Slaves are met with in nearly every house: the female portion is employed in domestic work, the male in agricultural labour; they receive once a year, at the feast of the great Baëram, a piece of cotton stuff; which wound round their loins constitutes their whole clothing. They are treated very well, and, in most families, partake of the same fare as their masters. The badge of servitude is, however, not wanting; for the male slaves are generally bound in fetters, applied to their legs, to prevent them from running away. I never saw one of these beings illtreated by his master for doing too little work; it is only when they make an attempt to run away, that they are beaten. The female slaves run at liberty, and unfettered; they are also treated with more lenity, especially if they should happen to be young and pretty, or when the master admits them to the rights of a wife. The children, born by these slaves, are the property of the owner, who may sell them; this is, however, no longer the case in Egypt, where all natural children are treated like Egyptians. These poor creatures have equal cause to complain of their masters, as some slave-proprietors make this a branch of commerce; thus they are mostly mustered after a few years, and sold to slave-merchants, who take them down to Grand Cairo. Europeans must be very careful in purchasing female slaves, and ought especially to be on their guard against those who speak Arabic well, for many of them are acquainted with all kinds of tricks. Many slaves, on the other hand, are not to be purchased from their proprietors, especially if they are well taught; and only when they have not adopted the faith of Islam, and die, are they treated like cattle. These children of nature frequently behave in the most singular manner when they take an object that is unknown to them into their hands; it would, indeed, make any man laugh heartily to see how awkwardly they comport themselves. A very comical instance of the kind occurred to me: a girl, who was suffering from head-ache, begged a cloth of me to bind round her head, and I lent her my flag,[29] as I had nothing else at hand. I visited her on the next day, thinking to find her ill at home, but was told that she was much better, and had gone out. My astonishment at meeting the handsome girl, in company with several of her friends, on the market-place, decked out with my flag in the form of a woman’s frock, may be easily imagined; and my laughter was greatly increased, at observing the double-headed eagle expanded in full glory over the centre of her body. Several Turks, who were present, were likewise attacked with fits of laughter; but the _belle_, and her friends, found this decoration so pretty, that I was besieged with entreaties to present them also with like _fantasias_; and I was obliged to use all possible means to persuade them, and make them understand, that I possessed no more articles of ornament of this description,