Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1904-02-02
NATIVE SUPERSTITION
EFFECT OF MATERNAL FEAR OF
THE CIVIL EYE"
Blindness and Weak Sight the Natural
Result of the Course Pursued
Kindness to Animals.
BY WILLIAM E. CURTIS.

ago, 1 was introduced to the inventor or the
incubator. He told me that he was not en-
titled to that honor. which had been thrust
upon him as an advertisement for the town
for he was nothing more than the patentee
of a substitute for setting hens. He said
that chickens were raised by incuba tors long
before the plaques of Egypt; that the pro-
cess had been invented by the same people
who devised the alphabet, the art Of pune
tuation. who invented clocks and longitude
and latitude, and geography and all that
sort of thing.
And [ find it is true. The Chinese were
great inventors. They have to their credit
a long list of things that we use every day.
Thomas Jefferson invented the revolving
chair and the letter press; A. H. Andrews of
Chicago invented the folding bed and Geo.
NJ Pullman the sleeping car: and Graham
Bell the telephone but the Egyptians beat
them all. and the deeper you dig into their
past the higher respect you gain for their
brains and their practical genius as archi-
tects. engineers, agriculturtsts and pro-
moters. They had great advantage over
us, however, in a clear field; there was no
one to claim priority of invention. The
world was new and needed a complete out
fit. 'ta-.
All this is diversion suggested by the
fact that in any one of the native villages
along the Nile you can find homemade in
cubators constructed of suu-dried bricks;
the same kind that the children of Israel
used to make, and the straw that they
didn't have to work with is scattered upon
the mud floors There is no thermometer
to register the heat; there is no tablet upon
which dates can be kept, but the Egyptian.
places the eggs upon the straw, makes a hre
of dried manure in the furnace and by the
senSitiveness of his brown hand he regu-
lates the heat. until the shells are broken
and the little chicks merge from their clos-
tiers into the wide, wicked world With this
rude arrangement the average number of
chickens produced is even larger than from
the highly polished modern inventions for
the same purpose that are run with kero-
sene oil.
This sort of thing has been going on from
the beginning of the world Nobody knows
when it started, and it is fair to assume
that Moses and Potiphars wife. and other
Egyptians We We're acquainted with in an
Gent times ate spring chickens for break
fast raised in incubators.
Prevalence of Blindness.
But notwithstanding the immense amount
of respect and admiration that the genius
of the Egyptians demands, they have some
very weak points, and one of them is SUI
perstition. I have heard it asserted by peo-
pie who ought to know that per cent of
the entire native population are blind
which is confirmed by the number of sight
less beggars you find around the mosques
and other blind people you see being led
about the streets, The University of Cairo
has department exclusively for blind men.
with large number of students. The same
authority; and he stands high in the medi-
cal world, declares that 30 per cent of the
natives have their sight permanently i'm
paired by the neglect of their mothers in
their childhood. Another authority asserts
that 10 per cent, or more than one-half, of
native Egyptians are suffering from de-
fectiye vision, and that only small per
cent have absolutely perfect eyesght. You
notice ophthalmic hospitals everywhere
Most of them are established and MAIN
tanned by Christian beneyolence and are
very largely patronized by the natives
when II Is too late You can also find in
every quarter of the native city, in every
market place, in railway stations, in street
cars, and everywhere that native women
and children can be found, the reasons for
the phenomenon / have mentioned-the
faces of infants and children covered with
flies and other insects.
The EVIL eye is the terror of all the
Arab race. Scholars who hold degrees from
Oxford Cambridge and other universities
wear amuets of various kinds to protect
them from its influence. Every horse and
donkey. every cow and goat rs protected in
a similar manner Over the Intel of every
Egyptian home substitutes for the
horseshoe. and kind people have rendered
a public service by fastening them over the
entrances to railway cars and places where
the people assemble You can buy effective
charms at a thousand shops and at very
low prices. The sale of antidotes to the evil
eve is one of the most extensive and lu-
crative trades in Egypt, but with all these
safeguards and measures of protection
mothers will not allow the faces of their
babies TO be washed, for fear they may at
tract the attention of the people who pos
scss this dreadful curse.
Cause of Sore Eyes.
Hence the chin and cheeks of nearly
every child you see are covered with sticky
substances, the residue of it's food and the
sweetmeats it has eaten and of course flies
swarm about 1t, and cause sores at the most
tender spots of the flesh. Half the babies
in Egypt have sore eyes from this very
cause; you can see dozens of children In a
mornings walk with their eyes covered
with insects, which their mothers never
brush away for fear 1t viii be unlucky.
The result is perfectly natural.
This superstition is universal throughout
Egypt You find 1t everywhere and among
all classes of people. 1t appears in every
stratum of society and in every branch of
business.
1t is constantly coming up In the courts
Not long ago native was tried for muir
der BY the advice of his lawyer he plead
ed guilty with great provocation and stat
ed the grounds upon which he actually OBJ
tained an acquittal. His brother having re-
Gently died, he ascertained that death was
caused by the evil eye of a neighbor He
considered il his duty to avenge his
brother. and killed the neighbor Accord
ing TO the Egyptian theory this was justifi-
able homicide.
The Trial by Ordeal
There other methods of avenging
wrongs and deciding disputes in Egypt An
official of the government in one of the
upper provinces tells this story:
''Taha Ali and Ahmed Hamad carried on
the business of butchers in partnership
Taha Ali informed Ahmed Hamad that a
sum of 5000 belonging to the partnership.
which had been left with him had been
stolen Ahmed Hamad did not believe the
story, and accused Taha Ali of theft They
decided to refer the matter to a fakir. who
had settled in the neighborhoed TO be tried
by system of ordeal
The two men accordingly went to the
fakir. He copied some passages from GER
tain religious books in his possession upon
native writing beard with European
writing ink, washed off the writing with
water into a bowl, dipped some bread into
the water; and divided the bread and water
between the two disputants. telling them
that the one who was in the wrong would
become very i'll. After eating the bread
and drinking the water the two disputants
went away. Taha Ali was shortly after