IN THE INTERIOR 279 



remained, cross-legged or upright, as far as to each "was 

 comfortable. Through the medium of my interpreter's 

 Frenche of Stratteforde atte Bowe, and still worse Ara- 

 bic which, curiously, he could speak, but neither read 

 nor write we talked hour after hour, as other guests, 

 lured by the stranger, dropped in to swell the circle. I 

 soon saw that I must not expect to regain Sousa and 

 catch the steamer I aimed for, and I was correct. But it 

 was better so. The whole experience was a rare treat. 

 In all my travels I have never met a man more fit for the 

 society of princes than Si Nassour ben El Hadj Salem. 

 Of tall, full growth, he had a face of great dignity and 

 beauty, a smile any woman might envy or fall a victim 

 to, manners gracious and courteous and anticipating as 

 we Teutonic rustics more's the pity so rarely see in 

 our soi-disant civilized intercourse, and a bearing every 

 inch a caliph. He had inherited his caliphate from an 

 uncle, and was highly considered by the French. 



I spent some days under his care, eating out of the 

 same dish and with my fingers at that, for though my 

 interpreter and I had provided ourselves with forks and 

 spoons I preferred to imitate my host sleeping in his own 

 soft, hand-made blankets, and journeying to and fro with 

 him in the neighborhood to all the places I wished to visit 

 in the footsteps of Caesar. He would not let me out of 

 his sight, and yet his presence was not for a moment de 

 trop, nor his courtesy overmuch. He furnished me with 

 his best steed, and a fine fellow he was, and rode with me 

 wherever I went or came. 



I had all too numerous opportunities of judging how 

 little heed Orientals pay to their own or any one else's 

 time. Whenever we would pass through a village, or 

 near by some friendly sheik, we were constrained by po- 

 lite insistence to come in and break bread. This was not 



