xchanging compliments with
their acquaintances. Native "swells" consequently promenade with a
piece of felt under their arms on which to sit when they wish, in
addition to its doing duty as a carpet for prayer. The most public
places, and usually the cool of the afternoon, are preferred for this
pastime.

The ladies of their Jewish neighbours also like to sit at their doors
in groups at the same hour, or in the doorways of main thoroughfares
on moonlight evenings, while the gentlemen, who prefer to do their
gossiping afoot, roam up and down. But this is somewhat apart from the
point of the lazy tendencies of the Moors. With them--since they have
no trains to catch, and disdain punctuality--all hurry is undignified,
and one could as easily imagine an elegantly dressed Moorish scribe
literally flying as running, even on the most urgent errand. "Why
run," they ask, "when you might just as well walk? Why walk, when
standing would do? Why stand, when sitting is so much less fatiguing?
Why sit, when lying down gives so much more rest? And why, lying down,
keep your eyes open?"

In truth, this is a country in which things are left pretty much to
look after themselves. Nothing is done that can be left undone, and
everything is postponed until "to-morrow." Slipper-slapper go the
people, and slipper-slapper goes their policy. If you can get through
a duty by only half doing it, by all means do so, is the generally
accepted rule of life. In anything you have done for you by a Moor,
you are almost sure to discover that he has "scamped" some part;
perhaps the most important. This, of course, means doing a good
deal yourself, if you like things done well, a maxim holding good
everywhere, indeed, but especially here.

The Moorish Government's way of doing things--or rather, of not doing
them if it can find an excuse--is eminently slip-shod. The only point
in which they show themselves astute is in seeing that their Rubicon
has a safe bridge by which they may retreat, if that suits their plans
after crossing it. To deceive the enemy they hide this as best
they can, for the most part successfully, causing the greatest
consternation in the opposite camp, which, at the moment when it
thinks it has driven them into a corner, sees their ranks gradually
thinning from behind, dribbling away by an outlet hitherto invisible.
Thus, in accepting a Moor's promise, one must always consider the
conditions or rider annexed.

This can be well il