PEROTE TRADESMEN.

177

army, Turkish Contingent, &c., there is work for three or four more. Very lately an English bootmaker has set up, but in a small way; he has more work than he can do, and will rapidly get on if he attends to his business. There is an opening for three or four bootmakers; so it is with almost every trade-saddlers, hosiers, &c.

English tradesmen would soon crush the competition of the Perote shopkeepers, whose goods are inferior in quality and make-nothing can be got from them really good and durable. All they have to sell is gimcrack and trashy, not such as we are accustomed to buy in England, and, moreover, is exorbitantly dear. They ask twice as much as they will take, and cheat the customer in the most barefaced manner, and if detected in their roguery are not the least abashed, but laugh in a most complacent way.

It is even worse in the Bazaar in Stamboul; the stall keepers there are most shallow and provoking knaves. It is most . difficult to get at the lowest price they will take for an article, or to arrive at

VOL. II.

N

178

TURKISH SHOPKEEPERS.

any approximation to its real value. On some days they will sell to the same person the same description of goods at half the price they will take at other times, and they always vary the upset price with every different customer. They have no notion of business, or of the value of time, which being of no value to them, they do not understand how it can be of any to you, and keep chaffing for half an hour about a few piastres. No one can go to the bazaar and buy the smallest article right off, without paying double its value at least. This bargaining appears to afford some excitement to the Turks-I always think they take a delight in it, for its own sake; and you can never get them to dispense with it even on the most pressing occasion. To make anything like a good bargain, one must devote one's time to it, and appear perfectly careless whether it is obtained or not. If the article is rejected with disdain, and the would-be purchaser walks off, the Turk will shout after him, "Johnny, Johnny," and as he is looking back will beckon to him to return, and will then probably come down in his price.

PLAGUE OF JEWS.

179

From considerable experience, I have always found 'Zenope' to be the best man of business in the bazaar. He is an Armenian, speaks English and French, and sells the best articles. If he is desired to deal prix fixé, a bargain may be closed at once, without any chaffing; but visitors generally want something off everything asked, so, of course, he has to put on to the sum he will take. Still, every stranger going into the bazaar may be sure that he will have to pay highly for whatever he buys.

Directly the traveller crosses the bridge of boats, on his way to Stamboul, he will be accosted by Jews, who ask if he is going to the bazaar, and follow, in spite of all he can do to prevent them. They want to be employed as interpreters, and to get a commission on whatever he buys. It is impossible to get rid of them. They will not be driven away, and adhere most pertinaciously to him wherever he goes; and if he commences to deal, they suddenly pop their dirty heads between him and the shopman, and begin to interpret and explain. Abuse is of no avail-they are

so used to it, both from Christian and Turk. They always hunt in pairs, and, as the traveller moves off, one follows, and the other stays behind to receive a backshish.

On Saturday, however, they are not to be seen as it is the Jewish Sabbath; and one may then go to the bazaar without any fear of being persecuted by them.

CHAPTER XIII.

THERAPIA.

August 2nd.-DR. ZOHRAB, a medical man in considerable practice, said to-day, that he had been twenty-five years in this country, and that this was the hottest and most unhealthy summer he had known-even hotter than at Damascus or Aleppo. He has been ill himself, and that is, perhaps, the reason why he feels the heat more. I do not find it very hot or oppressive, as long as one does not go out in the sun; and I have often suffered far more from the heat in London, than I have done in the East.