A RIDE TO BABYLOX. 361 



request of your lip such peace - restoring, grateful 

 clouds, you beguile the intervening half -hour to 

 dinner. If you are a man of an inquisitive turn of 

 mind, or desirous of distraction with your tobacco, 

 you need only take your seat on the parapet of the 

 terrace, look over it, and note the various domestic 

 arrangements that are being carried out on the 

 neighbouring roofs around. Whole troops of veiled 

 figures are flitting about like ghosts in the rapidly 

 increasing gloom, and swarthy Xubian slaves, stag- 

 gering under mountains of blue -striped bundles, 

 are emerging through a hole in the roof. These 

 bundles are the beds of the family; and in the course 

 of a few hours, when night has hung her black pall 

 over the face of the land, you will all be sleep- 

 ing, young and old, men and women, Christians 

 and Turks, with the same ceiling, the same roof, 

 above your heads the dark -blue, starlit vault of 

 heaven. 



It was after a stay of ten days or so at Baghdad, 

 that a party of four of us determined upon starting 

 for the ruins of Babylon. There was a difficulty 

 about horses, as only one of the party had his at 

 Baghdad. The rest of us, on making up our minds 

 to ride, on hire, whatever wretched animals the 

 bazaars might produce, had this sorry consolation 

 in our hearts, that at least half-a-dozen good horses, 

 sound in wind and limb, calling us lords and masters, 

 were standing engaged in the pleasant occupation of 



