This Fellow Lives By Alms (I Mean The Head Of The Hag).
Winter and
summer he wears no clothes but a thin and scanty white shirt.
He
wields a staff, and stalks along scowling and barefoot. His
immense shock of black hair streams behind him, and his brown
brawny body is curled over with black hair, like a savage man.
This saint has the largest harem in the town; he is said to be
enormously rich by the contributions he has levied; and is so
adored for his holiness by the infatuated folk, that when he
returns from the Hag (which he does on horseback, the chief Mollahs
going out to meet him and escort him home in state along the
Ezbekieh road), the people fling themselves down under the horse's
feet, eager to be trampled upon and killed, and confident of heaven
if the great Hadji's horse will but kick them into it. Was it my
fault if I thought of Hadji Daniel, and the believers in him?
There was no Dervish of repute on the plain when I passed; only one
poor wild fellow, who was dancing, with glaring eyes and grizzled
beard, rather to the contempt of the bystanders, as I thought, who
by no means put coppers into his extended bowl. On this poor
devil's head there was a poorer devil still - a live cock, entirely
plucked, but ornamented with some bits of ragged tape and scarlet
and tinsel, the most horribly grotesque and miserable object I ever
saw.
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