“But alas! Almansor’s troubles were not yet over, Allah would not yet permit him to see his native shore. The French nation was then at war with another Frankish people, the English. These English captured every French ship they could, and so it happened that on the sixth day the ship on which Almansor sailed was surrounded by a number of English ships, and was obliged to surrender. All the crew were transferred to another smaller vessel and, as ill luck would have it, this small vessel became detached from the rest of the fleet during a storm. Now there are robbers upon the high seas just as there are in the desert, and the small ship was seized by a pirate ship from Tunis, and all the crew were sent to Algiers and sold as slaves. Almansor was not so badly off as the Christians, because he was a Mussulman and a true Believer, but notwithstanding he began to abandon all hope of ever seeing his father’s house again. He had been purchased by a rich man, and for five years he lived with him, cultivating his garden and rearing his flowers. But suddenly the rich man died and left no near heirs, so that his property was divided up, his slaves were shared out, and Almansor fell into the hands of a slave-dealer who was just fitting out a ship to carry his slaves to another port, in order to sell them for a better price. I chanced to be one of this dealers slaves and was taken upon the same ship with Almansor. We soon made friends and he told me his wonderful adventures. But, when we landed, I was a witness of Allah’s goodness and merciful guidance, for it was upon Almansor’s native shore that we disembarked, and it was in the market place of his native town that we were publicly sold, and oh! my Lord, it was his own dear father who bought him.” The Sheik Ali Banu had listened thoughtfully to the slave’s story, but the conclusion did not quite seem to satisfy him. “The young man would be about one-and-twenty, you say?” he enquired. “Yes, my Lord, my own age,” answered the slave. “And what do you say is the name of his native town?” “If I was not mistaken it was Alexandria,” was the reply. “Alexandria!” cried the Sheik. “Then it was my son. Did he ever call himself Kairam? Had he dark eyes and brown hair?” “Yes, my lord,” said the slave, “and sometimes he called himself Kairam and _not_ Almansor.” “But tell me,” said the old man, “are you sure his own father bought him, did he assure you it was so? Because if this is the case he cannot be my son.” The slave answered: “I heard him thank Allah for having brought him back to his own city, and when an aged and distinguished-looking man approached him and bought him he whispered to me: ‘My misfortunes are at an end, for it is my own father who has bought me.’” “Alas! it was _not_ my son,” cried the Sheik in tones of deep grief.