THE PALACE. 



257 



the sun- glare, and a few stunted, wind- wrung 

 trees beautify the base. Seaward there is a ve- 

 randah, in which levees are held, and behind it 

 are stables and sundry outhouses, an oratory 

 and a graveyard, where runaway slaves, chained 

 together by the neck, lie in the shade. In this 

 oratory, as in other mosques, are performed the 

 prayers of the two Great Festivals which, during 

 the late prince's life, were recited at the Mto-ni 

 ' Cascine.' Here, too, is the large, gable-ended 

 house commenced in his elder age by the enter- 

 prising Sayyid Said, and built, it is said, after the 

 model of the Dutch factory at Bander Abbas. It 

 was intended for levees, and for a hall of plea- 

 sure. Unhappily, a large chandelier dropped 

 from the ceiling, seventy masons were crushed 

 by a falling wall ; and other inauspicious omens 

 made men predict that the prince would never 

 enter the c Akhir el Zaman ' (End of Time). It 

 has since been shut up, like one of our ghost- 

 haunted houses, which it not a little resembles. 



In the centre of the square, opposite the 

 palace, stands the Sayyid's nag-staff, where the 

 £ Bakur ' is administered, where executions take 

 place, and where, according to an American tra- 

 veller, 1 distinguished criminals are fastened to a 

 1 Kecollections of Majunga, Zanzibar, Muscat, Aden, 



VOL. i. 17 



