270 
A CRUSADE IN THE EAST. 
of agreeable sensations, but it was a vast improvement on 
the hot-water process. Such exquisite delight did the villain¬ 
ous old mummy take in it, that he strained every muscle with 
zeal, and snorted like a racer, his fiery eye glaring on me with 
a fiendish expression, and his long pointed teeth, glistening 
through the steam, as if nothing would have afforded him 
half so much satisfaction as to bite me. Stretching me on 
my back, he scrubbed away from head to foot, raking over 
the collar bones, ribs, and shin bones in a paroxysm of enthu¬ 
siasm. This done, he reversed the position, and raked his 
way back, lingering with great relish on every spinal eleva¬ 
tion, till he reached the back of my head, which event he 
signalized by bringing the end of the brush in sudden contact 
with it. He then pulled me up into a sitting posture again; 
for by this time I was quite loose, and felt resigned to any 
thing, and drawing the brush skillfully over the beaten track, 
gathered up several rolls of fine skin, each of which he ex¬ 
hibited to me, with a grin of triumph, as a token of uncom¬ 
mon skill. “ Tahib , Howadji? Tahib?” Good; isn’t 
your excellency cleverly done, eh ? 
Having arrived at this stage of the proceedings, the inde¬ 
fatigable monster again covered me up in a sea of lather, and 
while I was writhing in renewed agonies from streams of soap 
that kept running into my eyes, in spite of every effort to shut 
them off, he dashed a large dipper, full of hot water, over me, 
fo 1 lowing it by others in rapid succession, till, unable to endure 
the dreadful torturing, I sprang to my feet, seized the dipper, 
and shouted, “ backshish /” at the top of my voice. The word 
acted like magic. I never have known it to be applied in 
vain throughout the East. It opens sacred places, corrupts 
sacred characters, gives inspiration to the lazy, and new life 
to the desponding; in short, it accomplishes wonders, no mat¬ 
ter how miraculous. From that moment I was a happy man; 
rubbed down with a lamb-like gentleness, smoothed over softly 
with warm sheets, dried up from head to feet; turbaned like 
a Pasha, slipped into my clogs, and supported through the 
various chambers into the grand saloon, where I had the 
pleasure of greeting my friend the captain, of whom I had 
