Triumph of Civilization

An Egyptian man may offer an Egyptian girl his arm, but can she take it and remain respectable? Among the Egyptian judiciary this question caused as much head-scratching last week as a recondite Koran text.

At the pilgrim port of Suez a shocked policeman had arrested a girl for walking arm in arm with a man not her husband.

She was served with a writ charging 'indecent behavior in a public thoroughfare," was ordered by a district court to pay a -L-2 fine. Three dignified members of an appeal bench heard the outraged policeman give evidence: it was not in keeping with Egyptian tradition that a girl should "practically embrace a man in the street. In fact, husbands & wives, when in public view, always walked at a respectable distance of at least six feet."

Matters looked dark for the young woman until her counsel thought of a stunning defense. "Are we," he asked, "less civilized than Europeans? In all western countries it [arm linking] is the accepted custom." The case was quashed.

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