The Bazars In Which The Tradesmen Have Their Shops, Are Very
Extensive.
These shops are filled with all kinds of merchandise.
In
the centre of the town is a rectangular building, with colonnades,
where the principal merchants attend daily to transact business.
The inhabitants of Fez are of a large muscular stature, fair
complexion, with black beards and eyes; extremely amorous and jealous
of their women, whom they keep strictly guarded. Their houses consist
of four wings, forming a court in the centre, round which is an
arcade, or piazza, with one spacious apartment on each side. The court
is paved with square pieces of marble, and has a basin of the same in
the centre, with a fountain. They keep their houses remarkably clean
and neat; but all the streets of this immense town are narrow, very
badly paved with large irregular stones, and most shockingly
dirty. The tops of their houses, like those of Tetuan, and other towns
in Barbary, are flat, for the purpose of recreation.
Among the remnants of several amphitheatres, there is one very nearly
entire, which is kept in constant repair at the expense of the
Emperor, and appropriated as a menagerie for lions, tigers, and
leopards. As I was contemplating it the other day, I felt at a loss to
account for this being kept in repair, while the others were suffered
to moulder into dust, unheeded, excepting a very few, and those but
partially prevented from sharing the general wreck. I had stood some
time, thus employed, when I was suddenly interrupted in my
meditations, by the sound of voices close behind me; on turning I
perceived two Jews, one of whom I knew very well, from having given
advice to some part of his family.
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