h on his arrival at Damascus, having his beard
arranged by a barber of distinction, and dressing himself in a fresh
white suit, as was his custom when in residence, with his turban of the
same colour arranged a little aside, for Baroni was scrupulous as to his
appearance, he hired a donkey and made his way to the great bazaar.
The part of the city through which he proceeded was very crowded and
bustling: narrow streets, with mats slung across, to shield from the sun
the swarming population beneath. His accustomed step was familiar
with every winding of the emporium of the city; he threaded without
hesitation the complicated mazes of those interminable arcades. Now he
was in the street of the armourers, now among the sellers of shawls;
the prints of Manchester were here unfolded, there the silks of India;
sometimes he sauntered by a range of shops gay with yellow papooshes and
scarlet slippers, and then hurried by the stalls and shelves stored with
the fatal frippery of the East, in which it is said the plague in
some shape or other always lurks and lingers. This locality, however,
indicated that Baroni was already approaching the purlieus of the chief
places; the great population had already much diminished, the brilliancy
of the scene much dimmed; there was no longer the swarm of itinerant
traders who live by promptly satisfying the wants of the visitors to the
bazaar in the shape of a pipe or an ice, a cup of sherbet or of coffee,
or a basket of delicious fruit. The passengers were few, and all seemed
busy: some Armenians, a Hebrew physician and his page, the gliding
phantoms of some winding-sheets, which were in fact women.

Baroni turned into an arcade, well built, spacious, airy, and very
neatly fitted up. This was the bazaar of the dealers in drugs. Here,
too, spices are sold, all sorts of dye-woods, and especially the choice
gums for which Arabia is still celebrated, and which Syria would fain
rival by the aromatic juices of her pistachio and her apricot trees.

Seated on what may be called his counter, smoking a nargileh, in a
mulberry-coloured robe bordered with fur, and a dark turban, was a
middle-aged man of sinister countenance and air, a long hook nose and a
light blue eye.

'Welcome, Effendi,' he said, when he observed Baroni; 'many welcomes!
And how long have you been at Esh Sham?'

'Not too long,' said Baroni; 'and have you been here since my last
visit?'

'Here and there,' said the man, offering hi