The Interior of Sheikh Saba's House at Rufa'a, Bahrein
Sheikh Saba, who had married Sheikh Khallet's sister, was a great contrast to our host; he had been in Bombay and had imbibed in his travels a degree of worldliness which ill became a Wahabi. He had filled his house, to which he took us, with all sorts of baubles—gilt looking-glasses hanging on the walls; coloured glass balls in rows and rows up to the ceiling, each on a little looking-glass; lovely pillows and carpets, Zanzibar date baskets, Bombay inlaid chests, El Hasa coffee-pots, and a Russian tea-urn—a truly marvellous conglomeration of things, which produced on us a wonderful sense of pleasure and repose after the bareness of our host's abode. Sheikh Saba wore only his long white shirt and turban, and so unconventional was he that he allowed his consort to remain at one end of the room whilst my husband was there.
The courtyards of these houses are architecturally interesting: the Saracenic arch, the rosettes of open-work stucco, the squares of the same material with intricate patterns—great boons in a hot land to let in the air without the sun. There is also another contrivance for obtaining air; in building the house a niche three feet wide is left in the outer wall, closed in on the inner side except for about a foot. It is funny to see the heads of muffled women peering out of these air-shafts, into which they have climbed to get an undisturbed view. Here some of the women wear the Arabian buttra or mask, which, while it hides their features, gives their eyes full play. They are very inquisitive. Some of the women one meets on Bahrein are highly picturesque when you see them without the dark-blue covering.
I was fetched to one harem after the other, always followed by a dense crowd, to the apparent annoyance of my hostesses, who, however, seemed powerless to prevent the intrusion. I saw one woman holding on to the top of the door and standing on the shoulders of one who was squatting on the floor. One good lady grew enraged at the invasion, and threw a cup of hot coffee in an intruder's face.
In the afternoon we rode over to Mountainous (and, it might be added, ruinous) Rufa'a.
It is built on a cliff, 50 feet above the lowest level of the desert; from here there is a view over a wide, bleak expanse of sand, occasionally relieved by an oasis, the result of a well and irrigation, and beyond this the eye rests on Jebel Dukhan, 'the mountain of mist,' which high-sounding name has been given to a mass of rocks in the centre of Bahrein, rising 400 feet above the plain, and often surrounded by a sea-fog; for Bahrein, with its low-lying land, is often in a mist. Some mornings on rising early we looked out of our tent to find ourselves enveloped in a perfect London fog—our clothes were soaking, the sand on the floor of our tent was soft and adhesive; then in an hour the bright orb of heaven would disperse all this, for we were very far south indeed, on the coast of Arabia. Alas! on arrival we found that our young friend Sheikh Mohammed was out, for he had to be in attendance on his uncle, Sheikh Esau, who had just arrived at his tent near our encampment, and he had to provide all his uncle's meals; we saw a donkey with a cauldron on its back large enough to boil a sheep in, large copper trays, and many other articles despatched for the delectation of the sovereign and his retinue. Sheikh Mohammed's mother, quite a queenly-looking woman, was busying herself about the preparation of these things, and when she had finished she invited us to go into the harem. My husband felt the honour and confidence reposed in him exceedingly, but, alas! all the women were veiled; all he could contemplate was their lovely hands and feet dyed yellow with henna, their rich red shirts, their aprons adorned with coins, their gold bracelets and turquoise rings. However I assured him that with one solitary exception he had lost nothing by not seeing their faces. In one corner of the women's room was the biggest bed I ever saw: it had eight posts, a roof, a fence, a gate, and steps up to it; it is a sort of daïs, in fact, where they spread their rugs and sleep, and high enough to lay beds under it too. Occasionally we got a good peep at the women as they were working in the fields, or cutting with semi-circular saws the scrub that grows in the desert for their cattle.
Half-way between the two Rufa'as we halted at a well, the great point of concourse for the inhabitants of both villages. It was evening, and around it were gathered crowds of the most enchanting people in every possible costume. Women and donkeys were groaning under the weight of skins filled with water; men were engaged in filling them, but it seems to be against the dignity of a male Arab to carry anything. With the regularity of a steam crane the woodwork of the well creaked and groaned with a sound like a bagpipe, as the donkeys toiled up and down their slope, bringing to the surface the skins of water. It was a truly Arabian sight, with the desert all around us, and the little garden hard by which Sheikh Saba cultivates with infinite toil, having a weary contest with the surrounding sand which invades his enclosure.
The sun was getting low when we returned to our bare room at Sheikh Khallet's, and to our great contentment we were left alone, for our day had been a busy one, and a strain on our conversational powers. Our host handed us over to the tender mercies of a black slave, Zamzam by name, wonderfully skilled at cooking with a handful of charcoal on circular stoves coloured red, and bearing a marked resemblance to the altars of the Persian fire-worshippers. He brought us in our dinner: first he spread a large round mat of fine grass on the floor; in the centre of this he deposited a washing basin filled with boiled rice and a bowl of ghi or rancid grease to make it palatable; before us were placed two tough chickens, a bowl of dates, and for drink we had a bowl of milk with delicious fresh butter floating in it. Several sheets of bread about the size and consistency of bath towels were also provided, but no implements of any kind to assist us in conveying these delicacies to our mouths. With pieces of bread we scooped up the rice, with our fingers we managed the rest, and we were glad no one was looking on to witness our struggles save Zamzam with a ewer of water, with which he washed us after the repast was over, and then we put ourselves away for the night.
Very early next morning we were on the move for our trip across the island. The journey would be too long for donkeys, they said, so Sheikh Khallet mounted us on three of his best camels, with lovely saddles of inlaid El Hasa work, with two pommels, one in front and one behind, like little pillars, capped and inlaid with silver. We—that is to say my husband and I and the bazaar-master—ambled along at a pretty smart pace across the desert in the direction of a fishing village called Asker, on the east coast of the island, near which were said to exist ancient remains; these, of course, turned out to be myths, but the village was all that could be desired in quaintness; the houses were all of bamboo, and the floors strewn over with little white helix shells; in one of them we were regaled with coffee, and found it delicious after our hot ride; then we strolled along the shore and marvelled at the bamboo skiffs, the curiously-fashioned oars and water casks, the stone anchors, and other primitive implements used by this seafaring race. The bazaar-master would not let us tarry as long as we could have wished, for he was anxious for us to arrive before the midday heat at a rocky cave in the 'mountain of mist,' in the centre of the island. We dismounted from our camels, and proceeded to examine Jebel Dukhan, an escarped mass of limestone rocks with rugged outline and deep caves. From the gentle elevation of the misty mountain one gets a very fair idea of the extent and character of Bahrein. The island has been likened to a sheet of silver in a sea of pearl, but it looked to us anything but silvery, and for all the world like one of the native sheets of bread—oval and tawny. It is said to be twenty-seven miles long and twelve wide at its broadest point. From the clearness of the atmosphere and the distinctness with which we saw the sea all around us, it could not have been much more. There are many tiny villages dotted about here and there, recognisable only by their nest of palm trees and their strips of verdure. In the dim distance, to our left, arose the mountains of Arabia; beyond, the flat coast-line of El Hasa, encircling that wild, mysterious land of Nejd, where the Wahabi dwell—a land forbidden to the infidel globe-trotter.
Yet another sheikh of the El Khalifa family was introduced to us, by name Abdullah; he owns the land about here, and having been advised of our coming, had prepared a repast for us, much on the lines of the one we had had the evening before.
We much enjoyed our cool rest