Oriental Encounters Part 27

And I had got my money ready for my journey. I was going to visit some of the Greek Islands, Smyrna, and Constantinople, on my way to England, and had hoped, besides, to see a little of the Balkan States.

To pay out twenty pounds was to reduce that journey by at least a fortnight. And, as I said, I had forgotten all about the clothes, regarding all my Syrian debts as fully paid.

The hall was empty; we were quite alone. I fear I stormed at the Mu'allim Costantin, reminding him that he had promised that the clothes should not be dear.

'But,' he persisted, 'they are very cheap for the materials. If your Honour's wish was to pay less, you ought not to have chosen fabrics three parts silk. I did not know that you were counting money.'

He was right. Throughout my stay in Syria, until that moment, I had never counted money. Compared with England, living in the country was absurdly cheap, and on my small allowance I had lived at ease. He might quite reasonably have supposed me to be very wealthy. But I was not in reasonable mood just then. I paid the bill, but in an angry manner; and while I was still talking to him, the Cawwas arrived, and, close upon his heels, Ras.h.i.+d in tears, to tell me that the carriage was in waiting. The grief I felt at leaving Syria, at parting from Ras.h.i.+d and our Sheytan and many friends took hold of me. Hurriedly I said goodbye to the Mu'allim Costantin, and I am glad to say I changed my tone at that last moment, and had the grace to bid him think no more of the whole matter. But I shall carry to my grave the recollection of his face of horror while I scolded, the look that told his grief that he had been deceived in me.

I went and shoved the books into my luggage here and there, gave Ras.h.i.+d orders to send on the clothes, took leave of my kind hosts, and drove down in a hurry to the quay. It was not till some time after I arrived in England that I realised that the volumes which he had presented to me were a complete Bulac Edition of the _Thousand and One Nights_--a valuable book--which is my greatest treasure.

Nor have I ever had the chance of thanking the giver in a manner worthy of the gift, and wiping out the bad impression left by my ill-temper, for a letter which I wrote from England never reached him I am told, and when I next was in his country the Mu'allim Costantin had gone where kindness, patience, courtesy, and all his other virtues are, I hope, rewarded.

GLASGOW: W. COLLIN'S SONS AND CO. LTD.