‘They do not believe in our blessed Saviour,’ said Pasqualigo, ‘but they do believe in the Holy Sepulchre.’
Pasqualigo’s strong point was theology, and there were few persons in Jerusalem who on this head ventured to maintain an argument with him.
‘How do you know that the pilgrim is an Englishman?’ asked their host.
‘Because his servants told me so,’ said Pasqualigo.
‘He has got an English general for the principal officer of his household,’ said Barizy, ‘which looks like blood royal; a very fine man, who passes the whole day at the English consulate.’
‘They have taken a house in the Via Dolorosa,’ said Pasqualigo.
‘Of Hassan Nejed?’ continued Barizy of the Tower, clutching the words out of his rival’s grasp; ‘Hassan asked five thousand piastres per month, and they gave it. What think you of that?’
‘He must indeed be an Englishman,’ said Scheriff Effendi, taking his pipe slowly from his mouth. There was a dead silence when he spoke; he was much respected.
‘He is very young,’ said Barizy of the Tower; ‘younger than the Queen, which is one reason why he is not on the throne, for in England the eldest always succeeds, except in moveables, and those always go to the youngest.’
Barizy of the Tower, though he gave up to Pasqualigo in theology, partly from delicacy, being a Jew, would yield to no man in Jerusalem in his knowledge of law.