“Humanity is so feeble in mind,” says Renan, “that the purest thing has need of the co-operation of some impure agent.” And this, we think, is the gist of Khalid’s rhapsody on flounces and ruffles. But how is he to reconcile the fact with the truth in his case? For a single sanctified ruffle––a line of type in the canon law––is likely to upset all his plans. Yes, a priest in alb and chasuble not only can dispense with the blessings of his Pope, but––and here is the rub––he can also withhold such blessings from Khalid. And now, do what he may, say what he might, he must either revise his creed, or behave, at least, like a Christian.

Everything is ready, you say? The sky-blue, many-ruffled wedding gown; the set-out for the wayfare; the camel and donkeys; the little stock of books; the coffee utensils; the lentils and sweet oil;––all ready? Very well; but you can not set forth to-morrow, nor three weeks from to-morrow. Indeed, before the priest can give you his blessings––and what at this juncture can you do without them?––the dispensations of the ban must be performed. In other words, your case must now be laid before the community. Every Sunday, for three such to come, 168 the intended marriage of Khalid to Najma will be published in the Church, and whoso hath any objection to make can come forth and make it. Moreover, there is that little knot of consanguinity to be considered. And your priest is good enough to come and explain this to you. Understand him well. “An alm of a few gold pieces,” says he, “will remove the obstacle; the unlawfulness of your marriage resulting from consanguinity will cease on payment of five hundred piasters.”

All of which startles Khalid, stupefies him. He had not, heretofore, thought of such a matter. Indeed, he was totally ignorant of these forms, these prohibitions and exemptions of the Church. And the father of Najma, though assenting, remarks nevertheless that the alms demanded are much. “Why,” exclaims Khalid, “I can build a house for five hundred piasters.”

The priest sits down cross-legged on the divan, lights the cigarette which Najma had offered with the coffee, and tries to explain.

“And where have you this, O Reverend, about consanguinity, prohibition, and alms!” Khalid asks.

“Why, my child, in the Canons of our Church, Catholic and Apostolic. Every one knows that a marriage between cousins can not be effected, without the sanction of the Bishop.”

“But can we not obtain this sanction without paying for it?”

“You are not paying for it, my child; you are only contributing some alms to the Church.” 169

“You come to us, therefore, as a beggar, not as a spiritual father and guide.”

“That is not good speaking. You misunderstand my purpose.”

“And pray, tell me, what is the purpose of prohibiting a marriage between cousins; what chief good is there in such a ban?”

“Much good for the community.”

“But I have nothing to do with the community. I’m going to live with my wife in the desert.”

“The good of your souls is chiefly concerned.”

“Ah, the good of our souls!”

“And there are other reasons which can not be freely spoken of here.”

“You mean the restriction and prohibition of sexual knowledge between relatives. That is very well. But let us return to what concerns us properly: the good of my soul, and the spiritual well-being of the community,––what becomes of these, when I pay the prescribed alms and obtain the sanction of the Bishop?”

“No harm then can come to them––they’ll be secure.”

“Secure, you say? Are they not hazarded, sold by your Church for five hundred piasters? If my marriage to my cousin be wrong, unlawful, your Bishop in sanctioning same is guilty of perpetuating this wrong, this unlawfulness, is he not?”

“But what the Church binds only the Church can loosen.”

“And what is the use of binding, O Reverend 170 Father, when a little sum of money can loosen anything you bind? It seems to me that these prohibitions of the Church are only made for the purpose of collecting alms. In other words, you bind for the sake of loosening, when a good bait is on the hook, do you not? Pardon, O my Reverend Father, pardon. I can not, to save my soul and yours, reconcile these contradictions. For if Mother Church be certain that my marriage to my cousin is contrary to the Law of God, is destructive of my spiritual well-being, then let her by all means prohibit it. Let her restrain me, compel me to obey. Ay, and the police ought to interfere in case of disobedience. In her behalf, in my behalf, in the behalf of my cousin’s soul and mine, the police ought to do the will of God, if the Church knows what it is, and is certain and honest about it. Compel me to stop, I conjure you, if you know I am going in the way of damnation. O my Father, what sort of a mother is she who would sell two of her children to the devil for a few hundred piasters? No, billah! no. What is unlawful by virtue of the Divine Law the wealth of all the Trust-Kings of America can not make lawful. And what is so by virtue of your Canon Law concerns not me. You may angle, you and your Church, as long as you please in the murky, muddy waters of Bind-and-Loosen, I have nothing to do with you.”...

But the priests, O Khalid, have yet a little to do with you. Such arguments about the Divine Law and the Canon Law, about alms and spiritual beggars, 171 might cut the Gordian knot with your uncle, but––and whether it be good or bad English, we say it––they cut no ice with the Church. Yes, Mother Church, under whose wings you and your cousin were born and bred, and under whose wings you and your cousin would be married, can not take off for the sweet sake of your black eyes the ruffles and flounces of twenty centuries. Think well on it, you who have so extravagantly and not unwisely delivered yourself on flounces and ruffles. But to think, when in love, were, indeed, disastrous. O Love, Love, what Camels of wisdom thou canst force to pass through the needle’s eye! What miracles divine are thine! Khalid himself says that to be truly, deeply, piously in love, one must needs hate himself. How true, how inexorably true! For would he be always inviting trouble and courting affliction, would he be always bucking against the dead wall of a Democracy or a Church, if he did not sincerely hate himself––if he were not religiously, fanatically in love––in love with Najma, if not with Truth?

Now, on the following Sunday, instead of publishing the intended marriage of Khalid and Najma, the parish priest places a ban upon it. And in this, ye people of Baalbek, is food enough for tattle, and cause enough for persecution. Potent are the ruffles of the Church! But why, we can almost hear the anxious Reader asking, if the camels are ready, why the deuce don’t they get on and get them gone? But did we not say once that Khalid is slow, even slower than the law itself? Nevertheless, if this were a 172 Novel, an elopement would be in order, but we must repeat, it is not. We are faithful transcribers of the truth as we find it set down in Shakib’s Histoire Intime.

True, Khalid did ask Najma to throw with him the handful of dust, to steal out of Baalbek and get married on the way, say in Damascus. But poor Najma goes over to his mother instead, and mingling their tears and prayers, they beseech the Virgin to enlighten the soul and mind of Khalid. “Yes, we must be married here, before we go to the desert,” says she, “for think, O my mother, how far away we shall be from the world and the Church if anything happens to us.”

And they would have succeeded, the mother and cousin of Khalid, in persuading the parish priest to accept from them the prescribed alms and perform the wedding ceremony, had not the Jesuits, in the interest of the Faith and the Church, been dogging Khalid still. For if they have failed in sending him to the Bosphorus, they will succeed in sending him elsewhither. And observe how this is done.

After communicating with the Papal Legate in Mt. Lebanon about that fatal Latter Day Pamphlet of Thomas Carlyle, the Adjutant-General, or Adjutant-Bird, stalks up there one night in person and lays before the Rt. Rev. Mgr. his devil’s brief in Khalid’s case. It has already been explained that this Pamphlet was fathered on Khalid by the Jesuits. For if they can not punish the Voice which is still pursuing them––and in their heart of hearts they must have recognised 173 its thunder, even in a Translation––they will make the man smart for it who first mentioned Carlyle in this connection.

“And besides this pernicious booklet,” says the Adjutant-Bird, “the young man’s heretical opinions are notorious. He was banished from home on that account. And now, after corrupting and deluding his cousin, he is going to marry her despite the ban of the Church. Something, Monseigneur, ought to be done, and quickly, to protect the community against the poison of this wretch.” And Monseigneur, nodding his accord, orders his Secretary to write a note to the Patriarch, enclosing the aforesaid devil’s brief, and showing the propriety, nay, the necessity of excommunicating Khalid the Baalbekian. The Adjutant-Bird, with the Legate’s letter in his pocket, skips over to the Patriarch on the other hill-top below, and after a brief interview––our dear good Ancient of the Maronites must willy-nilly obey Rome––the fate of Khalid the Baalbekian is sealed.

Indeed, the upshot of these Jesuitic machinations is this: on the very day when Khalid’s mother and cousin are pleading before the parish priest for justice, for mercy,––offering the prescribed alms, beseeching that the ban be revoked, the marriage solemnised,––a messenger from the Bishop of the Diocese enters, kisses his Reverence’s hand, and delivers an imposing envelope. The priest unseals it, unfolds the heavy foolscap sheet therein, reads it with a knitting of the brow, a shaking of the beard, and, clapping one hand upon the other, tells the poor pleaders to go home. 174

“It is all finished. There is no more hope for you and your cousin.” And he shows the Patriarchal Bull, and explains.

Whereupon, Najma and Khalid’s mother go out weeping, wailing, beating their breasts and cheeks, calling upon Allah to witness their sorrow and the outrageous tyranny of the priests.

“What has my son done to be excommunicated? Hear it, ye people, hear it. And be just to me and my son. What has he done to deserve the anathema of the Church? What has he done?” And thus frantic, mad, she runs through the main street of the town, making wild gestures and clamours,––publishing, as it were, the Patriarchal Bull, before it was read by the priest on the following day, and tacked on the door of the Church.

Of this Bull, tricked with the stock phrases of the Church of the Middle Ages, such as “anathema be he,” or “banned be he,” who speaks with, deals with, and so forth, we have a copy before us. But our readers will not pardon us, we fear, if further space and consideration be here given to its contents. Suffice it to say, however, that Khalid comes to church on that fatal day, takes the foolscap sheet down from the door, and, going with it to the town-square, burns it there before the multitudes.

And it came to pass, when the Bull is burned in the town-square of Baalbek, in the last year of the reign of Abd’ul-Hamid, some among the multitudes shout loud shouts of joy, and some cast stones.

Then, foul, vehement speaking falleth between the 175 friends and the enemies of him who wrought evil in the sight of the Lord;

And every one thereupon brandisheth a stick or taketh up a stone and the battle ensueth.

Now, the mighty troops of the Sultan of the Ottomans come forth like the Yaman wind and stand in the town-square like rocks;

And the battle rageth still, and the troops who are come forth to part the fighting multitudes, having gorged themselves at the last meal, can not as much as speak their part:

And it came to pass, when the clubs and spades are veiled and the battle subsideth of itself, the good people return to their respective callings and trades;

But the perverse recalcitrants which remain––and Khalid the Baalbekian is among them––are taken by the aforesaid overfed troops to the City Hall and thence to the velayet prison in Damascus.

And here endeth our stichometrics of the Battle of the Bull.

Now, Shakib may wear out his shoes this time, his tongue, too, and his purse, but to no purpose. Behold, your friend the kaimkam is gloomy and impassive as a camel; what can you do? Whisper in his ear? The Padres have done that before you. Slip a purse into his pocket? They have done that, too, and overdone it long since. Yes, the City Hall of every city in the Empire is an epitome of Yildiz Kiosk. And your kaimkams, and valis, and viziers, have all been taught in the same Text-Book, at the same Political School, and by the same Professor. 176 Let Khalid rest, therefore and ponder these matters in silence. For in the City Hall and during the month he passes in the prison of Damascus, we are told, he does not utter a word. His partisans in prison ask to be taught his creed, and among these are some Mohammadans: “We’ll burn the priests and their church yet and follow you. By our Prophet Mohammad we will ...” Khalid makes no reply. Even Shakib, when he comes to visit him, finds him dumb as a stone, slain by adversity and disease. Nothing can be done now. The giant excommunicated, incommunicative soul, struggling in a prison of sore flesh, we must leave, alas, with his friends and partisans to pass his thirty days and nights in the second prison of stone.

Now, let us return to the Jesuits, who, having worsted Khalid, or the Devil in Khalid, as they charitably put it, will also endeavour to do somewhat in the interest of his intended bride. For the Padres, in addition to their many crafts and trades, are matrimonial brokers of honourable repute. And in their meddling and making, their baiting and mating, they are as serviceable as the Column Personal of an American newspaper. Whoso is matrimonially disposed shall whisper his mind at the Confessional or drop his advertisement in the pocket of the visiting Columns of their Bride-Dealer, and he shall prosper. She as well as he shall prosper.

Now, Father Farouche is commissioned to come all the way from Zahleh to visit the brother of Abu-Khalid their porter, and bespeak him in the interest of his 177 daughter. All their faculties of persuasion shall be exerted in behalf of Najma. She must be saved at any cost. Hence they volunteer their services. And while Khalid is lingering in prison at Damascus, they avail themselves of the opportunity to further the suit of their pickle-herring candidate for Najma’s love.

The Reverend Farouche, therefore, holds a secret conference with her father.

“No,” says he, “God would never have forgiven you for giving your daughter to one utterly destitute of morality, religion, money, and health. But praise Allah! the Church has come to her rescue. She shall be saved, wrested from the hands of Iblis. Yes, Holy Church, through us, will guide her to find a god-fearing life-companion; one worthy of her charms, her virtues, her fine qualities of heart and mind. The young man we recommend is rich, respected in the community; is an official of the Government with a third-class Medjidi decoration and the title of Bey; and is free from all diseases. Moreover, he is a good Catholic. Consider these advantages. A relation this, which no father would reject, if he loves his daughter and is solicitous of her future well-being. Speak to her, therefore, and let us know soon your mind.”

And our Scribe, in relating of this, loses his temper.––“An Official of the Government, a Bey with a third-class Medjidi decoration from the Sultan! As if Officialdom could not boast of a single scoundrel––as if any rogue in the Empire, with a few gold coins in his purse, were not eligible to the Hamidian decorations! 178 And a third-class decoration! Why, I have it on good authority that these Medjidi Orders were given to a certain Patriarch in a bushel to distribute among his minions....”

But to our subject. Abu-Najma does not look upon it in this light. A decorated and titled son-in-law were a great honour devoutly to be wished. And some days after the first conference, the Padre Farouche comes again, bringing along his Excellency the third-class Medjidi Bey; but Najma, as they enter and salaam, goes out on the terrace roof to weep. The third time the third-class Medjidi Dodo comes alone. And Najma, as soon as she catches a glimpse of him, takes up her earthen jar and hies her to the spring.

“O the hinny! I’ll rope noose her (hang her) to-night,” murmurs the father. But here is his Excellency with his Sultan’s green button in his lapel. Abu-Najma bows low, rubs his hands well, offers a large cushion, brings a masnad (leaning pillow), and blubbers out many unnecessary apologies.

“This honour is great, your Excellency––overlook our shortcomings––our beit (one room house) can not contain our shame––it is not becoming your Excellency’s high rank––overlook––you have condescended to honour us, condescend too to be indulgent.––My daughter? yes, presently. She is gone to church, to mass, but she’ll return soon.”

But Najma is long gone; returns not; and the third-class Dodo will call again to-morrow. Now, Abu-Najma brings out his rope, soaps it well, nooses 179 and suspends it from the rafter in the ceiling. And when his daughter returns from the spring, he takes her by the arm, shows her the rope, and tells her laconically to choose between his Excellency and this. Poor Najma has not the courage to die, and so soon. Her cousin Khalid is in prison, is excommunicated––what can she do? Run away? The Church will follow her––punish her. There’s something satanic in Khalid––the Church said so––the Church knows. Najma rolls these things in her mind, looks at her father beseechingly. Her father points to the noose. Najma falls to weeping. The noose serves well its purpose.

For hereafter, when the Dodo comes decorated, SHE has to offer him the cushion, bring him the masnad, make for him the coffee. And eventually, as the visits accumulate, she goes with him to the dress-maker in Beirut. The bridal gown shall be of the conventional silk this time; for his Excellency is travelled, and knows and reverences the fashion. But why prolong these painful details?

“Allah, in the mysterious working of his Providence,” says Shakib, “preordained it thus: Khalid, having served his turn in prison, Najma begins her own; for a few days after he was set free, she was placed in bonds forged for her by the Jesuits. Now, when Khalid returned from Damascus, he came straightway to me and asked that we go to see Najma and try to prevail upon her, to persuade her to go with him, to run away. They would leave on the night-train to Hama this time, and thence set 180 forth towards Palmyra. I myself did not know what had happened, and so I approved of his plan. But alas! as we were coming down the main Street to Najma’s house, we heard the sound of tomtoms in the distance and the shrill ulluluing of women. We continued apace until we reached the by-way through which we had to pass, and lo, we find it choked by the zeffah (wedding procession) of none but she and the third-class Medjidi....”

But we’ll no more of this! Too tragic, too much like fiction it sounds, that here abruptly we must end this Chapter.