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The next joke was connected with the Jewesses, four or five of whom sat in a row in the diwán. Almost everybody else was puffing away at a tchibouque or nargileh, and the place was one cloud of smoke. The poor Jewesses were obliged to decline joining us, for it happened to be Saturday, and they must not smoke on their Sabbath.
Soon the coffee-bearers appeared, every man carrying separately his tiny cup in a small metal stand; and presently to each of us there came a pipe-bearer, who first rested the bowl of the tchibouque at a measured distance on the floor, and then, on this axis, wheeled round the long cheery stick, and gracefully presented it on half-bended knee; already the well-kindled fire was glowing secure in the bowl, and so, when I pressed the amber up to mine, there was no coyness to conquer; the willing fume came up, and answered my slightest sigh, and followed softly every breath inspired, till it touched me with some faint sense and understanding of Asiatic contentment.
Old Moostapha, or Abdallah, or Hadgi Mohamed waddles up from the water’s edge with a small packet of merchandise, which he has bought out of a Greek brigantine, and when at last he has reached his nook in the bazaar he puts his goods before the counter, and himself upon it; then laying fire to his tchibouque he “sits in permanence,” and patiently waits to obtain “the best price that can be got in an open market.” This is his fair right as a seller, but he has no means of finding out what that best price is except by actual experiment.
He was rewarded with the Governorship of Jerusalem, which he held when I was there. I recollect, by-the-bye, that he tried one of his stratagems upon me. I did not go to see him, as I ought in courtesy to have done, during my stay at Jerusalem; but I happened to be the owner of a rather handsome amber tchibouque piece, which the Governor heard of, and by some means contrived to see.
There is no scarcity of water along the whole road from Belgrade to Stamboul, but the habits of our Tatar were formed by his ancestors and not by himself, so he took good care to see that his leathern water-flask was amply charged and properly strapped to the saddle, along with his blessed tchibouque.
He sent to me, and dressed up a statement that he would give me a price immensely exceeding the sum which I had given for it. He did not add my tchibouque to the rest of his trophies.
He is smoking a grimy tchibouque in a contemplative fashion, as he stands on the outskirts of the chattering throng. To him approaches a second stalwart, lean man about the same age and appearance. He is also smoking a long tchibouque; it is a custom which the elder inhabitants have adopted from the Turks.
The road entering Podgorica is very similar in appearance to that which leads into Cetinje, only the first impressions are considerably wilder and more uncivilised than that of the capital. Hundreds of Turks and Albanians are smoking their evening "tchibouque" in the streets, and scowl in no friendly manner at the stranger.
At the conclusion of the "haul" one of the men chose two of the largest fish and threw them into my canoe as a present; as thanks I lent my tobacco-tin, which they gratefully emptied. Montenegrins carry tobacco in a tin and roll their own cigarettes; no other form of smoking is known amongst them, except the tchibouque by some of the older men, a relic of Turkish times.
Our camp-kettle, filled from the brook, hummed doubtfully for a while, then busily bubbled under the sidelong glare of the flames; cups clinked and rattled; the fragrant steam ascended, and soon this little circlet in the wilderness grew warm and genial as my lady’s drawing-room. And after this there came the tchibouque—great comforter of those that are hungry and wayworn.
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