“Mr Childers,” said the Pasha, sitting down on a cushion beside me, “I have managed it at last, though not without difficulty, but when a man wants to help an old school-mate in distress he is not easily put down. You have to thank Lancey for anything I have done for you. There is, it seems, to be an exchange of prisoners soon, and I have managed that you and Lancey shall be among the number. You must be ready to take the road to-morrow.”
I thanked the Pasha heartily, but expressed surprise that one in so exalted a position should have found difficulty in the matter.
“Exalted!” he exclaimed, with a look of scorn, “I’m so exalted as to have very narrowly missed having my head cut off. Bah! there is no gratitude in a Turk—at least in a Turkish grandee.”
I ventured to suggest that the Pasha was in his own person a flat—or rather sturdy—contradiction of his own words, but he only grinned as he bowed, being too much in earnest to smile.
“Do you forget,” he continued, “that I am in disgrace? I have served the Turk faithfully all my life, and now I am shelved at the very time my services might be of use, because the Sultan is swayed by a set of rascals who are jealous of me! And is it not the same with better men than myself? Look at Mehemet Ali, our late commander-in-chief, deposed from office by men who had not the power to judge of his capacities—for what? Did he not say with his own lips, to one of your own correspondents, that although he had embraced the religion of Mohammed they never could forget or forgive the fact that he was not born a Turk, but regarded him as a Giaour in disguise; that his elevation to power excited secret discontent among the Pashas, which I know to be true; that another Pasha thwarted instead of aiding him, while yet another was sent to act the spy on him. Is not this shameful jealousy amongst our leaders, at a time when all should have been united for the common weal, well known to have operated disastrously in other cases? Did not Osman Pasha admit as much, when he complained bitterly, after the fall of Plevna, that he had not been properly supported? Our rank and file are lions in the field—though I cannot allow that they are lambs anywhere else—but as for our— Bah! I have said enough. Besides, to tell you the truth, I am tired of the Turks, and hate them.”
Here my servant interrupted the Pasha with a coolness and familiarity that amused me much.
“Sandy,” said he, with a disapproving shake of the head, “you oughtn’t to go an’ speak like that of your hadopted nation.”
The Pasha’s indignation vanished at once. He turned to Lancey with a curious twinkle in his eye.
“But, my good fellow,” he said, “it isn’t my hadopted nation. When I came here a poor homeless wanderer the Turks adopted me, not I them, because they found me useful.”
“That,” returned Lancey, “should ’ave called hout your gratitood.”