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It extends about seven hours in length, and contains upwards of a dozen hamlets, scattered on the side of the mountain. The principal of these is Soueyga, the market-place, where the great Sheikh of the Djeheyne resides, who is acknowledged as such by the Bedouins of that tribe, as well as by the people of Yembo.
This, being the coolest spot in the town during mid-day, is on that account the most frequented. In the Soueyga all the gentlemen hadjys take their morning and evening lounge, and smoke their pipes.
A sect of "Light- -extinguishers" is said to exist in India, as well as in Mesopotamia, and to them the Ismayleys of Syria and those of Mekka may, perhaps, belong. About the middle of the Soueyga, where the street is only four paces in breadth, are stone benches on each side.
The price of the handsomest was from one hundred and ten to one hundred and twenty dollars. At the extremity of the Soueyga, the street is covered with a high vaulted roof of stone, supported on each side by several massy buildings, serving as warehouses to the wealthy merchants; they were the work of one Mohammed, Pasha of Damascus, who lived several centuries ago, and now belong to the mosque.
In returning through the Shamye towards the Soueyga, we find, on the north side of these streets, a quarter called Garara, the most reputable of the town, and perhaps the best built, where the weal-thiest merchants have their houses. In the quarter of Garara, the women of Mohammed Aly Pasha, with a train of eunuchs attached to them, have now taken up their abode.
At the eastern extremity of the Soueyga, the street changes its name into that of Shamye, which is applied also to several by-streets on either side, those on the right leading towards the mountain, and those on the left towards the mosque. At the further end the Shamye joins the quarter of Shebeyka and Bab el Omar.
Near this place, too, is a public fountain, the work of the Othman Emperor Soleyman Ibn Selym: it is supplied from the Mekka aqueduct, and is crowded the whole day by hadjys, who come to fill their water-skins. Eastward of the Mesaa, near its extremity at the Merowa, branches off a street called Soueyga, or the Little Market, which runs almost parallel with the east side of the mosque.
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