There is something very attractive in the small cupboard-like shops of the main street. Their owners sit cross-legged ready for a chat, looking wonderfully picturesque in cream-coloured jelláb, or in semi-transparent white farrajîyah, or tunic, allowing at the throat a glimpse of saffron, cerise, or green from the garment beneath. The white turban, beneath which shows a line of red Fez cap, serves as a foil to the clear olive complexion and the dark eyes and brows, while the faces are in general goodly to look upon, except where the lines have grown coarse and sensuous.
So strong is the impression of elegant leisure, that it is difficult to imagine that these men expect to make a living from their trade, but they are more than willing to display their goods, and will doubtless invite you to a seat upon the shop ledge--where your feet dangle gracefully above a rough cobble-stone pavement--and sometimes even to a cup of tea. One after another, in quick succession, carpets of different dimensions (but all oblong, for Moorish rooms are narrow in comparison with their length) are spread out in the street, and the shop-owners' satellite, by reiterated cries of "Bálak! Bálak!" (Mind out! Mind out!) accompanied by persuasive pushes, keeps off the passing donkeys. A miniature crowd of interested spectators will doubtless gather round you, making remarks upon you and your purchases. Charmed by the artistic colourings, rich but never garish, you ask the price, and if you are wise you will immediately offer just half of that named. It is quite probable that the carpets will be folded up and returned to their places upon the shelf at the back of the shop, but it is equally probable that by slow and tactful yielding upon either side, interspersed with curses upon your ancestors and upon yourself, the bargain will be struck about halfway between the two extremes.
The same method must be adopted with every article bought, and if you purpose making many purchases in the same shop, you will be wise to obtain and write down the price quoted in each case as "the _very_ lowest," and make your bid for the whole at once, lest, made cunning by one experience of your tactics, the shopman should put on a wider marginal profit in every other instance to circumvent you. It is also well for the purchaser to express ardent admiration in tones of calm indifference, for the Moor has quick perceptions, and though he may not understand English, when enthusiasm is apparent, he has the key to the situation, and refuses to lower his prices.