The Bashaw and Colonel Mathews talked together, and we paid the governor long and laborious compliments, at which he smiled indulgently. He did not strike me as being at all overcome by them; he had, on the contrary, very much the air of a man of the world, and seemed rather to be bored, but too polite to say so. He looked exactly like Salvini as Othello. While the tea-drinking was going on we were making asides to Colonel Mathews, and urging him to propose our going into the prison, which he said he would do, but that it must be done diplomatically. We told him we would give all the prisoners bread and water, or a lump sum to the guards, or whatever he thought would please the Bashaw best. He and the Bashaw then began to talk about it, and the doctor and I looked consciously at the ceiling. The Bashaw said that never since he had been governor of Tangier had he allowed either a native or a foreigner to enter the prison; and that if a European did so, he would be torn to pieces by the fanatics imprisoned there, who would think they were pleasing Allah by abusing an unbeliever. Colonel Mathews also added, on his own account, that we would probably catch some horrible disease. The more they did not want us to go, the more we wanted to go, the doctor rising to the occasion with a keenness and readiness of resource worthy of a New York reporter after a beat. I can pay him no higher compliment. After a long, loud, and excited debate the Bashaw submitted, and the Consul-General won.