Part 41 (1/2)

?Hajji,? said he, after an ominous pause, ?look at , without common sense? or do you look upon yourself as the ed to take the beards of humankind into your hand, and to do what you like with thea! I a; I am less than an ounce of dust?

?Man!? said the second brother, in a war, do you say? then what have you , that you should codad to reat and good!? exclaimed I, ?what is all this? Why do you speak after this manner? What have I done? Speak, and speak truth!?

?Ah, Hajji, Hajji!? said rey beard at the sa much abomination! Could a man who has seen the world like you, suppose that others will eat it with you, and say, thanks be to Allah! No, no--we est your insolence

?But what have I done, O my uncle?? said I to him; ?by my soul, speak!?

?What have you done?? said ? is ? You !?

?Perhaps,? said the eldest brother, ?you think it a great honour which the son of an Ispahan barber confers upon one of the richest fahter!?

?And perhaps,? said the other, ?you ht of a merchant, and think him worthy of any alliance!?

?But Hajji, praise be to Allah! is a great merchant,? said the uncle ironically: ?his silks and velvets are now on their way to bring us la to us fro the surface of the seas between China and Bassorah!?

?And his parentage,? continued his son in the same strain, ?a barber?s son did you say? forbid it, Allah! No, no; he dates from the Koreish He is not even the descendant, but, by the blessing of God, of the ancestry of the Prophet; and who can come in competition with a Mansouri Arab??

?What is all this?? again and again did I exclai about my ears ?If you want to kill me, do so; but do not pull off my skin by inches?

?I tell you what is it, man without faith,? said the stern man, who hitherto had remained immovable; ?you are a wretch who deserves not to live! and if you do not iive up all pretensions to your wife, and leave this house and everything that belongs to it, without ato the two ruffians before mentioned); ?they will just make your soul take leave of your body as easy as they would knock the tobacco out of their pipes I have spoken, and you are master to act as you please?

Then the whole of the asseues at once, and, without reserve of words or action, told reeable truths

This storave me time for reflection, and I determined to try what a little resistance would do

?And who are you,? said I to the stern ? As for these,? pointing to my wife?s relations, ?the house is theirs, and they are welcome; but you, who are neither her father, her brother, nor her uncle, what have you to do here? I neither hter, nor your sister, and therefore what can it be to you who I ae He and his ruffians were curling up theirme, as the lion does the hind, before he pounces upon it

?Who aer ?If you want to know, ask those who brought me here I and my men act from authority, which if you dispute, it will be the worse for you?

?But,? said I, softening my tone, for I now found that they were officers of the police, ?but if you insist upon separating ive me time to consult the men of the law Every son of Islae, and ye would not be such infidels as to deprive rees to what you propose She first sought me out; I did not seek her She wooed me for my own sake, not for any worldly interest; and when I accepted her I knew her not, neither had I any tidings of either her wealth or her family The whole has been the business of predestination, and if ye are Mussulmans, will ye dare to oppose that??

?As to the wishes of Shekerleb upon the subject,? said the eldest brother, ?make your mind easy She desires a separation more even than we do?

?Yes, yes, in the nao in peace For the sake of Allah, let us be free,? and fifty other such excla to the door which led into the women?s apartments, from whence the sound came, I beheld my women veiled, headed by ive evidence against me, and who all see out their lamentations and entreaties for my dismissal, as if I were the wicked one in person to be exorcised fro that all was over with ainst a power I could not withstand, stranger and unprotected as I was in a foreign land, I put the best face I could uponup from my seat, I exclaimed, ?If it is so, be it so I neither want Shekerleb nor herthat belongs to them, since they do not want me; but this I will say, that they have treated me in a manner unworthy of the creed and na the unbelievers, I should have been treated better From the bottom of my heart I believe that the same punishment which shall be inflicted, on the last day, upon those who reject our Holy Prophet, shall be inflicted upon reat eainst them, as near as my memory would serve ar water shall be poured over them; their bowels and skins shall be dissolved, and, in this state, they be beaten with red hot ed hips, whose lashes are s, and the noise of which shall be claps of thunder?

Upon this, roused and excited as I ith the speech I had made, I stood in the middle of the room, and divested ed to ht have purchased with herdown every article fro for an old cloak which had originally belonged toa curse upon the staring assembly I left behind me