The unofficial side of _Baïram_ is quite as full of colour in its more scattered way. Then every man who can afford it, or whose master can, puts on a new suit of clothes. He at least dons something new, if only a gay handkerchief about his fez or neck. It is interesting to stand at some busy corner in a Turkish quarter and watch the crowd in its party-coloured holiday finery. Friends meeting each other stop, seize a hand between their two, and solemnly rub cheeks. Inferiors try to kiss the hand of superiors, who try in turn to snatch the hand away, their success depending on the degree of their superiority. And everybody wishes everybody else a blessed _Baïram_. The _bekjis_—watchmen who have beaten drums during the nights of Ramazan in order to get people up in time for their last meal—march about collecting tips. They announce themselves by their drums, to which they often add a pipe or a small violin, and they carry a pole that is gaudy with the handkerchiefs people give them. The sound of music, however, often means that dancing is on. There is sure to be something of the sort wherever Kürds or Laz gather together. Your true Turk is too dignified for such frivolities. And be it well understood that the only women who dance in the open at _Baïram_ are gipsies, hussies who love to deck themselves out in yellow and who blush not to reveal their faces or their ankles. I regret that I am too little of an expert in matters terpsichorean to enter into the fine points of these performances. I can no more than sketch out an impression of a big green tent in some vacant lot, of the high lights of brass that go with tea and coffee drinking in its shadow, and of fiercely moustachioed persons in tall felt caps, in hooded or haply goatskin jackets, and in wide trousers, if they be Kürds, or of slighter Laz with tight black legs that bulge out at the top and hoods picturesquely knotted about their heads, who join hands and begin very slowly a swaying step that grows wilder and wilder with the throbbing of a demon drum. [Illustration: The open spaces of the Mohammedan quarters are utilised for fairs]