le; 'it is exile to Europe,
then, that is the curse: well, I think you have some reason. I do not
know much of your quarter of the globe: Europe is to Asia what America
is to Europe. But I have felt the winds of the Exuine blowing up the
Bosphorus; and, when the Sultan was once going to cut off our heads for
helping the Egyptians, I passed some months at Vienna. Oh! how I sighed
for my beautiful Damascus!'

'And for your garden at Bethany?' said Tancred.

'It did not exist then. This is a recent creation,' said the lady. 'I
have built a nest in the chink of the hills, that I might look upon
Arabia; and the palm tree that invited you to honour my domain was the
contribution of my Arab grandfather to the only garden near Jerusalem.
But I want to ask you another question. What, on the whole, is the thing
most valued in Europe?'

Tancred pondered; and, after a slight pause, said, 'I think I know what
ought to be most valued in Europe; it is something very different from
what I fear I must confess is most valued there. My cheek burns while I
say it; but I think, in Europe, what is most valued is money.'

'On the whole,' said the lady, 'he that has most money there is most
honoured?'

'Practically, I apprehend so.'

'Which is the greatest city in Europe?'

'Without doubt, the capital of my country, London.'

'Greater I know it is than Vienna; but is it greater than Paris?'

'Perhaps double the size of Paris.'

'And four times that of Stamboul! What a city! Why 'tis Babylon! How
rich the most honoured man must be there! Tell me, is he a Christian?'

'I believe he is one of your race and faith.' 'And in Paris; who is the
richest man in Paris?' 'The brother, I believe, of the richest man in
London.'

'I know all about Vienna,' said the lady, smiling. 'Caesar makes my
countrymen barons of the empire, and rightly, for it would fall to
pieces in a week without their support. Well, you must admit that the
European part of the curse has not worked very fatally.'

'I do not see,' said Tancred thoughtfully, after a short pause, 'that
the penal dispersion of the Hebrew nation is at all essential to the
great object of the Christian scheme. If a Jew did not exist, that would
equally have been obtained.'

'And what do you hold to be the essential object of the Christian
scheme?' 'The Expiation.'

'Ah!' said the lady, in a tone of much solemnity, 'that is a great idea;
in harmony with our instincts, with our traditions,