Bab En' Neby, Bab Errahme, Bab Et Touba, Bab Setna
Fatme.
The permission to enter into this enclosure, which is called El
Hedjra, is granted gratis to people of rank,
As Pashas, or chiefs of the
Hadj caravans, and may be purchased by other people from the principal
eunuchs, at the price of about twelve or fifteen dollars, distributed in
presents among them: but few visiters avail themselves of this
privilege, because they well know that, on entering the enclosure,
nothing more is to be seen than what falls under their observation when
peeping in at the windows of the railing, which are constantly kept
open; and I was myself not inclined to attract general notice, by thus
satisfying my curiosity. What appears of the interior is a curtain
carried round, which takes up almost the whole space, having between it
and the railing an open walk, of a few paces only in breadth. The
curtain is equal in height to the railing; but I could not distinguish
from below, whether, like the latter, it is open at the top. There is a
covering, (as the eunuchs affirm,) of the same stuff of which the
curtain is made; this is a rich silk brocade, of various colours,
interwoven with silver flowers and arabesques, with a band of
inscriptions in golden characters, running across the midst of it, like
that of the covering of the Kaaba. This curtain is at least thirty feet
high: it has a small gate to the north, which is always shut; no person
whatever being permitted to enter within its holy precincts, except the
chief eunuchs, who take care of it, and who put on, during the night,
the new curtain sent from
[p.333] Constantinople, whenever the old one is decayed, or when a new
Sultan ascends the throne.
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