men in general as dust under her feet.
Her ignorance is unbounded. "India!" she said to Miss Hubbard. "You say
all India belongs to you English. You may well wish it did. You've only
got one port."

Meanwhile, we had reached the door of this famous lady's house, and were
clanging the great knocker. It was superior to any door we had "wakened"
that afternoon--made of pale, cinnamon-coloured wood, and immensely wide,
carved up above and brightened with great fork-like hinges and nail-heads
as large as pennies. A vastly stout slave, smart in proportion, opened
the door, and said something in Arabic to Miss Banks, which, translated,
intimated that a large tea party was going on within. She led us along
far-reaching, wide passages, which at length opened out into an extensive
patio, paved with great black and white marble tiles, like a giant
chess-board. A double row of finely tiled pillars supported the roof, and
a fountain shot up water in the centre of all. The style of the building
suggested that the dead man had known how to spend some of his money, and
to make for himself a place refined and romantic rather than gorgeous.

Stepping down the cool aisles between the pillars, the slave took us
towards a room opening out of the patio; and such a room!--hung with
embroideries, surrounded with luxurious divans worked in scarlet and
white, carpeted with deep-piled carpets, and yet no more than a mere
setting for the fantastic butterfly world which seemed let loose inside.
Tetuan's most aristocratic women, scented favourites of Moorish society,
kept in lavender and reared on sugar and orange-flower water, are not
among those things which one easily forgets. About twelve of them or
more--enough to dazzle and not bewilder, furnish to perfection yet avoid
a crush--were half reclining on the divans round the room. Fatima was on
our immediate left as we entered; a holy Shar[=i]fa on the right; the
daughter of another Shar[=i]f sat beyond her. The circle was one of
Sanctity and Rank.

We shook hands with the mistress of the house, and were motioned to take
our seats on the divan exactly opposite her.

Fatima was no disappointment. She suggested much, and more than fulfilled
the promise of her history. She was pale and dark, with a little head
like a snake's, thin sarcastic lips, and eyes full of smouldering devil.
Two silver trays stood in front of her, covered with fragile porcelain
cups and thin gilded cut-glass, with a silver-