I Met Him In The Great Bazar; He Is A Fine Young Man Of Light Complexion And The Usual High Profile, Handsomely Dressed, With A Cashmere Turband, Armed To The Extent Of Sword And Dagger, And Followed By Two Large, Fierce-Looking Negro Slaves Leaning Upon Enormous Nabbuts.

The town itself is in no wise remarkable.

Built on the edge of a sunburnt plain that extends between the mountains and the sea, it fronts the northern extremity of a narrow winding creek. Viewed from the harbour, it is a long line of buildings, whose painful whiteness is set off by a sky-like cobalt and a sea-like indigo; behind it lies the flat, here of a bistre-brown, there of a lively tawny; whilst the background is formed by dismal Radhwah,

"Barren and bare, unsightly, unadorned."

Outside the walls are a few little domes and tombs, which by no means merit attention. Inside, the streets are wide; and each habitation is placed at an unsociable distance from its neighbour, except near the port and the bazars, where ground is valuable. The houses are roughly built of limestone and coralline, and their walls full of fossils crumble like almond cake; they have huge

[p.227] hanging windows, and look mean after those in the Moslem quarters of Cairo. There is a "Suk," or market-street of the usual form, a long narrow lane darkened by a covering of palm leaves, with little shops let into the walls of the houses on both sides.

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