Napoleon's Egypt: Invading The Middle East - Reenactor.ru

THE OBJECT OF HIS DESIRES199venge on them.” Bernoyer, who had no use for clerics of any religion, complainedbitterly about their use of Islam to whip up the emotions of the crowds:“This is the great resort of priests, which they always employ to move and liftthe believers as they propose.” 33The first responder from the French side was Gen. Dominique-MartinDupuy, who had been born in Toulouse in 1767 and who had distinguished himselfin Italy, where at one point he had been the military commander of Milan.Now officially in charge of the Citadel overlooking Cairo, he received the reportsof disturbances down in the city with some skepticism and therefore tookwith him only a small cavalry force of twelve men. Bonaparte recalled, “Since theinhabitants of Cairo are gossips, fidgety and extremely curious about the news,General Dupuy was accustomed to such alarms.” Dupuy rushed with his cavalrymendown al-Ghawriya Street and then turned toward the quarter where SheikhAbdullah al-Sharqawi, the head of the divan, lived. Al-Sharqawi refused to seehim and sent a servant out to announce that the great cleric was not at home.Dupuy then went to the mansion of the Ottoman-appointed chief justice. He enteredbut, noticing the extreme agitation of the crowd outside, suggested thatthey postpone their discussion until the following day. The chief justice, whomust have been frantic to get the French off his property lest they make him evenmore a target than he already was, entirely agreed. “At this point a perfumer,dressed up in the guise of a cleric, with a vest and waist cloth, came forward callingout to the people, inciting them and exclaiming ‘God is most great, O Muslims.The clerics have commanded you to kill the infidels. Make ready, stalwarts,and strike them everywhere.’” Guilds like that of the perfumers often overlappedwith mystical Sufi orders, and this man may have been a Sufi leader—thus hisclaim of clerical authority. The perfumer-theologian led a mob toward al-Ashrafiya and they joined the crowds at the chief justice’s mansion. Bonapartesays, “Dupuy could barely remount his steed in the midst of the crowd. The cavalrymenwere being squeezed. A horse trampled a North African. This fierceman, who had arrived from Mecca, fired his pistol at the rider, killing him, andmounted his horse. The French detachment charged and dispersed the people.Dupuy, exiting the courtyard, received, as he entered the street, “a blow to thehead from the lance of a man who was at a fixed post there. He fell dead.” 34The commander in chief recounted how the rumor immediately spreadamong the crowd that the “Great Sultan” (i.e., Bonaparte himself) had beenkilled and that the French had thrown off their masks of civility and were massacringthe believers. “The muezzins, from the top of their minarets, called thetrue believers to defend the mosques and the city.” The French cavalrymen at