But a
beggarly five thousand piastres would not go very far in that direction.
It was too much from one point of view and too little from another, so
that he really was at a loss what to do with it.
His booth looked out upon that portion of the bazaar where there was a
vacant space separated from the trading booths by lofty iron railings.
This vacant space was a slave-market. Here the lowest class of slaves
were freely offered for sale. Every day Halil saw some ten to twenty of
these human chattels exhibited in front of his booth. It was no new
sight to him.
In this slave-market there were none of those pathetic scenes which
poets and romance writers are so fond of describing when, for instance,
the rich traders of Dirbend offer to the highest bidder miracles of
loveliness, to be the sport of lust and luxury, beautiful Circassian and
Georgian maidens, whose cheeks burn with shame at the bold rude gaze of
the men, and whose eyes overflow with tears when their new masters
address them. There was nothing of the sort in this place. This was but
the depository of used up, chucked aside wares, of useless Jessir, such
as dry and wrinkled old negresses, worn-out, venomous nurses, human
refuse, so to speak, to whom it was a matter of the most profound
indifference what master they were called upon to serve, who listened to
the slang of the auctioneer with absolute nonchalance as he
circumstantially totted up their years and described their qualities,
and allowed their would-be purchasers to examine their teeth and
manipulate their arms and legs as if they were the very last persons
concerned in the business on hand.
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