The city itself is divided into
three districts: the Jewish in the southern part, the Moslem in the
northern and western, and the Christian in the eastern. The Moslem
quarter is clean, the Christian quarter dirty, and the Jewish simply
filthy. I often had to gallop through the last-named holding my
handkerchief to my mouth, and the kawwasses running as though they had
been pursued by devils. Everywhere in Damascus, but especially in this
quarter, the labyrinthine streets are piled with heaps of offal, wild
dogs are gorged with carrion, and dead dogs are lying about. One must
never judge Damascus, however by externals: every house has a mean aspect
in the way of entrance and approach. This is done purposely to deceive
the Government, and not to betray what may be within in times of looting.
You often approach through a mean doorway into a dirty passage; you then
enter a second court, and you behold a marvellous transformation. You
find the house thoroughly cleaned and perfumed, paved courts with marble
fountains and goldfish, orange and jessamine trees, furniture inlaid with
gold and ebony and mother-o'-pearl, and stained-glass windows. In the
interior of one of the most beautiful houses I visited in Damascus the
show-room was very magnificent, upholstered in velvet and gold, and with
divans inlaid with marble, mother-o'-pearl, ebony, and walnut, and there
were tesselated marble floors and pavements and fountains; but _en
revanche_, God knows where they sleep at all.
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