There Is Also A Square Case Containing, Under Lock And Key, Small
Change And Some Choice Articles Of Commerce, Damaged Perfumes, Bad
Antimony For The Eyes, And Pernicious Rouge.
And dangling close above
it is a rusty pair of scales, ill poised enough for Egyptian Themis
herself to use.
To hooks over the shop-front are suspended reeds for
pipes, tallow candles, dirty wax tapers and cigarette paper; instead of
plate-glass windows and brass-handled doors, a ragged net keeps away
the flies when the master is in, and the thieves when he goes out to
recite in the Hasanayn Mosque his daily chapter "Ya Sin.[FN#29]" A
wooden shutter which closes down at night-time, and by day two
palm-stick stools intensely dirty and full of fleas, occupying the
place of the Mastabah or earthen bench,[FN#30] which accommodated
purchasers, complete the furniture of my preceptor's establishment.
[p.69]There he sits, or rather lies (for verily I believe he sleeps
through three-fourths of the day), a thin old man about
fifty-eight,[FN#31] with features once handsome and regular; a sallow
face, shaven head, deeply wrinkled cheeks, eyes hopelessly bleared, and
a rough grey beard ignorant of oil and comb. His turband, though large,
is brown with wear; his coat and small-clothes display many a hole;
and, though his face and hands must be frequently washed preparatory to
devotion, still they have the quality of looking always unclean. It is
wonderful how fierce and gruff he is to the little boys and girls who
flock to him grasping farthings for pepper and sugar. On such occasions
I sit admiring to see him, when forced to exertion, wheel about on his
place, making a pivot of that portion of our organisation which mainly
distinguishes our species from the other families of the Simiadae, to
reach some distant drawer, or to pull down a case from its accustomed
shelf. How does he manage to say his prayers, to kneel and to prostrate
himself upon that two feet of ragged rug, scarcely sufficient for a
British infant to lie upon? He hopelessly owns that he knows nothing of
his craft, and the seats before his shop are seldom occupied. His great
pleasure appears to be when the Haji and I sit by him a few minutes in
the evening, bringing with us pipes, which he assists us to smoke, and
ordering coffee, which he insists upon sweetening with a lump of sugar
from his little store. There we make him talk and laugh, and
occasionally quote a few lines strongly savouring of the jovial: we
provoke him to long stories about the love borne him in his
student-days by the great and holy Shaykh Abd al-Rahman, and the
antipathy with which he was regarded by the equally
[p.70]great and holy Shakh Nasr al-Din, his memorable single
imprisonment for contumacy,[FN#32] and the temperate but effective
lecture, beginning with "O almost entirely destitute of shame!"
delivered on that occasion in presence of other under-graduates by the
Right Reverend principal of his college.
Enter page number
PreviousNext
Page 47 of 302
Words from 24625 to 25148
of 157964
