as my son, and bring you a violin, of which I beg your acceptance.” I received with much pleasure the instrument, which was exactly to my taste, and gave him very many thanks. After an animated conversation of two hours, during which he questioned me upon all sorts of subjects, he retired. The next day he returned, and continued in this manner his visits for a fortnight; he then proposed to me to give him lessons in Arabic for an hour every day, for which he offered me a hundred piastres a month. I gladly accepted this advantageous proposal; and after six months’ teaching he began to read and speak Arabic tolerably well. One day he said to me, “My dear son, (he always addressed me thus,) I see that you have a great inclination for commerce; and as I wish to remain some time with you, I should like to employ you in a manner agreeable to yourself. Here is money: purchase goods, such as are saleable at Homs, at Hama, and the neighbourhood. We will trade in the countries least frequented by merchants; you will find we shall succeed well.” My desire of remaining with M. de Lascaris, and the persuasion that the undertaking would be successful, determined me to accept the proposal without hesitation; and I began, according to a note which he sent me, to make the purchases, which consisted of the following articles: red cloth, amber, corals in chaplets, cotton handkerchiefs, silk handkerchiefs black and red, black shirts, pins, needles, box combs and horn, rings, horses’ bits, bracelets of glass beads, and other glass ornaments; to these we added chemical products, spices, and drugs. M. Lascaris paid for these different articles eleven thousand piastres, or two thousand tallaris.