e extends over the water, so that when one sits there drinking
genuine Mocha coffee and smoking a Turkish nargileh one can hear
the beating of the waves and feel the undulations of the azure
Mediterranean. I drove out into the country a few miles to see the
Egyptian fellahs, or peasants. No--I shall not disgrace the name
"peasant" by using it here; for the Egyptian fellah is an ignorant,
superstitious, absolutely destitute, and, in every respect, miserable
wretch, and is worse off than a slave. Four walls of stones or earth
make one or two rooms, with a floor of clay and a roof of straw or sod.
A wooden box, a couple of kettles, and some mats made of grass or palm
canes, are the only pieces of furniture. A couple of goats, an ass, or,
at the very best, a yoke of oxen, are all he possesses in this world. He
works hard, and his fare is exceedingly plain. He neither desires nor
expects anything better, nothing stimulates him to acquire wealth; for
that would only give the tax-gatherer a pretext for extra extortions.
Miserable Egypt! I have seen much poverty and much misery among men; but
of everything I have seen in that line nothing can be compared with the
wretched condition of the Egyptian fellah.

[Illustration: FELLAH HUT.]

Still these unfortunate people seem to find happiness in their religion.
Here some one might object that this is a wretched happiness, because
their religion is Mohammedanism or Islamism. Man feels himself drawn to
a higher power. No matter what his condition, he longs for a life after
this, and searches after an object for his worship, and when he has
found this object he will give up his life rather than give up his
faith. And still that object for which a person or a nation is willing
to sacrifice even life itself is ridiculed and despised by another
person and another nation. If the ignorant were the only ones who
disagree in matters of faith, this condition might be easily explained;
but even the highest civilization has failed in its attempts to
harmonize the different religions, and, in my opinion, this fact ought
to make all thinking men tolerant and liberal toward those who hold
different religious views. The Mohammedan faith has made a deep and
lasting impression on a population scattered over a large part of the
surface of our earth, and no one dares deny that its adherents are much
more devoted to their religion and much more conscientious in observing
its rites than we as Christians