ing her face twice or
thrice, although he ought not to have gone beyond kissing her
hand--nay, he ought not to have kissed her hand at all, but the hand
of his partner, the Sultana Valideh.

When the minuet was over the eunuch musicians played a waltz in which
all the odalisks took part, clinging to one another in couples, and
thus they danced the pretty _trois pas_ dance, for the _deux pas_
revolution was the invention of a later and more progressive age.
Louder than the music was the joyous uproar of the dancers themselves.
Here and there some of them tumbled on the slippery floor to which
they were not accustomed, and the nymphs coming after them fell
around them in heaps. Some disliked the dance or were weary, but their
firier and more robust partners dragged them along, willy-nilly. The
old Kizlar-Agasi and the bey stood in the midst of them to take care
that no scandal took place. Suddenly the madcap odalisk army
surrounded them, clung on to them in twos and threes, dragged them
into the mad waltz, and twisted them round and round at a galloping
pace, till the two good old gentlemen had no more breath left in them.

The Sultan and the Valideh, with the prince and Milieva, were sitting
on a raised dais, laughing and looking on at the merry spectacle. The
pipers piped more briskly, the drummers drummed more furiously, the
cymbals clashed more loudly than ever, while the odalisks dragged
their prey about uproariously.

Ah! Listen! What didst thou hear, good Sultan? What noise is that
outside which mingles with the hubbub within? Outside there also is to
be heard the roll of drums, the flourish of trumpets, and the shouts
of men.

Nonsense! 'Tis but imagination. Bring hither the glasses--not those
tiny cups of sherbet, for this is the birthday of the Valideh. We will
be Europeans to-night. Bring hither wine and glasses for a toast!

The Sultan had a particular fondness for Tokay and champagne, and the
ambassadors of both these great Powers had the greatest influence with
him.

The odalisks also had to be made to taste these wines; and after that
the dance proceeded more merrily, and the boisterous music and
singing grew madder and madder.

What was that?

The Sultan grew attentive. What uproar is that outside the Seraglio?
What light is that which shines at the top of the round windows?

That uproar is no beating of drums; those shouts are not the shouts of
revellers; that din is not the beating of cymbals