HO TRAVELS IN UPPER 



ri<y subjected to no law but profusion, and which 

 may be reviewed, day after day, with new pleasure. 

 Is not this confusion, after all, the symmetry of na- 

 ture ? The sun has scarcely power to force his rays 

 through the foliage of those tufted orchards ; small 

 streamlets convey thither, winding as they flow, 

 the coolness and the aliment of vegetation ; ser- 

 pentine paths lead to them. There it is that the 

 indolent Turk, seated all day long with his pipe 

 and his coffee, seems to meditate profoundly, and 

 thinks of nothing. More worthy of enjoying those 

 enchanting retreats, had he the skill to share them 

 with a beloved female companion ; but the ex- 

 ample of the birds, the amorous cooing of the 

 turtle-doves, which animate those bowers of nature, 

 are incapable of disposing his soul to tenderness, or 

 of stealing him out of his cold apathy, out of his 

 melancholy insensibility. He flees, with disdain, 

 the commerce of a sex whose presence would con- 

 fer additional charms on scenes of delight, and, 

 under the dominion of proud indifference, would 

 repel the hand of the Graces, were they to attempt 

 to raise there an alfar to conjugal bliss. The unso- 

 cial Mussulman respects, at least, what he disdains 

 to imitate: those same turtle-doves, emblem of 

 love and fidelity, live by him in perfect security j 

 he never thinks of disturbing their repose ; he takes 

 pleasure in beholding them court his society ; in a 

 word, they are to him sacred birds. The European 



alone 



