Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1890-04-05

| gave, no one can ever give, an adequate de-
| scriptlon of this almost trackless labyrinth.
Nothing exists in Europe or America to
which it can be likened. 1 have attempted
its exploration on 18 different occasions. On
each but one was rescued and conveyed
! back to recognizable precincts and location
| only after an excellent exhibition of panto-
mime and coin. There is but one street, or
| way, which starts at somewhere and finally
reaches anywhere. This is the Rue de la
Kasbah. This at one time led from the
quays to the pirates stronghold on the
heights. What Is left of it rises step in
every two yards, and 300 crumbling stone
steps still remain. To the right and left of
this there are, 1 am told, upward of 400 dis
tinct streets, thoroughfares, courts, alleys
and lanes. No two are at right angles.
Every curve or sinuosity imaginable is de-
scrlbed. Is is maze of shadowy burrows
where fit and -loiter swarthy beings sheeted
in ghostly white In not a half dozen of
these old ARAB streets can one catch a
glimpse of more than tiny blue thread of
sky above. The widest streets are not up
ward of II feet in width; the average one
does not exceed eight; and in very many
one can touch the opposite walls with out
stretched hands. The habitations of rich
and poor are joined. None are detached.
In nearly every street and passage the sec
ond, third and sometimes fourth story of
the structures each extend beyond the lower
one, giving effects like those in the Dutch
city lanes in Amsterdam. The street side
OF each succeeding story is propped from
the lower one by huge timbers at acute an
giles; and in these dove and swallow cotes
are hung. The streets are stone, the walls
are stone; the props and ali exposed timbers
are whitewashed to resemble stone, and the
effect is something like wandering in tun-
mel of dazzling white, whose vaulted sides
are ornamented by strange and uncouth
architectural horiture, and through the
truncated pointed arch of which twilight
way there is seen but the slenderesr line of
sky.
STRANG STREET SCENES.
One will see stranger things within thes
streets than their quaint architecture. Th !
shops are all nearly tiny inches in the walls.
The Moorish merchant enters his black lit
tie den through a trap-door; lowers the shut
ter which falls. often in steps, to the street;
and sits in the center of his possessions,
which are all within reach, voiceless and
grave the day long, like forsaken Punch
In pantomime. Every manner of shop is
just like his. In some, workmen are en-
broidering the white burnous, utilizing their
great toes for holding tight the disengaged
thread. In others greasy fritters are fried in
solemn and stately manner while one
waits. Some display ostrich eggs and
native ornaments. Here and there is q
seller of herbs and vegetables. Again
white-robed and bearded men are surround
ed by crates of charcoal and tiny bundles of
fagots.
In others almost priceless oriental draper
les are packed and punched around mer-
chant who smokes and dreams as if no
fhnp hf foFf L.
The ancient and venerable letter and scroll
writer has his niche, or chair at archway
side, and waits with that stole patience only
an Indian or Moslem can command, to in
dite epistle or trace sacred passage from the
Koran upon egg shell, or on ribbon for some
devout ones amulet. Shoemakers so uat cross
legged, sewing and hammering upon sandals
and slippers only. Bread sellers crouch
against walls and doorways. Groups of
swarthy Kabyles with their copper ewers
are ever before the gurgling fountains.
Yelled women wriggle and mince to and
from market or khouba. Stately Arabs ap-
pear and disappear, their flowing robes shut
ting out the vistas of the narrow streets.
SEMI-BARBARIC LIFE.
Cloth vendors higgle-haggle at the cracks |
of massive doors barely ajar. Funeral cor |
teges pass on the run-for the dead Moslem |
arrives In paradise that much more speedily. |
Girls with dough-covered boards ready for |
the bakeries are as feet as the funerals. |
Tiny donkeys loaded with street garbage |
force you against the walls. Other donkeys |
with panniers packed with fruits, orange |
blossoms and roses, fill the shadowy ways
with the affairs Of sunny Algerian valleys.
The same weird, wild scenes of semi-bar-
barrie life that were here 1000 years ago are
here to-day, every day, all day. and will
remain. And if you wander these ghostly
ways at night, all is still. shadowful, silent
You see the white silent walls about you
You know that white, silent forms wblsk
past you. And away up there through in
finite space you see the white, silent stars
looking down.
1t holds, fascinates, enthralls One is
bound with almost inseparable fetters of in
terest to it; but when you have put the
white dove upon the hillside" behind you,
like breath of relief comes, as it
lid to me yesterday, when 1 stepped foot on
Sicilian shores, even ii above the white walls
and domes of thrice razed Catania loom the
lark and forbidding outlines of hideous,
fearful and ever-destroying Etna.
EDGAR L. WAKEMAN.