THE SLIPPER-MAKER'S BAZAR.—From a Painting by F. A. Bridgman.
AN AFRICAN SLIPPER-MAKER.
BY DAVID KER.
Noon in Algiers—a scorching African noon—bringing out the white-walled houses and white-domed mosques of the city, and the black shadows which they cast, sharp and clear as in a photograph, driving even the seasoned Arabs to the shelter of roofs and gateways, and making old Selim the slipper-maker, as he puffs his long pipe in the shady doorway of his shop, stroke his white beard with a self-satisfied air while eying the hot faces and dusty uniforms of the luckless French soldiers who come tramping past in the full mid-day glare.
To look at the old fellow as he squats there on his little mat, with his huge blue turban pulled over his eyes, and the long white folds of his heavy burnoose (mantle) rippling over the floor on every side, as if some one had upset a pitcher of milk over him, you would think that no amount of customers would get him on his feet again to-day. But there is one customer coming who will do it in a moment.
Dodging fearlessly past the huge gaunt camels which almost block the narrow street as they go slouching past with their long, noiseless stride, roped together in single file like beads on a string, a tiny figure stands upon the threshold, looking down at Selim from under its party-colored hood, with a great show of white teeth and laughing black eyes.
"Aha!" cries the old slipper merchant, springing up with wonderful briskness for a Mussulman. "Welcome to this house of mine, my pearl! What seeks Zuleika, daughter of Hussein, from her father's friend?"
"I want a pair of shoes," answered the little woman, with a business-like air; "and my father says they must be very fine indeed, for to-morrow some friends are coming to us, and you are to come too, and eat of our pilaff [rice and roast meat] and our sweetmeats, and see what a welcome we'll give you!"
Old Selim, with a sly twinkle in his small gray eye, rummages among the clusters of shoes that hang like grapes overhead, and produces a pair that make Zuleika's eyes open wide in wondering delight. Such a pair! all ablaze with scarlet and bright green and spangles of shining tinsel. And when he had tied them on, and set her down again, Selim gave her back two of the heavy copper pieces she had given him, and bade her buy fresh dates with them.
But her joy was suddenly checked. A passing water-carrier had let his skin bag come undone, and turned the dust into thick black mud all around Selim's threshold. Poor Zuleika, unable to untie her shoes again, unwilling to soil them, and not liking to disturb the old man any more, looked very rueful indeed.