-a
banquet, with music and dancing, was given in the fortress of Janina,
and every morning a hundred and one volleys were fired from the
bastions--the usual ceremony after great triumphs.

And when in the evening Ali took a promenade in his garden, and walked
up and down among his flowers, he would now and then trample the earth
beneath his feet. It was the grave of Zaid that he was trampling upon.
There stood an old dahlia, the sole survivor of its extirpated family,
and, levelling it to the ground with his foot, he trod it into the
grave, murmuring to himself, "No longer art thou alone--no longer
alone!"

CHAPTER XI

THE FLOWERS OF THE GARDEN OF BEGTASH

At the end of the fifteenth century, when the Turkish crescent had won
an abiding-place among the constellations of Europe, there dwelt in
the Turkish dominions a worthy dervish, Haji Begtash by name.

As the overflowing armies of the newly founded empire submerged the
surrounding Christian kingdoms, Haji Begtash went everywhere with the
conquering hosts, but in the intervals of peace he begged his way
about the empire, and scraped together a little money from the Turkish
grandees or from the extravagant, booty-laden Turkish soldiers.

Now wherefore did this worthy dervish make it a point to collect so
much money and wear himself out by travelling from the Adriatic to the
Euxine, when he might have sat all day long at the gate of the Kaaba,
as they call the stone on the tomb of the Prophet, and recited from
his long bead-string the nine properties of Allah (no very exhausting
labor, by-the-way), and received therefor, from the pilgrims to the
shrine, meat, drink, and abundance of alms?

Well, Haji Begtash had taken up a great work. When he accompanied the
Turkish armies, and they, on entering a Christian village, began to
cut down the inhabitants and tie the captives together with ropes,
the dervish would force his way through the bloodthirsty soldiery, and
if he beheld any wild Bashkir or Kurdish desperado about to dash out
the brains of a forsaken, weeping orphan child against a wall, he
would lay his hand upon them, take away the child, cover it with his
mantle, caress it, and take it away with him. And thus he would keep
on doing till he had with him a whole group of children, all of whom
were concealed beneath the folds of his ample cloak, where nobody
could hurt them; nay, frequently he would carry babies in
swaddling-clothes in his bosom, till