572 LECTURES AND ESSAYS [1880- 



paid by fees, of which one half are remitted to the superior 

 at Mecca. The Mohafiz is the supreme executive officer ; 

 but the real power lies in the hand of the Grand Shereef, 

 and his representative, the Shereef Fawwaz, is the strong 

 man of the place. Fawwaz is now an elderly man, with 

 a fine tall person, a keen commanding eye, and a dignified 

 manner. He is greatly respected and feared by the Arabs 

 for his severe justice. Fawwaz is a pure Arab in his 

 habits and ways of thought. He has never been abroad, 

 and is as ignorant as a child of the progress of European 

 ways and inventions in the East. When I called on him, 

 the conversation turned chiefly on railways, telegraphs, 

 telephones, and the like, and Ismail the Anglophile got 

 so eloquent on the wonders of England that the old 

 gentleman was perfectly confounded. But he knows 

 the Arabs, and keeps a firm hand over them ; and as 

 most people would rather be judged in Arabic fashion 

 than by Turkish law, he is far the most important judge 

 in the place. His jurisdiction, however anomalous it 

 may appear in a district nominally Turkish, is undis 

 puted, and includes the power of life and death. Hosein 

 and Al Mas gave me a very favourable picture of the 

 wide jurisdiction which Fawwaz, as representative of the 

 Emeer, exerts even over remote tribes far away through 

 the Nejd. But from other and less partial sources I 

 gather that this picture was considerably exaggerated. 

 Over the settled populations of the Hejaz the Khadhror 

 agricultural Arabs the Shereef has practically a complete 

 hold. The Bedouins cannot altogether dispute his 

 authority, for they must from time to time visit the 

 towns to buy and sell, and thus come within the sphere 

 where he has effective jurisdiction. His warrant, too, 

 can generally be executed even in remote places when 

 he desires to arrest an offender. But justice among 

 the Arabs is properly a private matter, and parties in 

 a dispute may either betake themselves to self-help, or 

 if they appeal to a judge regard him rather in the light 



