266 
festivals or family meals, that they are abstemious in the Haram; 
on the contrary they have very expensive entertainments in their 
own apartments: thus it was among the Greeks and Persians; 
when Ahasuerus king of Persia made a royal banquet for his 
nobles, Vashti the queen gave a feast to the women in the royal 
house. Maillet, the French consul at Cairo, was invited to a mag- 
nificent entertainment given by the Basha on the circumcision of 
his son, at which all the great men in that part of Egypt were pre- 
sent; aL the same time the expence in the ladies’ apartments 
amounted to nearly as much as the public festival; “ there being 
the same liberalities, the same pleasures, the same abundance, the 
same magnificence, that appeared out of the Haram. ’ 
The despotism and avarice of the Indian sovereigns generally 
prevent their subjects from making that display of fortune,’ which 
wealth and situation authorize in other countries; consequently 
within decayed palaces, ruinous courts, and closed gates, in modern 
oriental cities, it is not uncommon to find a house and garden fitted 
up in good style: this contrast was frequent among the Nabob’s 
subjects in Surat; those who had claimed the English protection 
better enjoyed the gifts of fortune. 
During my visit at that city, a young gentleman conversant in 
the Persian language, had an opportunity of rendering an essential 
service to a Mogul widow of distinction; who, in consequence of 
some deeds falsely translated, and misrepresented by the Mahomedan 
lawyers, was involved in a long series of trouble and expence: from 
the humane impulse of rescuing a respectable family from such 
chicanery, he interested himself in the cause, revealed the truth, 
and reinstated the lady in her fortune. Not having seen her gene- 
