In The Levant 35

In The Levant 35

When the day was two thirds spent we had purchased one hundred tiles,

jealously watched the packing of each one, and seen the boxes nailed

and corded. We could not have been more exhausted if we had undergone

an examination for a doctorate of law in a German university. Two boxes,

weighing two hundred pounds each, were hoisted upon the backs of mules

and sent to the French company's station; there does not appear to be a

dray or a burden-cart in Damascus; all freight is carried upon the back

of a mule or a horse, even long logs and whole trunks of trees.

 

When this transaction was finished, our Greek guide, who had heard me

ask the master of the house for brass trays, told me that a fellow whom

I had noticed hanging about there all the morning had some trays to show

me; in fact, he had at his house "seventeen trays." I thought this a

rich find, for the beautiful antique brasses of Persia are becoming rare

even in Damascus; and, tired as we were, we rode across the city for a

mile to a secluded private house, and were shown into an upper chamber.

What was our surprise to find spread out there the same "seventy-three"

tiles that we had purchased the day before, and which had been whisked

away from us. By "seventeen tray," the guide meant "seventy-three." We

told the honest owner that he was too late; we had already tiles enough

to cover his tomb.

 

 

 

 

XV.--SOME PRIVATE HOUSES.

 

|THE private houses of Damascus are a theme of wonder and admiration

throughout the Orient. In a land in which a moist spot is called a

garden, and a canal bordered by willows a Paradise, the fancy constructs

a palace of the utmost splendor and luxury out of materials which in a

less glowing country would scarcely satisfy moderate notions of comfort

or of ostentation.

 

But the East is a region of contrasts as well as of luxury, and it is

difficult to say how much of their reputation the celebrated mansions of

Damascus owe to the wretchedness of the ordinary dwellings, and also to

the raggedness of their surroundings. We spent a day in visiting several

of the richest dwellings, and steeping ourselves in the dazzling luxury

they offer.

 

The exterior of a private house gives no idea of its interior. Sometimes

its plain mud-wall has a solid handsome street-door, and if it is very

old, perhaps a rich Saracenic portal; but usually you slip from the

gutter, lined with mud-walls, called a street, into an alley, crooked,

probably dirty, pass through a stable-yard and enter a small court,

which may be cheered by a tree and a basin of water. Thence you

wind through a narrow passage into a large court, a parallelogram of

tesselated marble, having a fountain in the centre and about it orange

and lemon trees, and roses and vines. The house, two stories high,

is built about this court, upon which all the rooms open without

communicating with each other. Perhaps the building is of marble, and

carved, or it may be highly ornamented with stucco, and painted in gay

colors. If the establishment belongs to a Moslem, it will have beyond

this court a second, larger and finer, with more fountains, trees, and

flowers, and a house more highly decorated. This is the harem, and the

way to it is a crooked alley, so that by no chance can the slaves or

visitors of the master get a glimpse into the apartments of the women.

The first house we visited was of this kind; all the portion the

gentlemen of the party were admitted into was in a state of shabby

decay; its court in disrepair, its rooms void of comfort,--a condition

of things to which we had become well accustomed in everything

Moslem. But the ladies found the court of the harem beautiful, and

its apartments old and very rich in wood-carving and in arabesques,

something like the best old Saracenic houses in Cairo.

 

The houses of the rich Jews which we saw are built like those of the

Moslems, about a paved court with a fountain, but totally different in

architecture and decoration.

 

In speaking of a fountain, in or about Damascus, I always mean a basin

into which water is discharged from a spout. If there are any jets or

upspringing fountains, I was not so fortunate as to see them.

 

In passing through the streets of the Jews' quarter we encountered at

every step beautiful children, not always clean Sunday-school children,

but ravishingly lovely, the handsomest, as to exquisite complexions,

grace of features, and beauty of eyes, that I have ever seen. And

looking out from the open windows of the balconies which hang over the

street were lovely Jewish women, the mothers of the beautiful children,

and the maidens to whom the humble Christian is grateful that they tire

themselves and look out of windows now as they did in the days of the

prophets.

 

At the first Jewish house we entered, we were received by the entire

family, old and young, newly married, betrothed, cousins, uncles, and

maiden aunts. They were evidently expecting company about these days,

and not at all averse to exhibiting their gorgeous house and their

rich apparel. Three dumpy, middle-aged women, who would pass for ugly

anywhere, welcomed us at first in the raised recess, or _lewân_, at

one end of the court; we were seated upon the divans, while the women

squatted upon cushions. Then the rest of the family began to appear.

There were the handsome owner of the house, his younger brother just

married, and the wife of the latter, a tall and pretty woman of the

strictly wax-doll order of beauty, with large, swimming eyes. She wore

a short-waisted gown of blue silk, and diamonds, and, strange to say, a

dark wig; it is the fashion at marriage to shave the head and put on

a wig, a most disenchanting performance for a bride. The numerous

children, very pretty and sweet-mannered, came forward and kissed our

hands. The little girls were attired in white short-waisted dresses, and

all, except the very smallest, wore diamonds. One was a bride of twelve

years, whose marriage was to be concluded the next year. She wore an

orange-wreath, her high corsage of white silk sparkled with diamonds,

and she was sweet and engaging in manner, and spoke French prettily.

 

The girls evidently had on the family diamonds, and I could imagine that

the bazaar of Moses in the city had been stripped to make a holiday for

his daughters. Surely, we never saw such a display out of the Sultan's

treasure-chamber. The head-dress of one of the cousins of the family,

who was recently married, was a pretty hat, the coronal front of which

was a mass of diamonds. We saw this same style of dress in other houses

afterwards, and were permitted to admire other young women who were

literally plastered with these precious stones, in wreaths on the head,

in brooches and necklaces,--masses of dazzling diamonds, which after a

time came to have no more value in our eyes than glass, so common and

cheap did they seem. If a wicked person could persuade one of these

dazzling creatures to elope with him, he would be in possession of

treasure enough to found a college for the conversion of the Jews.

I could not but be struck with the resemblance of one of the plump,

glowing-cheeked young girls, who was set before us for worship, clad in

white silk and inestimable jewels, to the images of the Madonna, decked

with equal affection and lavish wealth, which one sees in the Italian

churches.

 

All the women and children of the family walked about upon wooden

pattens, ingeniously inlaid with ivory or pearl, the two supports of

which raise them about three inches from the ground.

 

They are confined to the foot by a strap across the ball, but being

otherwise loose, they clatter at every step; of course, graceful walking

on these little stilts is impossible, and the women go about like hens

whose toes have been frozen off. When they step up into the lewân, they

leave their pattens on the marble floor, and sit in their stocking-feet.

Our conversation with this hospitable collection of relations consisted

chiefly in inquiries about their connection with each other, and an

effort on their part to understand our relationship, and to know why we

had not brought our entire families. They were also extremely curious to

know about our houses in America, chiefly, it would seem, to enforce the

contrast between our plainness and their luxury. When we had been

served with coffee and cigarettes, they all rose and showed us about the

apartments.

 

The first one, the _salon_, will give an idea of the others. It was a

lofty, but not large room, with a highly painted ceiling, and consisted

of two parts; the first, level with the court and paved with marble, had

a marble basin in the centre supported on carved lions; the other two

thirds of the apartment was raised about a foot, carpeted, and furnished

with chairs of wood, inlaid with mother-of-pearl, stiffly set against

the walls. The chairs were not comfortable to sit in, and they were the

sole furniture. The wainscoting was of marble, in screen-work, and most

elaborately carved. High up, near the ceiling, were windows, double

windows in fact, with a space between like a gallery, so that the

lacelike screen-work was exhibited to the utmost advantage. There was

much gilding and color on the marble, and the whole was costly and

gaudy. The sleeping-rooms, in the second story, were also handsome in

this style, but they were literally all windows, on all sides; the space

between the windows was never more than three or four inches. They are

admirable for light and air, but to enter them is almost like stepping

out of doors. They are all _en suite_, so that it would seem that the

family must retire simultaneously, exchanging the comparative privacy of

the isolated rooms below for the community of these glass apartments.

 

The _salons_ that we saw in other houses were of the same general style

of the first; some had marble niches in the walls, the arch of which was

supported by slender marble columns, and these recesses, as well as the

walls, were decorated with painting, usually landscapes and cities. The

painting gives you a perfectly accurate idea of the condition of art in

the Orient; it was not only pre-Raphaelite, it was pre-Adamite, worse

than Byzantine, and not so good as Chinese. Money had been freely

lavished in these dwellings, and whatever the Eastern chisel or brush

could do to enrich and ornament them had been done. I was much pleased

by the picture of a city,--it may have been Damascus--freely done upon

the wall. The artist had dotted the plaster with such houses as children

are accustomed to make on a slate, arranging some of them in rows,

and inserting here and there a minaret and a dome. There was not the

slightest attempt at shading or perspective. Yet the owners contemplated

the result with visible satisfaction, and took a simple and undisguised

pleasure in our admiration of the work of art.

 

"Alas," I said to the delighted Jew connoisseur who had paid for this

picture, "we have nothing like that in our houses in America, not even

in the Capitol at Washington!"

 

"But your country is new," he replied with amiable consideration; "you

will have of it one day."

 

In none of these veneered and stuccoed palaces did we find any comfort;