The great conflagration of 1911 destroyed the heart of the business district by the Omayyade Mosque, and those who knew the city of a few years ago find it sadly strange to climb over the heaps of dusty rubbish which cover once familiar streets. But during the rebuilding, which is progressing rapidly, there is no appreciable diminution of business, and the intricate maze of the bazaars still presents scenes of marvelous variety and endless fascination. There is the Water-pipe Bazaar, where _narghileh_ bowls are made out of cocoanuts ornamented with gold and silver, the Draper’s Bazaar filled with shoddy European stuffs, the Saddle Bazaar with its brightly covered Arabic saddles and gorgeous accouterments, the almost forsaken Bazaar of the Booksellers, where now hardly a half-dozen poorly stocked booths hint at the intellectual conquests of the Damascus of centuries gone by, and the Spice Market, whose long rows of bottles scent the air with their essences and attars. The Silk Bazaar is the most brilliant, and its gaudiest patterns are hung out for the inspection of admiring Bedouin visitors. The Second-hand Bazaar of the auctioneers is commonly known as the Louse Market, not because of the uncomplimentary suspicion which first suggests itself, but from a very small and agile coin known by that name, which is frequently used in increasing the bids. As we pass along one street after another, we see open-front bakers’ shops where paper-like loaves are sold, still hot from the oven, and confectioners’ booths filled with all manner of sherbets and jellies and delicious preserved fruits and the infinite variety of sweet, indigestible pastry in which the Syrians delight. In one little square there are great piles of thin apricot paste which look exactly like bundles of brown paper. The merchant offers us a sample to taste, but we are not quite sure as to the quality of the dust that has been settling upon it all the morning. A long towel hung over yonder doorway indicates that it is the entrance to a _hammâm_ or public bath, within whose steaming court we can see brown, half-naked forms reclining on dingy divans. The intricate lattice-work of overhanging balconies guards the harems of the merchants from the vulgar gaze of the crowds below. This little gate, curtained by a hanging rug and edged with a line of slippers, leads from the deafening tumult of the bazaar to the solemn quiet of a cool, spacious mosque.