136 CIVIL HISTORY AND 



the town looks handsome and cheerful, the houses 

 seem lofty, and have a square solid appearance. 

 Their unvaried whiteness contrasts beautifully with 

 the dark-blue sea, and, no shrub or tree intervening 

 to break the uniformity of colour, gives it the sem- 

 blance of being excavated from a quarry of marble. 

 Over the tabular line of flat roofs, the minarets of 

 three mosques rise to a considerable height, with 

 several circular domes of kubbets or chapels. The 

 roadstead is almost open, being only protected by 

 two narrow tongues of land, on one of which is a 

 ruined castle, and on the other an insignificant fort, 

 A grove of date-trees adjoins the city, and extends 

 nearly two miles along the southern beach ; a 

 pleasing object for the eye to repose upon, con- 

 trasted with the interminable expanse in every 

 other direction of brown and desolate sterility. The 

 wall, by which it is completely surrounded, is not 

 more than sixteen feet high towards the sea ; though, 

 on the land side, it may in some places be double 

 that height. The two forts that guard the harbour 

 stand about a mile and a half asunder ; a single 

 broadside from an English man-of-war would level 

 the whole to the ground. 



The internal condition of the city corresponds not 

 with the imposing aspect of the exterior ; and the 

 moment the traveller passes the gates, his romantic 

 ideas are put to flight by the filth that abounds in 

 every street. The houses of the lower class of the 

 people, who rarely change their under-dress until it 

 is worn to rags, are circular huts composed of 

 wickerwork, covered inside with mats, and some- 

 times on the outside with a little clay. The roofs 

 are uniformly thatched; and in front each has a 

 small area or yard fenced off. The inhabitants have 

 a singular fancy for crowding their dwellings in 

 clusters, though there is ample space within the 

 walls left unoccupied. All the principal buildings 

 face the sea, and consist chiefly of public edifices 



