So now also a petty huckster rules the realm, and Sultan Mahmud has
nothing to think about but his fair women. Who can tell whether any one
of us would not have done likewise? Suppose a man to have been kept in
rigorous, joyless servitude for twenty years, and then suddenly to be
confronted with the alternative--"reign over hearts or over an
empire"--would he not perhaps have chosen the hearts instead of the
empire for his portion?
At the desire of the beauteous Sultana Asseki the insurrection of the
people had no sooner subsided than the Sultan ordered the Halwet
Festival to be celebrated.
The Halwet Festival is the special feast of women, when nobody but
womankind is permitted to walk about the streets, and this blissful day
may come to pass twice or thrice in the course of the year.
On the evening before, it is announced by the blowing of horns that the
morrow will be the Feast of Halwet. On that day no man, of whatever
rank, may come forth in the streets, or appear on the roof of a house,
or show himself at a window, for death would be the penalty of his
curiosity. The black and white eunuchs keeping order in the streets
decapitate without mercy every man who does not remain indoors. Notices
that this will be done are posted up on all the boundary-posts in the
suburbs of the city, that strangers may regulate their conduct
accordingly.
On the day of the feast of Halwet all the damsels discard their veils,
without which at all other times they are not permitted to walk about
the streets.
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