hion; and then all, as before, sat on mats or
cushions round the central bowl, each being furnished with a spoon and
thin flat soft piece of bread to dip into the mess of stewed kid, flakes
of which might be extracted with the fingers.

The women, who had fastened a piece of linen across their faces, ran
about and waited on the guests, who included three or four of the
principal men of the village, as well as the stranger, who, as Arthur
observed, was not of the uniform brown of the rest, but had some colour
in his cheeks, light eyes, and a ruddy beard, and also was of a larger
frame than these Moors, who, though graceful, lithe, and exceedingly
stately and dignified, hardly reached above young Hope's own shoulder.
Conversation was going on all the time, and Arthur soon perceived that he
was the subject of it. As soon as the meal was over, the new-comer
addressed him, to his great joy, in French. It was the worst French
imaginable--perhaps more correctly _lingua Franca_, with a French instead
of an Arabic foundation, but it was more comprehensible than that of the
Moorish sailor, and bore some relation to a civilised language; besides
which there was something indescribably familiar in the tone of voice,
although Arthur's good French often missed of being comprehended.

'Son of a great man? Ambassador, French!' The greatness seemed
impressed, but whether ambassador was understood was another thing,
though it was accepted as relating to the boy.

'Secretary to the Ambassador' seemed to be an equal problem. The man
shook his head, but he took in better the story of the wreck, though,
like the sailor, he shook his head over the chance of there being any
survivors, and utterly negatived the idea of joining them. The great
point that Arthur tried to convey was that there would be a very
considerable ransom if the child could be conveyed to Algiers, and he
endeavoured to persuade the stranger, who was evidently a sort of
travelling merchant, and, as he began to suspect, a renegade, to convey
them thither; but he only got shakes of the head as answers, and
something to the effect that they were a good deal out of the Dey's reach
in those parts, together with what he feared was an intimation that they
were altogether in the power of Sheyk Abou Ben Zegri.

They were interrupted by a servant of the merchant, who came to bring him
some message as well as a pipe and tobacco. The pipe was carried by a
negro boy, at sight o