As I write, there lie before me three successive paragraphs culled from a recent edition of a London paper. These paragraphs were intended to be, and doubtless were, amusing to their readers, but they contain inaccuracies. I have ascertained that one misstatement owes its origin to a report drawn up in connection with the guide’s account of the successful escape of Father Rossignoli. The facts connected with that flight, and my reported refusal to escape when the opportunity (?) offered, find their place later in my narrative. For the moment I shall content myself with but one of the paragraphs, and fill in the details which, while not detracting from the humorous element introduced, will show that the episode referred to had somewhat of a pathetic, if not tragic, vein in it. This may have been lost sight of owing to the tale being recorded in an office about two thousand miles away from the scene of action, and the inaccuracies may be accounted for by the fact that the tale was told by one of that large class in the East whose greatest glory it is, when one of them has by constant |135| practice attained a certain standard of inventive faculty and plausibility, to prove to the world that the race of Haroun-el-Rashid’s story-tellers is not yet extinct. There can be little doubt that the guide and Wakih Idris, and maybe others, would be much entertained, if not a little surprised, if told that the whole of their tales had apparently been believed in. On my servant Hasseena being sent into the Khaleefa’s hareem in May, 1887, she obtained her release, or dismissal, by declaring that she was with child; she was not. In November, 1888, she certainly was, and the fact could not be concealed. Hasseena, having been a slave, could not well be legally married, so that when dismissed from the Khaleefa’s hareem, she was sent as my property to the hareem of Idris es Saier, where she had, in addition to buying and preparing my food, to perform the housework and run messages for the women of Idris’s household.