rab - - bil - ’á - - la - - mee - - na-r - rah-
má - ni-r - ra - hee - mi má - li - ki yow - mi-d-
deen. Ee - yá - - ka naa - bu - doo - wa-
ee - yá - ka nesta - ’een. Ihdi - na-s - si - rá - ta-l-
mus - ta - kee - ma si - rá - ta-l - le zee - na an-
’am - ta ’a - lei - him ghei - ri-l-maghdoo - bi ’a-
lei - him wa-la-d - dá - - - -lleen. A’-meen.
CHAPTER XIX.
PUBLIC DANCERS.
Egypt has long been celebrated for its public dancing-girls; the most famous of whom are of a distinct tribe, called “Ghawázee.”[[476]] A female of this tribe is called “Gházeeyeh;” and a man, “Gházee;” but the plural Ghawázee is generally understood as applying to the females. The error into which most travellers in Egypt have fallen, of confounding the common dancing-girls of this country with the ’A′l’mehs, who are female singers, has already been exposed. The Ghawázee perform, unveiled, in the public streets, even to amuse the rabble. Their dancing has little of elegance. They commence with a degree of decorum; but soon, by more animated looks, by a more rapid collision of their castanets of brass, and by increased energy in every motion, they exhibit a spectacle exactly agreeing with the descriptions which Martial[[477]] and Juvenal[[478]] have given of the performances of the female dancers of Gades. The dress in which they generally thus exhibit in public is similar to that which is worn by women of the middle classes in Egypt in private; that is, in the hareem; consisting of a yelek, or an ’anter′ee, and the shintiyán, etc., of handsome materials. They also wear various ornaments: their eyes are bordered with the kohl (or black collyrium); and the tips of their fingers, the palms of their hands, and their toes and other parts of their feet, are usually stained with the red dye of the henna, according to the general custom of the middle and higher classes of Egyptian women. In general, they are accompanied by musicians (mostly of the same tribe), whose instruments are the kemengeh, or the rabáb, and the tár; or the darabukkeh and zummárah or the zemr: the tár is usually in the hands of an old woman.