The Seed of the Faith by Edith Wharton

Two days later Willard Bent sat in the shade of a ruined tomb outside / the Gate of the Graves, and watched the people streaming in to Eloued. / It was the eve of the feast of the local saint, Sidi Oman, who slept in / a corner of the Great Mosque, under a segment of green-tiled cupola, and / was held in deep reverence by the country people, many of whom belonged / to the powerful fraternity founded in his name.

The ruin stood on a hillock beyond the outer wall. From where the / missionary sat he overlooked the fortified gate and the irregular / expanse of the Potters' Field, with its primitive furnaces built into / hollows of the ground, between ridges shaded by stunted olive-trees. On / the farther side of the trail which the pilgrims followed on entering / the gate lay a sun-blistered expanse dotted with crooked grave-stones, / where hucksters traded, and the humblest caravans camped in a waste of / refuse, offal and stripped date-branches. A cloud of dust, perpetually / subsiding and gathering again, hid these sordid details from Bent's / eyes, but not from his imagination.