![A Pilgrimage to Nejd, the Cradle of the Arab Race. Vol. 1 [of 2] - Lady Anne Blunt](/cover_210244.jpg "A Pilgrimage to Nejd, the Cradle of the Arab Race. Vol. 1 [of 2] - Lady Anne Blunt")
one whom we were also interested to see, was Midhat Pasha, just arrived at Damascus as Governor-General of Syria. He had come with a considerable flourish of trumpets, for he was supposed to represent the doctrine of administrative reform, which was at that time seriously believed in by Europeans for the Turkish Empire. Midhat was the protégé of our own Foreign Office, and great things were expected of him. For ourselves, though quite sceptical on these matters and knowing the history of Midhat’s doings at Bagdad too well to have any faith in him as a serious reformer, we called to pay our respects, partly as a matter of duty, and partly it must be owned out of curiosity. It seemed impossible that a man who had devised anything so fanciful as parliamentary government for Turkey should be otherwise than strange and original. But in this we were grievously disappointed, for a more essentially commonplace, even silly talker, or one more naïvely pleased with himself, we had never met out of Europe. It is possible that he may have adopted this tone with us as the sort of thing which would suit English people, but I don’t think so. We kept our own counsel of course about our plans, mentioning only that we hoped to see Bagdad and Bussora and to go on thence to India, for such was to be ultimately our route. On the mention of these two towns he at once began a panegyric of his own administration there, of the steamers he had established on the rivers, the walls he had pulled down and tramways built. “Ah, that tramway,” he exclaimed affectionately. “It was I that devised it, and it is running still. Tramways are the first steps in civilisation. I shall make a tramway round Damascus. Everybody will ride in the trucks. It will pay five per cent. You will go to Bussora. You will see my steamers there. Bussora, through me, has become an important place. Steamers and tramways are what we want for these poor countries. The rivers of Damascus are too small for steamers, or I should soon have some afloat. But I will make a tramway. If we could have steamers and tramways everywhere Turkey would become rich.” “And canals,” we suggested, maliciously remembering how he had flooded Bagdad with his experiments in this way. “Yes, and canals too. Canals, steamers, and tramways, are what we want.” “And railways.” “Yes, railways. I hope to have a railway soon running alongside of the carriage road from Beyrout. Railways are important for the guaranteeing of order in the country. If there was a railway across the desert we should have no more trouble with the Bedouins. Ah, those poor Bedouins, how I trounced them at Bagdad. I warrant my name is not forgotten there.” We assured him it was not.
He then went on to talk of the Circassians, “ces pauvres Circassiens,” for he was speaking in French, “il faut que je fasse quelque chose pour eux.” I wish I could give some idea of the tone of tenderness and almost tearful pity in Midhat’s voice as he pronounced this sentence; the Circassians seemed to be dearer to him than even his steamers and tramways. These unfortunate refugees are, in truth, a problem not easy of solution: they have been a terrible trouble to Turkey, and, since they were originally deported from Russia after the Crimean war, they have been passed on from province to province until they can be passed no further. They are a scourge to the inhabitants wherever they go, because they are hungry and armed, and insist on robbing to get a livelihood. To the Syrian Arabs they are especially obnoxious, because they shed blood as well as rob, which is altogether contrary to Arab ideas. The Circassians are like the foxes which sportsmen turn out in their covers. It is a public-spirited act to have done so, but they cannot be made to live in peace with the hares and rabbits. Midhat, however, had a notable scheme for setting things to rights. He would draft all these men into the corps of zaptiehs, and then, if they did rob, it would be in the interests of Government. Some score of them were waiting in the courtyard at the time of our visit, to be experimented on; and a more evil-visaged set it would have been difficult to select.
On the whole, we went away much impressed with Midhat, though not as we had hoped. He had astonished us, but not as a wise man. To speak seriously, one such reforming pasha as this does more to ruin Turkey than twenty of the old dishonest sort. Midhat, though he fails to line his own purse, may be counted on to empty the public one at Damascus, as he did at Bagdad, where he spent a million sterling on unproductive works within a single year. As we wished him good-bye, we were amused to notice that he retained Mr. Siouffi, the manager of the Ottoman Bank, who had come with us, with him for a private conference, the upshot of which was his first public act as Governor of Syria, the raising of a loan.4
CHAPTER II
“This shadowy desert, unfrequented woods, I better brook than flourishing peopled towns.”
We spent a week at Damascus, a week not altogether of pleasure, although it was to be our last of civilised life. We had an immense number of things to buy and arrange and think over, before starting on so serious a journey as this, which we knew must be very unlike the pleasure trip of last year. We could not afford to leave anything to chance with the prospect of a three months’ wandering, and a thousand miles of desert, where it was impossible to count upon fresh supplies even of the commonest necessaries of life. Jôf, the first station on our road, was four hundred miles off, and then we must cross the Nefûd, with its two hundred miles of sand, before we could get to Nejd. The return journey, too, to the Persian Gulf, would have to be made without coming to anything so European as a Turkish town. Nobody could tell us what supplies were to be had in Nejd, beyond dates and corn. Mr. Palgrave’s account of Jebel Shammar was, in fact, the only guide we had to go on, and its accuracy had been so much doubted that we felt obliged to take into consideration the possibility of finding the Nejd towns mere oases, and their cultivation only that of the date.
Mohammed, less “insouciant” than most of his countrymen are on such matters, now made himself most useful, spending many hours in the bazaars with Wilfrid, as I did with the cook and the camel-man; and being a town Arab and a trader born, he saved us an infinity of trouble and time, and no few mejidies.
They began by choosing a complete suit of Bedouin clothes for Wilfrid, not exactly as a disguise, for we did not wish, even if we could have done so, not to pass for Europeans, but in order to avoid attracting more notice than was necessary on our way. The costume consisted of a striped silk jibbeh or dressing-gown worn over a long shirt, a blue and white abba of the kind made at Karieteyn, and for the head a black kefiyeh embroidered with gold which was fastened on with the Bedouin aghal, a black lamb’s-wool rope. Mohammed had brought with him a sword which had belonged to his grandfather, a fine old Persian blade curved like a sickle. He gave it to Wilfrid and received in return a handsome weapon somewhat similar but silver-mounted, which they found in the bazaar. Thus rigged out, for Mohammed too had been reclothed from head to foot (and he much required it), they used to sally out in the town as two Bedouin gentlemen. Wilfrid by holding his peace was able to pass with the unwary as an unconcerned friend, while Mohammed did the bargaining for cloaks, kefiyehs, and other articles suitable as presents to the Sheykhs whose acquaintance we might make. Mohammed was an expert in driving a hard bargain and knew the exact fashion in vogue in each Bedouin tribe, so that although his taste did not always quite agree with ours, we let him have his way. The only mistake he made, as it turned out, was in underestimating the value of gifts necessary in Haïl. Not one of us had the least idea of the luxury existing in Nejd, and Mohammed, like most of the northern Arabs, had heard of Ibn Rashid only as a Bedouin Sheykh, and fancied that a red cloth jibbeh would be the ne plus ultra of magnificence for him, as indeed it would have been for an Ibn Shaalan or an Ibn Mershid. We had, however, some more serious presents than these to produce, if necessary, in the rifles and revolvers we carried with us, so that we felt there was no real danger of arriving empty-handed.
The purchases which it fell to my share to make, with the assistance of Abdallah and the cook, were entirely of a useful sort, and do not require a detailed description here. As to dress, it was unnecessary for me to make any change, save that of substituting a kefiyeh for a hat and wearing a Bedouin cloak over my ordinary travelling ulster. Hanna and Abdallah were both of them masters in the art of haggling,
Midhat’s reign at Damascus lasted for twenty months, and is remarkable only for the intrigues in which it was spent. It began with an
Midhat Pasha – September 28: – ‘A private correspondent of the
