Page:Sixteen years of an artist's life in Morocco, Spain and the Canary Islands.djvu/78

Rh they purchase, bantering Hadj Mohammed out of his last farthing of profit, and when they sell, laying it on the Christian rebel against God, and on the English contemner of His people, in the same proportion that they have already skinned the Faithful.

The Moors, as they sit squatted on the ground, have a very earthy look, and even a strange earthy sort of smell, and their gilabs also being very much of the colour of the earth, it is difficult to distinguish them at a short distance from big grubs that have sprung up on the spot, with which a person of short sight, or of a lively imagination, may very easily confound them.

The market is abundantly provided with the usual produce displayed on such occasions at home. Here sits Fatima or Leila, presiding over a numerous collection of meagre fowls, or disposing to her customers of butter, eggs, millet, and vegetables of all descriptions. It was really something new to fin myself engaged in striking a bargain with a young lady enjoying one of these romantic names, usually associated with the enticing fictions of the Arabian Night or the high-wrought poetry of Byron. With all the mystery attending the appearance of one who peers at you only with one eye, while she carefully