One evening, according to my usual wont since I had become wayward and moody, alone (as Callum was on guard), but accoutred with my claymore, dirk, and loaded revolver (for in this district nobody ventures abroad unarmed), I wandered beyond the walls of Rodosdchig, to a grove of cypresses, where the wild grapes grew in luxuriance, and where I could pluck them with the dew of evening on their purple clusters. A little farther on lay one of those quiet Mohammedan cemeteries which are so poetically named by the Orientals the Cities of the Silent. There the ghost of each true Believer is supposed by the superstitious to sit invisibly at the head of its own grave.
Near this burial-place were the ruins of what had been an old Greek hermitage, in the days when poor anchorites 'sought to merit heaven' by drinking cold water and chewing dry peas.
On this evening the City of the Silent rang with the merry voices of a group of Turkish ladies. Clad in bright-coloured dresses, they were sitting on carpets, among the green resting places, drinking sherbet, eating bon-bons, and smoking pretty little chibouques, while a few slaves and sullen eunuchs hovered near them in attendance. As I passed these veiled fair ones, I heard a few shrill exclamations of wonder, while their dark rolling eyes seemed to sparkle with peculiar lustre through the holes in their snow-white yashmacks.
On the verge of this cemetery, and apart from the group, I passed a solitary lady, who was culling a bouquet of flowers from among the turbanned headstones; and who, in pursuit of this innocent object, had wandered to some distance from her companions. Attracted by the singular grace which pervaded all her actions, I hovered near her, and affected to read the epitaphs gilded on the marble tombs; but perceiving that her bracelet—which was composed of those magnificent opals which dart fire, and by the Orientals are believed to be found only where thunder has fallen—was lying on the grass, I hastened to restore it, and to clasp it on her wrist. With a hurried bow, and a sweet smile sparkling in her eyes, she permitted me to perform this little act; and while doing so, I was charmed by the delicate beauty of her arm and gloveless hand.
The bracelet was clasped, and I was on the point of touching my cap and retiring, when, either by accident or design—from all I knew of Turkish wives, I half suspected the latter—her bouquet fell from her hand, and the flowers were scattered about her.
'Mashallah!' she exclaimed, and laughed.
Though I knew well that if seen near her, or with her, a dose of bamboo-canes or a bullet, perhaps, might repay my temerity, I deliberately gathered up the flowers, and tieing them with a ribbon, presented them to her, with a few Turkish compliments, and begged permission to retain a rose, as a gift from her.
She at once accorded it, giving me, at the same time, a full, deep, and piercing glance through the square opening of her yashmack.
Oh, those speaking eyes! How well this woman knew their dangerous power!
I see them yet in imagination, for heaven never created aught more beautiful than the eyes of this Turkish damsel. She touched my hand slightly, and said, while casting a hurried glance about her,