st of
reason and the flow of soul" have not been lacking, and you have been
repeatedly assured of your welcome, and invited to partake beyond
the limit of human possibility, for the Moor believes you can pay
no higher compliment to the dainties he has provided than by their
consumption.

For a while you linger, reclining upon the mattress as gracefully as
may be possible for a tyro, with your arm upon a pile of many-coloured
cushions of embroidered leather or cloth. Then, after a thousand
mutual thanks and blessings, accompanied by graceful bowings and
bendings, you say farewell and step to the door, where your slippers
await you, and usher yourself out, not ill-satisfied with your
initiation into the art of dining-out in Barbary.

[Illustration: _Photograph by Dr. Rudduck._

FRUIT-SELLERS.]

XII

DOMESTIC ECONOMY

"Manage with bread and butter till God sends the jam."

_Moorish Proverb._

If the ordinary regulations of social life among the Moors differ
materially from those in force among ourselves, how much more so must
the minor details of the housekeeping when, to begin with, the husband
does the marketing and keeps the keys! And the consequential Moor
does, indeed, keep the keys, not only of the stores, but also often of
the house. What would an English lady think of being coolly locked
in a windowless house while her husband went for a journey, the
provisions for the family being meanwhile handed in each morning
through a loophole by a trusty slave left as gaoler? That no surprise
whatever would be elicited in Barbary by such an arrangement speaks
volumes. Woman has no voice under Mohammed's creed.

Early in the morning let us take a stroll into the market, and see how
things are managed there. Round the inside of a high-walled enclosure
is a row of the rudest of booths. Over portions of the pathway,
stretching across to other booths in the centre--if the market is a
wide one--are pieces of cloth, vines on trellis, or canes interwoven
with brushwood. As the sun gains strength these afford a most grateful
shade, and during the heat of the day there is no more pleasant place
for a stroll, and none more full of characteristic life. In the wider
parts, on the ground, lie heaps two or three feet high of mint,
verbena and lemon thyme, the much-esteemed flavourings for the
national drink--green-tea syrup--exhaling a most delicious fragrance.
It is early summer: the luscious oranges are not yet o