I left my baggage in the room allotted to me, and hastened into the church, to lighten the weight on my heart by fervent prayer.  The entrance into the church looks like the door of a private house; the building is small, but still sufficiently large for the Roman Catholic congregation.  The altar is richly furnished, and the organ is a very bad one.  The male and female portions of the congregation are separated from each other, the young as well as the old, and all sit or kneel on the ground.  Chairs there are none in this church.  The costume of the Christians is precisely the same as that of the Syrians.  The women wear boots of yellow morocco, and over these slippers, which they take off on entering the church.  In the street their faces are completely, in the church only partially, muffled, and the faces of the girls not at all.  Their dress consists of a white linen gown, and a large shawl of the same material, which completely envelops them.  They were all cleanly and neatly dressed.

The amount of devotion manifested by these people is very small; the most trifling circumstance suffices to distract their attention.  For instance, my appearance seemed to create quite a sensation among them, and they made their remarks upon me to one another so openly both by words and gestures, that I found it quite impossible to give my mind to seriousness and devotion.  Some of them pushed purposely against me, and put out their hands to grasp my bonnet, etc.  They conversed together a good deal, and prayed very little.  The children behaved no better; these little people ate their breakfast while the service was going on, and occasionally jostled each other, probably to keep themselves awake.  The good people here must fancy they are doing a meritorious work by passing two or three hours in the church; no one seems to care how this time is spent, or they would assuredly have been taught better.

I had been in the church rather more than an hour when a clergyman stepped up to me and accosted me in my native language.  He was a German, and, in fact, an Austrian.  He promised to visit me in the course of a few hours.  I returned to the Nuova Casa, and now, for the first time, had leisure to examine my apartment.  The arrangement was simple in the extreme.  An iron bedstead, with a mattress, coverlet, and bolster, a very dingy table, with two chairs, a small bench, and a cupboard, all of deal, composed the whole furniture.  These chattels, and also the windows, some panes of which were broken, may once, in very ancient times, have been clean.  The walls were of plaster, and the floor was paved with large slabs of stone.  Chimneys are no more to be found in this country.  I did not see any until my return to Sicily.

I now laid myself down for a couple of hours to get a little rest; for during my journey hither from Constantinople I had scarcely slept at all.