ouchrabiyehs, which are made of bits of cedar
elaborately carved in geometrical designs. The small size of the pieces
is due to the climate, the heats of the long summer would warp larger
surfaces of wood; but the delicacy and intricacy of the carving are a
work of supererogation due to Arabian taste. From the mouchrabiyehs the
inmates can see the passers-by, but the passers-by cannot see the
inmates, an essential condition for the carefully guarded privacy of the
family.

There is in Cairo a personage unconnected with the government who, among
the native population, is almost as important as the Khedive himself;
this is the Sheykh Ahmed Mohammed es Sadat, the only descendant in the
direct line of the Prophet Mohammed now living. He has the right to many
native titles, though he does not put them on his quiet little
visiting-card, which bears only his name and a mysterious monogram in
Arabic. By Europeans he is called simply the Sheykh (the word means
chief) es Sadat. The ancestral dwelling of the sheykh shares in its
master's distinction. It is pointed out, and, when permission can be
obtained, visited. It is a typical specimen of Saracenic domestic
architecture, and has always remained in the possession of the family,
for whom it was first erected eight hundred years ago. There are in
Cairo other Arabian houses as beautiful and as ancient as this. By
diplomatic (and mercenary) arts I gained admittance to three, one of
which has walls studded with jasper and mother-of-pearl. But these
exquisite chambers, being half ruined, fill the mind with wicked
temptations. One longs to lay hands upon the tiles, to bargain for an
inscription or for a small oriel with the furtive occupants, who have no
right to sell, the real owners being Arabs of ancient race, who would
refuse to strip their walls, however crumbling, for unbelievers from
contemptible, paltry lands beyond the sea. The house of the Sheykh es
Sadat may not leave one tranquil, for it is tantalizingly picturesque,
but at least it does not inspire larceny; the presence of many servitors
prevents that. To reach this residence one leaves (gladly) the Boulevard
Mohammed Ali, and takes a narrower thoroughfare, the Street of the
Sycamores, which bends towards the south. This lane winds as it goes,
following the course of the old canal, the Khaleeg, and one passes many
of the public fountains, or sebeels, which are almost as numerous in
Cairo as the mosques. A fountain in Arab