. At length he
seemed determined in what manner to receive the language of his new
companion.

"You are," he said, "of a nation that loves to laugh, and you make sport
with yourselves, and with others, by telling what is impossible, and
reporting what never chanced. Thou art one of the knights of France, who
hold it for glee and pastime to GAB, as they term it, of exploits that
are beyond human power. [Gaber. This French word signified a sort of
sport much used among the French chivalry, which consisted in vying
with each other in making the most romantic gasconades. The verb and the
meaning are retained in Scottish.] I were wrong to challenge, for the
time, the privilege of thy speech, since boasting is more natural to
thee than truth."

"I am not of their land, neither of their fashion," said the Knight,
"which is, as thou well sayest, to GAB of that which they dare not
undertake--or, undertaking, cannot perfect. But in this I have imitated
their folly, brave Saracen, that in talking to thee of what thou canst
not comprehend, I have, even in speaking most simple truth, fully
incurred the character of a braggart in thy eyes; so, I pray you, let my
words pass."

They had now arrived at the knot of palm-trees and the fountain which
welled out from beneath their shade in sparkling profusion.

We have spoken of a moment of truce in the midst of war; and this, a
spot of beauty in the midst of a sterile desert, was scarce less dear
to the imagination. It was a scene which, perhaps, would elsewhere have
deserved little notice; but as the single speck, in a boundless
horizon, which promised the refreshment of shade and living water, these
blessings, held cheap where they are common, rendered the fountain and
its neighbourhood a little paradise. Some generous or charitable hand,
ere yet the evil days of Palestine began, had walled in and arched over
the fountain, to preserve it from being absorbed in the earth, or choked
by the flitting clouds of dust with which the least breath of wind
covered the desert. The arch was now broken, and partly ruinous; but it
still so far projected over and covered in the fountain that it excluded
the sun in a great measure from its waters, which, hardly touched by a
straggling beam, while all around was blazing, lay in a steady repose,
alike delightful to the eye and the imagination. Stealing from under the
arch, they were first received in a marble basin, much defaced indeed,
but still che