if she should think fit; and in case he should not go quietly, to lay hands upon him, and turn him fairly out, if her nerve enable her so to do. If in the struggle she should get warm, and an approximation to crimson on her pretty face disclose the scene in which she has been obliged to discharge the functions, which, in better regulated countries, are assigned to the constable,-is she to be blamed? Surely not. The first law of nature is self-defence. And yet Miss Pardoe would call that crimson paint!

Moreover, an English lady can walk, or run, or ride, or drive where she likes. In Autumn she can pick up plenty of blushes, enough to serve her for a whole year, by the sea-side. She need never want exercise. If she have the privilege of Almack's she may, provided she is asked, quadrille or galopade all night. When the Almackian season expires, if she belong to an archery association, she may perform her part in the "Bow Stratagem" without any injury to her complexion. And when tired of earth, she may fly through the heavens with Mrs. Green in the Nassau balloon, and rob the rainbow of its vermilion.

But behold the fate to which the Ottoman Belinda is doomed. You enter that is, if you be allowed to get in under the wing of so fortunate a traveller as Miss Pardoe-a large, richly-carpeted apartment, surrounded on three sides by a divan-that is to say, a bench raised about a foot from the ground, softly cushioned, and covered with crimson shag: pillows abound, scattered along the couch at intervals, gaily embroidered with gold thread and coloured silks. Here also may be seen, a copious supply of coverlets suited to the season, a brass or copper cauldron filled with charcoal embers, if the weather be cold, a store of water and elegant napkins, for the purposes of ablution, and a koran. Two or three rose-wood brackets complete the furniture of the chamber; and this chamber is called the Harem.

The windows of the Harem are uniformly closely latticed, as well to exclude the eyes of prying curiosity from without, as to frustrate that which is often much more active within. These jalousies, however, are also very necessary to protect the Harem from the excessive light of the sun, in a region where, from the want of anything better to do, much of the day is devoted to sleep. "Come and spend a long day with us; bring your work, or your book, or both, and do as you like," is a very common note of invitation between neighbour female friends in England. In Turkey they just as often say, for as yet they seldom can write to each other," Come to-morrow and take a nap with us." A Turkish lady can sleep when she pleases-such is the force of habitwith the same facility with which she can take a cup of coffee or a glass of sherbet. She has only to arrange her cushions, sink down upon them, and in a moment her blessed soul is wandering through the gardens of Elysium. This is a habit which certainly does not tend to improve the complexion. A little artificial excitement may therefore be occasionally found indispensable beneath such a somnolent sky.

Miss Pardoe has made another notable discovery in the City of the Sultan-viz., that the ladies very commonly wear a quantity of hair, not their own! Countries might be named nearer home where a similar practice is said to prevail to a very considerable extent. I have myself seen, what I have supposed to be a splendid natural accumulation of auburn tresses, upon the heads of ladies of a 66 certain age," which

undoubtedly did become them amazingly, and reduced a regular baptismally registered thirty-seven to an apparent twenty-two! Is there anything wrong in this? A weakly constitution-a poetical temperament-a violent cold attended by fever, will sometimes act upon the capillary system in a most extraordinary manner. I have known an instance of an individual-I shall not say of which sex-going to bed with a perfectly black head of hair, and rising the following morning with a caput white as Caucasus !-the consequence of a dream so dreadful that no suffering from real misfortune could have been more severe than that which the sleeper is said to have endured on that fatal night. Too much sleep is inimical to capillary strength, and as the Turkish climate and the habits of the harem both require constant devotion to Morpheus, it is but proper that the effect of his power upon the tresses should be repaired by the hand of art. These the Ottoman ladies wear, when at home, wound amid the folds of embroidered handkerchiefs, which they twine about their heads, and secure by bodkins of diamonds and emeralds.

A Turkish lady of what may be called the "well-to-do mercantile class of life at Constantinople, usually dresses at home in a chemisette of silk gauze, trimmed with fringes of narrow ribbon, and wide trowsers of printed cotton falling to the ancle. Her feet are bare, but she has near her little yellow slippers very beautifully ornamented, in which you would think scarcely a toe would find room, and yet in which she contrives to locate five, whenever she chooses, and even to run about with the utmost agility. It is, however, a real luxury to press the naked foot upon those soft velvety carpets, and so she prefers it; the slipper being, however, always at hand, more for ornament than use. The reader may conjecture the sumptuousness of this appendage to a lady's toilet, when he is informed that I was asked five pounds sterling for a pair in one of the bazaars. A friend of mine in London lately received a pair of these slippers from Persia as a present, which she very properly forthwith deposited upon the mantel-piece of her drawing-room under a glass shade!

Over the chemisette is worn a robe of printed cotton of bright colours, trimmed with fringe, made in one piece, divided at the hip on either side to its extreme length, and girt about the waist with a Cachemire shawl. A train is added, called an antery; and, in winter, the in-door dress is completed by a tight vest generally of a light pink or green colour, and lined with fur. When the lady prepares to go out, she puts on her turban and veil, a long, loose, dark olive-coloured cloth pelisse, and yellow boots, like our old-fashioned Hessian boots; but as she wears her slippers inside them, and they are therefore necessarily larger than a delicate foot can require, it must be confessed that they exhibit the pedal proportions of her figure to very great disadvantage. Upon this latter point the Turkish ladies do undoubtedly require some useful lectures, both by precept and example. But as for foot-dressing, commend me to the belles of Cadiz. There are certainly no such ankles and insteps in any other part of the world as you see upon the Alameda of Cadiz. They dazzle yon like a sun-beam, so light, so airy, so flitting, so spiritual: in fact Cadiz may be called the "City of the Foot," as Miss Pardoe calls Stamboul the "City of the Sultan.'

Turks dine, as well as other people. In the centre of the room in

which the family assemble for that purpose, a wooden frame is placed about eighteen inches high; upon this frame is deposited a large wooden, or plated, or silver tray, according to the circumstances of the family, and thereupon a capacious white basin filled with soup. Around the basin are ranged porcelain saucers, filled with sliced cheese, anchovies, caviare, sweetmeats, and pickles of all sorts, box-wood spoons, goblets of sherbet scented with the rose, and pieces of hot unleavened bread. The operators seat themselves on cushions, tailor-like, round the tray, each having on his or her lap a linen napkin, and the preliminary ablutions having been duly performed, they proceed to work.

After the soup follows a large dish filled with stewed mutton, poultry, game, and viands of various kinds, already divided by the cook into small portions, which are fished up with spoons or fingers, as the case may be, all dipped in the same dish. It is considered a compliment to a stranger to pick out of the mass a leg or wing of a fowl, and present it to him-a compliment with which a Frank would on his first visit to a Turkish host be glad to dispense, but to which, nevertheless, he easily becomes reconciled, as the ceremony is really performed in a very delicate manner. For instance, the limb intended to be so presented is separated from the others with a spoon, and the host taking with the tips of a finger and thumb the very extreme point of the oblation, puts it before his guest in a manner that admits of no refusal. Small platters of various provender succeed each other rapidly; fish, pastry, creams, then perhaps stews again of goose, turkey, peacock, vegetables, and then sweets again, without any regard to the programmes recommended by the English or French professors of the divine art. A pyramid of pilauf literally crowns, or rather tiaras the feast.

The ordinary drink at a Turkish dinner is water-generally delicious water they have-and sherbet. Latterly wine has been interpolated between the sherbet and coffee. The dishes being all removed, the attendants, of whom in wealthy families there is always a numerous tribe, bring vases of rose-water, basins, strainers, and embroidered napkins; and the ablutions being again consummated, coffee and pipes are served. The members of the party rise or remain smoking, just as they please, and stay, cr go away, or resume any occupation which had been interrupted by the meal, or settle themselves on the divan for a nap, or form a circle for conversation, as they may think fit. The perfect freedom from every species of restraint by which Turkish society is distinguished, gives it an appearance of civilization, which a Frank is surprised to perceive amidst so many remains of the barbarous ages. Its hospitality in this respect is really of the most refined description.

The usual routine, however, is for the party to return to the apartment in which the family principally live. Here the massaljhe, or story-teller, often makes his appearance, to relieve the tedium of a long evening. These story-tellers are men of considerable talent, who sometimes invent romances, such as may be heard on the Mole at Naples, but more frequently confine themselves to the traditionary tales of genii, and of ancient mystic times, such as those recorded in the "Arabian Nights." Some shine in comic narratives, which occasionally assume a dramatic form; others approach the region of farce and buffoonery; while the higher order of these itinerant bards, as they may be styled, recite the compositions of Hafiz and Ferdausi, and the other

well-known Persian poets. A few have succeeded in interweaving with much of imaginary lore, historical transactions. Their elocution is remarkably graceful and engaging; and in order to make the most of their vocation, they take care to divide their narratives, which they abruptly break off at the points where the attention of the audience is wound up to the highest pitch. Arrived at the boundary which they have prescribed to themselves for the evening, they suddenly spring on their feet, and run out of the house as quickly as they can. If stopped on the way, no entreaty can bring them back; and if an carly appointment be demanded for going on with the sequel of the story or poem, or for bringing it to a conclusion, they have, or affect to have, prior engagements, which they cannot postpone. An addition to the usual present, however, soon brings about an arrangement agreeable to all parties.

While the exhibitor proceeds with his narrative, the members of the family, and their guests, are stretched on the divan, or seated around him on cushions, listening to his narrative with all that profound attention which children show in hearing ghost stories, or any other tales calculated to excite the imagination, sire and son, matron and daughter, smoking all the while so incessantly, that the group becomes eventually immerged in a volume of smoke, through which their features are scarcely discernible.

This universal use of the chibouk is the predominant feature not only of private, but of public life in the East. By "public," I do not, of course, mean anything bordering on politics: I use the epithet as contrasted with the strict closeness of domestic routine, and as expressing the unreserved exposure in which all the hours out of the twentyfour, not occupied in the Harem, are spent by a Turk who is not indebted to manual labour for his sustenance. The coffee-houses, in which they pass most of their time, are open to the gaze of all the world, even where those houses have no balconies. The balconies, however, which are very spacious, usually gain the preference. There the loungers of the town-and all are loungers who can afford to be idle-sit and smoke, and sip coffee all the day long. Sometimes a more substantial repast is added in the shape of a few sausages. In the balcony, too, the passing traveller takes his meal. If he be a Frank, he is abashed, until he gets used to it, by this open exhibition of his viaticum; the more so, as it is very probable that the said loungers, who take little or no notice of each other, will gather round him, aided, too, by all the little boys of the neighbourhood, and watch every morsel in its course of mastication with a degree of curiosity, or rather of avidity, exceedingly provoking to an inexperienced wanderer.

I have often regretted that I could not inure myself to smoking, while travelling in Spain, Germany, and Turkey. The incapability to enjoy a pipe, or even a cigar, made me such an exception in every group into which I happened to be thrown, that it was often quite annoying to be obliged to confess my deficiencies in that respect some twenty times per diem. In Turkey, most especially, a non-smoker is locked upon as a sort of barbarian, or rather as an "incomprehensible." Not smoke? How can you live? Do you eat? The one process seems to a Turk just as indispensable to animal existence as the other. Nor does one wonder at the universality of the habit in that country. The tobacco consumed in the chibouk is there a perfect perfume, an incense,

which is often of real practical utility in dispersing, or at least overcoming, the less agreeable odours that emanate from ill-ventilated chambers and streets polluted by pestilence.

I can imagine, though I cannot enjoy, the power which a wellcharged pipe, or a genuine Havanna, possesses to scatter on the atmosphere, thoughts that weigh too heavily on the craniological portion of the human system. A reverie of an hour or so, all about nothing, after a day's work, whether physical or mental, must be delicious. There is, moreover, a sociality about the thing particularly pleasing. Four or five men who light their cigars at the same shrine, and contribute to form the same cloud, cannot long be strangers or enemies to each other. The "emollitur mores" effect of tobacco is nowhere more conspicuous than in Turkey; it produces mutual civility in every district of an empire that as yet has to go through almost the whole process of civilization.

There is another striking peculiarity in Eastern, or at least in Turkish manners, which never failed to excite my admiration. Let a true Ottoman be employed how he may, smoking, sipping his coffee, dining, sleeping, sailing, walking, riding, writing, reading, fishing, selling, or buying, the moment he hears from the minaret the call of the muezzin to prayer, or perceives the approach of the hour for that duty, by the position of the sun, down goes his carpet, which he spreads on the ground, and as speedily do you behold his person prostrate, and his whole attention engrossed in the performance of his daily orisons. is utterly indifferent as to the effect which this movement may have upon those who happen to be near him. Whether he is surrounded by friends or strangers, whether in the steam-boat or the street, the Harem or the bazaar, the town or the country, in the drawing-room or the forest, he never fails, at the appointed hour, to pour forth his supplications to the God of the universe."

Prayer is really in Turkey, that which it ought to be wherever man exists-a part, and an essential part, of the business of life. In Christian countries the man who would withdraw from a dinner or card table to a corner of the room to say his prayers would be laughed at. Why so? Because it is unusual. But why is it so unusual? Because we think a great deal more of this world than of the next. That is the plain answer, colour it how we may and I regret to add that even among some nations which pride themselves upon their Bible-printing, tract-distributing, almshouse-building, charity-giving associations, I have never been fortunate enough to discern anything like the emotion which the act of prayer uniformly excites in a Mahometan mind.

I once travelled some hundred miles in company with an elderly Mussulman, whose regularity in the performance of his devotions particularly engaged my attention. He watched in the early morning for the rising sun, and the instant the disc rose above the horizon, his carpet was carefully spread; turning his face towards the east, he stroked his beard two or three times; he then fell at once on both knees, and sitting back upon his heels, he clasped his hands, his lips the while moving rapidly in silent prayer. After prostrating himself thrice, he rose, folded his arms on his breast, continued his prayer, returned to his first position on his knees, and bent backward and forward as if suffering the pangs of sorrow for his past sins, and earnestly entreating forgiveness for them. He then prostrated his whole figure as