The yearly fast begins with the new moon of Ramazan; crowds assemble in the open places and upon the terrace roofs till the popping of pistols and matchlocks and salvos from the squadron warn the faithful that the crescent has appeared. In the days of Sayyid Said the strict Arab salute of three guns (our 21) was kept up; five denoted a victory, and seven the decease of some eminent person. Arabs observe the dietetic law strictly; their women are expected to fast, and boys of 13 and 14 take a pride in imitating their parents. Many, especially those with weak digestion, cannot eat the dawn meal general throughout Egypt, Syria, and Persia. The Shafei ordeal ends when the sun has wholly sunk below the horizon; the Bayázi waits till daylight has almost faded from the _east_, and he prays before breaking bread. Most men begin hygienically with something easily digested, as dates and sour milk,—a more substantial meal follows after an hour. The rich pass much of the fasting time in sleep, and the burden here, as elsewhere, falls far more heavily upon the poor. At Zanzibar, however, the infliction is lightened by the damp climate and by the equinoctial day, short compared with the terrible 16 hours which must sometimes be endured in subtropical latitudes. Yet the servants and slaves are useless during Ramazan: idle at all times, they then assert a right to do nothing: as I before observed, the fast is one-twelfth of the year thoroughly wasted. On the other hand, it may be remarked that El Islam has wisely limited its festivals to six days in the year, a great contrast to the profuse waste of time which still characterizes the faith of Southern Europe. As at the beginning of the month, crowds assemble to sight the new moon which ends the fast, and every fellow who has a matchlock wastes powder and ball, without much regarding where the latter flies. Here, as in the Brazil, nothing can be done without wasting gunpowder: at Zanzibar the matchlock is perforce preferred, in Rio de Janeiro the rocket and the squib have taken its place. This year (1857) a storm of rain on the evening of May 24th concealed the crescent, and it was not till half- past five P.M. on the 25th, that a salute from the shipping announced, despite the thick drifting scud which hid every inch of sky, that the weary ‘blessed month’ was no more. Then the men gathered about the palace, the women flocked to the house-tops, and the city, usually so sadly silent, rang with shouting, singing, the braying of trumpets, and irregular discharges of small arms. After sunset again all was still as the grave.