But father Verseau, the Jesuit, now returned to Cairo, who had entered into a great distrust of the consul since the discovery of his intrigue with the basha about Murat’s letter, resolved to be of the party. Poncet, who was likewise on bad terms with the consul, neither inclined to lose the merits of his travels into Abyssinia, nor trust the recital of it to Monhenaut, or to the manner in which it might be represented in the consul’s letters. These three, Monhenaut, Poncet, and Verseau, set out therefore for Paris with very different views and designs. They embarked at Bulac, the shipping-place of Cairo upon the Nile, taking with them the ears of the dead elephant. The remaining part of the present brought for the king of France by this illustrious embassy, was an Abyssinian boy, a slave bought by Murat, and who had been hid from the search of the Sherriffe, when he forcibly took from him the two Abyssinian girls, part of the intended present also. This boy no sooner embarked on board the vessel at Bulac than a great tumult arose. The janizaries took the boy out of the vessel by force, and delivered him to Mustapha Cazdagli, their kaya; nor could all the interest of M. de Maillet and the French nation, or all the manœuvres of the Jesuits, ever recover him. As for Monhenaut, Poncet, and Verseau, his protectors, they were obliged to hide themselves from the violence of the mob, nor dared they again to appear till the vessel sailed. And happy was it for them that this fell out at Cairo, for, had they offered to embark him at Alexandria, in all probability it would have cost all of them their lives. I must beg leave here to suggest to the reader, how dangerous, as well as how absurd, was the plan of this embassy. It was to consist of twenty-eight Abyssinians, twelve of whom were to be sons of noble families, all to be embarked to France. What a pleasant day would the embarkation have been to M. de Maillet! What an honourable appearance for his king, in the eyes of other Christian princes, to have seen twenty-eight Christians under his immediate protection, twelve of whom we might say were princes, (as all the nobility in Abyssinia are directly of the family of the king), from motives of vanity only, by the pride of the Jesuits, and the ignorance of the consul, hurried in one day into apostacy and slavery! Whatever Maillet thought of Poncet’s conduct, his bringing Murat, and him only, cook as he was, was the very luckiest accident of his life.