n the son of Costantin--that dirt!--is preferred before him. In
this minute I was kneeling to our gracious Lady on his behalf."

"Praise to her!" exclaimed Abdullah, crossing himself. "There is none
like her in a difficulty, as I, of all men living, have best cause to
know, since she gave me all that I possess."

"Allah increase thy wealth!" said Sarah hastily, fearing the story she
had heard a thousand times.

Years ago the respectable Abdullah had been no better than a sot and
wastrel, having contracted the habit of drunkenness at Port Said, where
he spent three years as porter in a small hotel. He had squandered all
his savings and had drunk himself to the verge of madness, when one
summer night, as he lay on the floor of his house (as he himself
expressed it) "between drunk and sober," the Mother of God appeared to
him, "all white and blinding like the sand at noon." The vision, after
gazing on him a space, stretched out its hand and vanished. That was
all. But Abdullah arose with new heart. Thenceforth he honoured
himself, whom God had honoured. The change in him was plain for all to
see, and he proclaimed the cause of it aloud with streaming eyes. The
Orthodox Church confirmed the miracle, which made a noise at the time.
The Patriarch himself wrote the seer a long letter. People who had
long since washed their hands of the drunken reprobate vied one with
another to help the known favourite of Heaven. Abdullah obtained good
employment, first in an hotel at Jerusalem, then with an English
traveller of importance. Now, for some years, he had been a trusted
dragoman in the pay of a mysterious power called Cook. His religious
vogue had passed, his story and the miracle involved were quite
forgotten of the multitude. But Abdullah himself remembered, viewing
his respectability at the present day with the same feelings of awe and
reverence with which he had received it at the first. It was the
mantle of the Blessed Virgin, her gift to him. In it lay all his hope
for this world and the next.

"It is of Iskender that I come to speak," he said, having pulled out
his moustache to the utmost and swallowed twice with solemn gulps
preliminary to the announcement. "It hurts my soul to see him wasting
time----"

"Enough! enough, I say!" The woman screamed aloud to drown his words.
"Am I not already killed with such bad talk, deafened with it, maddened
with it every day from morn till night. Ah, by the Gospe