In front of him stood four wax candles (all Orientals
hate drinking in any but a bright light), and a tray containing a basin
of stuff like soup maigre, a dish of cold stewed meat, and two bowls of
Salatah,[FN#27] sliced cucumber, and curds.
The "materials" peeped out
of an iron pot filled with water; one was a long, thin, white-glass
flask of 'Araki, the other a bottle of some strong
[p.136]perfume. Both were wrapped up in wet rags, the usual
refrigerator.
Ali Agha welcomed me politely, and seeing me admire the preparations,
bade me beware how I suspected an Albanian of not knowing how to drink;
he made me sit by him on the bed, threw his dagger to a handy distance,
signalled me to do the same, and prepared to begin the bout. Taking up
a little tumbler, in shape like those from which French postilions used
to drink la goutte, he inspected it narrowly, wiped out the interior
with his forefinger, filled it to the brim, and offered it to his
guest[FN#28] with a bow. I received it with a low salam, swallowed its
contents at once, turned it upside down in proof of fair play, replaced
it upon the floor, with a jaunty movement of the arm, somewhat like a
pugilist delivering a "rounder," bowed again, and requested him to help
himself. The same ceremony followed on his part. Immediately after each
glass,-and rapidly the cup went about,-we swallowed a draught of water,
and ate a spoonful of the meat or the Salatah in order to cool our
palates. Then we re-applied ourselves to our pipes, emitting huge
puffs, a sign of being "fast" men, and looked facetiously at each
other,-drinking being considered by Moslems a funny and pleasant sort
of sin.
The Albanian captain was at least half seas over when we began the
bout, yet he continued to fill and to drain without showing the least
progress towards ebriety. I in vain for a time expected the bad-masti
(as the Persians call it,) the horse play, and the gross facetiae,
which generally
[p.137]accompany southern and eastern tipsiness. Ali Agha, indeed,
occasionally took up the bottle of perfume, filled the palm of his
right hand, and dashed it in my face: I followed his example, but our
pleasantries went no further.
Presently my companion started a grand project, namely, that I should
entice the respectable Haji Wali into the room, where we might force
him to drink. The idea was facetious; it was making a Bow-street
magistrate polk at a casino. I started up to fetch the Haji; and when I
returned with him Ali Agha was found in a new stage of "freshness." He
had stuck a green-leaved twig upright in the floor, and had so turned
over a gugglet of water, that its contents trickled slowly, in a tiny
stream under the verdure; whilst he was sitting before it mentally
gazing, with an outward show of grim Quixotic tenderness, upon the
shady trees and the cool rills of his fatherland. Possibly he had
peopled the place with "young barbarians at play;" for verily I thought
that a tear "which had no business there" was glistening in his stony
eye.
The appearance of Haji Wali suddenly changed the scene. Ali Agha jumped
up, seized the visitor by the shoulder, compelled him to sit down, and,
ecstasied by the old man's horror at the scene, filled a tumbler, and
with the usual grotesque grimaces insisted upon its being drunk off.
Haji Wali stoutly refused; then Ali Agha put it to his own lips, and
drained it, with a hurt feeling and reproachful aspect. We made our
unconvivial friend smoke a few puffs, and then we returned to the
charge. In vain the Haji protested that throughout life he had avoided
the deadly sin; in vain he promised to drink with us to-morrow,-in vain
he quoted the Koran, and alternately coaxed, and threatened us with the
police. We were inexorable. At last the Haji started upon his feet, and
rushed away, regardless of any thing but escape,
[p.138]leaving his Tarbush, his slippers, and his pipe, in the hands of
the enemy. The host did not dare to pursue his recreant guest beyond
the door, but returning he carefully sprinkled the polluting liquid on
the cap, pipe, and shoes, and called the Haji an ass in every tongue he
knew.
Then we applied ourselves to supper, and dispatched the soup, the stew,
and the Salatah. A few tumblers and pipes were exhausted to obviate
indigestion, when Ali Agha arose majestically, and said that he
required a troop of dancing girls to gladden his eyes with a ballet.
I represented that such persons are no longer admitted into
Caravanserais.[FN#29] He inquired, with calm ferocity, "who hath
forbidden it?" I replied "the Pasha;" upon which Ali Agha quietly
removed his cap, brushed it with his dexter fore-arm, fitted it on his
forehead, raking forwards, twisted his mustachios to the sharp point of
a single hair, shouldered his pipe, and moved towards the door, vowing
that he would make the Pasha himself come, and dance before us.
I foresaw a brawl, and felt thankful that my boon companion had
forgotten his dagger. Prudence whispered me to return to my room, to
bolt the door, and to go to bed, but conscience suggested that it would
be unfair to abandon the Albanian in his present helpless state. I
followed him into the outer gallery, pulling him, and begging him, as a
despairing wife might urge a drunken husband, to return home. And he,
like the British husband, being greatly irritated by the unjovial
advice, instantly belaboured with his pipe-stick[FN#30] the first person
[p.139]he met in the gallery, and sent him flying down the stairs with
fearful shouts of "O Egyptians!
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