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On all sides their minarets shoot up into the air, those minarets embellished with arabesques, carved and complicated with the most changing fancy. They have their little balconies, their rows of little columns; they are so fashioned that the daylight shows through them. Some are far away in the distance; others quite close, pointing straight into the sky above our heads.
The knights were arrogant and sneered at the foot soldiers; the men-at-arms did not trust the knights. They had the Cross on their armour; but few of them had in their hearts the spirit of Jesus who was nailed to the Cross. At last the long, yellow coast-line of Egypt was sighted. Behind it lay the minarets and white roofs of a city.
Upon the balcony my imagination painted a figure, limning it with loving details, the figure of Kâramaneh; and I thought that her glorious eyes would be sorrowful and her lips perhaps a little tremulous, as, her arms resting upon the rail of the balcony, she looked out across the smiling river to the domes and minarets of Cairo and beyond, into the hazy distance; seeing me in dreary, rain-swept London, as I saw her, at Gezîra beneath the cloudless sky of Egypt.
We are indebted to Clavigo for the first information of this new route of the commerce between India and Europe, by Sultania: it is supposed to have been adopted on the destruction of Bagdat by the Moguls; but we learn from other travellers that, towards the end of the fifteenth century, Sultania was remarkable for nothing besides the minarets of a mosque, which were made of metal, and displayed great taste and delicacy of workmanship.
The treasures of Roman art were placed under the care of government officers; baths, palaces, churches, aqueducts, were repaired or founded; to build seems to have been Dietrich's great delight; and we have left us, on a coin, some image of his own palace at Verona, a strange building with domes and minarets, something like a Turkish mosque; standing, seemingly, on the arcades of some older Roman building.
By ascending the tower of the Admiralty, a superb and comprehensive view of the capital is obtained. The streets are broad, the open squares vast in size, the avenues interminable, the river wide and rapid; while the lines of grand architecture are seemingly endless. The view from this elevation is indeed superb, studded with azure domes decked with stars of silver and gilded minarets.
There remains a sufficient number of them, however, to preserve the Oriental character of this side of the square. Above the trees on the other side of the square, higher than the line of the roofs, are seen four or five minarets, the shafts of which, built in courses alternately blue and red, stand out against the azure sky.
Beyond the belt of trees the minarets of some distant village are clear cut against the sky, for the air is so pure that distance seems to be annihilated. Looking east, the bold cliffs face the full glory of the sunset, and display a wonderful transformation of colour, as the white or biscuit-coloured rocks reflect the slowly changing colour of the light.
And beyond this he came to a many-coloured little street out of Bagdad, overhung with gay balconies, vivacious with spindled towers and minarets, and small reticent windows, out of which veiled ladies would glance. And all was still with the stillness of utter desertion.
When, however, after many a day of toil the distant minarets at length appear, the poor Bedouin relaxes the vigour of his pace, his steps become faltering and undecided, every moment his uneasiness increases, and at length he fairly sobs aloud, and embracing your knees, implores with the most piteous cries and gestures that you will dispense with him and his camels, and find some other means of entering the city.
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