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Show COFFEE TREE. COFFEE TREE. in use ever since without interruption, passed by degrees to came to amuse themselves with a game of chess or draughts, or many neighbouring towns ; and not long after reached Mecca, where it was introduced, as at Aden, by the dervises, and for the same purposes ofreligion. to make acquaintance, and pass their time agreeably at a small The inhabitants of Mecca wereat last so fond of this liquor, vogue, that they were frequented by peopleof all professions, and even bytheofficers of the seraglio, the pachas, and persons of the first rank about the court. However, when they seemed to be the most firmly established, the imans, or officers of the mosques, complained loudly of their being deserted, while the 900 that, without regarding the intention of the religious andother —a - —_ eS he — studious persons, they at length drank it publicly in coffee. 5 houses, where they assembled in crowds to pass the time agreeably, making that the pretence: here they played at chess, and suchother kind of games, andthat even for moncy. In these houses they amused themselves likewise with singing, dancing, and music, contrary to the manners of the rigid Mahometans, whichafterwards was the occasion of some disturbances. From hence the custom extendeditself to many other towns of Arabia, and particularly to Medina, and then to Grand Cairo in Egypt, where the dervises of the province of Yemen, who lived in a district by themselves, drank coffce the nights they intended to spendin devotion. They kept it in a large red earthen vessel, and re- ceived it respectfully from the handoftheir superior, who poured it out into cups for them himself. He was soon imitated by many devout people of Cairo, and their example followed by the studious; and afterwards by so many people, that coffee be- 201 expense, These houses and assemblies insensibly became so much in cofice-houses were full of company. The dervises andthereli. gious orders murmured, and the preachers declaimed against them, asserting that it was aless sin to go toa brothel thanto a coflee-house. After much wrangling, the devotees united their interests to obtain an authentic condemnation of coffee, and deter. mined to present to the mufti a petition for that purpose; in which they advanced, that roasted coffee was a kind of coal, and that what had any relation to coal was forbid by law. They desired him to determine on this matter according to the duty of his office. The chief of the law, without entering much into the question, gave such a decision as they wished for, and pronounced that came as commona drink in that great city, as at Aden, Mecca, the drinking of coffee was contrary to the law of Mahomet. and Medina, andothercities of Arabia. But at length the rigid Mahometans began to disapprove the dared to find fault with his sentence. use of coffee, as occasioning frequent disorders, and too nearly houses were shut, andthe officers of the police were commanded resembling wineinits effects, the drinking of which is contrary to the tenets of their religion. Government was therefore obliged to interfere, and at times to restrain the use of it. However,it had become so universally liked, that it was foundafterwards necessary to take off all restraint for the future. So respectable is the authority of the mufti, that nobody Immediately all the coffee- to prevent any one from drinking coffee. However, the habit was become so strong, and the use of it so generally agreeable, that the people continued, notwithstanding all prohibitions, to drink it in their own houses. ‘The officers of the police, seeing they could not suppress the use of it, allowed ofthe selling it Coffee continuedits progress through Syria, and was received on paying a tax, and of the drinking it, provided it was not at Damascus and Aleppo without opposition ; andin the year done openly ; so that it was drunk in particular places with the doors shut, or in the back room of some ofthe shopkeepers? 1554, under the reign of the great Soliman, one hundred years after its introduction by the mufti of Aden, it became knownto the inhabitants of Constantinople; when two private persons, whose names were Schems and Hekin, the one coming from Damascus and the other from Aleppo, each opened a coffee. house in Constantinople, and sold coffee publicly in rooms fitted up in an elegant manner ; which were presently frequented by men of learning, and particularly poets and other persons, who houses, Under colour of this, coffee-houses bylittle andlittle were reeestablished ; and a new mufti, less scrupulous and more enlightened than his predecessor, having declared publicly that colfee had no relation to coal, and that the infusion ofit was Not contrary to the Jaw of Mahomet, the number of cofleehouses became greater than before. After this declaration, the |