"To-morrow we will have the hunt in better style than we could arrange it now were the boys able," said Selim, endeavoring to appease the young tyrant.
The prince and his escort moved away without deigning a reply
"It is best not to insist," said the eunuch. "A wise maxim I will give thee, my prince:—Beware of demanding the impossible—check back even the desire of it. The rule of the Janizary school is that the boys have rest after the water-test, and the Padishah would not allow even his own son to break it. I would train thee to self-command; for the time may come when thou shalt command the empire. Your brother, Aladdin, is mortal."
"So you always interfere with me. You hate me, Yusef; I know you do. I wish the boys had all been drowned in the river, and old Selim, and you too," cried the royal lad, giving way to an outburst of childish rage.
"Wait until thou canst get the bit between thy teeth before attempting to run thine own gait," coolly replied the old eunuch.
CHAPTER X.
Beyond the walls of the seraglio lay the royal hunting grounds. Many acres of the city were enclosed within high walls of clayey earth, packed into huge square blocks and dried in the sun; on the top and outside of which bristled a miniature abattis of prickly vines. Some parts of this park were adorned with every elegance that the art of landscape gardening could devise. In the summer season these portions were covered with floral beauties, interspersed with water-jets, which tossed the light silver balls like fairy jugglers; broad basins sparkling with gold fish; and walks leading to little kiosks and arbors. Even its winter shroud could not conceal from the imagination what must have been its living beauty in summer.
The greater part of this reserve was, however, left in its natural state. Gnarled old olive trees twisted themselves like huge serpents above the dense copses of elder and hazel bushes. Dusky balsams rose in pyramids, overtopped by the pines, which spread their branches like umbrellas. Here and there were open fields, encumbered with stinted underbrush, and either broken with out-cropping rocks, or smooth with strips of meadow land now white and glistening under the snow.