ISKANDER EFFENDI. 45 



the Dead Sea threatening to carry away the very sides of 

 the bazaar. 



" The horseman reined up, or rather spoke to his horse, 

 who, like a true desert mare, stopped as if she were sud- 

 denly turned to a statue. Again he shouted to the Arab, 

 who hung lounging over the neck of his camel with an 

 appearance of nonchalance or stupidity that might well 

 have imposed on a stranger to Arab customs, but with his 

 keen black eye flashing from under the shawl that hung 

 over his head. The horseman was no stranger. The 

 next instant he uttered the sharp hiss that camels under- 

 stand, and with the utterance mingled the report of his 

 pistol. The camel paused with uplifted foot. The Arab 

 fell under the foot as it came down, the huge, spongy mass 

 rolling him over, but not crushing him. 



" ' He is dead,' I exclaimed involuntarily in English. 



" ' Only frightened/ said the Druse, in as good English 

 as mine : and, turning to his attendants, he uttered some 

 words of command which sufficed to clear the way before 

 him in a few seconds, and they were gone, leaving the 

 Arab lying in the gutter which runs along the middle of 

 the streets in Jerusalem, instead of at the sides as in other 

 cities. 



" English again ! and this time from a Druse ; and good 

 sounding English, with a hearty smack of familiarity about 

 it which left no doubt that the speaker had used that 

 tongue from his childhood. Only two words, but enough 

 for my brain to work upon, and so I pondered till the sun 

 went down, and then I walked on the wall above the Zion 

 Gate, and thought on the matter. For all this made up a 

 startling subject of thought for a Jew in Jerusalem. 



" Meantime the Arab had picked himself out of the gut- 

 ter. For Mohammedan or Jew durst not touch a man 



