CHAMBERS'S EDINBURGH JOURNAL. in spite of himself Peter was obliged to look up. He Poor Peter was quite upset at this question: he could not answer it; and so taking up the trouble that pressed at the moment, he contented himself with muttering, 'I'm so cold!' And so you are, poor fellow!' said the little girl kindly. But no wonder, when you are sitting here on the frosty side of the hedge. Look how the sun shines over there: come across to the bright side, and you will feel yourself cheered even before you are warmed with its heat.' And whether he would or no, she gently forced him from the chill seat on which he had sunk in the carelessness of grief, and made him settle himself comfortably on the sunny bank at the opposite side of the way. 'And now what is the matter?' she asked for the third time. 'I am sure there was something more than the cold.' And Peter, who had never before confessed a trouble to any one, found himself relating all his griefs to the little stranger whom he had never even seen till the day before. She laughed-she could not help it at his account of Snap's encounter with the traveller; and the more rueful and serious Peter looked, the more it still made her laugh, until he came to the close of the adventure, and then she looked very grave, and readily allowed that the punishment, and, above all, the hanging, was no laughing matter indeed. 'But, Peter, though you say your father is very stern, still I wonder you did not try to beg off poor Snap; as you were punished yourself, and bore it well, maybe for your sake Snap would be forgiven if you tried. Did you try?' 'No, indeed; it would be of no use: I never asked my father for anything. They say I am a fool!' And poor Peter, in deep consciousness of his degradation, again buried his burning face between his knees. A fool!' repeated the little girl, and her blue eyes opened very wide. Oh, Peter, you surely are not that? Do not let any one think so. Go to your father, like a sensible boy, and tell him you are sorry for what happened as you ought to be—and that you will promise for Snap that he shall not get into any more mischief. You know, Peter, you can promise that;' and again the bright eyes laughed gaily, while a dawning smile flitted over Peter's doleful features too. now I can stay no longer, otherwise I shall be late for 'And school; so good-by, Peter: do what I tell you, and be happy to-morrow.' And again the little one tripped away, turning again, and waving her hand until the bushes shut her out. Peter,' instead of Good-by, Snap.' But this time it was 'Good-by, Peter remained lost in a world of wonder and perplexity at the new line of conduct proposed to him. Should he, could he follow it; had he any chance of being listened to? No, it could be of no use he never could do it. Thus was he deciding, when again the sound of light footsteps made him turn his head, and in a moment the little girl stood breathless by his side, with her hand on her heart, to still its beating, but smiling all the time, as she waited impatiently for words. At last she exclaimed, 'Oh, I ran so fast! Just as I got to the top of the hill, I thought of one thing I wished to say; and I am so late; but I should tell you this: when you go to ask your father, Peter, do not hang your head, and look down as I have seen you do; maybe it is that makes him say you are like a fool; but look up in his face as if you trusted him, and were not afraid of him, or ashamed of what you asked for; and remember to say you are sorry, and promise for the future; and, that's all-remember now.' before he could answer a word, she was again out of And sight. through the ordeal, and succeeded; he even overheard Her words just turned the scale; Peter manfully went his father say to his wife, as he turned away, That boy is not such a fool after all;' and he certainly looked a different being, sitting on the sunny bank with Snap by his side, on the following morning when his little counsellor came up. giving food for thought, hope, and dreams for the rest of in the wild flowers grew more and more intense; now a would be Peter's answer. was, and she, too, had blushed deeply, painfully. But Even before he spoke the little one guessed how it exclaim, 'Oh, is that all; I was afraid it was-couldn't, the sentence was hardly finished, when she hastened to See, here is A, here is B; repeat them after me;' and or wouldn't you shan't have that story to tell again. laughed so joyously, echoing it again and again, that as her musical ear caught the accidental rhyme, she mirth, they both laughed the little embarrassment even Peter caught the infection, and joining in her away. closed the book, and more seriously said, Peter, this terable astonishment; such a presumptuous thought But his little companion combated all his objections, and, his spirit already roused by the shame he had just endured, it was settled at last that if he found himself successful in learning the alphabet under her teaching in a few days, with that as his groundwork he would make the trial. His lesson was marked out for that day; she spared him a little book, and to their mutual delight, in three days more he was perfect in all the letters. This success gave him some confidence; and, summoning his whole stock of courage, he accosted his father the following morning with a request that he might be sent to school. To school, boy! for what?-to idle, is it?' said his father, stopping short, and eyeing him from head to foot. 'No, father,' replied Peter resolutely; it is to learn. Try me at anyrate. I know my letters now, and I would wish to get on.' 'Your letters! A great stretch indeed, for, let me see, nine years old.' Poor Peter felt his heart swelling; but here his stepmother interposed-' And more shame for us to have him nine years in ignorance, if he was able to learn; and it was a great stretch for you, Peter, my little man, to learn your letters; you may well be proud of it; who knows but you may be a credit to us yet?' Peter's look of grateful astonishment at the kind word went to both their hearts: his father patted him on the head, and told him it should be as he wished; and from that moment forward he seemed to enter on a new existence. He respected himself, and others soon learned to respect him also; while, in the new turn of feeling, every one tried to find some good quality in Peter never suspected before: his heart and his mind, both so long left in fallow, now were ready to yield a tenfold crop; and while he gained the regards of his playmates, his master, before many months, pronounced him one of the most painstaking and improving boys in the school. What pride he would have felt in reporting his progress to his first little friend, as each day he went down the hill to their old place of meeting, and placing his four-footed or feathered charge under the guidance of Snap during the hours spent at school, loitered and watched in the vain hope of seeing her, if it were but for a moment. But she came not. After the first day when he related his triumph, and she shared in his joy, pouring a flood of courage and hope into his mind, he saw her no more; and the long summer waxed and waned, finding him still each morning on the same spot, returning ever with drooping head and disappointed heart. At last one day-it was late in autumn-joy of joy, he saw her coming slowly up the hill! Snap, with a quick cry, bounded to meet her, and for once Peter felt almost sorry that he should reach her first; but though she looked smiling and bright as ever-brighter even-she did not say one word in answer to all Peter's words of welcome, until she reached the little sunny spot where they were always used to sit; and even then she pressed her hand tightly on her side, as she had done on that long-ago day, and drew her breath quickly, though she had been walking very slow. Yes, it is a long time, Peter,' she said at last, in answer to all his questions-a long time since I was even out, for I have been very ill; but to-day was so fine, that I was allowed once more to go and see a friend I love that dear schoolmistress, for whom you have plucked so many nosegays.' 'No, indeed, they were not for her,' exclaimed Peter bluntly; they were always for yourself.' The little girl laughed one of her old blithe laughs; but then she put her hand to her side again, and Peter said quickly, as if to contradict his own thought, You are not sick now? sick people are always pale.' She smiled somewhat sadly, and laid her hand on his. It was always a little hand, but now it looked so small and thin, that the blue veins showed themselves quite plainly through. Peter thought it prettier than ever; but still there was something in her look, and in the little action itself, that raised a choking feeling in his throat which prevented his saying one word. After a moment's silence, she arose, and taking a book out of her basket-it was her little Bible-she said, You will keep this for my sake, Peter, and read it often: I am so glad you can read it now. I cannot stay longer, lest I should catch fresh cold; but whether we meet soon again or never, you will still remember me; and remember, too, what I always told you-in everything that pains or troubles us there is some bright side.' She looked upwards as she spoke, and there was a strange beauty in her face which awed and silenced Peter. He bowed his head between his knees, to hide his emotion: when he raised it again, she was gone. From that day forth, though each morning found him at the trysting-place, it was more to read a little portion of the book she had given him than with any sanguine expectation of seeing her again. And always when he turned away from his long-searching gaze down the valley, he used to raise his eyes to the blue sky and fleecy clouds, and feel as if the true answer was there. And then he bethought him how he had never asked her name, where she came from, or where she was going, but watched for her as he did for the morning sun, and saw her even like that, passing on day after day, and never returning back; and thus at last she became so identified with bright and beautiful nature in his simple mind, that he almost doubted whether she had been a reality at all. He kept her precious gift, even as he had done the first one, in the little stonehouse, now carefully stopped with moss and clay, to preserve it from damp. But notwithstanding all his precautions, he perceived a spot one day on the cover; and the fear of injury to it being even stronger than the fear of discovery, he brought it home, at what he thought a quiet hour, to air it by the fire. But Peter had not yet learned to estimate female curiosity: a little sister, who had become a favourite of his, from a slight fancied likeness to his early friend, was hovering near; and peeping over his shoulder to see what he had got, did what Peter, long as he had the book, had never thought of doing-she turned the leaves over to the title-page, and there discovered the giver's name. 'Jane Watson!' repeated she, first aloud, then slowly to herself Jane Watson! why, that was the name of Mrs Bonar's grandchild; that sweet little girl, that every one said was too lovely, too wise, and too good to stay in this world!' And is she in it now?' asked Peter nervously. Ah, no-they spoke too truly-she died last Christmas-day! When we gathered back to school, the best and fairest was gone. But why do you ask so anxiously, Peter? And where did you get this book? Did you ever know anything about her?' Prepared as he had been, the certainty was almost too much for Peter, to find out all about her only to know that he had surely lost her. But then recalling her last words, and remembering how much there was connected with their brief acquaintance that could never be lost to him, he gave his best tribute to her memory in the effort with which he conquered his emotion; in the smile, even though it was a sad one, with which he answered his sister's still questioning looks, as he calmly said, 'Yes, Letty, I was so happy. I knew her once, and am happier still that she knew me.' SUNDAY IN GLASGOW. Thirty-nine abstainers accomplished a moral survey of the city of Glasgow on the 29th October, being the communion Sabbath. The object of the survey was to ascertain the number of whisky-shops open for the sale of intoxicating liquors. The survey was made between the hours of six and ten in the evening. The result is the fact, ninety-seven public-houses were open! If a baker were to open which we now advisedly publish, that one thousand and his shop, a posse of policemen would be sent to shut it; and if the offence were repeated, the baker would be dragged before the authorities, and severely fined. The day is too sacred to be desecrated by the sale of bread. But whisky, it appears, may be sold in a thousand shops on the Sabbath-day without profanation. The dignity of Sunday, it seems, requires that food should be withheld; but it is not at all marred by the sale of poison. The people may not buy what may do them good on Sunday, but may have a liberal supply of what must do them harm. Virtue must starve on the sacred day if it forgets to buy its loaf on the Saturday; but vice is better cared for-it receives its appropriate aliment on that day as on others. The occupations that clothe, lodge, and educate the nation, must cease one whole day in seven; but the occupation that covers the masses with rags, that doles to them as poison what the baker should have handed as food, that drives them out of comfortable homes into wretched warrens, that dooms their children to ignorance and beggary -this occupation never ceases in the city of Glasgow. The baker, the butcher, and the grocer must stop, but the publican never. Our legislators (we have much to thank them for) have carefully closed the wells of physical health on the Sabbath, and have, with a wisdom too deep for common minds to appreciate, thrown open the sluices of crime, pauperism, and disease. Railway travelling, though a tolerably good mode of Sabbath desecration, is a mere bagatelle compared with opening the whisky-shops on Sundays. Ten hundred and ninety-seven whisky-shops, containing ten customers each, is equal to a train with ten thousand nine hundred and seventy passengers! But the dram-shops could easily accommodate ten times the number. Scottish Temperance Review. THE HEDGEHOG. Begging pardon of naturalists for such an accusation, I can't help saying that I think a great many fibs have been told about the hedgehog. In the first place, the old wives' fables about sucking cows, and so forth, were so horridly unbelievable, and yet so damaging to little hoggy's reputation with the vulgar, that the more erudite and more humane became his patrons and apologists, and made much more of him than he deserves. Dear old White of Selborne must have been taking a nap when he told us about hoggy's liking for plantain-roots. "The manner,' says White, in which hedgehogs eat the roots of the plantain in my grass walks is very curious: with their upper mandible, which is much longer than their lower, they bore under the plant, and so eat the root off upwards, leaving the tuft of leaves untouched. In this respect they are very serviceable, as they destroy a very troublesome weed.' Boy and man this passage tormented me many years, because I knew hoggy to be a bloodthirsty poacher, a regular knight-errant for attacking vipers, and a tyrant over all manner of mice and such small deer, and I thought it passing strange that he should take to cooling his copper with the roots of the old gentleman's plantains. However, the tastes of pigs and men are every now and then some what eccentric, so I left the matter sub judice, until chance solved the mystery. In a grass walk I saw some flattened plants of the common plantain withering and half dead; by the side of each I found the hole, bored, as White supposed, by the long upper mandible of the hoggy; but it was scarcely big enough to admit a lead pencil, and so round-and smooth, that I said directly to myself, "Tis the burrow of a night-eating caterpillar: 'I got a trowel, and in a trice the fellow was unearthed, and he afterwards turned to a ghost-moth, or yellow underwing, I can't say which, for both came out in one cage. The hedgehog is properly a nocturnal carnivorous animal; he prowls about at night, like an owl, looking after the nests of pheasants, partridges, corncraiks, and larks: he kills the old ones if he can, and sucks their eggs if he can't; now and then he overruns a rabbit; but his favourite dish is a snake or an adder-he catches these while dozing under cover, and suffering from repletion caused by four or five mice lying undigested in their stomachs, tail on, and it is then that desperate fights ensue: it is then that his armour, stands hoggy in good stead: the deadly adder, infuriated at feeling hoggy's teeth griping her back, lashes her head against a skin less vulnerable than that once said to have been worn by a Mr Achilles. The pluck and power of both are tried to the utmost; but hoggy is almost sure to triumph in the end, and the adder, half devoured, is often found next morning by the countryman, who wonders how he come so mauled.' I take it that the spiny coat of the hedgehog is nature's defence against the poison fangs of his favourite prey.Letters of Rusticus. SONG OF THE FORSAKEN MAID. 1. Оn weel I mind! The sun flung bricht II. Forgotten is that gentle strain, Sae luved and lost; without regret The wave in darkness sleeps again, And why maun I remember yet? Oh gin that lesson I could wrest Frae thy cauld heart, thou darksome sca! And whare suld I sae saftly rest, Sin' my fause luve's forgotten me? L. R. MORAL WITHOUT PHYSICAL COURAGE. Lieutenant Wwas at the storming of Morne Fortunée in the West Indies. His behaviour on that occasion excited general admiration. He was the first to ascend the breach and plant the king's colours on the captured redoubt. His gallantry was recorded in the orderly book, and he was recommended for immediate promotion. Strange to say, the following morning he waited on his commanding-officer, then Lieutenant-Colonel V-d-r, and requested leave of absence to return to Ireland, his native country, and to resign his commission in favour of a younger brother, who was desirous of entering the service. The colonel, surprised at this extraordinary request on the him, very naturally asked him what motive induced him to part of a young officer with such bright prospects before make so singular a proposal; when the young man frankly told him that, when the troops were moving forward for the attack, and the enemy's fire had opened upon them, he felt a strong, almost an insurmountable disposition to fail out; and he believed that nothing but the rapidity of the advance, and the shouts of the men, prevented him from disgracing himself; but after a short time, he added, his himself on the summit of the breach, with the colours in brain was on fire, he knew not where he was, and he found his hand, he knew not how; but he added, not without his vocation; and fearing that at some future period he hesitation, that he felt that the profession of arms was not might not have sufficient courage to overcome his fear, he was desirous to leave the service with honour while it was still in his power.-Dr Millingen's Mind and Matter.' THE ATMOSPHERE. It is only the girdling and encircling air, which flows above and around all, that makes the whole world kin." The carbonic acid, with which our breathing fills the air, to-morrow will be spreading north and south, and striving to make the tour of the world. The date-trees that grow round the fountains of the Nile will drink it in by their leaves; the cedars of Lebanon will take of it to add to their stature; the cocoa-nuts of Tahiti will grow riper upon it; and the palms and bananas of Japan will change it into flowers. The oxygen we are breathing was distilled for us some short time ago by the magnolias of the Susquehanna and the great trees that skirt the Orinoco and the Amazon. The giant rhododendrons of the Himalayas contributed to it, the roses and myrtles of Cashmere, the cinnamon-trees of Ceylon, and forests older than the flood, buried deep in the heart of Africa, far behind the mountains of the moon. The rain which we see descending was thawed for us out of icebergs which have watched the polar star for ages; and lotus lilies have sucked up from the Nile, and exhaled as vapour, snows that are lying on the tops of the Alps.— British Quarterly. Published by W. & R. CHAMBERS, High Street, Edinburgh. Also sold by D. CHAMBERS, 20 Argyle Street, Glasgow; W. S. OR, 147 Strand, London; and J. M'GLASHAN, 21 D'Olier Street. Dublin. Printed by W. and R. CHAMBERS, Edinburgh. CONDUCTED BY WILLIAM AND ROBERT CHAMBERS, EDITORS OF CHAMBERS'S INFORMATION FOR THE PEOPLE,' 'CHAMBERS'S EDUCATIONAL COURSE,' &c. No. 270. NEW SERIES. SATURDAY, MARCH 3, 1849. RETURN OF PILGRIMS FROM MECCA. TOWARDS the end of last January, I was sitting in a shop in one of the principal streets of Cairo, watching, for want of better employment, the fluctuating stream of turbans and tarbooshes, that stretched on both hands as far as the eye could reach, when first a distant murmur, then a loud buzz of voices, and presently a shout, a roar, came rolling up the narrow thoroughfare. Some very gratifying intelligence was evidently passing from mouth to mouth. Buying and selling were suspended at once the conclusion of many a bargain was adjourned both dealers and customers rose to their feet. And now three men, mounted on dromedaries, made their appearance, moving swiftly down the street: I soon heard them announcing that the caravan of pilgrims from Mecca had arrived at Suez. As messengers of glad tidings, they had pushed on in order to bring letters from those who had survived the privations and dangers of the journey. Long after these men had passed on their way to the citadel, the greatest excitement and agitation continued. In a few hours most of the inhabitants of Cairo were to learn or infer the fate of relations or friends who had been absent for months, and who had either perished in the desert, or were returning, crowned with glory, and encircled by respect, to their homes. PRICE 14d. Paradise, and an unlimited enjoyment of all those pleasures which are promised in a future state of existence to the true believer. The annual dispersion of men with faith thus invigorated, over the Mohammedan world, must produce a powerful effect. If the pilgrimage were abolished, by general consent, the votaries of the prophet would soon diminish. The tribes and nations who, like the Bedouins, neglect this duty, are far less bigotted, far more indifferent, than those who practise it with unswerving constancy. But it does not seem that the pilgrims derive any considerable enlightenment from their travels. Their object is not to get rid of their prejudices, but to strengthen them. It is true they mingle trade with devotion, and contrive to amass worldly wealth whilst increasing their claims upon heaven. As traders, they come in contact with the inhabitants of the regions they traverse; nevertheless they seem to return home with more confused notions than ever of geography, history, and manners. All they care about is collecting marvellous stories, wherewith to astound their less adventurous countrymen. When the hubbub had subsided, I entered into conversation with the shopkeeper on the subject of the pilgrimage, on which he had great pleasure in talking. As usual with Moslems, my friend avoided any allusion to the religious part of the procession, as not likely to interest me, and dwelt only on what may be called the secular view. He told me that the chief courier, whom I had seen pass, made a good thing of his trip; it being his privilege to bear the news to the pacha, and the great officers of the court, as well as to all people of position. Every visit he makes produces a present. As to the large packet of letters he carries addressed to minor people, he sells them at so much a hundred to any speculative men who may undertake to distribute them on the chance of a reward. It is customary for the walls round the doorways and Islamism boasts of many institutions admirably adapted for maintaining its character of unity; and the pilgrimage to Mecca is one of the chief among these. Every year, from every part of the Mohammedan world, a number of men, of all ranks and conditions, repair to the spot where the faith they profess took its rise, and amidst scenes, invested in their eyes with the most sacred associations, work themselves up into a state of enthusiastic devotion, to which perhaps they could never rise under ordinary circumstances. They must arrive at the Holy City in a frame of mind peculiarly susceptible of strong impressions. They have in general en-shop-fronts of the pilgrims who return in safety to be countered great perils by land or sea during the journey: some of them have passed whole months in the horrid solitudes of the desert, exposed to hunger and thirst, fatigue and danger, and kept constantly in mind of the uncertainty of things here below by the deaths which must frequently occur amongst large bodies of men traversing those desolate regions, which no doubt seem to them to have been purposely thrown across the path of the pilgrim to test his zeal, and enhance the merit of his undertaking. Once at Mecca, everything contributes to enhance his enthusiasm; and the consciousness that he has earned the good-will of men-that he will be looked upon with respect and veneration in his own country when he returns-that his influence will be enlarged, and his station exalted-is perhaps equally active with the belief that he has deserved a place in painted in bright colours with all sorts of fantastic figures, of flowers, animals, and even men, despite the prohibition of the prophet. It is common now to see steamboats among these representations, which are supposed to indicate the extraordinary objects witnessed by the returning traveller during his absence. There is a good deal of competition among the rude decorators, each seeming to vie with the other in producing the most fantastic and uncouth designs. They succeed at anyrate in giving a lively aspect to many of the streets. Though many of the pilgrims leave their last campingground almost immediately on their arrival, and effect their entry at night, the great body wait till morning. I went out a little after sunrise, and found the streets already completely occupied by the procession. It was an animating scene. Immense crowds of people, in holiday CHAMBERS'S EDINBURGH JOURNAL. van. her example; and at length the mahmal became a neThose who followed her upon the throne imitated cessary adjunct to the pilgrimage. It is now esteemed quite a sacred object, and those who cannot visit the Kaäba itself are almost compensated by touching the mahmal on its return, and gazing at the representation of the holy place embroidered on its front. costume, were pouring towards all the eastern gates; some merely as spectators, others to meet their long-ex-racter of sanctity. To commemorate this event, every was performed in safety, and she returned with a chapected friends or relatives. Every now and then numbers successive year she sent her empty litter with the caraof men bearing flags, or a band of music energetically playing, would pass, on their way to greet some particular pilgrim; whilst the uninterrupted line of camels, bearing gaudy litters of every description, slowly made its way in an opposite direction. On issuing from the Gate of Victory, I obtained a splendid view over the country. To the left were suburbs and palm-groves, in front was the desert, to the right rose the Red Mountain and the precipitous sides of Mokattam. with which an immense number of banner - bearers The procession, mingled, had divided into three or four columns, each directing itself towards one of the gates; whilst the intermediate spaces, and the slopes of the mounds that rose here and there, were filled up by groups of men and women, many of them evidently on the look-out for some well-known face. It frequently happens that the returning pilgrim neglects to write, and therefore, unless positive information has been received to the contrary, his family always goes out to meet him. Disappointment often awaits it; and every now and then, as I proceeded, I could hear shrill shrieks of sorrow rising in various directions. The women, on receiving intelligence of the death of a relative, return with loud wailings towards the city, tearing their clothes, and exhibiting other signs of grief; in strange contrast with the boisterous merriment, the exuberant delight of others. It is a curious picture of human life, with all its bustle and all its vicissitudes; all its triumphs and all its disappointments, its splendours and its miseries, its joys and its anguish. The drums, and the tambourines, and the pipes, the singing and the shouting, in vain competed with the voice of lamentation, which ever and anon pierced the air, and told how many hearts were ready to break amidst that scene of gaiety and rejoicing! There was little variety to be observed in the procession. After I had seen forty or fifty camels go by, every one that passed was a counterpart of one that had preceded. The litters, which often hold several people, are in general either square or arched, and supported on two large trunks made fast to the animal's sides. Some few of the wealthier people had tachterwans carried by two camels; one in front, the other behind. A great many women were to be observed peeping forth from these litters; which, as I have intimated, are commonly very gaudy, being covered with red, yellow, or blue cloth. Several of the pilgrims rode on asses, which were often stained with henna, as were indeed numbers of the camels, in order to show that they had been to Mecca. The I found the emír, or chief of the caravan, encamped at the Haswah, along with the escort of four hundred irregular Arnaout cavalry, sent by the pacha. tents scattered here and there, the horses picketed close at hand, the long spears, ornamented near the top with great tufts of wool stuck up near them, the savage-looking Arnaouts lolling about, produced altogether a very picturesque effect. The Haswah is a place situated in the desert about a mile and a-half north-east of Cairo. Several fine ruined mausolea dot its surface; and in the distance may be seen, over the undulating ground, the summits of those still splendid buildings called the Tombs of the Caliphs. On a little mound near the emir's tent was the mahmal, some account of which I may as well give at once. The mahmal is an emblem of sovereign power, a representative of the government of Egypt, which every year, therefore, is supposed to make the pilgrimage to Mecca. Six hundred years ago, Sultan Saleh, surnamed The Light of Faith, married Fatmeh, a beautiful Circassian slave, who, on his death, and that of his son, succeeded in ascending the throne of Egypt, and reigned with great magnificence and glory. In order to add a new prestige to her name, she resolved to perform the pilgrimage to the Holy City, and for this purpose caused a litter of a new form to be constructed. Her journey A small company of the pacha's regular infantry vered with a rough cloth. It was nearly square, with a were placed as a guard over the litter, which was copyramidal top; and even when I saw it uncovered the next day, presented a very mean appearance. frame was of common wood, and inside I saw an old The allowed us to approach quite near, and even lifted up box. With surprising toleration, the soldiers on guard the cover that we might see the interior. what the box contained, and received an evasive answer; but it was opened for us to look in. I could disI asked tinguish nothing but something like a carpet, possibly a piece of the kiswah, or covering of the Kaäba (with which the mahmal is often confounded by travellers), or perhaps the bur'o, or veil sent to hang before the door. The latter supposition is founded on a fact mennamely, that the custom of sending the veil origitioned by the most correct writer on Egyptian manners nated with the same queen who instituted the ceremony of the mahmal, and that the people call it the veil of Our Lady Fatmeh. I am aware that the same writer states that the litter contains nothing; but when he went to see it, bigotry was very strong, and to look inside was out of the question. A French artist, who This was on the second day, when the outer covering went with me, was allowed even to make a sketch of it. round, and working themselves up into a state of reliwas removed, and immense crowds were gathering gious enthusiasm. towards the city. On my way I observed a crowd colThere being nothing more to see, I returned slowly lected round one of the ruined mausolea, and alighting, pushed my way in. I found that an old gentleman had selected with great good taste the splendid dome as a protection for his hareem; and the crowd around was composed of his friends and relatives, waiting with music and banners to conduct him in triumph to his home. Luckily the ladies were in the act of mounting their donkeys, and the old gentleman had bestridden his mule, before my presence, so great was the excitement, attracted any attention. I was then good-humouredly quested to withdraw, which I did with divers apologies. informed that I had committed an indiscretion, and re On entering the gate, I found the streets still crowded little old woman attacked me with her tongue during |