THE GREAT SQUARE OF CAIRO. 2t fcbe crowds of Smyrna and Alexandria, where the growing influence of European dress and customs is already visible.

Here, every thing still exhaled the rich aroma of the Orient, as it had been wafted to me from the Thousand and One Nights, the Persian poets and the Arab chroniclers. I forgot that I still wore a Frank dress, and found myself wondering at the temerity of the few Europeans we met. I looked without surprise on the long processions of donkeys carrying waterskins, the heavily-laden camels, the women with white masks on their faces and black bags around their bodies, the stolid Nubian slares, the grave Abyssinians, and all the other various characters that passed and repassed us. But because they were so familiar, they were none the less interesting, for all had been acquaintances, when, like Tennyson, " true Mussulman was I, and sworn," under the reign of the good Haroun Al-Raschid.

We entered the Ezbekiyeh, which is wholly overgrown with majestic acacias and plane-trees, and thickets of aromatic flowering shrubs. It is in the Frank quarter of the city, and was first laid out and planted by order of Mohammed All All the principal hotels front upon it, and light, thatched cafes fill the space under the plane-trees, where the beau monde of Cairo promenade every Sunday evening. Nothing of the old City of the Caliphs, except a few tall minarets, can be seen from this quarter, but the bowery luxuriance of the foliage is all that the eye demands, and over the plain white walls, on every side, the palms—single, or in friendly groups—lift their feathery crowns. After installing our household gods in the chambers of the quiet and comfortable Hotel d'Europe, we went out to enjoy the sweet evening air in front of one of the cafes. I