Descending toward the south, we shall find a lighter sort of shoe in use, and one partaking more of the character of a slipper, used more as a protection for the sole of the foot in walking, than as an article of warmth. Thus the shoes generally used in the East, scarcely do more than cover the toes, yet, from constant use, the natives hardly ever allow them to slip from the feet. The learned author of the notes to “Knight’s Pictorial Bible,” speaking from personal observation of these articles, says, “The common shoe in Turkey or Arabia, is like our slipper _with_ quarters, except that it has a sharp and prolonged toe turned up.” No shoes in western Asia have ears, and they are generally of colored leather--red or yellow morocco in Turkey and Arabia, and green shagreen in Persia. In the latter country, the shoe or slipper in general use (having no quarters), has a very high heel; but with this exception, the heels in these countries are generally flat. No shoes or even boots have more than a single sole (like what we call “pumps”), which in wet weather imbibes the water freely. When the shoe without quarters is used, a slipper, with quarters, but without a sole, is worn inside, and the outer one alone is thrown off on entering a house. But in Persia, instead of this inner shoe of leather, they use a worsted sock. Those shoes that have quarters are usually worn without any inner covering for the foot. The peasantry and the nomade tribes usually go barefoot, or wear a rude sandal or shoe of their own manufacture; those who possess a pair of red leather or other shoes, seldom wear them except on holyday occasions, so that they last a long time, if not so long as among the Maltese, with whom a pair of shoes endures for several generations, being, even on holyday occasions, more frequently carried in the hand than worn on the feet. The boots are generally of the same construction and material as the shoes; and the general form may be compared to that of the buskin, the height varying from the mid-leg to near the knee. They are of capacious breadth, except among the Persians whose boots generally fit close to the leg, and are mostly of a sort of Russia leather, uncolored; whereas those of other people are, like the slipper, of red and yellow morocco. There is also a boot or shoe for walking in frosty weather, which differs from the common one only in having under the heel iron tips, which, being partly bent vertically with a jagged edge, give a hold on the ice, which prevents slipping, and are particularly useful in ascending or descending the frozen mountain paths--reminding us of the sort of boot worn by Tartarian ladies, as given in fig. 8. The shoes of the oriental ladies are sometimes highly ornamented; the covering part being wrought with gold, silver, and silk, and perhaps set with jewels, real or imitated. Examples of such decorated shoes are given in plate IV., figs. 9 and 10, and will