Walter's Tours in the East

The dancing girls are very numerous, not only in Palestine, but in Egypt. They are the same odious class all through.... "Their faces are never covered... They are stockingless... Stripping off their shoes when the music begins, their hips suddenly rise up, their bodies sway either way..."
-from "Chapter VII: A Night
in Jericho"

Before the Hardy Boys and the Bobsey Twins, there was Walter, who traveled to Egypt, Damascus, Samaria, Constantinople, Athens, and other exotic destinations, and regaled the world with his adventures abroad in Walter's Tours in the East. This, the second book in the series, first published in 1863, "takes young travellers into Jerusalem, shows them the city and its environs and holy places, gives them a tour to the Dead Sea and the Jordan, and makes them acquainted with the sacred localities in that region." This early example of children's fiction offers an illuminating look at 19th-century Western attitudes toward the East.


American writer and reverend DANIEL C. EDDY served as chaplain of the Senate in 1856. He also wrote a series of books about the fictional Percy family's travels in Europe, including A Visit to Ireland (1859) and Through Scotland and England (1859).