Rensselaer Union, Volume 9, Number 42, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 5 July 1877 — Egyptian Slavery. [ARTICLE]

Egyptian Slavery.

Slaves in Egypt may be broadly divided into white and black, although the shades of color between these two extremes are very numerous. To the one class belong the fair-skinned Circassian and the dusky, but often beautiful, Abys sinian; and to the other, the darker, but still straight-haired, Galla, and the negro from Nubia, Kordofan or Darfour. The extinction of the Mamlouks, and the indiscriminate admission of Arabs and Copts alike to the public service, have practically put an end to the importation of white male slaves, who are now rarely or never met with as adults. -Some few boys are occasionally purchased as playfellows for the sons of the wealthier Beys or Pashas, but, in almost every instance, as soon as they reach full age they are liberated, married off—frequently to their masters’ daughters—and in some way established in life. In fact, the relations of this very limited class to their owners just falls short of adoption, which was formerly vdry common, but is less so now. The relatively great mortality among the children of white mothers who have themselves not been born in the country, contribute} to maintain the demand for Circassian girls, the vast majority of whom, however, find not merely purchasers, but husbands, among thesons of the wealthier classes. But the importation of these Circassian luxuries has greatly fallen off since the cessation of the regular traffic between Constantinople and the coast of Arabii. reduced the supply, and correspondingly raised the price of the smuggled article. Most of the few who now reach Egypt singly or in couples, where thirty years ago they came in scores, belong to the Circassian Colonies in Rourae lia or Asia Minor, and the difficulties of even their import under the eyes of jealour foreign Consuls are such that the trade has virtually ceased. At any rate, it is only in the very wealthiest harems that these exotic beauties are now to be found. They are mostly bought at from ten to twelve years of age, and after being well nurtured for three or four years, and taught the usual Eastern accomplishments, are, as a rule, either married by the master of the house or given as wives to his sons. In strict law marriage does not confer freedom, but the girl is nearly always first liberated, and the offspring are, in any c%se, bora free. One especial reason why these white girls are thus almost always married is that they wear much longer than either native Egyptian ladies or Abyssinians, retaining their fine physique to thirty-five or even forty yews of age, while the latter are generally withered and posses before twenty-five. Tins is an important consideration, in view of the now prevailing fashion among the upper classes of having only one wife, but the much higher cost of these white beauties places them beyond the reach of ail but the wealthiest, and except for these the harem market is now chiefly supplied with Abyssinians, who, at a fifth, or even eighth or tenth of the price, are in all but color and wear physically equal to the best of their white rivals, borne of these copper-skinned houris are indeed very modelsof Southern beauty. Many of the wives of the middle and nearly all the concubines of the upjier classes are taken from this source of supply, as free Arab girls never enter harems in this latter capacity. There are also many Abyssinian male slaves, whose employment and treatment are similar to those of their white fellows, and, who, once liberated, may, like the latter, rise to any attainable rank in the public service. The other class of wholly black slaves is much more numerous, and is generally employed in lower kinds of domestic work than those just noticed. They comprise specimens of every black race known to Northern and Central Africa, from the mixed Arabs and Abyssinians of Nubia, Berber and Sennaar, to the pure negro of Darfour, and the yet other cross—neither negro nor Abyssinian—which forms the Galla tribes. These it is whose kidnapping and other means of obtainment in the remote interior form the chief ground of complaint against slavery in Egypt. But once in the country and absorbea into its service, their condition, it ihay be affirmed, becomes not merely an immense improvement on their past, but in all respects one of the lighest forms of servitude to which the name of slavery can be given. From every materiabpoint of view they are infinitely better off than the free-boru fellahs, on whom, indeed, they look down with proud contempt as an inferior class—since, as before remarked, both law and religion combine to protect them, |as neither protects the peasant. A bad master can, of course, ill-treat his slave as well as his free servant to the borders of cruelty witlioutcoming within the clutches of the Cadi; but such cases are rare, as, the social sentiment on the subject is essentially humane and quite as operative as public opinion among ourselves. — Tinsley'* Magazine.