'I stand in a portico hung with gentian-blue ipomoeas...and look out on a land of mists and mysteries; a land of trailing silver veils through which domes and minarets, mighty towers and ramparts of flushed stone, hot palm groves and Atlas snows, peer and disappear at the will of Atlantic cloud-drifts.'

In Morocco is Edith Wharton's classic account of her journey to Morocco in the final days of World War I. With a characteristic sense of adventure, Wharton set out to explore the country and its people, recording her impressions and encounters.

She travelled by military jeep - to Rabat, Moulay Idriss, Fez and Marrakech, from the Atlantic coast to the High Atlas. Along the way she witnessed religious ceremonies and ritual dances, visited the opulent palaces of the Sultan and was admitted to the mysterious world of his harem.

Her descriptions of the places she visited - mosques, palaces, ruins, markets and harems - are typically observant and full of colour and spirit. Wharton's narrative is as rich as souks through which she wandered, peopled with storytellers and warriors, slaves and spin-spinners: an evocative and intimate portrait of this extraordinary country.