Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 22, 1911.djvu/202

 172 The Popular' Ritual of

There is a " Christian " {jidsrdni), — an " ambassador " with a three-cornered hat on his head, — who is accompanied by his Moorish servants; and a "courier" {rdkkds) brings him letters. There is a " mule " {bdgla), represented by a person who is carrying the skull of a camel on a stick, who is provided with a tail of horsehair, and whose head and back are covered with a rug {fellis) on the top of which is a packsaddle. There are tabbdlln, playing drums {tbfila, sing. tbdt), and oboes {gidti, sing, gdita) ; and there are dancing boys {l-ayydl) from Arabic-speaking mountain tribes. All these persons go about from house to house every night from the evening of the second day of the feast till that of the seventh day {sdba' 'Id). The performance opens by the entering of Basseh and the tabbdlln. The former begins to dance, while the latter play and sing as follows, — A Bdssek middi, a l-ldliya d-aberdi, a Basseh l-fdrrdn, a l-ldhya del- kdrrdn (" O Bdsseh my dear fellow, O beard of reeds, O Basseh of the oven, O beard of the cuckold ! "). Suna enters and dances in her turn, after which she and Basseh perform together a lascivious dance, the former wagging her stomach, and the latter kissing and embracing her and giving himself a most indecent appearance by making a fold in his clothes. The tabbdlln, who have been playing all the time, now sing, — A Bdsseh iwa iwa twa Itlu ! — which implies an exhortation to Basseh to have sexual connection with Suna. After the owner of the house has given them some money, which they hand over to the manager of the play, they go aside and are succeeded by the Jews, who play on their instruments, dance, and sing some nonsense in the Arabic idiom peculiar to the Jews. The same is then done by the Jewesses, who dance first alone and afterwards with their husbands. The Jew with the basket enters and dances ; the other Jews and the Jewesses gather round him to buy fish ; one of them is pushed down and dies ; his wife weeps over him, scratching her face in the usual manner; the Jews ask the owner

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