“Ah, you are young,” exclaimed Benonia, with enthusiasm. “Glorious youth! By youth have all great deeds been accomplished. Ransack the history of ages. The fact is stamped on every line. The Trojan, Paris, was but a youth when he ran away with the fair Grecian, and got his native town destroyed for it ten years after! Cæsar was in the freshness of life when he destroyed the Republic and founded a despotism. Nero developed his villany early, and Heliogabalus was a confirmed glutton before his minority was over! Nay, to come to our own country, what was the age of the Boy Jones when he passed the sacred precincts of a Royal palace, and stood where none but Royal feet had ever trod before?—Barely sixteen! Look at Lord William Lennox—how young he was when he wrote his great works!”
Benonia paused. De Tankard dropped a warm and sparkling tear. “I will start to the East to-morrow!” he exclaimed.
“You had better have a couple of millions,” said Benonia. “I have got about half-a-dozen in my pocket to carry me over the night.”
* * * * *
Chapter XLVIII.
Silence reigns beneath the brilliant azure of an Oriental sky;—silence, broken only by the silver tinkling of the camel’s bell. A noble creature is the camel. Compared with that Caucasian of beasts, the shapeless quadruped of the Northern, is but an ass!
Ever and anon, through the moist perfumed twilight, steals a delicious breeze. Delicious, but melancholy. For in that breeze floats a prophet’s sigh. The cypress moans as it passes; and the palm-tree bows its proud head in honour to it, as it flies along! On the holy barrenness of the saintly brow of Lebanon, the moon’s rays fall reverently, and Lebanon looks holier under their light.
In the court in front of the counting-house of an Emir, sits De Tankard. From among the round pebbles of the pavement, springs a fresh fountain. On the branches of the trees gleam ripe oranges.
The young man looked sad and solemn. He had that morning seen an angel, as usual! By his side was a lovely female, and near him the lively young Emir Baboo smoked his nargilly.
“Do you often see angels, De Tankard?” he asked, laughing.