“What! don’t you see that Oud Raï and my wretch of a wife, to be avenged of the beating I gave them, have subtracted the bullock in question without my knowledge, and have cut it up in my tent, in order to compromise me with the authorities? Sidi Bou Krari! it is as clear as the sun, that. Don’t you see that I am a virtuous husband calumniated by a criminal wife?” A subdued murmur, mingled with stifled laughter arose in the assembly at the victim air which Ben Serraq tried hard to assume, and also at listening to the singular pleading which he had improvised. “Ben Serraq,” said the magistrate, in a sceptical tone, “your case must be a very bad one, to compel you to employ such poor arguments for its defence. How could your wife play you such a trick as you describe without your knowledge, since your accusers found your tent filled with the animal’s remains, the head particularly being so conspicuous and recognisable an object?” “What is there extraordinary in that?” asked Ben Serraq, not in the slightest degree disconcerted. “My wife is so artful, and I am so simple and innocent, that she could easily contrive to conceal the matter.” “Come; these are wretched arguments. For a man like you, who has had so many transactions with the authorities, it is not a clever way of getting out of the scrape.” “I invoke Allah and his justice!” screamed Ben Serraq with the throat of a wild boar. “I am a poor persecuted innocent; there is nothing proved against me, absolutely nothing. The case at least is doubtful,--that is incontestable,--and in cases of doubt the law requires me to take an oath. Put me on my oath; I will swear on the Koran, on Sidi Bou Krari, on whatever book you please, I am as innocent as a suckling.” “No doubt. You will take a hundred oaths as readily as one. But, unfortunately for you, I have not forgotten your previous character, and must consider the charge as completely established.” “Allah! Lord of the Universe! Justice is not to be had in this country.” “Honest men will say the contrary, when they hear you are caught, and especially when they see you transported to France: whither I intend requesting you to be sent.” “That’s the reward people get for serving the French!” swaggered Ben Serraq, as Coriolanus might have done when banished by ungrateful Rome. “Not bad, by my faith! You doubtless consider you are rendering people a service by easing them of their purses.” “I have been of service to you in time of warfare, by marching constantly at the head of your columns.” “True; you have sometimes marched at the head of our columns as a guide; but most assuredly you insisted upon heavy wages, as far as I can recollect. Besides, that is no reason why you should be allowed, in recompense, to plunder the whole human race. You ought to have reformed, as you promised you would, and then we should have forgotten the past.” “I am slandered! I am a victim!”