lient
and striking peculiarities, and has deprived the traveler of much
opportunity for insight into the real life of the Oriental, only to be
seen while he is journeying from place to place, since his own house
is generally closed against the stranger, and it is only in the khan
that a glimpse of his mode of life can be obtained.

The khan, like the harem, is one of the peculiar institutions of the
East, and will probably so continue, in spite of the advancing tide of
European civilization; which, however it may affect the outer aspects
of that life, has as yet made little impression on its more essential
features. The men may wear the Frank dress (all but the hat, which
they will not accept), may smoke cigars instead of chibouques, and
drink "gaseous lemonade" (champagne), in defiance of the Prophet's
prohibition; the women may send from the high harems for French
fashions, and "fearfully and wonderfully" array themselves therein;
but in other respects the people will stubbornly adhere to their own
social system and habits of life.

It follows that the traveler who goes to the East to study the manners
and customs of its people will get only an imperfect and outside view
if he makes himself comfortable in one of the hybrid European hotels
we have described, instead of braving the picturesque discomforts of
the Oriental hotel or khan, which he will find endurable by taking a
few preliminary precautions easily suggested to him on the spot.

EDWIN DE LEON.

OUR MONTHLY GOSSIP.

THE CALIFORNIAN AT VIENNA.

I am in bonds and fetters through not understanding the German tongue.
It is a weary torture to be a stupid, uncomprehended foreigner. I am
lost in a linguistic swamp. It is necessary to employ one man to talk
to another. The _commisionnaire_ does not understand more than half I
say. What might he not be interpreting to the other fellow? The most
trivial want costs me a world of anxiety and trouble. I desired some
blotting-paper. I went to a little stationery shop. I said, "Paper!
paper! fuer die blot, you know. Ich bin Englisher--er: ink no dry;
what you call um? Vas? vas? Hang it!" They took down all sorts of
paper--letter-paper, wrapping-paper, foolscap, foreign post. I tried
to make my want known by signs. I made myself simply ridiculous. The
shopkeeper stared at me in perplexity, disgust and despair. Then he
discussed the matter with his wife. I fretted, perspiring vigorously.
I went away. I went to