him with round eyes, “I was shy, dirty, ignorant, lazy, and wilful. My parents and teachers had but to give me an order for me to conceive at once some plan of disobeying it. All forms of activity save those connected with dissipation were abhorrent to me. So far from reciting with other boys of my age in chorus and without fault the verses of the Koran, I grew up completely ignorant of that work, the most Solemn Name in which I to this day pronounce with an aspirate from an unfamiliarity with its aspect upon the written page. Yet I am glad to say that I never neglected my religious duties, that I prayed with fervour and regularity, and that I had a singular faith in the loving kindness of my God.
“I had already reached my seventeenth year when my father, who had carefully watched the trend of my nature and the use to which I had put my faculties, addressed me as follows:
“ ‘Mahmoud, I wish you no ill. I have so far fed and clothed you because the Caliph (whom Allah preserve!) has caused those who neglect their younger offspring to be severely beaten upon the soles of their feet. It is now my intention to send you about your business. I propose’—and here my dear father pulled out a small purse—‘to give you the smallest sum compatible with my own interests, so that if any harm befall you, the vigilant officers of the Crown cannot ascribe your disaster to my neglect. I request that you will walk in any direction you choose so only that it be in a straight line away from my doors. If, when this your patrimony is spent, you make away with yourself I shall hold you to blame; I shall be better pleased to hear that you have sold yourself into slavery or in some other way provided for your continued sustenance. But what I should like best would be never to hear of you again.’ With those words my father (your grandfather, dear boys), seizing me by the shoulders, turned my back to his doors and thrust me forth with a hearty kick the better to emphasize his meaning.
“Thus was I launched out in the dawn of manhood to try my adventures with the world.
“I discovered in my pouch as I set out along the streets of the city the sum of 100 dinars, with which my thoughtful parent had provided me under the legal compulsion which he so feelingly described. ‘With so large a capital,’ said I to myself, ‘I can exist for several days, indulge my favourite forms of dissipation, and when they are well spent it will be time enough to think of some experiment whereby to replace them.’ ”
Here the eldest nephew said respectfully and with an inclination of the head: “Pray, uncle, what is a dinar?”
“My dear lad,” replied the merchant with a merry laugh, “I confess that to a man of my position a reply to your question is impossible. I could only tell you that it is a coin of considerable value to the impoverished, but to men like myself a denomination so inferior as to be indistinguishable from all other coins.”
Having so expressed himself the worthy merchant resumed the thread of his tale:
“I had, I say, started forward in high spirits to the sound of the coins jingling in my pouch, when my steps happened to take to the water-side, where I found a ship about to sail for the Persian Gulf. ‘Here,’ said I to myself, ‘is an excellent opportunity for travelling and for seeing the world.’
“The heat of the day was rising. No one was about but two watermen, who lay dozing upon the bank. I nimbly stepped aboard and hid myself behind one of the bales of goods with which the deck was packed. When the sun declined and work was resumed, the sailors tramped aboard, the sail was hoisted, and we started upon our journey.
“Befriended by the darkness of night I crept out quietly from my hiding-place and found a man watching over the prow, where he was deputed to try the depth of the water from time to time with a long pole. I affected an air of authority, and told him that the Captain had sent me forward to deliver his commands, which were that he should give me a flask of wine, some fruit, and a cake (for I guessed that like all sailors he had in his possession things both lawful and unlawful). These I told him I would take to my relative the Captain. He left me with the pole for a moment and soon returned with the provisions, with which I crept back to my hiding-place, and there heartily consumed them.
“During the whole of the next day I lay sleeping behind the bales of goods. With the fall of the second night I needed a second meal. I dared not repeat my first experiment, and lay musing till, hunger having sharpened my wits, I hit upon a plan with which surely Providence itself must have inspired a poor lonely lad thrown in his unaided weakness upon a cruel world.
“I bethought me that the watchman of either board would have some provision for the night. I remembered a sort of gangway between the high bales upon the main deck, which corridor led back far under the poop into the stern sheets. It has been so designed for the convenience of stowing and unloading, affording a passage for the workmen as they handled the cargo. I put these two things together in my mind (but to God be the glory) and formed of them a plan for immediate execution.
“I crept from my hiding-place and sauntered along the dark deck until I came upon the watchman, squatting by the rail, and contemplating the stars in the moonless sky. He had, as I had suspected, a platter the white of which I could just see glimmering against the deck beside him. I thought I also discerned a gourd of wine. I approached him as one of the crew (for they were chance strangers taken on at the wharf). We talked in low tones of the girls of Bagdad, of the police, of opportunities for theft, and of such other topics as are common to the poor, till, naturally, we came to wine. He cursed the poor quality of his own, in the gourd beside him. I, after some mystery, confided to him that I had a stock of excellent wine, and, as my friendship for him increased, I made a clean breast of it and told him it was in the stern sheets, far under the poop deck along the narrow passage between the high bales. I offered to go with him and fetch it, allowing him, in his eagerness, to go first. When he was well engaged in groping aft I turned, crept forward again silently and rapidly, picked up the loaf and cheese which I found on his platter, as also the gourd, and vanished into my hiding-hole.
“I ate my fill—though somewhat too hurriedly, and remarked how long a time my shipmate was spending at searching that empty place. As I heard him creeping back at last cursing violently in whispers, I was aware of faint dawn in the East, and determined that my cruise must end.
“We were already in the neighbourhood of the sea, as I discovered by tasting the water over the side in the darkness and discovering it to be brackish. I bethought me that my poor comrade had now an excellent reason for ferretting me out, that the Captain also would soon hear of me and that, with daylight, I should certainly be visited with a bastinado or put into chains and sold. I therefore slipped over the side (for I was an excellent swimmer) and made for the shore. There I lay on a warm beach and watched through the reeds the great sail of the ship as it slipped down-stream further and further away in the growing light.
“When the sun rose the vessel was out of sight, and looking about me I discovered a little village not far from the shore inhabited by simple fishermen, but containing several houses of some pretension, the residences of wealthy merchants who came here from Bosra in their moments of leisure to relax themselves from the catch-as-catch-can of commerce in that neighbouring city.
“My first action at the opening of the new day was to fall upon my knees and add to the ritual prayer a humble outpouring of thanks for the benefits I had already received and a fervent appeal for guidance. That appeal was heard. I rose from my knees full of a new-found plan.
“To one of those wealthier houses which stood near the village I at once proceeded and sent in a message by a slave to its owner saying that my master, a wealthy dealer in carpets, solicited the custom of his lordship, and that if the great man would but accompany me to the quay I would there show him wares well worthy of his attention.
“It so happened (and here was Providence again at work) that this merchant had a passion for a particular sort of carpet which is solely made by the inhabitants of El Kzar, for they alone possess the secret, which they very zealously guard. The slave, therefore, brought me back the message that his master would not be at the pains of accompanying me unless such wares were present for his inspection. If my carpets were those of El Kzar he would willingly inspect them, but if they were of any other brand he was indifferent.
“And let this