During Hassan’s short absence from Alexandria an English family of the name of Thorpe had arrived there—Mr Thorpe being an elderly gentleman of good fortune and education, whose passion for antiquarian pursuit had induced him to visit the land of the Pyramids, together with his wife and their delicate daughter. Mr Thorpe had brought a letter of introduction to the British merchant, who undertook to procure for him a dragoman to accompany the family on their excursion up the Nile. A Greek was recommended, by name Demetri, who possessed a fair smattering of all the languages spoken in the Levant.
Foyster, Mr Thorpe’s valet and confidential servant, having approved of Demetri, he was forthwith engaged. After a short search a dahabiah was found, which belonged to a pasha absent on service, and who had left with his wakeel (agent) a discretionary power to let his boat, which was large and well decorated. The wakeel, being a Greek, was an acquaintance of Demetri, which rendered the bargaining easy and satisfactory to both parties. It was agreed that Mr Thorpe was to pay £250 for the six winter months, the wakeel refunding from that amount £15 to Demetri, and £15 to Foyster. Mr Thorpe was informed by the English merchant that the charge was unusually high; but as in those days there was much difficulty in finding so large and comfortable a boat, the bargain was concluded and the ratification duly exchanged.
A few days after, Foyster and Demetri were walking homeward from the bazaar, where they had been making some purchases for the boat, when they fell in with Hassan, who was returning towards the house of Hadji Ismael.
Hassan was well acquainted with Demetri, who had frequently amused his leisure hours with tales of the countries he had visited, and the wonderful feats he had performed, in which latter branch the Greek had drawn more liberally on his invention than on his memory. The youth had also seen Foyster at the British merchant’s house, and knew him to be an attendant on the rich English family, whose approaching excursion up the Nile was already the theme of general conversation. The place where they met happening to be immediately in front of a coffee-shop, Demetri proposed that they should rest for a few minutes and take a cup of coffee. While they were thus occupied—Demetri’s two companions listening to his flowery description of the wonders of Upper Egypt—a Moghrebi,[25] of gigantic and herculean proportions, who had probably been indulging in a forbidden drink more stimulating than coffee, came up, and his fanaticism being roused at the sight of Foyster’s dress, he cried out to him, in an angry voice—
“Get up, Christian dog, and give me your seat.”
The valet, not understanding a word, looked at Demetri for an explanation. The latter, much alarmed, and evidently not desirous of exhibiting any feat of valour similar to those of which he had often boasted, said to the Moghrebi—
“He is a stranger, and does not understand your speech.”
“Does he not?” replied the other; “then perhaps he will understand this,” and so saying he kicked the seat from under Foyster with such force that the latter fell backwards on the ground.
While this was being enacted, Demetri whispered to Hassan—
“Let us make haste to get away from this place. That is the noted pehlivan.[26] He carries four men on his shoulders; he is an elephant.”
“Why do you insult the stranger, and kick his seat from him?” said Hassan to the Moghrebi. “He offered you no offence.”
“Offence!” replied the Moghrebi scornfully; “his presence is an offence. Is he not a dog of an infidel?”
“There is no God but Allah, and Mahomet is his prophet,” said Hassan. “Those who are ignorant of the truth are to be pitied; but our lord (Mohammed Ali) has made friends with these Franks. They buy and sell here in peace, and it is not right to strike or insult them without cause in our streets.”
“And who are you, youngster, who dare to preach to me?” said the athlete contemptuously. “Are you perhaps a sheik, or a mollah, or a kâdi?”
“I am a man, and I fear not a wise one, for wasting my words upon an ox without understanding,” replied Hassan, his eyes kindling with anger.
“You are a bastard (Ebn-Haram),” shouted the athlete; “and if you had half a beard I would spit upon it.”
Hearing this abusive epithet now applied to him before a score of spectators, Hassan’s fury was no longer to be controlled. Springing upon the Moghrebi with the bound of a tiger, he seized him by the throat, and a fearful struggle ensued.
Although the athlete was the heavier and more bulky man, it soon appeared that Hassan was his equal in strength, and far his superior in activity. After a contest of some minutes, in which each displayed a complete mastery of all the sleights of wrestling, Hassan succeeded in passing his hand under the leg of his gigantic opponent, and lifting him fairly in his arms, dashed him with terrific force on the ground. Hassan stood for a moment looking on his fallen opponent, from whose mouth and nostrils flowed a stream of blood. The people from the coffee-shop now crowded round him: some threw water on his face, and in a short time he recovered sufficiently to raise himself up; but he was in no condition to renew the struggle, and Hassan walked away with his two companions, followed by the ejaculations of the bystanders—“Mashallah! wonderful!”—the greater part of them being rejoiced at the discomfiture of the athlete, who was indeed a notorious brawler and bully.
The preparations of the dahabiah were now nearly completed. It had been found, however, that after all she was too small to accommodate all the party with comfort, so a second of a smaller size had been hired.
It was about this time that, after receiving a letter from Cairo, Hadji Ismael sent one morning for Hassan and told him that a new commission had arrived, in the execution of which his assistance would be requisite.
“Upon my head and eyes be it,” said the youth.
“I have received a letter from my friend Ali Pasha, commonly called Delì Pasha;[27] he tells me that our lord, Ibrahim Pasha, saw the horses which I sent to Constantinople two or three years ago, and was so much pleased with them that he gave great praise to his servant (me), saying that no horse commission had been so well executed as this. Our lord Ibrahim Pasha has now desired Delì Pasha to write to me and find out who purchased these horses for me, and if possible to send the person up to Cairo, where his services are much required. Now, Hassan, as you had the chief trouble and merit of that purchase, I propose to send you to Delì Pasha on this matter. It may open you a way to fortune.”
“You are my uncle,”[28] replied Hassan; “and I am ready to go where you wish, and my fortune is in the hand of Allah.”
“Nay, my son,” said the good merchant; “it is bitter to my heart to part with you, but you know that it is not consistent with the circumstances of your birth and early youth that you should remain always in this town: you do not wish to go to Cairo? Perhaps, by the blessing of Allah, you may learn things there which concern your happiness?”
Hassan saw at once that his foster-father had communicated to the Hadji some of the mysterious circumstances attending his early childhood, so he replied—
“It is true that I have a weight on my heart, and if I could remove it by a journey to Cairo, it would be a blessed journey indeed.”
“You would seek for a father; is it not so?” said the Hadji.
“It is so,” replied Hassan. “I have made search and inquiry in Alexandria without success; but I am sure I shall find him, for I have taken a fal in the Koran,[29] and the words that I found were, ‘The faithful who seek shall not be disappointed in their hope.’”
“Inshallah! your hope will be fulfilled!” replied the merchant. “Have you anything with you by which a parent, if found, could recognise you?”
Hassan undid his long girdle, and from its inmost folds produced the relics given him by his foster-mother. The merchant examined them attentively.
“These would be sufficient,” he said, “to identify you; but, Hassan, if you go to Cairo, remember that there are many accidents by water and by land; you might be robbed, and could never replace them. You had better leave some of them with me; I will keep them for you in my iron chest; whenever you require them, you can send for them.”
Hassan acquiesced in the proposal of his kind patron, and reserving only the quaintly devised amulet, he gave up the remainder, receiving from the merchant a paper describing them accurately and bearing the merchant’s seal.
The worthy Hadji was grieved to part with his protégé, for whom he entertained an affection almost paternal; but having resolved to do so for the youth’s own advantage, his chief anxiety now was to furnish him well for the journey. For this purpose he desired Mohammed Aga to procure a pair of stout saddlebags, into which he put two complete suits of clothes, and also two small Cashmere shawls; with respect to these last the Hadji whispered, “You need not wear these unless you find a father in some great man, but they may be useful to you as presents.” He gave him also a sword of excellent temper, a slight but beautifully worked Persian dagger, and a pair of English pistols: to these he added a well-filled purse; but observing some hesitation in Hassan’s countenance, the kind-hearted Hadji added with a smile, “Nay, it is almost all due to you for past services; but I shall write to Delì Pasha and inform him that your salary is prepaid for three months from this date.” Hassan kissed the hand of his benefactor, his heart was too full for speech, and he could only utter—
“If I find a father, may he be like Hadji Ismael.”
Of personal vanity Hassan was as free as from the foibles which usually attend it; but it cannot be denied that when he walked out in the full dress and equipment proper to a young Bedouin Sheik, it was with a prouder step, and the day-dreams concerning his future destiny took a firmer hold of his imagination.
“Whither bound, my brother?” called out to him Demetri, on meeting him near the door of the merchant’s house. “Mashallah! you have the air and costume of a bridegroom! Who is the moon-faced one whom you have chosen? By our head, Hassan, it is not well to keep these things secret from your friends. When is the wedding to take place?”
“Nay, there is no wedding in the case,” said Hassan, laughing. “The Hadji is going to send me on a commission to Cairo, and he has given me this dress and these arms.”
“May Allah reward him!” said the merry Greek. “To Cairo, said you? Why, the Fates are propitious. We are going there likewise. Inshallah! we will go together.”
“How may that be?” demanded Hassan. “You are going with that rich Frank family, and I hear that your boat will be so crowded with luggage and people that there will not be room for a sparrow on board.”
“Nonsense,” replied the Greek. “There is always room for a friend. The English servant and I can do as we please, for the old Englishman troubles himself about nothing so long as he has his books and a few old bricks and tiles to look at.”
“Bricks and tiles!” said Hassan. “Why, is he going to build a house in Upper Egypt?”
“No; but by my father’s head, he is mad about old bricks. The other day he made me go with him all round the mounds near Pompey’s Pillar, and he brought back with him nearly an ass-load of fragments of stone, bricks, and pottery.”
“Wonderful!” said Hassan. “But why do you think the English servant would be willing to give me a passage in the boat?”
“Why,” replied Demetri, “because ever since the day that you threw down the Moghrebi bully who had kicked his seat from under him, he does nothing but talk of you. Never fear; he will be delighted to have your company; and we will tell the old gentleman that if we have you on board, all the thieves and robbers within twenty miles of the bank will disappear as by magic.”
“Nay,” said Hassan, laughing; “do not tell him anything that might lead him to think me a boasting fool. But you certainly may tell him that if he gives me a passage, and any danger or trouble occurs, I shall be ready to tender the best service in my power.”
On this they parted, and Demetri communicated the plan the same day to the valet, who relished it extremely, being well satisfied to have by him in case of need a stouter heart and arm than that with which Providence had blessed the Greek interpreter. They proceeded together to Mr Thorpe, and explained to him the advantages to be derived from the proposed addition to their party.
“But,” said Mr Thorpe, “I fear we have no cabin vacant.”
“Cabin!” echoed Demetri. “Does your excellency think that a son of the desert like him would go into a cabin? No, no. With his bornoos [cloak] over him, and his khordj [saddle-bags] under his head, he will sleep like a prince on any part of the deck.”
Mr Thorpe having no other objection to make, and the ladies being curious to see the hero of Foyster’s narrative, no further persuasion was requisite, and Hadji Ismael, on his part, was heartily glad that his young protégé had found so convenient and easy a conveyance to Cairo.
It was with sincere and mutual regret that Hassan parted with Mohammed Aga and his son Ahmed, who had shown him such invariable kindness during the three or four years that he had spent in Alexandria. But “destiny had written it,” and it is wonderful to see the composure with which good Mussulmans resign themselves even to the heaviest misfortunes with that phrase on their tongue.
The chief clerk, in bidding adieu to Hassan, put a letter into his hand. “Take this, my son,” he said. “It is addressed to Ahmed Aga, the mirakhor[30], and favourite Mameluke of Delì Pasha. I have known him long, and I trust he will be a good friend to you.”
Hassan in quitting the merchant’s house left universal regret behind him. Even the old Berber bowàb [porter] said, “Allah preserve him. He was a good youth. Every Bairam he gave me a dollar, and if I was half asleep and kept him at the door, he never cursed my father.”