panoramas of the Mediterranean, and
bombardments of the Malakhoff tower—occupying
many thousand leagues of landscapes and
square feet of canvas—at a great atelier or
painting-room, spaciously erected for the
purpose, in the very thick of Gibbet Street.
How Messrs. Doubletie and Coverflats, the
accomplished directors of this great scene-
painting undertaking, could have selected
Gibbet Street as a location for their studio
seems, at the first blush, to pass
comprehension; but the rent may have been
moderate, or the premises convenient, or
the situation central; at any rate there
they are with thieves to right of them,
thieves to left of them, thieves in front
of them; volleying oaths and ribaldry all day
long.

Under Poundbrush's auspices I have had
many opportunities lately of assisting at the
At Homes of the Gibbet Street thieves.
Their interiors are not by any means difficult
of visual access; for their windows are, as I
have said, mostly open. Besides, a great
portion of their daily business is transacted
in the open street. They eat in the street,
they drink, fight, smoke, sing, and—when
they have a chance—thieve in the street. A
very curious contemplation is presented by
standing at the window of this studio. Turning
your back to the busy painters, who are
pursuing a beautiful, humanising art, revelling
in fruits and flowers, sunny landscapes, and
stately architecture, and then to turn your
eyes upon this human dunghill. What have
we done to be brought to this strait?
Look into the black holes of rooms, cast your
eyes upon those ragged heaps where the
creatures sleep, hear the men curse, and see
them strike the wretched, wretched women.

It was in some of these latter-day
contemplations of the thieves in their domesticity in
Gibbet Street, that I came to my grand
conclusion that the thief is a man—and that he
must eat and drink and sleep; and I am
gratified to be able to chronicle one little trait
of human nature, and that, too, of the kindlier
sort. At one o'clock, post meridian, lately,
the waiter from some adjacent cookshop
was journeying through Gibbet Street (always
a North-west passage of great peril and travail
to waiters and potboys), and, in his hands, he
bore one of those stately pyramids of pewter-
covered dishes of meat and potatoes, which
none but waiters can balance, or cook-
shop keepers send out all hot. A thief passing
that way—a young thief, probably
inexperienced, new to Gibbet Street, who
had not yet learnt its code of etiquette—
followed the waiter dexterously, and was
about to tilt the topmost dish from off the
pyramid, with a view to upsetting the whole
edifice, scattering the viands, and making
off with the contents. I trembled for the
result. Two or three half-naked boys and a
hungry dog of most dishonest appearance,
watched the proceedings with anxious eyes.
The nefarious purpose had nearly been
accomplished, when there issued, suddenly from
a doorway, a tall robber—a black-whiskered
Goliath. He, espying the intention of the
juvenescent footpad, suddenly cast him into
the kennel; thus allowing the waiter with
his savoury cargo to pass safely by: and
roughly shaking the youth, cried out, ''What
are you up to? Don't yer know, yer fool!
Them's for Painting Room!"

What was this? Was it reverence for art,
or can there be really some honour among
thieves, some hidden good in this wretched
Gibbet Street?

THE BRITISH DERVISH.

RICHARD BURTON—educated at an English
public school, and Trinity College, Oxford;  a
lieutenant in the Bombay army, tall, dark,
with Oriental eyes and beard that a
Persian might envy; a taste for travel
which no amount of misery could quell, a
special master of the Arabic, Persian,
Hindoostani, and Turkish languages; versed in
magic and mesmerism; with an aptitude for
imitation that would make the fortune of an
actor—determined some three years ago, to
penetrate into the sacred temples of
Mohammedanism never before seen or described
by any Christian. One of the few
mysteries which the age of railways and
steamboats, revolvers and photographs, has not
explored.

On the evening of April the third, eighteen
hundred and fifty-three, a Persian prince
embarked on board the Bengal; for, on such
a dangerous errand, our traveller could not
begin his disguise too soon. A fortnight on
board was industriously spent in practising
the habits and ceremonies of common life
that distinguish the Moslem from the Giaour;
the Oriental from the European. "Look, for
instance, at an Indian Moslem drinking a
glass of water. The operation is simple
enough, but includes no less than five novelties.
In the first place, he clutches his
tumbler as though it were the throat of a
foe; secondly, he ejaculates, 'In the name of
Allah, the Compassionate, the Merciful,'
before wetting his lips; thirdly, he imbibes
the contents, swallowing it, not drinking,
and ending with a satisfied grunt; fourthly,
before setting down the cup, he sighs forth,
'Praise be to Allah;' and fifthly, he replies,
'May Allah make it pleasant to thee,' in
answer to a friend's polite 'Pleasurably and
health.' He is also careful to avoid the
irreligious action of drinking the pure element in
a standing position."

Landing in Egypt with a shaven head and
full beard,—exclaiming, as true believers do
on all occasions of concluding actions,
"Alhamdulillah," meaning, "Praise to the Lord
of the (three) worlds,"—the spectators, a
motley mob, murmured "Moslem!" and, if