‘It is strange,’ said Fakredeen, ‘but frequently as I have been at Aleppo and Antioch, I have never been in their country. I have always been warned against it, always kept from it, which indeed ought to have prompted my earliest efforts, when I was my own master, to make them a visit. But, I know not how it is, there are some prejudices that do stick to one. I have a prejudice against the Ansarey, a sort of fear, a kind of horror. ‘Tis vastly absurd. I suppose my nurse instilled it into me, and frightened me with them when I would not sleep. Besides, I had an idea that they particularly hated the Shehaabs. I recollect so well the Emir Bescheer, at Bteddeen, bestowing endless imprecations on them.’ ‘He made many efforts to win them, though,’ said Sheikh Hamood, ‘and so did the Emir Yousef.’ ‘And you think without them, noble Sheikh,’ said Tancred, ‘that Syria is not secure?’ ‘I think, with them and peace with the desert, that Syria might defy Turk and Egyptian.’ ‘And carry the war into the enemy’s quarters, if necessary?’ said Fakredeen. ‘If they would let us alone, I am content to leave them,’ said Hamood. ‘Hem!’ said the Emir Fakredeen. ‘Do you see that gazelle, noble Sheikh? How she bounds along! What if we follow her, and the pursuit should lead us into the lands of the Ansarey?’ ‘It would be a long ride,’ said Sheikh Hamood. ‘Nor should I care much to trust my head in a country governed by a woman.’ ‘A woman!’ exclaimed Tancred and Fakredeen. ‘They say as much,’ said Sheikh Hamood; ‘perhaps it is only a coffee-house tale.’ ‘I never heard it before,’ said Fakredeen. ‘In the time of my uncle, Elderidis was Sheikh. I have heard indeed that the Ansarey worship a woman.’ ‘Then they would be Christians,’ said Sheikh Hamood, ‘and I never heard that.’ CHAPTER XLVI. _The Laurellas_ IT WAS destined that Napoleon should never enter Rome, and Mahomet never enter Damascus. What was the reason of this? They were not uninterested in those cities that interest all. The Emperor selected from the capital of the Cæsars the title of his son; the Prophet, when he beheld the crown of Syria, exclaimed that it was too delightful, and that he must reserve his paradise for another world. Buonaparte was an Italian, and must have often yearned after the days of Rome triumphant. The son of Abdallah was descended from the patriarchs, whose progenitor had been moulded out of the red clay of the most ancient city in the world. Absorbed by the passionate pursuit of the hour, the two heroes postponed a gratification which they knew how to appreciate, but which, with all their success, all their power, and all their fame, they were never permitted to indulge. What moral is to be drawn from this circumstance? That we should never lose an occasion. Opportunity is more powerful even than conquerors and prophets.