with her light guitar hung by a silken cord by her neck.

But in vain did she listen and watch for the song to be repeated.
All was still on those beautiful waters, and no sound came upon the
ear save the distant burst of delirious mirth from some opium shop
where the frequenters had reached a state of wild and noisy
hilarity, under the influence of the intoxicating drug. The
half-witted boy seemed to comprehend her wishes, and already with a
leap that would have done credit to a greyhound, had thrown himself
on the top of the seraglio wall on the sea side, and sat there,
watching first Komel, and then the water beneath the point.

Despairing at last of again hearing the song, she lightly struck the
strings of her guitar, and thus accompanied, sung the song that she
had heard the previous night. The boy recognized the first note of
the air, and springing to his feet, peered off into the shadows upon
the water, supposing they came from thence; but seeing by a glance
that it was the slave who sung, he dropped from the wall and crept
quietly to her side. Before the song was ended he lay down at her
feet in a state apparently of dormancy, though his eyes, peering
from beneath one of his arms, were fixed upon a cluster of stars
that shone the heavens above him.

The bell from an English man-of-war that lay but an arrow's shot
off, had sounded the middle watch before Komel left the spot where
she had hoped once more to hear those to her enchanting sounds. She
arose and walked away with reluctant steps from the place towards
the palace, leaving the idiot boy by himself. But scarcely had she
gone from sight, before he jumped to his feet, leaped once more to
the top of the wall, looked off with apparent earnestness among the
shipping and along the shore of the sparkling waters, where the moon
lay in long rays of silver light upon it, and then dropping once
more to the ground, came to the spot where Komel had sat, and lying
down there, slept, or seemed to do so.

Here Komel came night after night, but the song was no more
repeated. Either the sentry's shot had effectually frightened away
the serenader, or else he had not come hither with any fixed object
connected with his song. In either case the poor girl felt unhappy
and disappointed in the matter, and her companions saw a cloud of
care upon her fair face. The Sultan, too, marked this, and seemed to
wonder that time did not heal the wounded spirit of his slave. His
kindl