Journal 40, page 10

the chorus grumbles. Miss Long whispers to me at this juncture, "I assure you its not half so nice as the twirlers" & I whisper solemnly back, neither of us daring to laugh: "It is stupid enough now but the guide promises that they'll take on worse after a little."

Now each brother kisses every other on the hand & the chief priest kisses the other one's ear & all take off their coats & prepare for business & a brother opens the window-a measure we can appreciate for odors not of aloes nor of Araby rise to our gallery from the mob below. "A-e-i-o" (Allah hou"!) now says the chorus with great explosiveness, bending down up right, up as they repeat endlessly this new noise. 12 men keep this up, bending back & forth like fire men hard at the brakes while a few old men totter through the same motions in feeble imitation, & four [?] men squatting in the midst yowl like Tom cats on a moonlit eve-one of them, a crook nosed old Turk leering now & then at the others in a way that I incline to think sarcastic & the handsome six year old embryo dervish stands behind him & bends this way & that in imitation of the dozen hearty fellows that are playing firemen at the brakes, but in a most imbecile & inconsequent style. Perspiration flows freely & we all regret that we didn't bring along our new rose-water vinaigrettes. I notice in the explosive line a darkey whose extreme earnestness & mellow roar keeps up the reputation of his countrymen for zeal. An Armenian is on one side of him-a Turk upon the other & they mingle the falling perspiration in beautiful unison & fraternity. But the little innocent child standing & weaving ignorantly to & fro in the center of this Bedlam is the most suggestive as he is the only attractive object here, attired like the rest in a little white cap below which his dark eyes & curling hair form a sweet attractive picture. Innocent childhood surrounded by such horrid sights, such hideous sounds, yet lovely & beautiful as even [?] as God meant man should be always [?]-as man might have been. "See the brethren who sit around & look on-the more excited the fire company act the more contented they appear" whispers Kate shrewdly.

The old grey haired man on the central mat-whose epiglottis I have several times seen as he yelled now gives out altogether & sits murmuring [?] his prayer with closed eyes & quiet manner. A brother in butternut does solo to the chorus now growing hoarse but as explosive as ever. The chief priest (now in a pea green gown & sicklied oer with the pale cast of thought looks as if in an extreme pang of colic as he bows his head to right & left. The motion gradually accelerates. What was 4/4 time half an hour ago has become 16/32 & the noise is like that of the steam engine of an express train at full speed. The pea green priest lifts up his hands-murmurs a few feeble words when instantly this pow wow ceases. The heated line now breaks up & a young weaver who had lead the mad motion seats himself beside old epiglottis on a mat, takes out a big handkerchief & wipes himself carefully-naked breast-arms-head & face & looks the