examination; a belt of burnished gold, like a succession of
clasps, supported a small scimitar, whose scabbard of ivory and gold was
of exquisite workmanship, the top of the handle being formed by a single
emerald of purest color; his legs were bare, save at the ankles, where
two rings of massive gold encircled them; on his feet he wore a kind of
embroidered slippers, curiously studded with precious stones. A white
turban of muslin, delicately sprigged with gold, covered his head,
looped in front by another large emerald, which glared and sparkled like
an eye in the centre of his forehead.

This was his gala costume; but his every-day one resembled it in
everything, save the actual value of the material. Such was El Jarasch,
who was to be my companion and my messmate,--a fact which seemed to
afford small satisfaction to either of us.

Nothing could less resemble his splendor than the simplicity of my
costume. Halkett, when ordered to "rig me out," not knowing what precise
place I was to occupy on board, proceeded to dress me from the kit of
the sailor we had left behind in Dublin; and although, by rolling up the
sleeves of my jacket, and performing the same office for the legs of my
trousers, my hands and feet could be rendered available to me, no such
ready method could prevent the clothes bagging around me in every absurd
superfluity, and making me appear more like a stunted monster than a
human being. Beside my splendidly costumed companion I made, indeed, but
a sorry figure, nor was it long dubious that he himself thought so; the
look of savage contempt he first bestowed on me, and then the gaze of
ineffable pleasure he accorded to himself afterwards, having a wide
interval between them. Neither did it improve my condition, in his
eyes, that I could lay claim to no distinct duty on board. While I was
ruminating on this fact, the morning after I joined the yacht, we
were standing under easy sail, with a bright sky and a calm sea, the
southeastern coast of Ireland on our lee; the heaving swell of the blue
water, the fluttering bunting from gaff and peak, the joyous
bounding motion, were all new and inspiriting sensations, and I was
congratulating myself on the change a few hours had wrought in my
fortune, when Halkett came to tell me that Sir Dudley wanted to speak
with me in his cabin. He was lounging on a little sofa when I entered,
in a loose kind of dressing-gown, and before him stood the materials
of his yet un