lt the fire-waters of
the West, without ceremony, in retreats withdrawn from the public
eye. Being a less violent and a less shameful passion, I suppose,
it is indulged in with more of the humanities. The etiquette of the
coffee-house, of those coffee-houses which have not been too much
infected by Europe, is one of their most characteristic features.
Something like it prevails in Italy, where you tip your hat on
entering and leaving a _caffe_. In Turkey, however, I have seen a
new-comer salute one after another each person in a crowded
coffee-room, once on entering the door and again after taking his
seat, and be so saluted in return--either by putting the right hand
to the heart and uttering the greeting _Merhabah_, or by making the
_temennah_, that triple sweep of the hand which is the most
graceful of salutes. I have also seen an entire company rise upon
the entrance of an old man, and yield him the corner of honor.

Such courtesies take time. Then you must wait for your coffee to be
made. To this end coffee, roasted fresh as required by turning in
an iron cylinder over a fire of sticks and ground to the fineness
of powder in a brass mill, is put into a small uncovered brass pot
with a long handle. There it is boiled to a froth three times on a
charcoal brazier, with or without sugar as you prefer. But to
desecrate it by the admixture of milk is an unheard of sacrilege.
Some _kahvehjis_ replace the pot in the embers with a smart rap in
order to settle the grounds. You in the meanwhile smoke. That also
takes time, particularly if you "drink" a _narguileh_, as the Turks
say. This is familiar enough in the West to require no great
description. It is a big carafe with a metal top for holding
tobacco and a long coil of leather tube for inhaling the
water-cooled fumes thereof. The effect is wonderfully soothing and
innocent at first, though wonderfully deadly in the end to the
novice. The tobacco used is not the ordinary weed, but a much
coarser and stronger one called _tunbeki_, which comes from Persia.
The same sort of tobacco used to be smoked a great deal in shallow
red earthenware pipes with long mouthpieces. They are now chiefly
seen in antiquity shops.

[Illustration: INTERIOR OF A TURKISH CAFFINET, EARLY NINETEENTH
CENTURY--AFTER ALLAN]