The western portion of this province has been for many years, and probably still is, the camping-ground of the powerful and warlike tribe of the “Sons of Ali”; a branch of which tribe, acknowledging as its chief Sheik Sâleh el-Ghazy, occupied the encampment above referred to.[[1]]
The evening was calm and still, and lovely as childhood’s sleep: no sound of rolling wheel, or distant anvil, or busy mill, or of the thousand other accessories of human labour, intruded harshly on the ear. Within the encampment there was indeed the “watch-dog’s honest bark,” the voices of women and children, mingled with the deeper tones of the evening prayer uttered by many a robed figure worshipping towards the east, but beyond it nought was to be heard save the tinkling of the bells of the home-coming flocks, and the soft western breeze whispering among the branches of the graceful palms its joy at having passed the regions of dreary sand. It seemed as if Nature herself were about to slumber, and were inviting man to share her rest.
In front of his tent sat Sheik Sâleh, on a Turkish carpet, smoking his pipe in apparent forgetfulness that his left arm was bandaged and supported by a sling.
At a little distance from him were his two favourite mares, each with a foal at her side, and farther off two or three score of goats, tethered in line to a kels,[[2]] surrendering their milky stock to the expert fingers of two of the inmates of the Sheik’s harem; beyond these, several hundred sheep were taking their last nibble at the short herbs freshened by the evening dew; while in the distance might be seen a string of camels wending their slow and ungainly way homeward from the edge of the desert: the foremost ridden by an urchin not twelve years old, carolling at the utmost stretch of his lungs an ancient Arab ditty addressed by some despairing lover to the gazelle-eyes of his mistress.
The Sheik sat listlessly, allowing his eyes to wander over these familiar objects, and to rest on the golden clouds beyond, which crowned the distant sandhills of the Libyan desert. The neglected pipe was thrown across his knee, and he was insensibly yielding to the slumberous influence of the hour, when his repose was suddenly disturbed by the sound of voices in high altercation, and a few minutes afterwards his son Hassan, a lad nearly sixteen years of age, stood before him, his countenance bearing the traces of recent and still unsubdued passion, while the blood trickled down his cheek.
Although scarcely emerged from boyhood, his height, the breadth of his chest, and the muscular development of his limbs gave the impression of his being two or three years older than he really was; in dress he differed in no wise from the other Arab lads in the encampment, nor did his complexion vary much from theirs—bronzed by constant exposure to weather and sun; his eyes were not like those of the Arab race in general—rather small, piercing, and deep-set—but remarkably large, dark, and expressive, shaded by lashes of unusual length; a high forehead, a nose rather Greek than Roman in its outline, and a mouth expressive of frank mirth or settled determination, according to the mood of the hour, completed the features of a countenance which, though eminently handsome, it was difficult to assign to any particular country or race. Such was the youth who now stood before his father, his breast still heaving with indignation.
“What has happened, my son?” said the Sheik; “whence this anger, and this blood on your cheek?”
“Son!” repeated the youth, in a tone in which passion was mingled with irony.
“Whence this blood?” again demanded the Sheik, surprised at an emotion such as he had never before witnessed in the youth.
“They say it is the blood of a bastard,” replied Hassan, his dark eye gleaming with renewed indignation.