334 I Go A-FISHING. 



" The company was small, and the opera was cut down ; 

 but you may imagine my surprise when, in one of the in- 

 ferior parts, I recognized the daughter of my neighbor. 

 I never knew whether she recognized me. It was a 

 strange affair altogether. I sent for the manager the 

 next morning; but they brought me word that the com- 

 pany was only a lot of Italian strollers, and had sailed for 

 Smyrna that very morning. Effendi, what were you tell- 

 ing me about a girl you saw in the East last winter ?" 



"Only another example of American wandering. It 

 was not any one that I knew, but it shows that American 

 girls as well as men are sometimes rovers. I saw a very 

 beautiful girl on horseback in one of the Oriental cities, 

 a slight, fragile-looking creature, a pretty face, remarka- 

 ble for large and fine eyes, which struck you as very sor- 

 rowful in their expression. She rode well. I met her 

 several times. You will not often see a more attractive 

 woman. She could not have been much over nineteen. 

 Asking about her, I found that she was under the protec- 

 tion of a well-known Pasha, but she was not one of his 

 wives. Poor fool ! she was and is a fool, if she still lives, 

 for her fate is as sure as the succession of days. Several 

 men of credibility and position told me that she was an 

 American girl, and I once heard her speak English with 

 a decided American accent." 



" There is romance every where. A little incident hap- 

 pened to the Effendi and myself last summer on the sea- 

 shore. We had gone down for a few days of sea-fishing, 

 and it happened that the little hotel was suddenly crowd- 

 ed to overflowing, so that when we sat down at the supper- 

 table it was difficult to get any one to serve us. Look- 

 ing for a waiter, I saw, standing on the opposite side of 

 the table, a dark-faced girl, of fourteen or thereabouts, 



