MY FRIEND MOIIAMMED-BEN-OUMBARK. 317 



the top of the cave, had snatched at me with his paw, like a 

 cat, and seizing my burnous, instead of my head, he commenced 

 tearing it to pieces, at the same time venting his anger 

 with low growls, that sounded very unpleasantly, so near to 

 me as he was. Fearing lest he might insert his paw into my 

 shallow cave, I pushed out the sheep he was coveting. He 

 sprang on it without the slightest scruples, and had the 

 indelicacy to eat it before my very eyes. 



"At last, when he had made up his mind to leave, after his 

 pleasant little lunch, he marched off without any thanks for 

 my kindness, leaving the skin of the sheep on one side, with 

 the smoking remains of his supper, and on the other my 

 new burnous, all torn in pieces. 



" The bloody thief did not leave me time enough to go to 

 the neighbors to get another sheep, for when he left for the 

 woods, the day began to break, and I was obliged to go home 

 and kill one of my own lambs, or else go without mutton on 

 the day of El-cid-Kebir, from which poverty may the prophet 

 defend me. 



" This was the first time that I was ever reduced to this 

 strait, and it is only the lion that can ever bring me there 

 again." 



This is the second personage whose portrait I desire to 

 place in my gallery of native Arabs, and as I have now com- 

 pletely recovered from the fever, if it so pleases the reader, 

 we will return to the narrative of my hunts. 



