VIKHAT
“O, thou blessed that contains no demon, but a fairy! When I follow thee thou takest me into regions overlooking Paradise. My sorrows are as nothing. My rags are become as robes of silk. My feet are shod, not worn and bleeding. I lift up my head——O Flower of Paradise! O Flower of Paradise!”Old Arabian Song.
“O, thou blessed that contains no demon, but a fairy! When I follow thee thou takest me into regions overlooking Paradise. My sorrows are as nothing. My rags are become as robes of silk. My feet are shod, not worn and bleeding. I lift up my head——O Flower of Paradise! O Flower of Paradise!”
Old Arabian Song.
“When the European is weary he calls for alcohol to revive him; when he is joyful he thinks of wine that he may have more joy. In like manner the Chinese wooes his ‘white lady,’ the poppy flower. The Indian chews bhang, and the West African seeks surcease in kola. To the Yemen Arab, khat, the poor man’s happiness, his ‘flower of paradise,’ is more than any of these to its devotees. It is no narcotic compelling sleep, but a stimulant like alcohol, a green shrub that grows upon the hills in moist places. On the roads leading to the few cities of Arabia, and in the cities themselves, it may be seen being borne on the backs of camels to the market-place or the wedding feast—the wet and dripping leaves of the shrub. The poor and the well-to-do at once crave and adore it. They speak of it as ‘the strength of the weak,’ ‘the inspiration of the depressed,’ ‘the dispeller of sorrow and too deep care.’ All who may, buy and chew it, the poor by the anna’s worth, the rich by the rupee. The beggar when he can beg or steal it—even he is happy too.”American Consular Report.
“When the European is weary he calls for alcohol to revive him; when he is joyful he thinks of wine that he may have more joy. In like manner the Chinese wooes his ‘white lady,’ the poppy flower. The Indian chews bhang, and the West African seeks surcease in kola. To the Yemen Arab, khat, the poor man’s happiness, his ‘flower of paradise,’ is more than any of these to its devotees. It is no narcotic compelling sleep, but a stimulant like alcohol, a green shrub that grows upon the hills in moist places. On the roads leading to the few cities of Arabia, and in the cities themselves, it may be seen being borne on the backs of camels to the market-place or the wedding feast—the wet and dripping leaves of the shrub. The poor and the well-to-do at once crave and adore it. They speak of it as ‘the strength of the weak,’ ‘the inspiration of the depressed,’ ‘the dispeller of sorrow and too deep care.’ All who may, buy and chew it, the poor by the anna’s worth, the rich by the rupee. The beggar when he can beg or steal it—even he is happy too.”
American Consular Report.
Thedawn had long since broken over the heat-weary cup and slopes of the Mugga Valley, in which lies Hodeidah. In the centre of the city, like a mass of upturnedyellow cups and boxes surrounded by a ring of green and faced by the sea, were the houses, with their streets and among and in them the shopkeepers of streets or ways busy about the labors of the day. Al Hajjaj, the cook, whose place was near the mosque in the centre of the public square, had already set his pots and pans over the fire and washed his saucers and wiped his scales and swept his shop and sprinkled it. And indeed his fats and oils were clear and his spices fragrant, and he himself was standing behind his cooking pots ready to serve customers. Likewise those who dealt in bread, ornaments, dress goods, had put forth such wares as they had to offer. In the mosque a few of the faithful had entered to pray. Over the dust of the ill-swept street, not yet cleared of the rubbish of the day before, the tikka gharries of the better-to-do dragged their way along the road about various errands. The same was speckled with natives in bright or dull attire, some alive with the interest of business, others dull because of a life that offered little.
In his own miserable wattle-covered shed or hut, no more than an abandoned donkey’s stall at the edge of the city, behold Ibn Abdullah. Beggar, ne’er-do-well, implorer of charity before the mosque, ex-water-carrier and tobacco seller in Mecca and Medina, from whence he had been driven years before by his extortions and adulterations, he now turned wearily, by no means anxious to rise although it was late. For why rise when you are old and weary and ragged, and life offers at best only a little food and sleep—or not so much food as (best and most loved of all earthly blessings) khat, the poor man’s friend? For that, more than food or drink, he craved. Yet how to come by it was a mystery. There was about him not a single anna wherewith to sate his needs—not so much as a pice!
Indeed, as Ibn Abdullah now viewed his state, he had about reached the end of his earthly tether. His career was and had been a failure. Born in the mountain district back of Hodeidah, in the little village of Sabar, source of the finest khat, where formerly his father had been akhat farmer, his mother a farmer’s helper, he had wandered far, here and there over Arabia and elsewhere, making a living as best he might: usually by trickery. Once for a little while he had been a herdsman with a Bedouin band, and had married a daughter of the tribe, but, restlessness and a lust of novelty overcoming him, he had, in time, deserted his wife and wandered hence. Thence to Jiddah, the port of debarkation for pilgrims from Egypt and Central Africa approaching Mecca and Medina, the birthplace and the burialplace of the Prophet. Selling trinkets and sacred relics, water and tobacco and fruit and food, and betimes indulging in trickery and robbery, he had finally been taken in the toils of the Cadis of both Mecca and Medina, by whose henchmen he had been sadly drubbed on his back and feet and ordered away, never to return. Venturing once more into the barren desert, a trailer of caravans, he had visited Taif, Taraba and Makhwa, but finding life tedious in these smaller places he had finally drifted southward along the coast of the Red Sea to the good city of Hodeidah, where, during as many as a dozen years now, he had been eking out a wretched existence, story-telling, selling tobacco (when he could get it) or occasionally false relics to the faithful. Having grown old in this labor, his tales commonplace, his dishonesty and lack of worth and truth well known, he was now weary and helpless, truly one near an unhonored end.
Time was, in his better days and greater strength, as he now bethought him on this particular morning, when he had had his full share of khat, and food too. Ay-ee! There had been some excellent days in the past, to be sure! Not even old Raschid, the khat drunkard, or Al Hajjaj, the cook, who might be seen of a late afternoon before his shop, his pillow and carpets and water chatties about him, his narghili lit, a bunch of khat by his side, his wife and daughter at the window above listening to him and his friends as they smoked or chewed and discoursed, had more of khat and food than had he. By Allah, thingswere different then! He had had his girls, too, his familiar places in the best of the mabrazes, where were lights and delightful strains of song, and dancing betimes. He had sung and applauded and recounted magnificent adventures with the best of them. Ay-ee!
But of late he had not done well—not nearly as well as in times past. He was very, very old now, that was the reason; his bones ached and even creaked. An undue reputation for evil things done in the past—Inshallah! no worse than those of a million others—pursued him wherever he went. It was remembered of him, unfortunately, here in Hodeidah, as in Mecca and Medina (due no doubt to the lying, blasting tongue—may it wither in his mouth!—of Tahrbulu, the carrier, whom he had known in Mecca)—that he had been bastinadoed there for adulterating the tobacco he sold—a little dried goats’ and camels’ dung, wind-blown and clean; and as for Taif, to which place he had gone after Mecca, Firaz, the ex-caravan guard who had known him in that place—the dog!—might his bones wither in the sun!—had recalled to various and sundry that at Mecca he had been imprisoned for selling water from a rain-pit as that of the sacred well of Jezer! Be it so; he was hard pressed at the time; there was no place to turn; business was poor—and great had been his yearning for khat.
But since then he had aged and wearied and all his efforts at an honest livelihood had served him ill. Betimes his craving for khat had grown, the while his ability to earn it—aye, even to beg it with any success!—had decreased. Here in Hodeidah he was too well known (alas, much too well known!), and yet where else was he to go? By sea it was all of three hundred miles to Aden, a great and generous place, so it was said, but how was he to get there at his time of life? No captain would carry him. He would be tossed into the sea like a rat. Had he not begged and been roundly cursed? And to Jiddah, whereby thousands came to Mecca, a full five hundred miles north, hedare not return. Were he there, no doubt he would do better: the faithful were generous.... But were he caught in the realm of the Grand Sherif— No; Hodeidah had its advantages.
He arose after a time, and, without ablutions, prostrating himself weakly in the direction of Mecca, adjusted his ragged loin- and shoulder-cloths and prepared to emerge for the day. Although hungry and weak, it was not food but khat that he desired, a few leaves of the green, succulent, life-giving plant that so restored his mood and strength and faculties generally. By Allah, if he had but a little, a handful, his thoughts concerning life would be so much more endurable. He might even, though cracked and wretched was his voice, tell a tale or two to idlers and so earn an honest anna. Or he would have more courage to beg, to lie, to mourn before the faithful. Yea, had he not done so often? With it he was as good as any man, as young, as hopeful; without it—well, he was as he was: feeble and worn.
As he went forth finally along the hot, dusty road which led into the city and the public market and mosque, lined on either side by low one-story mud houses of the poor, windowless, and with the roadway in front as yet unswept, his thoughts turned in eager seeking to the khat market, hard by the public square and beyond the mosque, whose pineapple-shaped dome he could even now see rising in the distance over the low roofs before him. Here it was that at about eleven o’clock in the morning the khat camels bearing their succulent loads would come winding along the isthmus road from the interior. He could see them now, hear their bells, the long striding camels, their shouting drivers, the green herb, wet and sweet, piled in refreshing masses upon their backs! How well he knew the process of its arrival—the great rock beyond the Jiddah gate casting a grateful shade, the two little black policemen ready to take custom toll of each load and give a receipt, the huge brutes halting before the door of the low kutcha-thatchedinn, there to pick at some wisps of grass while their masters went inside to have a restful pull at a hubbuk (water-pipe) and a drink of kishr, or maybe a bowl of curds. Meanwhile, a flock of shrewd youngsters, bribelings of the merchants of the bazaars within the city, would flit about the loaded animals, seeking to steal a leaf or to thrust an appraising glance into the closely wrapped bundles, in order that they might report as to the sweetness and freshness of their respective loads.
“What, Okowasji, is the quality of your khat to-day? Which beast carries the best, and has thy driver stinted no water on the journey to keep it fresh?”
To find true answers to these questions had these urchins taken their bribe-money in the bazaars. But the barefoot policeman would chase them away, the refreshed drivers would come out again, fiercely breathing calumnies against the grandmothers of such brats, and the little caravan would pick its way upward and downward again into the market.
But to-day, too weary to travel so far, even though by sighs and groans and many prayers for their well-being he might obtain so little as a leaf or two from the comfortable drivers, he betook himself slowly toward the market itself. En route, and especially as he neared a better portion of the city, where tikka gharries might be seen, he was not spareful of “Alms, in the name of Allah! Allah! Alms!” or “May thy hours in paradise be endless!” But none threw him so much as a pice. Instead, those who recognized his familiar figure, the sad antithesis of all industry and well-being, turned away or called: “Out of the way, thou laggard! To one side, dog!”
When he reached the market, however, not without having cast a wishful eye at the shining pots and saucers of Al Hajjaj en route, the adjoining bazaar had heard of the coming of the green-laden caravan, and from the dark shops, so silent until now, cheerful cries were beginning to break forth. Indeed the streets were filled with singing and a stream of lean figures all headed one way. Likehimself they were going to the khat market, only so much better equipped for the occasion—rupees and anna in plenty for so necessary and delectable an herb. Tikka gharries rattled madly past him, whips were waved and turbans pushed awry; there were flashes of color from rich men’s gowns, as they hurried to select the choicest morsels, the clack of oryx-hide sandals, and the blunt beating of tom-toms. As the camels arrived in the near distance, the market was filled with a restless, yelling mob. Bedlam had broken loose, but a merry, good-natured bedlam at that. For khat, once obtained, would ease whatever ill feeling or morning unrest or weariness one might feel.
Although without a pice wherewith to purchase so much as a stalk, still Ibn could not resist the temptation of entering here. What, were none of the faithful merciful? By Allah, impossible! Perchance—who knows?—there might be a stranger, a foreigner, who in answer to his appealing glance, his outstretched hands, an expression of abject despair which long since he had mastered, would cast him an anna, or even a rupee (it had happened!), or some one, seeing him going away empty-handed or standing at the gate outside, forlorn and cast down, and asking always alms, alms, would cast him a delicious leaf or spray of the surpassing delight.
But no; this day, as on the day previous, and the one before that, he had absolutely no success. What was it—the hand of fate itself? Had Allah truly forsaken him at last? In a happy babel, and before his very eyes, the delicious paradisiacal stimulant was weighed on government scales and taxed again—the Emir must live! And then, divided into delicious bundles the thickness of a man’s forearm, it was offered for sale. Ah, the beauty of those bundles—the delight therein contained—the surcease even now! The proud sellers, in turban and shirt, were mounting the small tables or stands about the place and beginning to auction it off, each bundle bringing its own price. “Min kam! Min kam!” Hadji, the son of Dodow, was now crying—Hadji,whom Ibn had observed this many a day as a seller here. He was waving a bunch above the outstretched hands of the crowd. “How much? How much will you give for this flower of paradise, this bringer of happiness, this dispeller of all weakness? ’Tis as a maiden’s eyes. ’Tis like bees’ breath for fragrance. ’Tis—”
“That I might buy!” sighed Ibn heavily. “That I might buy! Who will give me so much as a spray?”
“One anna” (two cents), yelled a mirthful and contemptuous voice, knowing full well the sacrilege of the offer.
“Thou scum! O thou miserable little tick on the back of a sick camel!” replied the seller irritably. “May my nose grow a beard if it is not worth two rupees at the very least!”
“Bismillah! There is not two rupees’ worth in all thy filthy godown,budmash!”
“Thou dog! Thou detractor! But why should one pay attention to one who has not so much as an anna wherewith to ease himself? To those who have worth and many rupees—look, behold, how green, how fresh!”
And Al Hajjaj, the cook, and Ahmed, the carpet-weaver, stepped forward and took each a bunch for a rupee, the while Ibn Abdullah, hanging upon the skirt of the throng and pushed contemptuously here and there, eyed it all sadly. Other bundles in the hands of other sellers were held up and quickly disposed of—to Chudi, the baker, Azad Bakht, the barber, Izz-al-Din, the seller of piece goods, and so on, until within the hour all was exhausted and the place deserted. On the floor was now left only the litter and débris of stems and deadened leaves, to be haggled over by the hadjis (vendors of firewood), the sweepers, scavengers and beggars generally, of whom he was one; only for the want of a few pice, an anna at the most, he would not even now be allowed to carry away so much as a stem of this, so ill had been his fortunes these many, many days. In this pell-mell scene, where so many knew him and realized the craving wherewith he was beset, not one paused to offer him asprig. He was as wretched as before, only hungrier and thirstier.
And then, once the place was finally deserted, not a leaf or a stem upon the ground, he betook himself slowly and wearily to his accustomed place in the shadow of one of the six columns which graced the entryway of the mosque (the place of beggars), there to lie and beseech of all who entered or left that they should not forget the adjuration of the Prophet “and give thy kinsman his due and the poor and the son of the road.” At noon he entered with others and prayed, for there at least he was welcome, but alas, his thoughts were little on the five prescribed daily prayers and the morning and evening ablutions—no, not even upon food, but rather upon khat. How to obtain it—a leaf—a stem!
Almost perforce his thoughts now turned to the days of his youth, when as a boy living on the steep terraced slope of the mountains between Taiz and Yerim, he was wont literally to dwell among the small and prosperous plantations of the khat farmers who flourished there in great numbers. Indeed, before his time, his father had been one such, and Sabar and Hirwa, two little villages in the Taiz district, separated only by a small hill, and in the former of which he was born, were famous all over Arabia for the khat that was raised there. Next to that which came from Bokhari, the khat of Sabar, his home town, was and remained the finest in all Yemen. Beside it even that of Hirwa was coarse, thin and astringent, and more than once he had heard his mother, who was a khat-picker, say that one might set out Sabari plants in Hirwa and that they quickly became coarse, but remove Hirwa plants to Sabar, and they grew sweet and delicate.
And there as a child he—who could not now obtain even so much as a leaf of life-giving khat!—had aided his mother in picking or cutting the leaves and twigs of khat that constituted the crops of this region—great camel-loads of it! In memory now he could see the tasks of the cooler months,where, when new fields were being planted, they were started from cuttings buried in shallow holes four to six inches apart with space enough between the rows for pickers to pass; how the Yemen cow and the sad-eyed camel, whose maw was never full, had to be guarded against, since they had a nice taste in cuttings, and thorn twigs and spiny cactus leaves had to be laid over the young shoots to discourage the marauders.
At the end of a year the young shrubs, now two feet high, had a spread of thick green foliage eighteen inches in diameter. Behold now the farmer going out into the dawn of each morning to gaze at his field and the sky, in the hope of seeing the portents of harvest time. On a given morning the air would be thick with bulbuls, sparrows, weaver birds, shrilly clamoring; they would rise and fall above the plants, picking at the tenderest leaves. “Allah be praised!” would cry the farmer in delight. “The leaves are sweet and ripe for the market!” And now he would call his women and the wives of his neighbors to the crop-picking. Under a bower of jasmine vines, with plumes of the sweet smellingrehan, the farmer and his cronies would gather to drink from tiny cups and smoke the hubbuk, while the womenfolk brought them armfuls of the freshly cut khat leaves. What a joyous time it was for all the village, for always the farmer distributed the whole of his first crop among his neighbors, in the name of Allah, that Allah’s blessings might thus be secured on all the succeeding ones. Would that he were in Sabar or Hirwa once more!
But all this availed him nothing. He was sick and weary, with little strength and no money wherewith to return; besides, if he did, the fame of his evil deeds would have preceded him perhaps. Again, here in Hodeidah, as elsewhere in Arabia, the cities and villages especially, khat-chewing was not only an appetite but a habit, and even a social custom or function, with the many, and required many rupees the year to satisfy. Indeed one of the painful things in connection with all this was that, notunlike eating in other countries, or tea at least, it had come to involve a paraphernalia and a ritual all its own, one might say. At this very noon hour here in Hodeidah, when, because of his luck, he was here before the temple begging instead of having a comfortable home of his own, hundreds—aye, thousands—who an hour earlier might have been seen wending their way happily homeward from the market, their eyes full of a delicious content, their jaws working, a bundle of the precious leaves under their arms, might now be found in their private or public mabraz making themselves comfortable, chewing and digesting this same, and not until the second hour of the afternoon would they again be seen. They all had this, their delight, to attend to!
Aye, go to the house of any successful merchant, (only the accursed Jews and the outlanders did not use khat) between these hours and say that you had urgent news for him or that you had come to buy a lakh of rupees’ worth of skins.... His servant would meet you on the verandah (accursed dogs! How well he knew them and their airs!) and offer the profoundest apologies ... the master would be unutterably sick (here he would begin to weep), or his sister’s husband’s aunt’s mother had died this very morning and full of unutterable woe as he was he would be doing no business; or certainly he had gone to Tawahi but assuredly would return by three. Would the caller wait? And at that very moment the rich dog would be in his mabraz at the top of his house smoking his hubbuk and chewing his leaves—he who only this morning had refused Ibn so much as a leaf! Bismillah! Let him rot like a dead jackal!
Or was it one who was less rich? Behold the public mabraz, such as he—Ibn—dared not even look into save as a wandering teller of tales, or could only behold from afar. For here these prosperous swine could take their ease in the heat of the day, cool behind trellised windows of these same, or at night could dream where were soft lights and faint strains of song, where sombre shadow-steeped figuresswayed as though dizzy with the sound of their own voices, chanting benedictions out of the Koran or the Prophets. Had he not told tales for them in his time, the uncharitable dogs? Even now, at this noon hour, one might see them, the habitués of these same well-ventilated and well-furnished public rooms, making off in state for their favorite diversion, their khat tied up in a bright shawl and conspicuously displayed—for whom except himself, so poor or so low that he could not afford a little?—and all most anxious that all the world should know that they went thus to enjoy themselves. In the mabraz, each one his rug and pillow arranged for him, he would recline, occupying the space assigned him and no more. By his side would be the tall narghili or hubbuk, the two water-pots or chatties on copper stands, and a bowl of sweets. Bismillah, he was no beggar! When the mabraz was comfortably filled with customers a servant would come and light the pipes, some one would produce a Koran or commence a story—not he any more, for they would not have him, such was his state—and the afternoon’s pleasure would begin. Occasionally the taraba (a kind of three-stringed viol) would be played, or, as it might happen, a favorite singer be present. Then the happy cries of “Taieeb!” or “Marhabba! Marhabba!” (Good!), or the more approbative “O friend, excellent indeed!” would be heard. How well he remembered his own share in all this in former years, and how little the knowledge of it all profited him now—how little! Ah, what a sadness to be old and a beggar in the face of so much joy!
But as he mused in the shade, uttering an occasional “Alms, alms, in the name of Allah!” as one or another of the faithful entered or left the mosque, there came from the direction of the Jiddah gate, the regular khat-bearing camel route, shrill cries and yells. Looking up now, he saw a crowd of boys racing toward the town, shouting as they ran: “Al khat aja!” (the khat has come), a thing which of itself boded something unusual—a marriage or special feast of some kind, for at this late hour for what other reasonwould khat be brought? The market was closed; the chewers of khat already in their mabrazes. From somewhere also, possibly in the house of a bridegroom, came the faint tunk-a-lunk of a tom-tom, which now seemed to take up the glad tidings and beat out its summons to the wedding guests.
“Bismillah! What means this?” commented the old beggar to himself, his eyes straining in the direction of the crowd; then folding his rags about him he proceeded to limp in the direction of the noise. At the turn of a narrow street leading into the square his eye was gladdened truly enough by the sight of a khat-bearing camel, encompassed by what in all likelihood, and as he well knew was the custom on such occasions, a cloud of “witnesses” (seekers of entertainment or food at any feast) to the probable approaching marriage. Swathed round the belly of the camel as it came and over its load of dripping green herbs, was laid a glorious silken cloth, blazing with gold and hung with jasmine sprays; and though tom-toms thumped and fifes squealed a furious music all about him, the solemn beast bore his burden as if it were some majesty of state.
“By Allah,” observed the old beggar wearily yet eyeing the fresh green khat with zest, “that so much joy should be and I have not a pice, let alone an anna! Would that I might take a spray—that one might fall!”
“Friend,” he ventured after a moment, turning to a water-carrier who was standing by, one almost as poor as himself if more industrious, “what means this? Has not Ramazan passed and is not Mohorrum yet to come?”
“Dost thou address me, thou bag of bones?” returned the carrier, irritated by this familiarity on the part of one less than himself.
“Sahib,” returned the beggar respectfully, using a term which he knew would flatter the carrier, no more entitled to a “Sir” than himself, “use me not ill. I am in sore straits and weak. Is it for a marriage or a dance, perhaps?”
“Thou hast said,” replied the carrier irritably, “—ofZeila, daughter of old Bhori, the tin-seller in the bazaar, to Abdul, whose father is jemidar of chaprassies at the burra bungalow.”
At the mere mention of marriage there came into the mind of Ibn the full formula for any such in Hodeidah—for had he not attended them in his time, not so magnificent as this perhaps but marriages of sorts? From noon on all the relatives and friends invited would begin to appear in twos and threes in the makhdara, where all preparations for the entertainment of the guests had no doubt been made. Here for them to sit on in so rich a case as this (or so he had heard in the rumored affairs of the rich), would be long benches of stone or teak, and upon them beautiful carpets and pillows. (In all the marriages he had been permitted to attend these were borrowed for the occasion from relatives or friends.) Madayeh, or water-bubbles, would be ready, although those well enough placed in the affairs of this world would prefer to bring their own, carried by a servant. A lot of little chatties for the pipes would be on hand, as well as a number of fire-pots, these latter outside the makhdara with a dozen boys, fan in hand, ready to refill for each guest his pipe with tobacco and fire on the first call of “Ya yi-yall!” How well he remembered his services as a pipe-filler on occasions of this kind in his youth, how well his pleasure as guest or friend, relative even on one occasion, in his earlier and more prosperous years and before he had become an outcast, when his own pipe had been filled. Oh, the music! the bowls of sweets! the hot kishr, the armful of delicious khat, and before and after those little cakes of wheat with butter and curds! When the makhdara was full and all the guests had been solemnly greeted by the father of the bride, as well as by the prospective husband, khat would be distributed, and the pleasure of chewing it begin. Ah! Yes, weddings were wonderful and very well in their way indeed, provided one came by anything through them.
Alas, here, as in the case of the market sales, his opportunitiesfor attending the same with any profit to himself, the privilege of sharing in the delights and comforts of the same, were over. He had no money, no repute, not even respect. Indeed the presence of a beggar such as he on an occasion of this kind, and especially here in Hodeidah where were many rich, would be resented, taken almost as an evil omen. Not only the guests within but those poorer admirers without, such as these who but now followed the camel, would look upon his even so much as distant approach as a vile intrusion, lawless, worthless dog that he was, come to peek and pry and cast a shadow upon what would otherwise be a happy occasion.
Yet he could not resist the desire to follow a portion of the way, anyhow. The escorted khat looked too enticing. Bismillah! There must be some one who would throw him a leaf on so festal an occasion, surely! By a slow and halting process therefore he came finally before the gate of the residence, into which already the camel had disappeared. Before it was the usual throng of those not so vastly better than himself who had come to rejoice for a purpose, and within, the sound of the tom-tom and voices singing. Over the gate and out of the windows were hung silken carpets and jasmine sprays, for old Bhori was by no means poor in this world’s goods.
While recognizing a number who might have been tolerant of him, Ibn Abdullah also realized rather painfully that of the number of these who were most friendly, having known him too long as a public beggar, there were few.
“What! Ne’er-do-well!” cried one who recognized him as having been publicly bastinadoed on one occasion here years before, when he had been younger and healthy enough to be a vendor of tobacco, for adulterating his tobacco. “Do you come here, too?” Then turning to another he called: “Look who comes here—Ibn, the rich man! A friend of the good Bhori, no doubt, mayhap a relative, or at least one of his invited guests!”
“Ay-ee, a friend of the groom at least!” cried another.
“Or a brother or cousin of the bride!” chaffed still a third.
“A rich and disappointed seeker after her hand!” declared a fourth titteringly.
“He brings rich presents, as one can see!” proclaimed a fifth. “But look now at his hands!” A chortle followed, joined in by many.
“And would he be content with so little as a spray of khat in return?” queried a sixth.
“By Allah, an honest tobacco-merchant! Bismillah! One whom the Cadi loves!” cried a seventh.
For answer Ibn turned a solemn and craving eye upon them, thinking only of khat. “Inshallah! Peace be with thee, good citizens!” he returned. “Abuse not one who is very low in his state. Alms! Alms! A little khat, of all that will soon generously be bestowed upon thee! Alms!”
“Away, old robber!” cried one of them. “If you had ever been honest you would not now be poor.”
“What, old jackal, dost thou come here to beg? What brings thee from the steps of the mosque? Are the praying faithful so ungenerous? By Allah! Likely they know thee—not?”
“Peace! Peace! And mayst thou never know want and distress such as mine! Food I have not had for three days. My bones yearn for so much as a leaf of khat. Be thou generous and of all that is within, when a portion is given thee give me but a leaf!”
“The Cadi take thee!”
“Dog!”
“Beggar!”
“Come not too near, thou bag of decay!”
So they threatened him and he came no closer, removing rather to a safe distance and eyeing as might a lorn jackal a feast partaken of by lions.
Yet having disposed of this objectionable intruder in this fashion, no khat was as yet forthcoming, the reason being that it was not yet time. Inside, the wedding ceremony andfeast, a matter of slow and ordered procedure, was going forward with great care. Kishr was no doubt now being drunk, and there were many felicitations to be extended and received. But, once it was all over and the throng without invited to partake of what was left, Ibn was not one of those included. Rather, he was driven off with curses by a servant, and being thus entirely shut out could only wait patiently in the distance until those who had entered should be satisfied and eventually come forth wiping their lips and chewing khat—in better humor, perchance—or go his way. Then, if he chose to stay, and they were kind—
But, having eaten and drunk, they were in no better mood in regard to him. As they came forth, singly or in pairs, an hour or more later, they saw in him only a pest, one who would take from them a little of that which they themselves had earned with difficulty. Therefore they passed him by unheeding or with jests.
And by now it was that time in the afternoon when the effect on the happy possessor of khat throughout all Arabia was only too plainly to be seen. The Arab servant who in the morning had been surly and taciturn under the blazing sun was now, with a wad of the vivifying leaves in his cheek, doing his various errands and duties with a smile and a light foot. The bale which the ordinary coolie of the waterfront could not lift in the morning was now but a featherweight on his back. The coffee merchant who in the morning was acrid in manner and sharp at a bargain, now received your orders gratefully and with a pleasantry, and even a bid for conversation in his eye. Abdullah, the silk merchant, dealing with his customers in sight of the mosque, bestowed compliments and presents. By Allah, he would buy your horse for the price of an elephant and find no favor too great to do for you. Yussuf, the sambuk-carrier, a three-hundred-weight goatskin on his back, and passing Ibn near the mosque once more, assured Ali, his familiar of the same world and of equal load, as theytrudged along together, “Cut off my strong hand, and I will become Hadji, the sweeper” (a despised caste), “but take away my khat, and let me die!” Everywhere the evasive, apathetic atmosphere of the morning had given way to the valor of sentient life. Chewing the life-giving weed, all were sure that they could perform prodigies of energy and strength, that life was a delicious thing, the days and years of their troubles as nothing.
But viewing this and having none, and trudging moodily along toward his waiting-place in front of the mosque, Ibn was truly depressed and out of sorts. The world was not right. Age and poverty should command more respect. To be sure, in his youth perhaps he had not been all that he might have been, but still, for that matter, had many others so been? Were not all men weak, after their kind, or greedy or uncharitable? By Allah, they were, and as he had reason to know! Waidi, the water-seller? A thief really, no whit better than himself, if the world but knew. Hussein, the peddler of firewood; Haifa, the tobacco tramp—a wretched and swindling pack, all, not a decent loin- or shoulder-cloth among them, possessed of no better places of abode than his own really, yet all, even as the richest of men, had their khat, could go to their coffee places this night and enjoy it for a few anna. Even they! And he!
In Hodeidah there was still another class, the strictly business or merchant class, who, unlike men of wealth or the keepers of the very small shops, wound up their affairs at four in the afternoon and returning to their homes made a kind of public show of their ease and pleasure in khat from then on until the evening prayers. Charpoys, water-pipes and sweetmeats were brought forth into the shade before the street door. The men of the household and their male friends sprawled sociably on the charpoys, the ingredients for the promotion of goodly fellowship ready to their hands. A graybeard or two might sit among them expounding from the sacred book, or conversation lively in character but subdued in tone entertained the company. Then the aged, thepalsied, even the dying of the family, their nearest of kin, were brought down on their beds from the top of the house to partake of this feast of reason and flow of wit. Inside the latticed windows the women sat, munching the second-best leaves and listening to the scraps of wisdom that floated up to them from the company below.
It was from this hour on that Ibn found it most difficult to endure life. To see the world thus gay while he was hungry was all but too much. After noting some of this he wandered wearily down the winding market street which led from the mosque to the waterfront, and where in view of the sea were a few of the lowest coffee-houses, frequented by coolies, bhisties and hadjis. Here in some one of them, though without a single pice in his hand, he proposed to make a final effort before night should fall, so that thereafter in some one of them, the very lowest of course, he himself might sit over the little khat he would (if fortunate) be permitted to purchase, and a little kishr. Perhaps in one of these he would receive largess from one of these lowest of mabraz masters or his patrons, or be permitted to tell an old and hoarse and quavering tale. His voice was indeed wretched.
On his way thence, however, via the Street of the Seven Blessings, he came once more before the door of Al Hajjaj, the cook, busy among his pots and pans, and paused rather disconsolately in the sight of the latter, who recognized him but made no sign.
“Alms, O Hajjaj, in the name of the Prophet, and mayst thou never look about thy shop but that it shall be full of customers and thy profit large!” he voiced humbly.
“Be off! Hast thou no other door than mine before which to pause and moan?”
“Ever generous Hajjaj,” he continued, “’tis true thou hast been kind often, and I deserve nothing more of thee. Yet wilt thou believe me that for days I have had neither food nor drink—nor a leaf of khat—nay, not so much as an wheaten cake, a bowl of curds or even a small cup ofkishr. My state is low. That I shall not endure another day I know.”
“And well enough, dog, since thou hast not made more of thy life than thou hast. Other men have affairs and children, but thou nothing. What of all thy years? Hast thou aught to show? Thou knowest by what steps thou hast come so. There are those as poor as thyself who can sing in a coffee-house or tell a tale. But thou—Come, canst thou think of nothing better than begging? Does not Hussein, the beggar, sing? And Ay-eeb tell tales? Come!”
“Do thou but look upon me! Have I the strength? Or a voice? Or a heart for singing? It is true; I have sung in my time, but now my tales are known, and I have not the strength to gather new ones. Yet who would listen?”
The restaurant-keeper eyed him askance. “Must I therefore provide for thee daily? By Allah, I will not! Here is a pice for thee. Be off, and come not soon again! I do not want thee before my door. My customers will not come here if thou dost!”
With slow and halting steps Ibn now took himself off, but little the better for the small gift made him. There was scarcely any place where for a pice, the smallest of coins, he could obtain anything. What, after all, was to be had for it—a cup of kishr? No. A small bowl of curds? No. A sprig of khat? No. And so great was his need, his distress of mind and body, that little less than a good armful of khat, or at least a dozen or more green succulent sprays, to be slowly munched and the juice allowed to sharpen his brain and nerves, would have served to strengthen and rest him. But how to come by so much now? How?
The character of the places frequented by the coolies, bhisties (water-carriers), hadjis and even beggars like Ibn, while without any of the so-called luxuries of these others, and to the frequenters of which the frequenters of these were less than the dust under their feet, were still, to these latter, excellent enough. Yea, despised as they were, theycontained charpoys on which each could sit with his little water-chatty beside him, and in the centre of the circle one such as even the lowly Ibn, a beggar, singing his loudest or reciting some tale—for such as they. It was in such places as these, before his voice had wholly deserted him, that Ibn had told his tales. Here, then, for the price of a few anna, they could munch the leavings of the khat market, drink kishr and discuss the state of the world and their respective fortunes. Compared to Ibn in his present state, they were indeed as lords, even princes.
But, by Allah, although having been a carrier and a vendor himself in his day, and although born above them, yet having now no voice nor any tales worth the telling, he was not even now looked upon as one who could stand up and tell of the wonders of the Jinn and demons and the great kings and queens who had reigned of old. Indeed, so low had he fallen that he could not even interest this despised caste. His only gift now was listening, or to make a pathetic picture, or recite the ills that were his.
Nevertheless necessity, a stern master, compelled him to think better of his quondam tale-telling art. Only, being, as he knew, wholly unsuited to recite any tale now, he also knew that the best he could do would be to make the effort, a pretense, in the hope that those present, realizing his age and unfitness, would spare him the spectacle he would make of himself and give him a few anna wherewith to ease himself then and there. Accordingly, the hour having come when the proffered services of a singer or story-teller would be welcomed in any mabraz, he made his way to this region of many of them and where beggars were so common. Only, glancing through the door of the first one, he discovered that there were far too few patrons for his mood. They would be in nowise gay, hence neither kind nor generous as yet, and the keeper would be cold. In a second, a little farther on, a tom-tom was beginning, but the guests were only seven in number and but newly settled in their pleasure. In a third, when thediaphanous sky without was beginning to pale to a deep steel and the evening star was hanging like a solitaire from the pure breast of the western firmament, he pushed aside the veiling cords of beads of one and entered, for here was a large company resting upon their pillows and charpoys, their chatties and hubbuks beside them, but no singer or beater of a tom-tom or teller of tales as yet before them.
“O friends,” he began with some diffidence and imaginings, for well he knew how harsh were the moods and cynical the judgments of some of these lowest of life’s offerings, “be generous and hearken to the tale of one whose life has been long and full of many unfortunate adventures, one who although he is known to you—”
“What!” called Hussein, the peddler of firewood, reclining at his ease in his corner, a spray of all but wilted khat in his hand. “Is it not even Ibn Abdullah? And has he turned tale-teller once more? By Allah, a great teller of tales—one of rare voice! The camels and jackals will be singing in Hodeidah next!”
“An my eyes deceive me not,” cried Waidi, the water-carrier, at his ease also, a cup of kishr in his hands, “this is not Ibn Abdullah, but Sindbad, fresh from a voyage!”
“Or Ali Baba himself,” cried Yussuf, the carrier, hoarsely. “Thou hast a bag of jewels somewhere about thee? Now indeed we shall hear things!”
“And in what a voice!” added Haifa the tobacco-tramp, noting the husky, wheezy tones with which Ibn opened his plea. “This is to be a treat, truly. And now we may rest and have wonders upon wonders. Ibn of Mecca and Jiddah, and even of marvelous Hodeidah itself, will now tell us much. A cup of kishr, ho! This must be listened to!”
But now Bab-al Oman, the keeper, a stout and cumbrous soul, coming forth from his storeroom, gazed upon Ibn with mingled astonishment and no little disfavor, for it was not customary to permit any of his customers of the past to begin here, and as for a singer or story-teller he had never thought of Ibn in that light these many years. He was too old, without the slightest power to do aught but begin in a wheezy voice.
“Hearken,” he called, coming over and laying a hand on him, the while the audience gazed and grinned, “hast thou either anna or rupee wherewith to fulfill thy account in case thou hast either khat or kishr?” The rags and the mummy-like pallor of the old man offended him.
“Do but let him speak,” insisted Hussein the peddler gaily, “or sing,” for he was already feeling the effects of his ease and the restorative power of the plant. “This will be wonderful. By the voices of eleven hundred elephants!”
“Yea, a story,” called Waidi, “or perhaps that of the good Cadi of Taiz and the sacred waters of Jezer!”
“Or of the Cadi of Mecca and the tobacco that was too pure!”
Ibn heard full well and knew the spectacle he was making of himself. The references were all too plain. Only age and want and a depressing feebleness, which had been growing for days, caused him to forget, or prevented, rather, his generating a natural rage and replying in kind. These wretched enemies of his, dogs lower than himself, had never forgiven him that he had been born out of their caste, or, having been so, that he had permitted himself to sink to labor and beg with them. But now his age and weakness were too great. He was too weary to contend.
“O most generous Oman, best of keepers of a mabraz—and thou, O comfortable and honorable guests,” he insisted wheezily, “I have here but one pice, the reward of all my seekings this day. It is true that I am a beggar and that my coverings are rags, yet do but consider that I am old and feeble. This day and the day before and the day before that—”
“Come, come!” said Oman restlessly and feeling thatthe custom and trade of his mabraz were being injured, “out! Thou canst not sing and thou canst not tell a tale, as thou well knowest. Why come here when thou hast but a single pice wherewith to pay thy way? Beg more, but not here! Bring but so much as half a rupee, and thou shalt have service in plenty!”
“But the pice I have here—may not I—O good sons of the Prophet, a spray of khat, a cup of kishr—suffer me not thus be cast forth! ‘—and the poor and the son of the road!’ Alms—alms—in the name of Allah!”
“Out, out!” insisted Oman gently but firmly. “So much as ten anna, and thou mayst rest here; not otherwise.”
He turned him forth into the night.
And now, weak and fumbling, Ibn stood there for a time, wondering where else to turn. He was so weak that at last even the zest for search or to satisfy himself was departing. For a moment, a part of his old rage and courage returning, he threw away the pice that had been given him, then turned back, but not along the street of the bazaars. He was too distrait and disconsolate. Rather, by a path which he well knew, he circled now to the south of the town, passing via the Bet-el-Fakin gate to the desert beyond the walls, where, ever since his days as a pack servant with the Bedouins, he had thought to come in such an hour. Overhead were the stars in that glorious æther, lit with a light which never shines on other soils or seas. The evening star had disappeared, but the moon was now in the west, a thin feather, yet transfiguring and transforming as by magic the homely and bare features of the sands. Out here was something of that beauty which as a herdsman among the Bedouins he had known, the scent of camels and of goats’ milk, the memory of low black woolen tents, dotting the lion-tawny sands and gazelle-brown gravels with a warm and human note, and the camp-fire that, like a glowworm, had denoted the village centre. Now, as in a dream, the wild weird songs of the boys and girls of the desert came back, the bleating of their sheep and goats inthe gloaming. And the measured chant of the spearsmen, gravely stalking behind their charges, the camels, their song mingling with the bellowing of their humpy herds.
“It is finished,” he said, once he was free of the city and far into the desert itself. “I have no more either the skill nor the strength wherewith to endure or make my way. And without khat one cannot endure. What will be will be, and I am too old. Let them find me so. I shall not move. It is better than the other.”
Then upon the dry, warm sands he laid himself, his head toward Mecca, while overhead the reremouse circled and cried, its tiny shriek acknowledging its zest for life; and the rave of a jackal, resounding through the illuminated shade beyond, bespoke its desire to live also. Most musical of all music, the palm trees now answered the whispers of the night breeze with the softest tones of falling water.
“It is done,” sighed Ibn Abdullah, as he lay and wearily rested. “Worthless I came, O Allah, and worthless I return. It is well.”