fore tobacco? In Syria, at the present day, they
smoke a plant called _timbac_; the Chinese smoke opium; the artificial
preparations for the hookah are known to all Indians. I believe,
however, that these are all refinements, and for this reason, that
in the classic writers, who were as well acquainted with the Oriental
nations as ourselves, we find no allusion to the practice of smoking.
The anachronism of the pipe I have not therefore ventured to commit, and
that of coffee will, I trust, be pardoned.]

[Footnote 20: page 58.--_Wilder gestures of the dancing girls._ These
dancing girls abound throughout Asia. The most famous are the Almeh of
Egypt, and the Nautch of India. These last are a caste, the first only a
profession.]

[Footnote 21: page 64.--_For thee the bastinado_. The bastinado is the
common punishment of the East, and an effective and dreaded one. It is
administered on the soles of the feet, the instrument a long cane or
palm-branch. Public executions are very-rare.]

[Footnote 22: page 73.--_A door of tortoise-shell and mother-of-pearl_.
This elegant mode of inlay is common in Oriental palaces, and may be
observed also in Alhambra, at Granada.]

[Footnote 23: page 74.--_A vaulted, circular, and highly embossed roof,
of purple, scarlet, and gold._ In the very first style of Saracenic
architecture. See the Hall of the Ambassadors in Alhambra, and many
other chambers in that exquisite creation.]

[Footnote 24: page 74.--_Nubian eunuchs dressed in rich habits of
scarlet and gold._ Thus the guard of Nubian eunuchs of the present Pacha
of Egypt, Mehemet Ali, or rather Caliph, a title which he wishes to
assume. They ride upon white horses.]

[Footnote 25: page 74.--_A quadrangular court of roses._ So in Alhambra,
'The Court of Myrtles,' leading to the Court of Columns, wherein is the
famous Fountain of Lions.]

[Footnote 26: page 75.--_An Abyssinian giant._ A giant is still a common
appendage to an Oriental court even at the present day. See a very
amusing story in the picturesque 'Persian Sketches' of that famous
elchee, Sir John Malcolm.]

[Footnote 27: page 75.--_Surrounded by figures of every rare quadruped._
'The hall of audience,' says Gibbon, from Cardonne, speaking of the
magnificence of the Saracens of Cordova, 'was encrusted with gold and
pearls, and a great basin in the centre was surrounded with the curious
and costly figures of birds and quadrupeds.'-_Decline and Fall_, vol. x.
p. 39.]