Wali

“ In each special case the wali indicated by the law is he who stands closest to the woman in accordance with the above classification. A more nearly related class is replaced by one more distant only where the former does not exist or where its members are morally and physically incapable of discharging the functions of wali. ”

“ I replied, “By Allah I will not go, unless the Wali go with us; for, an he be present, he and the officers, thou wilt not dare to work thy wicked will upon me.” So the Kazi rose and swore an oath, saying, “By the truth of Him who created mankind, we will not go but with the Emir!” Accordingly we repaired to the Judge’s house, accompanied by the Chief, and going up, searched it through, but found naught; whereat fear fell upon me and the Wali turned to me and said, “Fie upon thee, O ill-omened fellow! thou hast put us to shame before the men.” ”

“ Now when it was morning-tide a rumour flew about town that the Judge’s daughter had been seized by the Wali and the watch together with the young Shalabi in a certain place and presently the report reached her father who cried, “There is no Majesty and there is no Might save in Allah, the Glorious, the Great! O Saving God, save me! Oh vile disgrace and foul dishonour before Sultan and subjects who shall say the Kazi’s daughter hath been seduced and abused. 338However may the Veiler enveil me!” On his part the Wali went up to the Palace and sought the Sovran to acquaint him therewith ”

“ The Wali had only let my husband go in order to be able to accuse him of meddling, and by Mr. Eldridge's not answering I suspected he knew it too. An old Druze from the Haurán came to our house, said he had seen my husband, and began to praise him. I said, "Why, what is he doing?" He replied, "Máshálláh! we never saw a Consul like him. He can do in one day what the Wali-Pasha could not do in five years. We had a quarrel with the Bedawi, and we carried off all their goats and sheep, and the Government was going to attack us. ”

“ The Wali bade carry him to his lodging; but one of those in attendance upon him, Al-Murádi hight, said to him, "What wilt thou do? This man is robed in rich raiment and on his finger is a golden ring, whose bezel is a ruby of great price; so we will carry him away and slay him and take that which is upon him of clothes and bring to thee all we get; for that thou wilt not often see profit the like thereof, especially as this fellow is a foreigner and there is none to ask after him."294 Quoth the Chief, "This wight is a thief and that which he saith is leasing." ”

“ Now when the Wali heard my words he said to me, "O man, the skies are not wont to shed aught save rainwater; and a man in his right wits speaketh not such speech as this." Said I, "By the life of thy head, O my lord, they did rain all three of them;" but the officers cried, "O my lord, verily this man be Jinn-mad and his wife who telleth plain truth is wronged by him: the fellow deserveth confining in the Máristán."246 Accordingly the Chief of Police bade the men set the woman free and let her wend her ways and seize me and throw me into the madhouse. ”

“ So they searched, and behold, they came upon a woman's mantilla and petticoat-trousers full of blood, which when I espied, I fell down in a fainting-fit. Now when the Wali saw this, he said, "By Allah, the Captain is excused!" Then my comrades came round about me and sprinkled water on my face till I recovered, when I arose and accosting the Kazi (who was covered with confusion) , said to him, "Thou seest that suspicion is fallen on thee, and indeed this affair is no light matter, because this woman's family will assuredly not sit down quietly under her loss." ”

“ He can be of great service as long as there is a proper understanding with the Government, but a very dangerous state of things is created if he makes himself a rival authority to whom the disaffected think that they can look for redress." [6]
This (there is no doubt about it) Burton was always doing; and his knowledge of oriental affairs and methods made him all the more formidable to the Wali. Matters came to a head when Burton went to visit the Druzes in the Hauran, a month or two before his recall. By some means or other he spoiled the Wali's game in that quarter ”

“ Said the Kazi, “O King of the Age, I will abide here beside thee and do thou let the Wali go down and bring before thee that which is with him in gaol, and the case shall be made manifest, because hearing with the ear is not like eyeing with the eye.” The Sultan replied, “This rede is right,” whereupon the Chief of Police returned to his house and ordered the gaoler to open the gaol and bring thereout the maiden Sitt al-Husn and her lover the youth Mohammed Shalabi. ”

“ After a time the wali, too, understood this, and sent once more for the village headmen from far and near, addressing them somewhat as follows:—“To-morrow morning you, Nyamba”—or as the case might be—“are to come at eight and bring the people of your village, and they are to bring midimu and mitete (dancing-masks and snuff-boxes) as many as they have, and all the other things that you use in the house and in the shamba and in the bush,—for the white man likes these things and will pay you for them in pice and 356rupees. ”

“ In the long roll of Welsh history which we have been unfolding there are many illustrious names—Cunedda Wledig, Howel Dda, Owen Gwynedd, the Lord Rees, Llewelyn Fawr, and Llewelyn the last Prince of Wales: but of all the men of the Middle Ages no one has so touched the heart and fired the imagination of Wales as Owen Glyndwr. For all Welsh people he stands alone and supreme, the ideal Welshman of all time. ”

“ There is one other characteristic of modern Wales—a certain pride, not so much in what has been done, but in what is going to be done. Wales is small, though not much smaller than Palestine, or Holland, or Switzerland, and every part of it knows the other. There is a healthy rivalry between its towns and between its colleges; each town can show that it has done something for Wales in the past—by means of its industries, or school, or press. In the strong feeling of unity there is ambition to surpass, and each part lives in the light of the action of the other parts. ”

“ Those little plain square buildings, scattered so profusely all over Wales, so ugly in the eyes of the tourist, yet so sacred to those who dwell around them; what was the secret of their power and their charm? To-day there are many competing institutions—the school, the college, the club, and the library; but in those days the chapel was everything. In the pulpit the artistic soul of Wales found its full expression, as it {214} has never quite succeeded in doing anywhere else. Its poetry (if we except its hymns) , good as much of it is, never even approaches the very best. ”

“ Her brave warriors, best of patriots, poured out their blood for freedom. Ancient and mountainous Wales, Paradise of the bard, every valley and cliff is lovely in my sight; through the feeling of patriotism, how alluring is the ripple on her rivers and brooks. If the enemy treads my country under foot, the old language of the Welsh lives as it used to live; the Muse suffers not, in spite of the horrid hand of the traitor, nor yet the melodious harp of my country. ”

“ Their low, quiet voices, their gentle ways, their spiritual intensity, all throw a glamour about the lives they lead. One does not expect to find a sage in yon little cottage where the village bread is baked. Yet he is there, his books two deep on every shelf of his little room, his lamp burning far into the night. Nor does one expect to find a Welsh Jenny Lind in this cot whose brass doorsill we have just left; but, busy about her work, a voice the world might well run to listen to follows us down these Welsh upland meadows. ”

“ Henceforward the heroes of Wales were not soldiers, but poets, scholars, and, above all, preachers. A last flicker of the old martial spirit, the old lust of battle, is seen in the struggle between King and Parliament. To write the history of Wales between 1642 and 1649 would simply be to narrate the incidents of the Civil War, for no part of the country played a more prominent part in the contest than did the Principality. Here, however, it must suffice to disentangle from the rest that which was peculiarly Welsh, and to draw attention to a few Welshmen who rendered themselves illustrious. ”

“ No one felt more keenly, or with a greater sense of shame, the degraded condition of the people of Wales at the time. Although a staunch Royalist and Churchman, he was filled with the stern Puritan love of righteousness, and an ardent desire to convince his countrymen of the evil of their ways. Like Edmund Prys he bethought him of the Welshman's intense love of poetry and music. Why, instead of singing profane ditties, should the people not sing songs of an edifying character? ”

“ THE WELSH.
Ancient manners are less obliterated by time and the varying modes of life in North Wales, than in most of the other provinces of Britain. In this age of communication and intelligence, few will be credulously eager to imagine that the inhabitants of any one part of our island are materially distinguished in their characters from those of another: yet none can immerge themselves in this romantic country, without being struck by the superior modesty and simplicity of its inhabitants. ”

“ To come out of Wales into England was like the change from china to earthenware! Frank, as a d—-d Englishman, had not of course perceived the exquisite refinement and emotional capacity of that Welsh girl! And, delicately stirring in the dark mat of his still wet hair, he explained how exactly she illustrated the writings of the Welsh bard Morgan-ap-Something in the twelfth century.
Ashurst, full length on the horsehair sofa, and jutting far beyond its end, smoked a deeply-coloured pipe, and did not listen, thinking of the girl's face when she brought in a relay of cakes. ”

“ Any Englishman's life was safe anywhere, and Wales became one of the most easily governed countries in all the wonderful British Empire.
And in the great world-war, that even children, who read these stories, can remember, Wales, the Land of the Free, the Home of Deathless Democracy, led all the British Isles, colonies, islands, or coaling stations around the wide world, in loyalty, valor and sacrifice. And the handsome son of the King, George, the Prince of Wales, led the descendants of Welsh archers, now called the Fusileers. ”

“ XII GIANT TOM AND GIANT BLUBB
Everyone who has read anything of Welsh history—though not of the sort that is written by English folks—knows also that Cornwall is, in soul, a part of Wales. Before the Romans, first, and the Saxons, next, invaded Britain, the Cymric people lived all over the island, south of Scotland.
They were the British people, and nobody ever heard the German name, "Wales," which means a foreign land; or the word "Welsh," which refers to foreigners, until men who were themselves outsiders came into Britain. ”

“ The inhabitants of this province derived their origin from Flanders, and were sent by king Henry I. to inhabit these districts; a people brave and robust, ever most hostile to the Welsh; a people, I say, well versed in commerce and woollen manufactories; a people anxious to seek gain by sea or land, in defiance of fatigue and danger; a hardy race, equally fitted for the plough or the sword; a people brave and happy, if Wales (as it ought to have been) had been dear to its sovereign, and had not so frequently experienced the vindictive resentment and ill-treatment of its governors. ”

“ In Wales you get fierce frays and frequent shedding of blood; on the borders you get callous cruelty to a prisoner, or the disfiguring of dead bodies—even that of Simon de Montfort, the greatest statesman of the Middle Ages in England—on the battlefield when all passion was spent.
Take the rulers of Wales again. Griffith ap Conan and Llywelyn the Great had the energy and the foresight, though their sphere was so much smaller, of Henry II. And what English king, except Alfred, attracts one on account of lovableness of character as Owen Gwynedd and Owen Cyveiliog and the Lord Rees do? ”

“ And Wales, which seems itself in its nearness now only like a district of England, and that district for the most part wild and but scantily peopled,—can there be anything so remarkable about its pulpit work as to make it either capable or worthy of any separate account of its singularities and idiosyncrasies? To most English people Welsh preaching is a phase of religious life entirely unknown: thousands of tourists visit the more conspicuous highways of Wales from year to year, its few places of public resort or more manifest beauty ”

“ THE FIRST-BORN PRINCE OF WALES.
[On the death of Llewellyn, the Welsh demanded a native Prince: so King Edward of England, who was then in Wales, sent for Eleanor, his Queen; and she, soon after her arrival in Caernarvon Castle, was delivered of a son, whom the King presented to the Welsh chieftains, and whom they acknowledged as their native Prince.]
I.
Weep, noble lady! weep no more!
⁠The woman’s joy is won:
Fear not! ”

“ And so the people of Wales, turning their backs upon this splendid opportunity, began to tread that long road of political failure and futility which made them ultimately a mere appanage of England, and which, but for the efforts of bards and men of letters in the creation of a precious national literature, would have led inevitably to the total extinction of the Welsh nation. ”

“ There are doubtless bad Valis as there are bad men in other stations of life, and we were on the look-out for one in order to make an example of him. Alas that I can only give my experience of a good Vali, Mohamed Cherif Reouf Pasha, Governor-General of the first-class vilayet of Erzeroum. ”