I Was Glad, For My
Part (Though Outwardly Majestic And Indignant In Demeanour), That
The Horses Had Not Come, And That We Had A Chance Of Seeing This
Little Queer Glimpse Of Oriental Life, Which The Magistrate's
Faithlessness Procured For Us.
As piety forbids the Turks to eat during the weary daylight hours
of the Ramazan, they spend their time profitably in sleeping until
the welcome sunset, when the town wakens:
All the lanterns are
lighted up; all the pipes begin to puff, and the narghiles to
bubble; all the sour-milk-and-sherbet-men begin to yell out the
excellence of their wares; all the frying-pans in the little dirty
cookshops begin to friz, and the pots to send forth a steam: and
through this dingy, ragged, bustling, beggarly, cheerful scene, we
began now to march towards the Bow Street of Jaffa. We bustled
through a crowded narrow archway which led to the cadi's police-
office, entered the little room, atrociously perfumed with musk,
and passing by the rail-board, where the common sort stood, mounted
the stage upon which his worship and friends sat, and squatted down
on the divans in stern and silent dignity. His honour ordered us
coffee, his countenance evidently showing considerable alarm. A
black slave, whose duty seemed to be to prepare this beverage in a
side-room with a furnace, prepared for each of us about a
teaspoonful of the liquor: his worship's clerk, I presume, a tall
Turk of a noble aspect, presented it to us; and having lapped up
the little modicum of drink, the British lion began to speak.
Enter page number
PreviousNext
Page 143 of 240
Words from 39002 to 39271
of 65663
