Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 11, 1900.djvu/377

 Cairene Folklore. 357

The one said : ' You owe me thirty paras.' The other answered : ' No, I owe only one piastre less ten paras.' So they quarrelled and fought, till an Egyptian came and pointed out that the two sums were the same, as forty paras make a piastre."

If the Copts of Upper Egypt are satirised by the Moham- medans of Cairo, the Copts in Cairo itself have taken their revenge. A cook I once had was a Copt, and my waiter one day came to me from him with a grin upon his face. I asked what had happened, and was told that he had just heard a story from the cook which bore hardly upon poor Mohammedans like himself. The story, which goes back to the long centuries of Mohammedan persecution, was as follows : —

''There was once a Copt who said to God: ' Shall we go (when we die) to Paradise or to the fire ? ' He answered : ' My boy, you will go to Paradise.' Then the Copt asked : ' The Catholics, and the English, and the Protestants, will they also all go to Paradise?' He replied: 'Certainly, there's a vestibule (there).' Then he asked : ' And the Mohammedans?' He answered: ' Ugh, is it a pigstye ? ' " •

I will first give some examples of Cairene stories, and then pass on to the superstitions and more genuine folk- lore of the people.

I.

" There was once a fellah, who being annoyed with his wife left the village and went away; he came to another village, went to a house there and begged. The mistress came to him : * Where do you come from (she asked) ? ' He replied : ' I am come from hell.' She said : ' Have you not seen my son Mohammed (there) ? ' He answered :

' Kan fi wahid Gipti, 'al le-Rabbuna : " nehosh eg-genna vvala 'n-nar?" 'Alio: " waladi, tehosh eg-genna." Huwa 'alio : " el-Katalik, wel-Ingliz, wel- Berotestant yehoshu gami'hum eg-genna?" 'Alio: "Wallah! fl dalliz." 'Alio: " wel-Muslimin ?" 'Alio: '•Ugh! hiya zeriba ? "