CAIRO, JERUSALEM, AND DAMASCUS.*
THIS attractive volume appeals in equal measure to lovers of art and students of history. Besides a few line drawings, it contains a large number of coloured illustrations by Mr. Walter Tyrwhitt, which are admirably executed, and show ue how impotent are ordinary photographs or engravings to reproduce the gorgeous effect of Oriental scenery, where beauty and variety of colouring often constitute the principal charm. The Cairo series are perhaps more strikingly success- ful than the rest, and among those we may single out "Sharia al-Azhar," " Old Gateway of a Ruined Mosque near Bab al-Wazir," "Gateway of the Mosque of Ibrahim Agha," and several street scenes, particularly the Sharia al-Kirabiyeh, or street of the water-carriers. The illustrations of Jerusalem and Damascus are not so rich and brilliant, and make on the whole a less vivid impression, though it is easy to imagine that these places are superior to Cairo in the natural beauty of their surroundings.
The text, for which Professor Margoliouth is responsible, deals with the past history of the three cities, and brings together in short compass a great amount of information chiefly drawn from sources which are sealed except to specialists in Oriental literature. The author's learning, however, does not prevent his pages from being thoroughly readable and interesting. Ten chapters, comprising more than half the volume, are devoted to Cairo, which was the leading city of Islam during the centuries that elapsed between the fall of Baghdad and the rise of Constantinople. Founded in 969 A.D. as the capital of the Fatimide dynasty, it passed two hundred years later into the hands of Saladin, whose family, the Ayyubids, carried on the government of Egypt until they were supplanted by the Mamlukes, who in their turn had to make way for the Ottoman Turks. Then came the French occupation, the massacre of the Mamlukes by Mohammed Ali (to whose great-granddaughter, Princess Nazli, this hook is dedicated), and the appointment of Ismail Pasha as first Khedive. There are ample and excellent materials in Arabia for sketching the history and topography of Cairo under these five dynasties. It will be sufficient to mention the works of Makrizi and the Khitat Taufikiyyah of Ali Pasha Mubarak. Professor Margoliouth has skilfully combined the political annals with an architectural account of the buildings and monuments by which many Wiens Sovereigns and grandees procured for themselves a vicarious immortality. Of the Fatimide edifices, al-Azhar is the most famous. Originally a mosque, it soon was converted into a seminary for maintaining and propagating the heretical doctrines associated with the Fatimides ; but Saladin made it what
it has been ever since,—the University of orthodox Islam. The enormous influence which it exerts at the present time in favour of the traditional Moslem scholasticism may be estimated by the fact that last year it possessed nearly ten thousand students, with more than three hundred Professors.
Al-Azhar did not owe its supremacy to absence of competition.
The fashion of founding mosques, colleges, and hospices was followed by one Monarch after another; even the worst and most brutal tyrants were seldom backward in this respect.
Their munificence in adorning the city occasionally drove them to fantastic expedients for raising revenue. A plan adopted by the Mum luke Sultan Kaietbai was "to endow research in the shape of alchemy, various persons professing to turn base metal into gold, if money were provided to pay for experiments. When these experiments proved unsuccessful the Sultan avenged himself by depriving the unfortunate alchemists of their eyes and tongues." While the Aral, chroniclers tell us enough and to spare concerning the exploits of the ruling classes—the record of assassinations
• Cairo, Jerusalem, and Dammam: Three Chief Cities of the Egyptian &dials. By D. S. Margoliouth. With Illustrations in Colour by W. S. S. Tyrwhitt, and additional Pintas by Reginald Barrat, Loudon Chatto and Wiuidus. [20s. nat.] was to be seen in Franco up to the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes. The Edict itself, which is given here at full length, would hardly satisfy by its provisions our Roman Catholic friends. The " pretended Reformed religion "—so it is styled throughout the Edict—was not to be allowed in sundry places which were excluded for one reason or another : in Rheims and other places in North-East France, in the bishopric of Cornonailles, in Toulouse, in Dijon, in Sens, and in Nantes itself Paris was to have one place, which might be five leagues away. But long before the actual Revocation, as we learn from this auto- biography, very serious infractions were made on the restricted liberty thus granted. In 1670—the Revocation came about in 1685—a proclamation was made forbidding the presence of more than twelve persons at a wedding or baptism ; in 1680 the occupation of midwife was closed against women of the Reformed religion ; in 1681 an edict came out reducing the ago at which converts might be received to seven ; children so converted might demand sustentation from their parents, and these were forbidden to send any son or daughter under sixteen for education abroad ; in 1684 the King forbade all private individuals to receive sick persons of the Reformed religion into their houses. These things are not to be explained away,—they are public acts. And they are abundantly illustrated from Fontaine's own experi nice. They certainly snake up a curious ideal of religious liberty. James Fontaine contrived to escape, and for some time his life is an account of his exertions to support himself. His ingenuity and resolution were unfailing,—one sees in him what admirable subjects the King and his advisers drove out of France. In 1694 he migrated to Ireland, where ho combined commercial and clerical pursuits,—his people were too poor to pay him. Finally, he established a school. The adversities of his life were not by any means at an end. More than once his house was attacked by French privateers. The last entry of his diary is dated June, 1722. He was then in feeble health ; the year before he had lost his wife.
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