outcasts; mushrabiyas, worm-eaten and decayed; little mousetrap alleys
that lead us under arches of the Middle Ages, and sometimes close over
our heads by reason of the fantastic bending of the ruins. Even by such
a route as this are we conducted to a famous basilica! Were it not for
these groups of Copts, dressed in their Sunday garb, who make their way
like us through the ruins to the Easter mass, we should think that we
had lost our way.

And how pretty they look, these women draped like phantoms in their
black silks. Their long veils do not completely hide them, as do
those of the Moslems. They are simply placed over their hair and leave
uncovered the delicate features, the golden necklet and the half-bared
arms that carry on their wrists thick twisted bracelets of virgin
gold. Pure Egyptians as they are, they have preserved the same delicate
profile, the same elongated eyes, as mark the old goddesses carved in
bas-relief on the Pharaonic walls. But some, alas, amongst the young
ones have discarded their traditional costume, and are arrayed _a la
franque_, in gowns and hats. And such gowns, such hats, such flowers!
The very peasants of our meanest villages would disdain them. Oh! why
cannot someone tell these poor little women, who have it in their power
to be so adorable, that the beautiful folds of their black veils give
to them an exquisite and characteristic distinction, while this poor
tinsel, which recalls the mid-Lent carnivals, makes of them objects that
excite our pity!

In one of the walls which now surround us there is a low and shrinking
doorway. Can this be the entrance to the basilica? The idea seems
absurd. And yet some of the pretty creatures in the black veils and
bracelets of gold, who were in front of us, have disappeared through it,
and already the perfume of the censers is wafted towards us. A kind of