red-coats in Cairo."

"Egypt, monsieur! No, they are paid by England."

"Well, I suppose they know their own business best, but they seem to me
to take a great deal of trouble, and to get mighty little in exchange.
If they don't mind keeping order and guarding the frontier, with a
constant war against the Dervishes on their hands, I don't know why any
one should object. I suppose no one denies that the prosperity of the
country has increased enormously since they came. The revenue returns
show that. They tell me, also, that the poorer folks have justice, which
they never had before."

"What are they doing here at all?" cried the Frenchman, angrily. "Let
them go back to their island. We cannot have them all over the world."

"Well, certainly, to us Americans who live all in our own land it does
seem strange how you European nations are for ever slopping over into
some other country which was not meant for you. It's easy for us to
talk, of course, for we have still got room and to spare for all our
people. When we start pushing each other over the edge we shall have to
start annexing also. But at present just here in North Africa there is
Italy in Abyssinia, and England in Egypt, and France in Algiers----"

"France!" cried Monsieur Fardet. "Algiers belongs to France. You laugh,
monsieur. I have the honour to wish you a very good-night." He rose from
his seat, and walked off, rigid with outraged patriotism, to his cabin.

CHAPTER II

The young American hesitated for a little, debating in his mind whether
he should not go down and post up the daily record of his impressions
which he kept for his home-staying sister. But the cigars of Colonel
Cochrane and of Cecil Brown were still twinkling in the far corner of
the deck, and the student was acquisitive in the search of information.
He did not quite know how to lead up to the matter, but the Colonel very
soon did it for him.

"Come on, Headingly," said he, pushing a camp-stool in his direction.
"This is the place for an antidote. I see that Fardet has been pouring
politics into your ear."

"I can always recognise the confidential stoop of his shoulders when he
discusses _la haute politique_" said the dandy diplomatist. "But what
a sacrilege upon a night like this! What a nocturne in blue and silver
might be suggested by that moon rising above the desert. There is a
movement in one of Mendelssohn's songs which seems to embody it
all,--a sense of vastness, of re