A mahomedan’s story. 
119 
by an attachment, for which he declared, with the most 
frantic asseverations, that she should suffer death. I 
heard her fall on her knees, I heard her deep sobs, 
her pathetic appeal, her entreaties for mercy, — plead- 
ing with all the eloquence of innocence, but she 
pleaded in vain. The devil to whom she appealed 
was not to be softened by entreaty, he gnashed his 
teeth like a creature maddened ; he raised his arm — ■ 
I no longer hesitated, but rushed from my hiding- 
place, and reached the side of the monster just as he 
was about to plunge a large knife into the heart of 
his victim. At this time I was a soldier and wore 
arms. My sword was already in my grasp ; I seized 
the arm of the ruffian, and at one stroke clove him 
to the jaws. The skull gaped hideously as he fell, 
his limbs shrank for a moment, as if lessening their 
naturally dwarfish proportions ; he then stretched 
them out to their full extension in the agonies of 
death, and almost instantly ceased to breathe. He 
lay upon the earthy floor of the cavern which reeked 
with his polluted blood, like a reptile loathsome to 
the sight, and even in death an object of disgust. I 
looked on him not only without pity, but with that 
sort of exultation which I should have felt at having 
mastered a tiger. I now approached the object of 
my timely interference, who stood trembling before 
me, as if the knife of her tyrant was still raised to 
destroy her. She gazed upon me with a mixed ex- 
pression between unconsciousness and terror, which 
made me at first apprehend that the shock had over- 
powered her reason. I soothed her with expressions 
of the tenderest endearment, when, shortly recovering 
