Arab Americans -- Fiction; Immigrants -- New York (State) -- New York -- Fiction
And when the emigrant has a surplus of gold, when his capital is such
as can not be dissipated on a suit of shoddy, a fortnight's lodging,
and a passage across the Atlantic, the ingenious ones proceed with the
Fourth Act of _Open Thy Purse_. "Instead of starting in New York as a
peddler," they say, unfolding before him one of their alluring
schemes, "why not do so as a merchant?" And the emigrant opens his
purse for the fourth time in the office of some French manufacturer,
where he purchases a few boxes of trinketry,--scapulars, prayer-beads,
crosses, jewelry, gewgaws, and such like,--all said to be made in the
Holy Land. These he brings over with him as his stock in trade.
Now, Khalid and Shakib, after passing a fortnight in Marseilles, and
going through the Fourth Act of the Sorry Show, find their dignity as
merchants rudely crushed beneath the hatches of the Atlantic steamer.
For here, even the pleasure of sleeping on deck is denied them. The
Atlantic Ocean would not permit of it. Indeed, everybody has to slide
into their stivy bunks to save themselves from its rising wrath. A
fortnight of such unutterable misery is quite supportable, however, if
one continues to cherish the Paradise already mentioned. But in this
dark, dingy smelling hole of the steerage, even the poets cease to
dream. The boatmen of Beirut and the sharpers of Marseilles we could
forget; but in this grave among a hundred and more of its kind, set
over and across each other, neither the lute nor the little that
remained in that Ksarah bottle, could bring us any solace.
We are told that Khalid took up his lute but once throughout the
voyage. And this when they were permitted one night to sleep on deck.
We are also informed that Khalid had a remarkable dream, which, to our
Scribe at least, is not meaningless. And who of us, thou silly Scribe,
did not in his boyhood tell his dreams to his mother, who would turn
them in her interpretation inside out? But Khalid, we are assured,
continued to cherish the belief, even in his riper days, that when you
dream you are in Jannat, for instance, you must be prepared to go
through Juhannam the following day. A method of interpretation as
ancient as Joseph, to be sure. But we quote the dream to show that
Khalid should not have followed the setting sun. He should have turned
his face toward the desert.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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