DOMESTIC ECONOMY. 
387 
sketch of a crocodile; the fastening is a bolt and a 
rude padlock. These, however, are rarely required. 
We passed on one occasion through the large and 
populous city of Rabbah at midnight without meeting 
a single individual, and every house appeared to be 
open. There is something like luxury in the clean- 
swept courts, tessellated with broken pottery: some 
pieces of a more showy kind adorn the thresholds. 
This was eminently the case with the ‘ Giddah,’ of 
Mistress Barijih; a respectable elderly spinster, with 
whom we had engaged lodgings at Fandah; but the 
King commanded her not to receive us, as he claimed 
the exclusive privilege of making us comfortable or 
uncomfortable, and unfortunately his tastes had a 
tendency to the latter. Barijih’s house was a perfect 
labyrinth of clean shady comts and huts, with jars of 
deliciously cool water; although there were no other 
inmates than herself and an old woman, her servant. 
Around the cookery corner are calabashes and earthen 
pots of various forms, and machines for pounding the 
red wood with which they adorn or medicate themselves. 
Sheep, goats and fowls enjoy, and seem to claim, 
the full benefit of the premises. The peculiar domicile 
of the poultry is under the granary hut, which is always 
raised considerably from the ground, for the purpose of 
ventilation, and an aperture left for the brood, as a ready 
refuge from the numerous hawks which are conti- 
nually sailing about. Many large Fulvous vultures are 
commonly seen perched on the apex of the conical roofs, 
c c 2 
