48 Journal of Mr. Burckhardt's 



chief importance when considered as the capital of Arabia. At 

 this period of the Hadj, there is not probably one man in a thou-t 

 sand who does not engage in mercantile transactions (if the 

 military, who are few in number, are excepted.) The caravans 

 from Damascus and Baghdad are charged with the richest ma- 

 nufactures and productions of India, Syria, and Persia, in mus- 

 lins, shawls, gold stuffs, carpets, drugs, and precious stones. 

 The fleets from Suez bring down the coarser fabrics of Egypt, 

 in linen, woollen, and cotton articles of ordinary dress, as well 

 as richer garments of European cloth with Cairo-manufactured 

 horse trappings, highly ornamented arms, particularly sabres 

 and pistols for the military, and muskets, German-blade swords, 

 and crooked knives, all of inferior qualities, for the Arabs. To 

 this is added the celebrated red woollen caps of Tunis, with a 

 commoner kind in imitation of them from Europe, red and yel- 

 low leather shoes and slippers, some few British cotton goods, 

 and as much ammunition as they can safely smuggle on shore. 

 These form the investments of private traders, besides which 

 immense quantities of corn, rice, dourra, and other grains, are 

 sent from Egypt both by the vessels from Suez, and by the 

 land caravans through Medina to Mecca, all on account of 

 the Pasha himself, who has monopolized the whole of that 

 trade. 



The wealth and population, thus collected, render the city so 

 much the scene of bustle and activity, that from sun-rise until 

 noon, during every day of the Hadj, the public bazars are 

 crowded so as to render a passage through them absolutely im- 

 possible. Ibrahim assured us that the ordinary bazars of Cairo, 

 thronged as they always are to an excess, were yet but thinly 

 peopled in comparison to those of Mecca at the season of the 

 pilgrimage. It is here that the rich ladings of the caravans are 

 exposed to public inspection and sale, in separate ranges, ap- 

 propriated to the reception of their respective articles only, as 

 usual throughout the East. These goods are sometimes sold in 

 large parcels to private purchasers, but much more generally in 

 small ones by public auction, called by the Turks, " Haratch," 

 the manner of doing which is by a man's holding aloft the ar- 



