Abdallah, who hated his second brother, Sa’ood, and had many other fierce enmities in the capital, then accidentally learned that Palgrave had employed a deadly poison (strychnine) in making a remarkable cure. Thenceforth all his powers of persuasion were employed in endeavoring to procure some of the drug; but Palgrave, suspecting his real design, positively refused to let him have any. His rage was suddenly and strongly expressed on his countenance, foreboding no good to the traveller, who took the first opportunity of returning to his house. “There Aboo-’Eysa, Barakat, and myself,” he says, “immediately held council to consider what was now to be done. That an outbreak must shortly take place seemed certain; to await it was dangerous, yet we could not safely leave the town in an over-precipitate manner, nor without some kind of permission. We resolved together to go on in quiet and caution a few days more, to sound the court, make our adieus at Feysul’s palace, get a good word from Mahboob (no difficult matter), and then slip off without attracting too much notice. But our destiny was not to run so smoothly.” Late in the evening of November 21st, Palgrave was summoned to Abdallah’s palace. The messenger refused to allow Barakat or Aboo-’Eysa to accompany him. The occasion seemed portentous, but disobedience was out of the question. Palgrave followed the messenger. On entering the reception-room, he found Abdallah, Abd-el-Lateef, the successor of the Wahabee, Mahboob, and a few others. All were silent, and none returned his first salutation. “I saluted Abdallah,” says Palgrave, “who replied in an undertone, and gave me a signal to sit down at a little distance from him, but on the same side of the divan. My readers may suppose that I was not at the moment ambitious of too intimate a vicinity. “After an interval of silence, Abdallah turned half round toward me, and with his blackest look and a deep voice said, ‘I now know perfectly well what you are; you are no doctors, you are Christians, spies, and revolutionists, come hither to ruin our religion and state in behalf of those who sent you. The penalty for such as you is death, that you know, and I am determined to inflict it without delay.’ “‘Threatened folks live long,’ thought I, and had no difficulty in showing the calm which I really felt. So looking him coolly in the face, I replied, ‘_Istagh-fir Allah_,’ literally, ‘Ask pardon of God.’ This is the phrase commonly addressed to one who has said something extremely out of place. “The answer was unexpected: he started, and said, ‘Why so?’ “‘Because,’ I rejoined, ‘you have just now uttered a sheer absurdity. “Christians,” be it so; but “spies,” “revolutionists”—as if we were not known by everybody in your town for quiet doctors, neither more nor less! And then to talk about putting me to death! You cannot, and you dare not.’