Her parents had sold her, when young and promising great beauty, to a Turkish slave-merchant; and it was with unalloyed pleasure, in anticipation of the novelty and magnificence of the great Stamboul, that she leaped on board the vessel which was to convey her from her friends and country. At first she herself felt the irksomeness of constraint; but soon became reconciled to her self-chosen lot, and learned to approve of all the regulations of the harem to which she was consigned. Her notions, therefore, on her return, at the death of her master, to her own country, were much scandalised at the freedom and what she considered the levity of her young countrywomen; and she loved to expatiate on the superior manners and customs of the fair captives in the seclusions of Stamboul. Like other dames, who find that their charms can no longer captivate, her temper at times became rather cross and crabbed, though she always tried to treat her young motherless charge with kindness. Such was the old Ana, Kahija, who, wrapped in her feridji, now entered the anderoon to interrupt with her gossip the conversation of the two maidens. She delighted in gossiping--what old nurse does not? particularly a Turkish one. She now came out of breath, with her exertion of walking from a neighbouring cottage, to say with great eagerness, that the chief shepherd had just come in from the distant mountains, where he had seen the dark mountain khan, Khoros Kaloret, whose brother had turned traitor, and been killed by the young chief Selem, galloping by with a long train of savage followers, who were riding furiously in the direction of the Ubin. "Oh, Allah, grant that he meet not my father or Selem there!" exclaimed Ina, in accents of terror. "I know not what may happen, child," said the old nurse. "They say he is a fierce chief. I hear, too, that he sought your hand. Mashallah! but you might have been proud to wed so rich a Khan; and yet, Bosh! what is he even to a merchant of Stamboul?" "Why could you not love him?" asked Zara; "they say he is of gallant appearance." "Ah, Zara! love him? you know not what love is, to ask such a question. Love him! No! I could only fear him, he looks so stern and fierce; so unlike the calm and grave features of my father," said Ina. "What is all this stuff the girls are talking about love?" chimed in the old nurse. "Bosh! what nonsense is this? Love! What is love? it is nothing; it is worse than nothing; it is folly--it is Bosh! What should maidens know about love? Let them be married, and then it is time to love their lords and masters."