Highness had already given him the skin and bones of hippopotami, and many other animals alive and dead. If he wished for any birds, he was welcome to as many as he pleased! It so chanced, however, that Abbas Pasha took it into his head, or somebody told him, that we had in England several extraordinary breeds of dogs, horses, and cows,—hounds that could catch a gazelle by sheer fleetness, small fighting-dogs that would master a bull,—horses that could compete with his finest Arabian steeds, and beat them in a hard day’s hunt over rough ground. He bethought himself, therefore, of the hippopotamus. One good turn of this kind might deserve another of a different kind. “So, Consul,” said the Pasha abruptly one day, when Mr. Murray was dining with him, “so, you want a hippopotamus?” “Very much, your Highness.” “And you think that such an animal would be an acceptable present to your Queen and country?” “He would be accounted a great rarity,” said the Consul; “our naturalists would receive him with open arms—figuratively speaking,—and the public would crowd to pay their respects to him.” Abbas Pasha laughed at this pleasantry of the Consul. “Well,” said he, “we will inquire about this matter.” He half-turned his head over one shoulder to his attendants: “Send here the Governor of Nubia!” The attendants thus ordered made their salam, and retired. Anybody, not previously aware of the easy habits of a despotic sovereign, would naturally conclude that the Governor of Nubia was, at this time, in Cairo, and at no great distance from the royal abode. But it was not so. The Governor of Nubia was simply there—at home—smoking his pipe in Nubia. This brief and unadorned order, therefore, involved a post-haste messenger on a dromedary across the Desert, with a boat up the Nile, and then more dromedaries, and then another boat, and again a dromedary, till the Pasha’s mandate was delivered. We next behold the Governor of Nubia, in full official trim, proceeding post-haste with his suite across the Desert, and down the Nile, travelling day and night, until finally he is announced to the Pasha, and admitted to his most serene and fumigatious presence. The Governor makes his grand salam. “Governor,” says the Pasha—and we have this unique dialogue on the best authority—“Governor, have you hippopotami in your country?” “We have, your Highness.” Abbas Pasha reflected a moment; then said—“Send to me the Commander of the Nubian army. Now, go!” This was the whole dialogue. The Governor made his salam, and retired. With the same haste and ceremony, so far as the two things can be combined, he returned to Nubia by boat, and dromedary, and horse, and covered litter; and the same hour found the Commander of the army of Nubia galloping across the Desert with his attendants, in obedience to the royal mandate.