Here is Ivanoff from Odessa or Tiflis, in the white peaked cap and high boots dear to every Russian, haggling over the price of a carpet with Ali Mahomet of Bokhara; there Chung-Yang, who has drifted here from Pekin through Siberia, with a cargo of worthless tea, vainly endeavouring to palm it off on that grave-looking Parsee, who, unfortunately for the Celestial, is not quite such a fool as he looks.

Such a hubbub never was heard.
Every one is talking or shouting at the top of their voices, women screaming, beggars whining, fruit and water sellers jingling their cymbals, while from the coppersmiths' quarter hard by comes a deafening accompaniment in the shape of beaten metal.

Occasionally a caravan of laden camels stalk gravely through the alleys, scattering the yelling crowd right and left, only to reassemble the moment it has passed, like water in the wake of a ship.

Again it separates, and a sedan, preceded by a couple of gholams with long wands, is carried by, and one gets a momentary glimpse of a pair of dark eyes and henna-stained finger-tips, as a fair one from the "anderoon" [C] of some great man is carried to her jeweller's or perfumer's.

The "yashmak" is getting very thin in these countries, and one can form a very fair estimate of the lady's features (singularly plain ones) as the sedan swings by.