The herald., 1896-08-25
WiCkedness and Wretche dness
Reign Supreme
A DEATH DEALING CLIMATE
Supplemented by Vice Of Every Imagin-
able Form
Port Said, In the Midst Of q Hldeous Desert,
DeserveI Its Reputation for ABB
soiute Badness

On the baking sands at the southeast
corner of the Mediterranean, just whore
the sSuez canal gives birth to tons of steam
crs, ships and every sort of craft, lies Port
Said, the wickedest city in the whole
world.
1t is not lightly nor vainly that this
dirty, urattractvc town on the borderland
betv7een Asia and Africa, half mud walls
and half brick, has been given this name,
for If ever locality deserved such an op-
probrious designation it is this same Port
Said.
Not in any single particular has Port
Said any advantages, commercial or atmos-
phcric. Seven months in the year it is
piping hot and fever breeding, the other
fyo months hardly less dangerous to
health. Trading or business there is al
most mono in the ordinary way, not even
of tho oriental sort. Few cities, indeed,
have so little to offer in the way of shops
and goods for sale. Port Said's sole bust
ness importance in fact, is simply that it
serves as q PORT Of call for the vessels just
going into CT just coming out of the Suez
canal.
There arc Is, COO or go, 900 people in the
town who are permanent residents, but
there not being any business to speak of
four fifths OF these lead idle, wandering,
dissipated lives. Thoir numbers are con-
stantly added to, for, with the arrival of
each ship in tie roadstead-a ship is always
bound to stay there ten or n dozen hours
at lcast-creNy and passengers come ashore
for strolls through the dirty streets, and
the lower minded of them drink and gam
bic in the dcns that dot the town on every
hand.
Under these conditions there has sprung
up q most alarming state Of continued and
constant immortality, which never lessens
but increases yearly. No law, no regula-
tions no police force hold any of these de-
baucherics in check All is open and free.
Vice not only exists, but 1aunts itself
on every hand.
No other city offers like soil for vice to
grow in Irrcgularly Port Said has sprung
up ever since the opening of the Suez
canal, when it was only handful of mud
huts on tho Mediterranean Shores until
the present time, when it is populous
city, while still u struggling oriental viii
lage, of miles Of crooked streets, narrow
lanes with many turn lending for the
most part in cul de sacs) and grim look
ing bywayg between dirty walls
Hardly street in the whole town can
boast of such thing as pavement. Even
ulC CIllCl uNClut, VIC LNtlC ut SOilllllGICt, lS
ankle deep in dust and sand and seems
more like q slum quarter of European
city than the chief artery of any mctropo-
lis, however small.
In all Of Port Said there are only two
buildings tAat command attention from
the visitor-the casino and q big mosque
in the Arab quarter of the town. The
casino is the great gambling hell of this
end of the Mediterranean shore, and to it
flock all Of the gamblers OF that part Of tho
world, gathering there in the dirty, gaudy
hall to put down their i'll gotten gold
pieces upon the faded green cloth. 1t is n
Monte Carlo, with all the charms of its
sybaritic luxuriance and elegance gone, u
tawdry place freqUeuted by the lowest
types. 1t is there that the street beggars,
of which Port Said ia fpll, como to aquan-
der away what they have gained from the
pockets of sy:nrathi2ing visitors.
The mosque IL tho Arab quarter has
but ono really interesting feature, and
that is Il feature filed with unpleasantness.
The traveller who goes to visit it needs nee
essarily to take OF his shoes, in accordance
with tho Mosie1n rite, and lis only safety
Is to carry them as ho wanders about,
for TIE pilfering Arabs in this quarter of
the town think nothing Of purloining the
foot coverings Of any one, and there is
many a foreigner who has had to hobbe
back to his ship 2 q pair of uncomfortable
shoes of oriental manufacture, purchased
speedily and at O dozen times their actual
value in some shop rcar tho mosque.
Two things so to keep Port Said the
wickedest city in existence one being the
climate, which makes hard drinking Il
necessity for tho residents, and the other
tho fact that for some reason or other the
off scourings OF I'll the nations rear by
pour themselves into it. Italians, Rus
slams, Austrians, Turks, Abyssinians,
Egyptians, Arabs Spaniards, Frcnchmcn
and even few degraded Britishers are to
be found in every corner of this prohigate
settlement, all of the worst types their re-
spectivo nations can prodCce-blackleg
swindlers, gamblers, forgers, 1nurderers
and professional beggars, whose arts have
failed elsewhere
The dens are inrumerable, and as can
well be understood they are always well
patronized The climate causes men who
take up residence on these burning sands
to drink to avoid the fever, which is al
ways present danger Somehow the de-
graded and vicious of tho population-or
| about four-flfths of the inhabitants-man-
age to stand this climate and live year aft
or GEAR, but the decent people who have to
stay in Port Said for business reasons find
it impossible as Il general thing to keep
both sober and healthy. They have to
choose between the two, and it is com.
mon saying that five out of every six men
who go to live at Port Said die either of
dclirium tremens or fever within a few
years.
The most of them succumb quickly to
the temptations of the place and join in
the great procession of dissipation and
riotous living. The vice is just the reverse
of gilded, but after a time man gets used
to that and does not mind it. There are,
1T is true, many respectable people living
in this town, but they make no impression
on the great unleavened mass.
The officials Of Port Said either do not
care or else they have determined that it Is
better for them financially to take no no.
tice of the evils around them. Certainly
no attempts arc being made to improve
the city anyway.-San Francisco Exam
incr