Except in the matter of decay, I found little change in the native portion of the city since my visit in 1898; but the aspect of the city proper has grown modern. Fine new streets, public buildings and residences, are seen everywhere in the Ezbekieh and Ismailian quarters of the city, while certain sections suggest a European capital. The Ezbekieh Gardens, opposite the Continental Hotel, form really a small park in the centre of the city, and are a great resort for tourists as well as residents.
The Ismailian is the fashionable quarter of the city, and it is said that many wealthy citizens have left their former luxurious native homes for a modern residence in the new section. Hence many dealers in the bazars have secured the deserted Oriental homes, and now live in comparative luxury, showing that conditions and residential centres change in the Old World as well as in the New.
But note how much more attractive the original home must appear to native eyes. A passage leads from the street to a spacious court, and grouped around the court, which usually has a fountain in the centre (with sometimes one or two trees), are the rooms for general use and those assigned to guests. The apartments occupied by the women of the family, commonly called the harem, are not visible, but are generally spacious and well furnished, even luxuriously appointed, with inlaid floors, decorated walls, and rich rugs. The light filters through either meshrebîya or flat latticed windows, for no profane eye can gaze on the supposed loveliness of damsel and dame, nor can they, in their turn, gaze outward for any distance, which shows the restricted social condition of the women.
It is said that they are virtually regarded with contempt, and, though usually kindly treated in the harem, they are considered only as ornamental appendages of the home; hence they are rarely educated, and never in more than those accomplishments, such as music and dancing, which tend to add to their attractiveness.
The better classes of women are always seen veiled, and, with the peculiar covering over the nose, one can only judge of their appearance by their often very beautiful eyes. Oh, the infinite sadness to be found in the depths of many of them!
I was, however, told by a gentleman, long resident in Cairo, that there are indications of a gradual change as regards education, the wives of a few high officials having been educated on broader lines than mere accomplishments; hence it is to be hoped that the leaven will work in time. It may also be found later that the transference of the harem from an Oriental home to a Number 9 residence on a fashionable street will lessen the seclusion heretofore imposed.
The Nile is always a centre of interest, not only for those who explore it to the cataracts or Khartoum, but for natives and tourists who throng its banks to catch a glimpse of the queer sailing craft, and to watch the never-ending procession that passes over it—men, women, vehicles, and animals filling every available space.
It is quite the fashion for parties of tourists to repair to the bridge at 5 a.m. in order to watch the marketmen, venders of all kinds, and the heavily laden donkeys and camels fulfilling their part in the labor of supplying the city markets.
Once across the bridge, the procession from the country is even more picturesque; and, viewed from a waiting "tram" in the late afternoon, when all are homeward bound, the scene is most incongruous. Sometimes four or five heavily veiled women in black robes are seen on one of the long two-wheeled carts, drawn by an emaciated horse with a native at his head as a propelling power; next, follow a flock of geese, two or three score of goats, a group of sheep, four or five camels looking down with a superior air on the donkeys, as well as pedestrians of many complexions and of varied dress—Arabs, Bedouins, Soudanese, and Egyptians—their queerly shaped turbans and brilliant colors lending the finishing touch to the scene. Nowhere else in the Orient does such a view present itself, and its setting is the Nile!
The last glimpse of the Nile, the evening before my departure, will never be forgotten. The occasion was an invitation to indulge in afternoon tea at the Hôtel Semiramis, near the entrance to the bridge. We lingered on for the sunset, which first appeared as a flaming ball of fire, succeeded by myriad shades of rainbow hues, these fading into softer tints and later into those more delicate tones that prelude the twilight. Then silence seemed to brood over the wonderful river, and we departed.
If the street scenes, the bazars, and the Nile are an index to the native life of Cairo, a greater claim may be made for the mosques, in which the city abounds; for they represent political changes, social evolution, and artistic development, as history proves. To substantiate this claim of the mosques, a brief digression is necessary.
The origin of Cairo dates back to the Muslim invasion in 640; the original Arab settlement was called Fustât, the "Town of the Tent," which is substantially the old Cairo of to-day. Here was erected almost at once the first mosque, that of Amr, sometimes called Amru. In 751 a northeast suburb was added, called El Askar; this was to be the residence of the Governor, and here also was erected the Mosque of El Askar. Keeping still to the northeast, another city was added, in 860, by the first independent Muslim King of Egypt, Ibn Tûlûn, called El Katâi; the "wards" became divided into separate quarters for various nations and classes, and here was erected the remarkable Mosque of Ibn Tûlûn. A fourth city still farther northeast was added a little over a century later, called El Kâhira (the Cairo of to-day); this did not become the commercial capital of Egypt, but occupied the same relation to Fustât that El Askar and Katâi held. The Town of the Tent, resting on the bank of the Nile, still remained the metropolis, as it did after the fall of both El Askar and Katâi—the disaster to these latter cities giving additional prestige to El Kâhira.
The building of a mosque[1] was regarded by the rulers not only as an expression of religious zeal, but as a contribution to the life of the State. Several mosques were erected during the two centuries of Arab rule, but Amr was the first and most important. It is situated near the site of the old Roman city of Misr, where Amr first pitched his tent, on the invasion of Egypt. The outside of the old mosque is not imposing, but, with the vast court forty thousand feet in area, surrounded by colonnades consisting of numberless columns with every variety of capitals (taken from Christian churches), it excites our admiration. Wooden beams, stretched from column to column, formerly supported one hundred and eighty thousand hanging lamps which illuminated the edifice every night, while throngs of learned men, professors, and persons of many conditions gathered there daily for lectures and discussion. The great convocation was on Friday, when a sermon and prayers were the order of the day, the immense court affording ample space for the multitude, while the large east end sanctuary gave room for persons of distinction to kneel. The mihrab, or niche, where worshippers turned toward Mecca, the pulpit, and the tribunal were also features of the edifice. We now see little of the original mosque, for it has been remodelled from time to time; but it still remains the best type of the congregational mosque (called Gami, meaning "assembly"), and to me it seemed, as I looked upon it, one of the most impressive monuments of a dead past that I had ever seen.
With the political change in 868, which introduced the Turkish period, Ibn Tûlûn became the ruler, and another era of mosque and palace and hospital building prevailed. The Mosque of Ibn Tûlûn is the only monument that survives; it is also a congregational type and has the same general style as Amr; it is the earliest instance of the use of the pointed arch throughout a building, this being two centuries earlier than its use in England. Five rows of arches form the arcade, or cloisters, on the Mecca end of the building, with two rows on the other three sides. The ornaments on the arches and around the windows are in stucco, and are worked by hand in the plaster, instead of being moulded as is the stucco work of the Alhambra. These consist of a bud, flower, and rosette pattern. Another century passed on, when, in 969, the victorious Gauhar forced the passage of