knows!"

As he spoke he looked the girl at whom the words were aimed, full in
the face; but she turned silently and proudly away, and an angry shade
passed over her lovely features.

CHAPTER V.

When the Arab was at last admitted to the governor's presence his
attendants unfolded a hanging before him. The giant Masdakite did the
chief share of the work; but as soon as the Mukaukas caught sight of the
big man, with his bushy, mane-like hair, and a dagger and a battle-axe
stuck through his belt, he cried out:

"Away, away with him! That man--those weapons--I will not look at the
hanging till he is gone."

His hands were trembling, and the merchant at once desired his faithful
Rustem, the most harmless of mortals, to quit the room. The governor,
whose sensitive nerves had been liable to such attacks of panic ever
since an exiled Greek had once attempted to murder him, now soon
recovered his composure, and looked with great admiration at the hanging
round which the family were standing. They all confessed they had never
seen anything like it, and the vivacious Dame Susannah proposed to send
for her daughter and her visitors; but it was already late, and her
house was so far from the governor's that she gave that up. The father
and son had already heard of this marvellous piece of work, which had
formed part of the plunder taken by the Arab conquerors of the Persian
Empire at the sack of the "White Tower"--the royal palace of Madam, the
capital of the Sassanidze. They knew that it had been originally 300
ells long and 60 ells wide, and had heard with indignation that the
Khaliff Omar, who always lived and dressed and ate like the chief of a
caravan, and looked down with contempt on all such objects of luxury,
had cut this inestimable treasure of art into pieces and divided it
among the Companions of the Prophet.

Haschim explained to them that this particular fragment had been the
share of the booty allotted to Ali, the Prophet's son-in-law. Haschim
himself had seen the work before its dismemberment at Madain, where it
hung on the wall of the magnificent throne-room, and subsequently, at
Medina.

His audience eagerly requested him to describe the other portions; he,
however, seemed somewhat uneasy, looking down at his bare feet which
were standing on the mosaic pavement, damp from the fountain; for, after
the manner of his nation, he had left his shoes in the outer room. The
governor had noticed the old man's