Tazewell Republican. [volume] (Tazewell, Va.) 1892-1919, 1897-08-05
BACKBONE OF EGYPTIAN RACE.
Formed by the Hnrd-WOrlsing, Pa
tient Serfs OF the Soil.


tient Serfs OF the Soil.
We lad come into the region Of the
up-country fellahin-the peasants and
cultivators of the soil, who form the
backbone of the Egyptian race and have
from earliest times persistently main
taiued the type of field laborer, TIE serf
of the soil. The horrible expressions
practiced upon these poor creatures in
times past, the eNactions, cruclties,
butcheries, monstrous injustice from
which they have suffered, have not dis
turbcd their conservative temper or
destroyed their passionate fondness for
their native soil or their stubborn re-
sistance to taxation. 1t is said that girls
often refuse to marry men who will not
bind themselves TO live in their native
village. Occasionally one meets man
or boy who went to the exhibition OF
Old Cairo, in Chicago, and, while there,
received good offers to remain in Amer"
lea, but refused them all because OF
homesickness. This climate is the per-
petual friend and consider TO the poor;
and, if they were only little cleaner, a
little less degraded and superstitious,
there would be small occasion for pity.
The filthy condition of the Arab chill
dren, both in town and country, is con-
slant source of sorrow and disgust to
the tourist. 1t is said that they are
wilfully neglected by their parents,
that they may escape the baleful eff
fects of the evil eye, universally be-
lieved in by the natives. AS you ascend
the Nile, the face veil disappears, and
nose-rinsas and curious tattooing be-
come cor mon. 4 casual visitor is at
great disadvantage in the effort to ac-
quire accurate information as to the
domestic arrangements Of the people.
The guides and others with whom you
come in contact generally tell you the
tales that seem to them appropriate
and polite for the ears of foreigners.
The donkey-boys and others who have
had some intercou Sc with strangers
know that the idea of plurality of
wives is abhorrent to the ordinary Eng
lish and American mind. They there
fore express a dislike of it themselves;
and each afiirms that he has taken but
one wife, and does not intend to bur-
den himself with more,
Concurrent testimony seems to show
that it is rather rare for well-to-do
Egyptian to take more than one legal
wife at time, though the number of
his female slaves may be unlimited.
The law of the prophet allows four legal
wives; and I am told that the fellahin
often take the full complement of ,lp-
mates, in order to use them as field Ia
borers without wage. AS you ascend
the Nile, you often see women at work
in the fields and busy at all sorts of
mental tasks except the hardest-that
of raising water from the Nile by means
of the shaduf for purposes Of irrigation.
One realizes how cheap labor must be
in Egypt, when, for few pence day,
men will stand half naked, in mud and
water, lifting skin buckets to the level
of hollow in the steep bank, by means
of long pole and weight balanced on
support; while another man above
repeats the paianful process of raising
it to the level of the irrigating ditch.
It is one of the saddest sights one sees
on the Nile-this pouring of water, by
means of little buckets, into bitches,
and growing old in fertiliZing a small
patch of land. This appliance is prob
ably as old as the awkward, unhandy
plow one sees the peasants using in the
fields to turn over the soil, and shows
the stationary character of people
who, in many respects, seem bright
and quick-witted. The water-wheel,
turned by oxen or buffaloes, also be-
comes familiar sight, and the mourn
full creak of the wheel is the only sound
one hears at night, when the steamer is
tied up to the bank. Thus the great
river is meat and drink and life and
health to all the people-the only source
Of moisture in an otherwise sterile land.
This fact is brought home to you again
and again, and the wonder of it never
PepiSter