force of life remaining to the great game of pleasure, whose born thralls they were.

There were two tarabukas and brass castanets, and when the old pair were seated upon the carpet near the door, they all smote their rude instruments, and a wild clang raged through the little chamber. Thereto they sang. Strange sounds-such music as the angular, carved figures upon the temples would make, had they been conversing with us-sounds to the ear like their gracelessness to the eye.

This was Egyptian Polyhymnia preluding Terpsichore.

KUSHUK ARNEM quaffed a goblet of hemp arrack. The beaker was passed to the upper divan, and the Howadji, sipping, found it to smack of aniseed. It was strong enough for the Pharaohs to have imbibed-even for Herod, before beholding Herodias; for these dances are the same. This dancing is more ancient than Aboo Simbel. In the land of the Pharaohs, the Howadji saw the dancing they saw, as uncouth as the temples they built. This dancing is to the ballet of civilized lands, what the gracelessness of Egypt was to the grace of Greece. Had the angular figures of the temple sculptures preluded with that music, they had certainly followed with this dancing.

Kushuk Arnem rose and loosened her shawl girdle in such wise, that I feared she was about to shed the frivolity of dress, as Venus shed the sea

foam, and stood opposite the divan, holding her brass castanets. Old Hecate beat the tar into a thunderous roar. Old husband drew sounds from his horrible rabáb, sharper than the sting of remorse, and Xenobi and the Giraffe each thrummed a tarabuka until I thought the plaster would peel from the wall. Kushuk stood motionless, while this din deepened around her, the arrack aerializing her feet, the Howadji hoped, and not her brain. The sharp surges of sound swept around the room, dashing in regular measure against her movelessness, until suddenly the whole surface of her frame quivered in measure with the music. Her hands were raised, clapping the castanets, and she slowly turned upon herself, her right leg the pivot, marvellously convulsing all the muscles of her body. When she had completed the circuit of the spot on which she stood, she advanced slowly, all the muscles jerking in time to the music, and in solid, substantial spasms.

It was a curious and wonderful gymnastic. There was no graceful dancing-once only there was the movement of dancing, when she advanced, throwing one leg before the other as gipsies dance. But the rest was most voluptuous motion-not the lithe wooing of languid passion, but the soul of passion starting through every sense, and quivering in every

cry

limb. It was the very intensity of motion, concentrated and constant. The music still swelled savagely, in maddened monotony of measure Hecate and the old husband, fascinated with the Ghazeeyah's fire, threw their hands and arms excitedly about their instruments, and an occasional of enthusiasm and satisfaction burst from their lips. Suddenly stooping, stili muscularly moving, Kushuk fell upon her knees, and writhed, with body, arms, and head upon the floor, still in measure-still clanking the castanets, and arose in the same manner. It was profoundly dramatic. The scenery of the dance was like that of a characteris tic song. It was a lyric of love, which words can not tell-profound, oriental, intense, and terrible Still she retreated, until the constantly down-slip ping shawl seemed only just clinging to her hips and making the same circuit upon herself, she sa down, and after this violent and extravagant exertion was marbly cold.

Then timid, but not tremulous, the young Xenobi arose bare-footed, and danced the same dance-not with the finished skill of Kushuk, but gracefully and well, and with her eyes fixed constantly upon the elder. With the same regular throb of the muscles, she advanced and retreated, and the Paradise-pavilioned prophet could not have felt his heavenly

hareem complete, had he sat smoking and entranced with the Howadji.

Form so perfect was never yet carved in marble —not the Venus is so mellowly moulded. Her outline has not the voluptuous excess which is not too much—which is not perceptible to mere criticism, and is more a feeling flushing along the form, than a greater fullness of the form itself. The Greek Venus was sea-born, but our Egyptian is sun-born. The brown blood of the sun burned along her veins -the soul of the sun streamed shaded from her eyes. She was still, almost statuesquely still. When she danced, it was only stillness intensely stirred, and followed that of Kushuk as moonlight succeeds sunshine. As she went on, Kushuk gradually rose; and, joining her, they danced together. The Epicureans of Cairo, indeed-the very young priests of Venus, assemble the Ghawazee in the most secluded adyta of their dwellings; and there, eschewing the mystery of the Hintyan, and the gauziness of the tób, they behold the unencumbered beauty of these beautiful women. At festivals so fair, arrack, raw brandy, and "depraved human nature," naturally improvise a ballet whereupon the curtain here falls.

Suddenly, as the clarion call awakens the longslumbering spirit of the war-horse, old Hecate sprang to her feet; and, loosening her girdle, seized