N SLAVE GIRL WITH COFFEE SERVICE, PERSIA]

Then is often seen a contention in courtesy amongst them,
especially in any greater assemblies, who shall drink first. Some
man that receives the _fenjeyn_ in his turn will not drink yet--he
proffers it to one sitting in order under him, as to the more
honourable; but the other putting off with his hand will answer
_ebbeden_, "Nay, it shall never be, by Ullah! but do thou drink."
Thus licensed, the humble man is despatched in three sips, and
hands up his empty _fenjeyn_. But if he have much insisted, by this
he opens his willingness to be reconciled with one not his friend.
That neighbor, seeing the company of coffee-drinkers watching him,
may with an honest grace receive the cup, and let it seem not
willingly; but an hard man will sometimes rebut the other's gentle
proffer.

Some may have taken lower seats than becoming their _sheykhly_
blood, of which the nomads are jealous; entering untimely, they sat
down out of order, sooner than trouble all the company. A _sheykh_,
coming late and any business going forward, will often sit far out
in the assembly; and show himself a popular person in this kind of
honourable humility. The more inward in the booth is the higher
place; where also is, with the _sheykhs_, the seat of a stranger.
To sit in the loose circuit without and before the tent, is for the
common sort. A tribesman arriving presents himself at that part or
a little lower, where in the eyes of all men his pretension will be
well allowed; and in such observances of good nurture, is a nomad
man's honour among his tribesmen. And this is nigh all that serves
the nomad for a conscience, namely, that which men will hold of
him. A poor person, approaching from behind, stands obscurely,
wrapped in his tattered mantle, with grave ceremonial, until those
sitting indolently before him in the sand shall vouchsafe to take
notice of him; then they rise unwillingly, and giving back enlarge
the coffee-circle to receive him. But if there arrive a _sheykh_, a
coffee-host, a richard amongst them of a few cattle, all the
coxcomb companions within will hail him with their pleasant
adulation _taad henneyi_, "Step thou up hither."

The astute Fukara _sheukh_ surpass all men in their coffee-drinking
courtesy, and Zeyd