Читать книгу At the Court of the Amîr - John Alfred Gray - Страница 12

Table of Contents

Sir S. Pyne’s adventure in the Kabul river. The Tower on the bank. Minars of Alexander. Mahomedan Mosques. The cry of the Priest. Prayers and Religious Processions. Afghan conception of God. Religious and non-Religious Afghans. The schoolhouse and the lessons. Priests. Sêyids: descendants of the Prophet. The lunatic Sêyid. The Hafiz who was fined. The Dipsomaniac. The Valet who was an assassin. A strangler as a Valet. The Chief of the Police and his ways. Danger of prescribing for a prisoner. “The Thing that walks at night.” The end of the Naib. Death-bed services. Graves and graveyards. Tombs. The Governor of Bamian. Courtship and weddings among the Afghans. The formal proposal by a Superior Officer. The wedding of Prince Habibullah. Priests as healers of the sick. The “faith cure.” Charms. The “Evil Eye.” Dreadful fate of the boy who was impudent. Ghosts.

Adventure in the Kabul River.

When we had been in Kabul about a fortnight, His Highness the Amîr nearly lost the services of Mr. Pyne. It occurred in this way. We were riding along the lanes around Kabul, accompanied by a guard of troopers, and Mr. Pyne was lamenting that he had drank water for lunch. “There it was,” he said, “still deadly chill.” He certainly had water enough and to spare very shortly after. He had galloped on a little ahead towards the river, and when we turned the corner expecting to catch sight of him, he was nowhere to be seen. The Kabul river, swollen by rains and melting snow, was roaring and foaming by. I galloped along the bank expecting to see him. Hearing a shout, I looked back and saw one of the sowars, who was some yards behind me, jump off his horse and run to the bank, which was here some three or four feet above the river. I sprang off my horse and ran up just in time to see Pyne dragged out, dripping, by the lash of the soldier’s whip.

He was galloping, he said, along the path on the river bank when he came to a place where the bank was lower and the river partly overflowed it. Never thinking but what there was firm bottom he did not stop, and down his horse sunk till Pyne was up to his armpits in water, icy cold. The next minute the current swept him off, and he found himself under water near his horse’s heels, with the animal striking out violently in its endeavour to swim out. He came to the surface and tried to swim to the bank, but his arm caught in the rein and he and his horse were swept together to the middle of the stream. He got clear of the rein by sinking, and struck for the bank again, but found the current turned his head up stream. Meanwhile, his riding boots became filled with water, and his turban and clothes soaked. The current swept him along, but by violent exertion he reached the bank, here four or five feet high, caught at a root and shouted. The root was torn out, and again he was swept into midstream: things now seemed to be getting serious. He saw two men wrestling on the bank, and a priest on a tower calling people to prayer, but no one would look round at him. With the heavy turban weighing him down, and wet clothes impeding his action, he could with difficulty keep his head above water. His breath was going, and his muscles aching when he once more got under the bank. He saw me go galloping by, and shouted. The sowar who was near heard the shout, saw him, jumped off his horse, and threw him the lash of his whip.

Just under the bank his feet touched the bottom, and he stood up to his neck in water, holding on to the whip and panting to get enough breath to scramble up the bank. He was hauled out, dripping, and then we looked round for the horse. The poor brute was struggling and snorting, and being rapidly carried along midstream. Pyne ran along the bank and called to him. The animal turned his head, pricked up his ears, and struck vigorously for the shore. He reached the bank, and with two or three violent plunges scrambled up to dry land.

Pyne did not tell me all this on the river bank, for we mounted at once and galloped off to the workshops, so that he could get into dry clothes; then I heard the whole story.

No evil resulted, but the soldiers of the guard were informed that if Mr. Pyne had been drowned, their lives would have been forfeited—a strong inducement to a “guard” to be watchful and attentive.

I mentioned a “priest on a tower calling people to prayer.” There are several towers round about Kabul, mostly to the north-west of the city. They are not of great height, and I doubt if they were built originally for religious minarets, for they are not attached to any mosque or musjid. Probably they were originally watch-towers put up by the peasants to guard their crops and herds from local marauders. On the mountains near Kabul one sees stupendous minars which were built, it is said, by Alexander to mark the road through Afghanistan to India. One of these may be seen from Kabul on the distant peak of a mountain to the east of the Kabul valley; another can be seen west of Kabul, from the elevation of the Paghman hills.

Mahomedan Mosques.

Mosques, or, as they are called, musjids, are numerous in Kabul. Some are comparatively large, with a courtyard and a domed roof with a minaret on each side. These have either a stream of water near, or a tank or well, for the use of those who come to pray: for Mahomedans invariably wash hands, feet, and face before they pray, and cleanse also the nostrils and mouth. There is a rush matting on the floor, and the worshippers leave their shoes outside, as they do when entering any house. Inside, the musjid is very empty and bare.

In the west wall is the niche, or mihrab, marking the direction of Mecca: or the Kibla, so called because of the Kibla or stone of Mahomed in Mecca, and towards this the worshippers turn their faces when they pray. In the larger musjids there is also a pulpit or platform with three steps, called a Mimbar, from which the Imām or preacher recites his Sabbath oration, Friday being the Sabbath. The Amîr’s new rupee is stamped on one side with a decorative representation of a musjid with a three-stepped pulpit inside. At early dawn, and at four other times during the day, the priest mounts the minaret, and, standing upright, with his thumbs in his ears and his hands spread out, he utters in a penetrating falsetto voice the call of the faithful to prayer, “Allah akbar! Allah akbar, Mahomed Ressul Allah!” and so on. “God is great, God is great, Mahomed is the Prophet of God. Come to Prayers, Prayers are better than sleep. Come to salvation, God is great. There is no god but God.” Then a few people begin to gather in, ten or twelve to a musjid.

They stand in a row, their faces towards Mecca, and the priest, having descended, stands in front of them with his face in the same direction. The priest recites the prayers, standing, or stooping with his head bent, kneeling or prostrating himself with his forehead touching the ground, according to the law of the ceremony. The people imitate the priest in his motions. They are supposed to repeat the prayers to themselves, but the prayers are in Arabic, which very few Afghans understand: so that if they have learnt them by heart they repeat them simply as a parrot does.

The smaller musjids have no courtyard, they are flat-roofed and open on one side, the roof being supported on that side by carved wooden pillars, and the musjid is raised three steps above the street. These have the mihrab, or altar, but no pulpit, and the minaret is replaced by a block of stone about a foot square outside the musjid, on which the priest stands to utter the call to prayer. These, too, have a stream, a well or tank, or some other water supply for ablution.

So far as I could judge the majority of people do not go to a musjid to pray except when there is some national calamity, such as a visitation of cholera. On these occasions they go in procession with bands of music and flags. I once saw a procession in the distance, but though I felt some curiosity to see it nearer, I did not thrust myself unduly forward. There are drawbacks to doing so when Mahomedans are in a state of religious enthusiasm, for there is the possibility that one of them, overcome by excess of zeal, might obtain Paradise for himself by putting a knife into a Feringhi. It was not my ambition to be, in this way, a stepping-stone to Paradise.

Ordinarily such Afghans as profess religion go through the ceremony of prayer just where they happen to be when the time of prayer arrives. There are five periods appointed in the day. The first, just before sunrise; the second, just after midday; the third, an hour before, and the fourth, just after sunset; and the fifth, when they can no longer distinguish a white from a black thread. If they happen to be at Durbar they withdraw a little from the presence of the Amîr—for His Highness sits towards the west of the audience chamber—spread their cloaks or coats in lieu of “praying carpets,” and turning towards the west, or Mecca, go through their prayers. The Amîr’s two eldest sons pray regularly at the appointed times, and if they happen to be in Durbar at the time some of the chief officers join them.

His Highness the Amîr does not pray, at least so far as I know. I have never seen him do so openly, though it may be he prays in his heart. I have noticed that some of the greatest scoundrels at the Court are those who openly pray, or go through the form of prayer most regularly.