heep's Trotters, and my father
Neat's Tongues; but they would have been ashamed to expose for sale on
their stalls a Tongue so worthless as thine." Mahomet Bassa was, like
most of the Turks, a man of Pleasure, and his Harem was furnished with
an extraordinary number of choice Beauties.

His Highness (as he is called), happening to single me out from the rest
of the Slaves on board of the Galleasse, and being told that I was
English--for equally in hopes of Bettering my Condition, and for the
purpose of keeping Secret my Employment with his Eminence, I had avowed
myself to be of that Nation--ordered me to be released from my Chains,
and brought before him at the Divan. Through his Interpreter, a cunning
Rogue from Corfu, who spoke most Languages indifferently well, he asked
me who I was, and how I came to be aboard the Speronare. I answered,
conveniently mixing fact with fiction, that I had been a Captain by Sea
and Land in the Service of the King of England; that I had earned a good
deal of Prize-Money; had retired from Active Duties, being now nigh upon
Fifty years of Age, and was taking my pleasure by voyaging in a part of
Europe with which I had hitherto been little acquainted. This Answer
seemed to satisfy him pretty well; although he was very curious to know
whether I had any Kindred in the Island of Malta, or any foregathering
among the Knights. Fortunately for me the Interpreter, to whom I had
given a hint of ultimate Reward, deposed that I could not speak twenty
words of Maltese (which is a kind of Bastard Italian); and he told me
that if it had been discovered that I was in any way Connected with the
Order, I should surely have been Impaled; the Dey being then in a
towering rage with the Knights, one of whose commanders had just
captured one of his finest Brigantines, and Dressed Ship, as he
humorously put it, by hanging every Man-Jack of the Crew at the
Yard-arm, and the Algerine Captain at the Mizen. The Dey then asked me
if I had any Friends who I thought would pay my Ransom, the which he
placed at the Moderate Computation of Four Thousand Gold Achmedies
(about Fifteen Hundred Pounds sterling). I answered, that I thought I
could raise about half that Sum, if I were allowed to communicate with
one Monsieur Foscue, a Banker at Marseilles, upon whom I had--or rather
my Captors had--a Letter of Credit, which they had taken from me. But by
Ill-luck this Letter of Credit could not be found. The Captain and Crew
of