DIVAN. y

as some Turks, whose homes were there, had told us wonders

of the delights of their f\it Mesopotaiuians, and the splendid

dates of Bassora. We therefore resolved to take our passports with

us, in case we should determine to cx'oss the Red Sea. By this

time I had thoroughly seen through the Pascha, and resolved at

once to propose to him a scheme I had formed in iavour of these

oppressed I'aces, viz., that he should place himself at their head, and

declare them and himself independent of the Egyptian Vampire ; and ere long I actually did so, and all, in the end, might have

gone right, had he not, instead of gaining in every way the con-

fidence of the principal persons and heads of tribes, and most in-

fluential people about him, tyrannised over all in the most shame-

ful manner. Gold and regiments was his motto. When either my brother or I wished to pay a visit to the Pas-

cha (and this Joseph, as private physician, should have done every

morning, but cunningly avoided it, under the plea of not daring to

interrupt him in the multiplicity of matters which the Pascha had

to attend to, though the sly doctor never omitted his morning's

visit to the Pascha's wife, a daughter of Mahomed Ali, and to

his harem), we went first to the chasnadar's (treasurer's), a

Circassian, who had been manumitted by the Pascha, and who

could always produce a good breakfast from the great man's

cellar and kitchen ; and such visits, at which there was gene-

rally a merry party, we used, among ourselves, to call "anticham-

briren"(antechambering). Others who had not the entree of our

small divan, had often to stand for hours at the doors of the

great divan, as there all business is so far public, that any one who has a report or request to make, may without announce-

ment enter, and remain standing till the Pascha makes a sign to him to advance, and permits him, with the before-mentioned movements of the hands and deepest reverence, to say, " Good

morning, your Excellency ! " (Salbacheer, Saba-el-chair Effendina !) and perchance to kiss the hem of his robe, and then, according to

his rank, tell him, either by slightest sign, or in words, to be

seated (fadl ochaut), i. e. to kneel with the feet under the hinder

part of the body, which, resting on them, is bent, however, forward

in the attitude of prayer, and so to remain till the great man, by

another sign, allows of a seat being taken in a somewhat more