When they had regained their apartments the lordly Keferinis soon appeared, to offer them his congratulations on their return. The minister was peculiarly refined and mysterious this morning, especially with respect to the great event, which he involved in so much of obscurity, that, after much conversation, the travellers were as little acquainted with the occurrence as when they entered the courtyard of Gindarics.
‘The capture of a pasha’s harem is not water spilt on sand, lordly Keferinis,’ said the Emir. ‘We shall hear more of this.’
‘What we shall hear,’ replied Keferinis, ‘is entirely an affair of the future; nor is it in any way to be disputed that there are few men who do not find it more difficult to foretell what is to happen than to remember what has taken place.’
‘We sometimes find that memory is as rare a quality as prediction,’ said Tancred.
‘In England,’ replied the lordly Keferinis; ‘but it is never to be forgotten, and indeed, on the contrary, should be entirely recollected, that the English, being a new people, have nothing indeed which they can remember.’
Tancred bowed.
‘And how is the most gracious lady, Queen of queens?’ inquired Fakredeen.
‘The most gracious lady, Queen of queens,’ replied Keferinis, very mysteriously, ‘has at this time many thoughts.’
‘If she require any aid,’ said Fakredeen, ‘there is not a musket in Lebanon that is not at her service.’
Keferinis bent his head, and said, ‘It is not in any way to be disputed that there are subjects which require for their management the application of a certain degree of force, and the noble Emir of the Lebanon has expressed himself in that sense with the most exact propriety; there are also subjects which are regulated by the application of a certain number of words, provided they were well chosen, and distinguished by an inestimable exactitude. It does not by any means follow that from what has occurred there will be sanguinary encounters between the people of the gracious lady, Queen of queens, and those that dwell in plains and cities; nor can it be denied that war is a means by which many things are brought to a final conjuncture. At the same time courtesy has many charms, even for the Turks, though it is not to be denied, or in any way concealed, that a Turk, especially if he be a pasha, is, of all obscene and utter children of the devil, the most entirely contemptible and thoroughly to be execrated.’