iable. For the space of sixteen consecutive hours and a quarter, we were forbidden to eat, drink, smoke, snuff, and even to s

rco

rco e bev

d condemn any open infraction of it with uncommon severity. In

secret n'es

l'eclat qui f

ed severely from such total abstinence, I found but one patient who would eat even to save his life. And among the v

ts, the chief effect of the "blessed month" upon True B

ladies who have scratched, bitten, and otherwise injured the bodies of their lords. The Mosques are crowded with a sulky, grumbling population, making themselves offensive to one another on earth whilst working their way to heaven; and in the shade, under the outer walls, the little boys who have been expelled the church attempt to forget their miseries in spiritless play. In the bazars and streets, pale long-drawn faces, looking for the most part intolerably cross, catch your eye, and at this season a stran

the stomach becomes accustomed to such hours, but in matters of appetite, habit is everything, and for health's sake one should strive to eat as plentifully as possible. Then sounds the Salam, or Blessings on the Prophet,4 an introduction to the Call of Morning Prayer. Smoking sundry pipes with tenderness, as if taking leave of a friend; and until the second gun, fired at about half-past tw

ive fresh instructions. At 9 A.M. Shaykh Mohammed enters, with "lecture" written upon his wrinkled brow; or I pick him up on the way, and proceed straight to the Mosque Al-Azhar. After three hours' hard reading, with little interruption from bystanders - this is long vacation, most of the students being at home - comes the call to mid-day prayer. The founder of Al-Islam ordained but few devotions for the morning

vapour breaks the dreary expanse of splendour on high. There being no such comforts as Indian tatties, and few but the wealthiest houses boasting glass windows, the interior of your room is somewhat more fiery than the street. Weakened with fasting, the body feels the heat trebly, and the disordered stomach almost affects the brain. Every

ople flock to the windows and balconies, in order to watch the moment of their release. Some pray, others tell their

eously rises the sweet cry of the Mu'ezzin, calling men to prayer, a

the delightful intelligence to your parched tongue, empty stomach, and languid limbs. You exhaust a pot full of water, no matter its size. You clap h

jelly of milk, starch, and rice-flour. They then smoke a pipe, drink a cup of coffee or a glass of sherbet, and recite the evening prayers; for the devotions of this hour are delicate things, and while sm

zan evening. The Egyptians have a prov

est, if it be but

walk, if it be

an's dwelling-house.13 The scene reminds you strongly of the Sonneurs of Brittany and the Zampognari from the Abruzzian Highlands bagpiping before the Madonna. There a tall, gaunt Maghrabi displays upon a square yard of dirty paper certain lines and blots, supposed to represent the venerable Ka'abah, and collects coppers to defray the expenses of his pilgrimage. A steady stream of loungers sets through the principal thoroughfares towards the Azbakiyah Gardens, which skirt the Frank quarter; there they sit in the moonlight, listening to Greek and Turkish bands, or making merry with cakes, toasted grains, coffee, sugared-drinks, and the broad pleasantries

ps of straw for Mash'als, or cressets, and outrunners, all huzzaing with ten-schoolboy power. "O thy right! O thy left! O thy face! O thy heel! O thy back, thy back!" cries the panting footman, who, huge torch on shoulder, runs before the grandee's carriage; "Bless the Prophet and get out of the way!" "O Allah bless him!" respond the good Moslems, some shrinking up to the walls to avoid the stick, others rushing across the road, so as to give themselves every chance of being knocked down. The donkey boy beats his ass with a heavy palm-cudgel, - he fears no treadmill here, - cursing him at the top of his voice for a "pander," a "Jew," a "Christian," and a "son of

two sticks together: "upon Allah! upon Allah! O daughter!" cry the bystanders, when the obstinate "bint"18 (daughter) of sixty years seizes their hands, and will not let go without extorting a farthing. "Bring the sweet" (i.e.

easant to thee!20 is t

the other, instead of returning

am the thick one and thou art the thin!" resumes the first speaker, and so on

forth, "Hie ye to devotion! Hie ye to salvation." And (at morning-prayer time) he adds: "Devotion is better than sleep! Devotion is bette

le of crowded life, all is desolate; the town walls seem crumbling to decay, the hovels are tenantless, and the paths untrodden; behind you lies the Wild, before you, the thousand tomb-stones, ghastly in their whiteness; while beyond them the tall dark forms of the Mamluk Soldans' towers rise from the low and hollow ground like the spirits of kings guarding ghostly subjects in the Shadowy Realm. Nor less weird than the scene are the sounds! - the hyaena's laugh, the howl of the wild dog, and the screech of the low-flying owl. Or we spent the evening at some Takiyah23 (Darwayshes' Oratory), generally preferring that called the "Gulshani," near the Muayyid Mosque outside the Mutawalli's saintly doo

n) are by some Egyptian limner's art metamorphosed into a preternatural tabby cat grasping a scimitar, with the jolly fat face of a "gay" young lady, curls and all complete, resting fondly upon her pet's concave back. This high dignitary's reception room was a court-yard sub dio: fronting the door were benches and cushions composing the Sadr

egular features and the usual preposterous lamb-skin cap and beard, two peaked black cones at least four feet in length, measured from the tips, resting on a slender basement of pale yellow face. After a quarter of an hour of ceremonies, polite mutterings and low bendings with the right hand on the left breast, the Mirza's pipe was handed to him first,

ng. It is, for instance, understood that yo

he quotation is a hackneyed one, but it st

unciation and novelty of citation, "in leaving home

hysician the "lie

'd doctors th

d parsons the

you would pass for a man of belles

physician hath

patient hath life

of our days b

aft, and his dr

his dragoman for a counter-fee will sell their interests shamelessly. He is a hidalgo of blue blood in pride, pompousness and poverty. There is not a sheet of writing-paper in the "Consulate" - when they want one a farthing is sent to the grocer's - y

careful on the way to address each sentinel with a "Peace be upon thee!" especially if you have no lantern, otherwise you may chance to sleep in the guard-house. And, ch

ndure as long as Memory lasts, - a thunder-cloud bursting upon the Alps, a night of stormy darkness off

the huge hanging balcony-windows of fantastic wood-work, supported by gigantic brackets and corbels, and under deep verandahs, and gateways, vast enough for Behemoth to pass through, and in blind wynds and long cul-de-sacs, lie patches of thick darkness, made visible by the dimmest of oil lamps. The arch is a favourite feature: in one place you see it a mere skeleton-rib opening into some huge deserted hall; in another the ogre is full of fretted stone and wood carved like lace-work. Not a line is straight, the tall dead walls of the Mosques slope over their massy buttresses, and the thin minarets seem about to fall across your path.