Note 14 — Chapter II
Reading edition
It must be observed that, in the East, a usual way of doing honour to distinguished guests is to spread something costly for them to tread or sit on. Thus, when it was thought that her Royal Highness the Princess of Wales would have visited Damietta, the English agent there, a rich merchant, had arranged that the path from the side of the Nile to his house door should be covered with Cashmere shawls. Carpets are seldom left spread out in a room, but are rolled up and moved from room to room as wanted, being generally small, and never made singly to cover a whole room.