew that a cargo of passengers
for Australia had reached Cairo that morning, and were to be passed
on to Suez as soon as the railway would take them, and did not
therefore expect that the greeting had come from any sojourner in
Egypt. I should perhaps have explained that the even tenor of our
life at the hotel was disturbed some four times a month by a flight
through Cairo of a flock of travellers, who like locusts eat up all
that there was eatable at the Inn for the day. They sat down at the
same tables with us, never mixing with us, having their separate
interests and hopes, and being often, as I thought, somewhat loud
and almost selfish in the expression of them. These flocks
consisted of passengers passing and repassing by the overland route
to and from India and Australia; and had I nothing else to tell, I
should delight to describe all that I watched of their habits and
manners--the outward bound being so different in their traits from
their brethren on their return. But I have to tell of my own
triumph at Suez, and must therefore hasten on to say that on turning
round quickly with my outstretched hand, I found it clasped by John
Robinson.
"Well, Robinson, is this you?" "Holloa, Walker, what are you doing
here?" That of course was the style of greeting. Elsewhere I
should not have cared much to meet John Robinson, for he was a man
who had never done well in the world. He had been in business and
connected with a fairly good house in Sise Lane, but he had married
early, and things had not exactly gone well with him. I don't think
the house broke, but he did; and so he was driven to take himself
and five children off to Australia. Elsewhere I should not have
cared to come across him, but I was positively glad to be slapped on
the back by anybody on that landing-place in front of Shepheard's
Hotel at Cairo.
I soon learned that Robinson with his wife and children, and indeed
with all the rest of the Australian cargo, were to be passed on to
Suez that afternoon, and after a while I agreed to accompany their
party. I had made up my mind, on coming out from England, that I
would see all the wonders of Egypt, and hitherto I had seen nothing.
I did ride on one day some fifteen miles on a donkey to see the
petrified forest; but the guide, who called himself a dragoman, took
me wrong or cheated me in some way. We rode half the day over a
stony, sandy plain, seeing nothing, with a terrible wind that filled
my mouth with grit, and at last the dragoman got off. "Dere," said
he, picking up a small bit of stone, "Dis is de forest made of
stone. Carry that home." Then we turned round and rode back to
Cairo. My chief observation as to the country was this--that
whichever way we went, the wind blew into our teeth. The day's work
cost me five-and-twenty shillings, and since that I had not as yet
made any other expedition. I was therefore glad of an opportunity
of going to Suez, and of making the journey in company with an
acquaintance.
At that time the railway was open, as far as I remember, nearly half
the way from Cairo to Suez. It did not run four or five times a
day, as railways do in other countries, but four or five times a
month. In fact, it only carried passengers on the arrival of these
flocks passing between England and her Eastern possessions. There
were trains passing backwards and forwards constantly, as I
perceived in walking to and from the station; but, as I learned,
they carried nothing but the labourers working on the line, and the
water sent into the Desert for their use. It struck me forcibly at
the time that I should not have liked to have money in that
investment.
Well; I went with Robinson to Suez. The journey, like everything
else in Egypt, was sandy, hot, and unpleasant. The railway
carriages were pretty fair, and we had room enough; but even in them
the dust was a great nuisance. We travelled about ten miles an
hour, and stopped about an hour at every ten miles. This was
tedious, but we had cigars with us and a trifle of brandy and water;
and in this manner the railway journey wore itself away. In the
middle of the night, however, we were moved from the railway
carriages into omnibuses, as they were called, and then I was not
comfortable. These omnibuses were wooden boxes, placed each upon a
pair of wheels, and supposed to be capable of carrying six
passengers. I was thrust into one with Robinson, his wife and five
children, and immediately began to repent of my good-nature in
accompanying them. To each vehicle were attached four horses or
mules, and I must acknowledge that as on the railway they went as
slow as possible, so now in these conveyances, dragged through the
sand, they went as fast as the beasts could be made to gallop. I
remember the Fox Tally-ho coach on the Birmingham road when Boyce
drove it, but as regards pace the Fox Tally-ho was nothing to these
machines in Egypt. On the first going off I was jolted right on to
Mrs. R. and her infant; and for a long time that lady thought that
the child had been squeezed out of its proper shape; but at last we
arrived at Suez, and the baby seemed to me to be all right when it
was handed down into the boat at Suez.
The Robinsons were allowed time to breakfast at that cavernous
hotel--which looked to me like a scheme to save the expense of the
passengers' meal on board the ship--and then they were off. I shook
hands with him heartily as I parted with him at the quay, and wished
him well through all his troubles. A man who takes a wife and five
young children out into a colony, and that with his pockets but
indifferently lined, certainly has his troubles before him. So he
has at home, no doubt; but, judging for myself, I should always
prefer sticking to the old ship as long as there is a bag of
biscuits in the locker. Poor Robinson! I have never heard a word
of him or his since that day, and sincerely trust that the baby was
none the worse for the little accident in the box.
And now I had the prospect of a week before me at Suez, and the
Robinsons had not been gone half an hour before I began to feel that
I should have been better off even at Cairo. I secured a bedroom at
the hotel--I might have secured sixty bedrooms had I wanted them--
and then went out and stood at the front door, or gate. It is a
large house, built round a quadrangle, looking with one front
towards the head of the Red Sea, and with the other into and on a
sandy, dead-looking, open square. There I stood for ten minutes,
and finding that it was too hot to go forth, returned to the long
cavernous room in which we had breakfasted. In that long cavernous
room I was destined to eat all my meals for the next six days. Now
at Cairo I could, at any rate, see my fellow-creatures at their
food. So I lit a cigar, and began to wonder whether I could survive
the week. It was now clear to me that I had done a very rash thing
in coming to Suez with the Robinsons.
Somebody about the place had asked me my name, and I had told it
plainly--George Walker. I never was ashamed of my name yet, and
never had cause to be. I believe at this day it will go as far in
Friday Street as any other. A man may be popular, or he may not.
That depends mostly on circumstances which are in themselves
trifling. But the value of his name depends on the way in which he
is known at his bank. I have never dealt in tea spoons or gravy
spoons, but my name will go as far as another name. "George
Walker," I answered, therefore, in a tone of some little authority,
to the man who asked me, and who sat inside the gate of the hotel in
an old dressing-gown and slippers.
That was a melancholy day with me, and twenty times before dinner
did I wish myself back at Cairo. I had been travelling all night,
and therefore hoped that I might get through some little time in
sleeping, but the mosquitoes attacked me the moment I laid myself
down. In other places mosquitoes torment you only at night, but at
Suez they buzz around you, without ceasing, at all hours. A
scorching sun was blazing overhead, and absolutely forbade me to
leave the house. I stood for a while in the verandah, looking down
at the few small vessels which were moored to the quay, but there
was no life in them; not a sail was set, not a boatman or a sailor
was to be seen, and the very water looked as though it were hot. I
could fancy the glare of the sun was cracking the paint on the
gunwales of the boats. I was the only visitor in the house, and
during all the long hours of the morning it seemed as though the
servants had deserted it.
I dined at four; not that I chose that hour, but because no choice
was given to me. At the hotels in Egypt one has to dine at an hour
fixed by the landlord, and no entreaties will suffice to obtain a
meal at any other. So at four I dined, and after dinner was again
reduced to despair.
I was sitting in the cavernous chamber almost mad at the prospect of
the week before me, when I heard a noise as of various feet in the
passage leading from the quadrangle. Was it possible that other
human beings were coming into the hotel--Christian human beings at
whom I could look, whose voices I could hear, whose words I could
understand, and with whom I might possibly associate? I did not
move, however, for I was still hot, and I knew that my chances might
be better if I did not show myself over eager for companionship at
the first moment. The door, however, was soon opened, and I saw
that at least in one respect I was destined to be disappointed. The
strangers who were entering the room were not Christians--if I might
judge by the nature of the garments in which they were clothed.
The door had been opened by the man in an old dressing-gown and
slippers, whom I had seen sitting inside the gate. He was the Arab
porter of the hotel, and as he marshalled the new visitors into the
room, I heard him pronounce some sound similar to my own name, and
perceived that he pointed me out to the most prominent person of
those who then entered the apartment. This was a stout, portly man,
dressed from head to foot in Eastern costume of the brightest
colours. He wore, not only the red fez cap which everybody wears--
even I had accustomed myself to a fez cap--but a turban round it, of
which the voluminous folds were snowy white. His face was fat, but
not the less grave, and the lower part of it was enveloped in a
magnificent beard, which projected round it on all sides, and
touched his breast as he walked. It was a grand grizzled beard, and
I acknowledged at a moment that it added a singular dignity to the
appearance of the stranger. His flowing robe was of bright colours,
and the under garment which fitted close round his breast, and then
descended, becoming beneath his sash a pair of the loosest
pantaloons--I might, perhaps, better describe them as bags--was a
rich tawny silk. These loose pantaloons were tied close round his
legs, above the ankle, and over a pair of scrupulously white
stockings, and on his feet he wore a pair of yellow slippers. It
was manifest to me at a glance that the Arab gentleman was got up in
his best raiment, and that no expense had been spared on his suit.
And here I cannot but make a remark on the personal bearing of these
Arabs. Whether they be Arabs or Turks, or Copts, it is always the
same. They are a mean, false, cowardly race, I believe. They will
bear blows, and respect the man who gives them. Fear goes further
with them than love, and between man and man they understand nothing
of forbearance. He who does not exact from them all that he can
exact is simply a fool in their estimation, to the extent of that
which he loses. In all this, they are immeasurably inferior to us
who have had Christian teaching. But in one thing they beat us.
They always know how to maintain their personal dignity.
Look at my friend and partner Judkins, as he stands with his hands
in his trousers pockets at the door of our house in Friday Street.
What can be meaner than his appearance? He is a stumpy, short,
podgy man; but then so also was my Arab friend at Suez. Judkins is
always dressed from head to foot in a decent black cloth suit; his
coat is ever a dress coat, and is neither old nor shabby. On his
head he carries a shining new silk hat, such as fashion in our
metropolis demands. Judkins is rather a dandy than otherwise,
piquing himself somewhat on his apparel. And yet how mean is his
appearance, as compared with the appearance of that Arab;--how mean
also is his gait, how ignoble his step! Judkins could buy that Arab
out four times over, and hardly feel the loss; and yet were they to
enter a room together, Judkins would know and acknowledge by his
look that he was the inferior personage. Not the less, should a
personal quarrel arise between them, would Judkins punch the Arab's
head; ay, and reduce him to utter ignominy at his feet.
Judkins would break his heart in despair rather than not return a
blow; whereas the Arab would put up with any indignity of that sort.
Nevertheless Judkins is altogether deficient in personal dignity. I
often thought, as the hours hung in Egypt, whether it might not be
practicable to introduce an oriental costume in Friday Street.
At this moment, as the Arab gentleman entered the cavernous coffee-
room, I felt that I was greatly the inferior personage. He was
followed by four or five others, dressed somewhat as himself; though
by no means in such magnificent colours, and by one gentleman in a
coat and trousers. The gentleman in the coat and trousers came
last, and I could see that he was one of the least of the number.
As for myself, I felt almost overawed by the dignity of the stout
party in the turban, and seeing that he came directly across the
room to the place where I was seated, I got upon my legs and made
him some sign of Christian obeisance.
I am a little man, and not podgy, as is Judkins, and I flatter
myself that I showed more deportment, at any rate, than he would
have exhibited.
I made, as I have said, some Christian obeisance. I bobbed my head,
that is, rubbing my hands together the while, and expressed an
opinion that it was a fine day. But if I was civil, as I hope I
was, the Arab was much more so. He advanced till he was about six
paces from me, then placed his right hand open upon his silken
breast,- and inclining forward with his whole body, made to me a bow
which Judkins never could accomplish. The turban and the flowing
robe might be possible in Friday Street, but of what avail would be
the outer garments and mere symbols, if the inner sentiment of
personal dignity were wanting? I have often since tried it when
alone, but I could never accomplish anything like that bow. The
Arab with the flowing robe bowed, and the other Arabs all bowed
also; and after that the Christian gentleman with the coat and
trousers made a leg. I made a leg also, rubbing my hands again, and
added to my former remarks that it was rather hot.
"Dat berry true," said the porter in the dirty dressing-gown, who
stood by. I could see at a glance that the manner of that porter
towards me was greatly altered, and I began to feel comforted in my
wretchedness. Perhaps a Christian from Friday Street, with plenty
of money in his pockets, would stand in higher esteem at Suez than
at Cairo. If so, that alone would go far to atone for the apparent
wretchedness of the place. At Cairo I had not received that
attention which had certainly been due to me as the second partner
in the flourishing Manchester house of Grimes, Walker, and Judkins.
But now, as my friend with the beard again bowed to me, I felt that
this deficiency was to be made up. It was clear, however, that this
new acquaintance, though I liked the manner of it, would be attended
with considerable inconvenience, for the Arab gentleman commenced an
address to me in French. It has always been to me a source of
sorrow that my parents did not teach me the French language, and
this deficiency on my part has given rise to an incredible amount of
supercilious overbearing pretension on the part of Judkins--who
after all can hardly do more than translate a correspondent's
letter. I do not believe that he could have understood that Arab's
oration, but at any rate I did not. He went on to the end, however,
speaking for some three or four minutes, and then again he bowed.
If I could only have learned that bow, I might still have been
greater than Judkins with all his French.
"I am very sorry," said I, "but I don't exactly follow the French
language when it is spoken."
"Ah! no French!" said the Arab in very broken English, "dat is one
sorrow." How is it that these fellows learn all languages under the
sun? I afterwards found that this man could talk Italian, and
Turkish, and Armenian fluently, and say a few words in German, as he
could also in English. I could not ask for my dinner in any other
language than English, if it were to save me from starvation. Then
he called to the Christian gentleman in the pantaloons, and, as far
as I could understand, made over to him the duty of interpreting
between us. There seemed, however, to be one difficulty in the way
of this being carried on with efficiency. The Christian gentleman
could not speak English himself. He knew of it perhaps something
more than did the Arab, but by no means enough to enable us to have
a fluent conversation.
And had the interpreter--who turned out to be an Italian from
Trieste, attached to the Austrian Consulate at Alexandria--had the
interpreter spoken English with the greatest ease, I should have had
considerable difficulty in understanding and digesting in all its
bearings, the proposition made to me. But before I proceed to the
proposition, I must describe a ceremony which took place previous to
its discussion. I had hardly observed, when first the procession
entered the room, that one of my friend's followers--my friend's
name, as I learned afterwards, was Mahmoud al Ackbar, and I will
therefore call him Mahmoud--that one of Mahmoud's followers bore in
his arms a bundle of long sticks, and that another carried an iron
pot and a tray. Such was the case, and these two followers came
forward to perform their services, while I, having been literally
pressed down on to the sofa by Mahmoud, watched them in their
progress. Mahmoud also sat down, and not a word was spoken while
the ceremony went on. The man with the sticks first placed on the
ground two little pans--one at my feet, and then one at the feet of
his master. After that he loosed an ornamented bag which he carried
round his neck, and producing from it tobacco, proceeded to fill two
pipes. This he did with the utmost gravity, and apparently with
very peculiar care. The pipes had been already fixed at one end of
the stick, and to the other end the man had fastened two large
yellow balls. These, as I afterwards perceived, were mouth-pieces
made of amber. Then he lit the pipes, drawing up the difficult
smoke by long painful suckings at the mouthpiece, and then, when the
work had become apparently easy, he handed one pipe to me, and the
other to his master. The bowls he had first placed in the little
pans on the ground.
During all this time no word was spoken, and I was left altogether
in the dark as to the cause which had produced this extraordinary
courtesy. There was a stationary sofa--they called it there a
divan--which was fixed into the corner of the room, and on one side
of the angle sat Mahmoud al Ackbar, with his feet tucked under him,
while I sat on the other. The remainder of the party stood around,
and I felt so little master of the occasion, that I did not know
whether it would become me to bid them be seated. I was not master
of the entertainment. They were not my pipes. Nor was it my
coffee, which I saw one of the followers preparing in a distant part
of the room. And, indeed, I was much confused as to the management
of the stick and amber mouth-piece with which I had been presented.
With a cigar I am as much at home as any man in the City. I can
nibble off the end of it, and smoke it to the last ash, when I am
three parts asleep. But I had never before been invited to regale
myself with such an instrument as this. What was I to do with that
huge yellow ball? So I watched my new friend closely.
It had manifestly been a part of his urbanity not to commence till I
had done so, but seeing my difficulty he at last raised the ball to
his mouth and sucked at it. I looked at him and envied the gravity
of his countenance, and the dignity of his demeanour. I sucked
also, but I made a sputtering noise, and must confess that I did not
enjoy it. The smoke curled gracefully from his mouth and nostrils
as he sat there in mute composure. I was mute as regarded speech,
but I coughed as the smoke came from me in convulsive puffs. And
then the attendant brought us coffee in little tin cups--black
coffee, without sugar and full of grit, of which the berries had
been only bruised, not ground. I took the cup and swallowed the
mixture, for I could not refuse, but I wish that I might have asked
for some milk and sugar. Nevertheless there was something very
pleasing in the whole ceremony, and at last I began to find myself
more at home with my pipe.
When Mahmoud had exhausted his tobacco, and perceived that I also
had ceased to puff forth smoke, he spoke in Italian to the
interpreter, and the interpreter forthwith proceeded to explain to
me the purport of this visit. This was done with much difficulty,
for the interpreter's stock of English was very scanty--but after
awhile I understood, or thought I understood, as follows:- At some
previous period of my existence I had done some deed which had given
infinite satisfaction to Mahmoud al Ackbar. Whether, however, I had
done it myself, or whether my father had done it, was not quite
clear to me. My father, then some time deceased, had been a
wharfinger at Liverpool, and it was quite possible that Mahmoud
might have found himself at that port. Mahmoud had heard of my
arrival in Egypt, and had been given to understand that I was coming
to Suez--to carry myself away in the ship, as the interpreter
phrased it. This I could not understand, but I let it pass. Having
heard these agreeable tidings--and Mahmoud, sitting in the corner,
bowed low to me as this was said--he had prepared for my acceptance
a slight refection for the morrow, hoping that I would not carry
myself away in the ship till this had been eaten. On this subject I
soon made him quite at ease, and he then proceeded to explain that
as there was a point of interest at Suez, Mahmoud was anxious that I
should partake of the refection somewhat in the guise of a picnic,
at the Well of Moses, over in Asia, on the other side of the head of
the Red Sea. Mahmoud would provide a boat to take across the party
in the morning, and camels on which we would return after sunset.
Or else we would go and return on camels, or go on camels and return
in the boat. Indeed any arrangement would be made that I preferred.
If I was afraid of the heat, and disliked the open boat, I could be
carried round in a litter. The provisions had already been sent
over to the Well of Moses in the anticipation that I would not
refuse this little request.