The bazaar at Broussa has lost none of its Eastern charm, but prices have gone up by leaps and bounds since I was here ten years ago. They will, probably, soon rise still higher when hand-embroidery dies out before the machine-made imitations.
The Central Mosque has been rather disfigured by the over-zealous multiplication of mural texts; but the beautiful fountain preserves the most marked characteristic of all mosques, on which their "appeal" so largely depends. It also contains some very fine specimens of the curious old clocks, which only show Turkish hours.
In the courtyard there are more fountains and many pigeons, and the public letter-writer. Just now he is hard at work for a profitable customer who, one might think, surely knew how to conduct his own correspondence. From my experience as an amateur, doing my best for the Poilus, I should never imagine that letter-writing could be an easy profession.
How well I remember the poor boy (a particularly serious "case") who asked me to "tell Jeanne" that . . . "he was well and happy and enjoying himself. But that some friends had written and told him she had not been faithful, and 'he didn't care.' All the girls were running after him, and the grand ladies, too. He hadn't any time to think about her."
He afterwards gave me careful instructions about a P.S. "But I do think of her sometimes." In another few minutes it was, "I often think of her." And, finally, "you can tell her that I forgive her, and love her as much as ever."
Every corner of Broussa reveals the true "Islam" atmosphere; whether you look down on it from the surrounding heights, or wander along its quaint streets and alleys. Everywhere you see latticed windows, mosques, and dervishes' Tekké. It stands on a wide stretch of marshland, seemingly going on for ever, with its countless rows of skeleton-poplars, that stand out in the blue-grey mist like ghostly sentinels.
