Edward William Lane

Perhaps the reader may not be displeased if I here attempt to acquaint him more particularly with one of my Muslim friends, the first of those above alluded to; and to shew, at the same time, the light in which he, like others of his country, regards me in my present situation. The sheykh Ahmad (or seyyid Ahmad, for he is one of the numerous class of “shereefs,” or descendants of the Prophet,) is somewhat more than forty years of age, by his own confession; but appears more near to fifty.

For several years before he adopted the trade of a book-seller, which was that of his father, he pursued no other occupation than that of performing in the religious ceremonies called “zikrs;” which consist in the repetition of the name and attributes, &c. of God, by a number of persons, in chorus; and in such performances he is still often employed. He was then a member of the order of the Saạdeeyeh darweeshes, who are particularly famous for devouring live serpents; and he is said to have been one of the serpent-eaters: but he did not confine himself to food so easily digested. One night during a meeting of a party of darweeshes of his order, at which their Sheykh was present, my friend became affected with religious frenzy, seized a tall glass shade which surrounded a candle placed on the floor, and ate a large portion of it.

This son of mine,” she continued, “this my son Ahmad, is a worthless fellow; he has a wife here, a good creature, with whom he has lived happily, with God's blessing, for sixteen years; and now he has neglected her and me, and given himself up to a second wife, a young, impudent wench: he lavishes his money upon this monkey, and others like her, and upon her father and mother and uncles and brother and brother's children, and I know not whom besides, and abridges us, that is, myself and his first wife, of the comforts to which we were before accustomed.