III. 
106 GRAND CAIRO. 
CHAP, part of their art consists in mingling with their 
Ululation such affecting expressions of praise 
and pity, such a pathetic narrative of the em- 
ployments, possessions, and characteristics of 
the deceased, and such inquiry as to his reasons 
for leaving those whom he professed to love 
during life, as may excite the tears and sighs of 
the relations and friends collected about the 
corpse. It is therefore evident, that this cus- 
tom, like the caoineadh of the Irish\ and the 
funeral cry of other nations ^ are remains of 
( 1 ) See an account of the Ceremony of Ululation among the Irish, 
as taken from the Transactions of the Royal Irish Academy, in Dr. 
Adam Clarke's Edition of " Harmer's Observatioiis," vol. III. p. 40. 
Land. 1808. Among other expressions used by the Irish mourners, 
they continually repeat the words "Ullaloo! Ullaloo! why didst 
THOU DIE?" — " The Ullaloo of the Irish," says the learned Editor of 
Harmer's work, " is the same, both in sense and sound, with the <U J, 
oolooleh of the Arabians, the ululo of the Romaiis, the oXoXi^a of the 
Greeks, and the hh'< yalal of the Hebrews." 
(2) The custom seems to have been universal ; for it has been ob- 
served among the descendants of the three great families ; the /4rab, 
the Tahtar, and the Goth. The Arab, as here related. The Tahtar, 
as in Russia. (See Olearius, lib. iii. p. 143. Lond. 1662.) The Goth, 
Gets, or Greeks, as we learn from Homer. It prevails, also, among 
the Albanians; and is found even among the Greenlanders, and in 
Abyssinia. " The women continue their weeping and lamentation. 
Their h/jwl is all in one tone ; as if an instrument were to play a tre- 
mulous fifth downwards, through all the semitones. Now and then 
they pause a little." See Crantz's History of Greenlaiid, vol. J. p. 239. 
Lond. 1767. See also Salt's Travels ,- and Part I. of these Travels, 
p,25l. Svo. edit, for an account of the same custom in Russia. 
