the neighbouring houses; a vigilant _bowwab_ or
doorkeeper is stationed at the outer portal; and within this the eunuchs
guard the curtains, heavy with golden embroidery, which cover the doorway
leading to the interior; and woe to the intruder who should attempt to
penetrate beyond the entrance! A closed door is never permitted in the
hareem; but etiquette forbids the husband to enter when slippers laid
before the doorway denote that his wife is receiving visitors--a method
of exclusion which is said to be sometimes kept in operation for many days
together. The scale of precedence among the inmates is regulated on a very
different system from that of European society. Mr Urquhart has correctly
remarked that "the precept, 'Thou shalt leave thy father and mother, and
cleave unto thy wife,' has not been transcribed from the Gospel to the
Koran: the wife in the East is not the mistress of the household; she is
the daughter of her husband's mother," to whom the appellation of _hanum_,
or chief lady belongs of right to the end of her life: and even if the
mother be not living, the sisters of the husband take precedence of the
wife, who is regarded by them as a _younger_ sister. The first wife,
however, where there is more than one, can only lose her pre-eminence of
rank by the misfortune of being childless, in which case she gives place
to one who has become a mother; but, among the higher classes, each wife
has her separate apartments and attendants, and in some cases even
inhabits separate mansion--all, however, within the bounding walls of the
hareem.

"In the great hareems, the hanum generally has four principal attendants,
two of whom are elderly, and act simply as companions; the third is the
treasurer, and the fourth is the sub-treasurer. The next in rank are those
who hand pipes and coffee, sherbet and sweetmeats; and each of these has
her own set of subordinates. Lastly rank the cooks and house slaves, who
are mostly negresses." The position of these _white slaves_, among whom
Mrs. Poole "found the most lovely girls in the hareem, many of them fully
justifying my preconceived ideas of the celebrated Georgian and Circassian
women," may, perhaps, be best understood by a reference to the familiar
pages of the Thousand and One Nights; the hareem scenes in which are
probably drawn from those of Syria and Egypt at the period when those
tales were written. "Though torn from their parents at an early age, they
find and ackno