An Account of the Manners and Customs of the Modern Egyptians

Fortunately in recent years many educated, observant, and enterprising Englishmen have studied Mussulman life and character in many parts of the world. The names of Sir Richard Burton and Edward Henry Palmer stand as types of the later generation of these men; but in the early part of this century no man can be named who has greater claims to recognition and gratitude for his labours in this direction than Edward William Lane. To him we owe an admirable translation of “The Thousand and One Nights,” with notes, which form a complete encyclopædia of Arab manners and customs; selections from the Koran, which introduce the English reader to its most valuable portions; an invaluable Arabic-English Lexicon; and lastly the present work, which has been described as “the most remarkable description of a people ever written.”

Edward William Lane, third son of the Rev. Theophilus Lane, a Prebendary of Hereford Cathedral, and of Sophia Gardiner, a niece of Gainsborough the painter, was born at Hereford, on Sept. 17th, 1801, and largely educated by his parents, especially his mother, to whom he owed much of his intellectual and moral training. Having shown equal mastery of classics and mathematics, he intended entering at Cambridge with a view to taking holy orders, but abandoned this intention after a short visit to Cambridge. Immediately afterwards he found himself able to solve all the problems in the mathematical tripos of the year except one, the solution to which came to him while asleep, and was at once written down on waking in the middle of the night. Joining his elder brother Richard, an able lithographer, in London, he made great progress in engraving and other branches of art, which were afterwards of much value to him in Egypt. Through overwork and want of exercise, he injured his constitution, and nearly succumbed to an attack of fever. His subsequent ill-health led him to contemplate a residence in the East, to which his now rapidly progressing studies in Arabic had already attracted him. In July, 1825, he left England in a brig bound for Alexandria. On Sept. 2nd the vessel nearly foundered in a gale off Tunis; the master proved incompetent, and begged Lane, who knew something of navigation, to take the helm; and, lashed to the wheel, he succeeded in taking the brig safely into Malta.

Arrived at Alexandria, he resolved to throw himself con amore into native life, to adopt native costume, speak Arabic continually, and penetrate the inner life of the people. Several months were spent in Cairo; at the Pyramids he lived in a tomb for a fortnight, with bones, rags, and mummies for his companions; in 1826 he ascended the Nile to the Second Cataract; everywhere recording his exact impressions, making plans and careful drawings, and taking all trouble to secure accurate knowledge. He returned to England in the autumn of 1828, with a complete “Description of Egypt,” as it then was, and 101 excellent sepia drawings, made with the camera lucida. But Egypt was not yet known or appreciated in England, and publishers would not incur the expense of publishing the work and reproducing the drawings, though they were universally praised by all who saw them. Fortunately that part of the work which gave an account of the modern inhabitants was shown to Lord Brougham, who at once recommended its acceptance by the Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge. But in order to perfect the book, Lane undertook to visit Egypt a second time, to stay two years, and still more completely enter into the life of the Egyptians. The book, when ready, was illustrated by admirable woodcuts drawn on the blocks by his own hand; it was published in December, 1836, in two volumes. Its success was immediate and great; other editions followed, the third, much improved, being published by Charles Knight in 1842. It is from this that the present edition is reprinted. Later editions have contained various modifications, but nothing can add to the book as we present it, as a perfect picture of what Lane saw in Egypt in 1833-5. Even twenty-five years later, the people and their habits had in many ways altered more than in several preceding centuries. We can never reconstruct Egypt as Lane saw it, except by reading Lane’s description. It has a permanent value as history, and thus no attempt has here been made to modernise it, or to alter the references which he made to “recent” or “present” times. It bears the stamp of a character singularly open to the realisation of the genius of a different race from his own, and as such it has few parallels in literature.