Then straightening in my hands the rippled length
Of all my tresses, slowly one by one,
I took the flowers out.—Dear one, in thy strength
Pray for my weakness. Thou hast seen the sun
Large in the setting, drive a column of light
Down through the darkness: so, within death's night,
O my beloved, when I shall have gone,
If it might be so, would my love burn on.
From Household Words
THE MODERN HAROUN-AL-RASCHID.
In the district of Ferdj' Onah (which signifies Fine Country), Algeria, lives a Scheik named Bou-Akas-ben-Achour. He is also distinguished by the surname of Bou-Djenoni (the Man of the Knife), and may be regarded as a type of the eastern Arab. His ancestors conquered Ferdj' Onah, but he has been forced to acknowledge the supremacy of France, by paying a yearly tribute of 80,000 francs. His dominion extends from Milah to Rabouah, and from the southern point of Babour to within two leagues of Gigelli. He is forty-nine years old, and wears the Rahyle costume; that is to say, a woollen gandoura, confined by a leathern belt. He carries a pair of pistols in his girdle, by his side the Rahyle flissa, and suspended from his neck a small black knife.
Before him walks a negro carrying his gun, and a huge greyhound bounds along by his side. He holds despotic sway over twelve tribes; and should any neighboring people venture to make an incursion on his territory, Bou-Akas seldom condescends to march against them in person, but sends his negro into the principal village. This envoy just displays the gun of Bou-Akas, and the injury is instantly repaired.
He keeps in pay two or three hundred Tolbas to read the Koran to the people; every pilgrim going to Mecca, and passing through Ferdj' Onah, receives three francs, and may remain as long as he pleases to enjoy the hospitality of Bou-Akas. But whenever the Scheik discovers that he has been deceived by a pretended pilgrim, he immediately dispatches emissaries after the impostor; who, wherever he is, find him, throw him down, and give him fifty blows on the soles of his feet.
Bou-Akas sometimes entertains three hundred persons at dinner; but instead of sharing their repast, he walks round the tables with a baton in his hand, seeing that the servants attend properly to his guests. Afterwards, if any thing is left, he eats; but not until the others have finished.
When the governor of Constantinople, the only man whose power he recognizes, sends him a traveller; according to the rank of the latter, or the nature of the recommendation Bou-Akas gives him his gun, his dog, or his knife. If the gun, the traveller takes it on his shoulder; if the dog, he leads it in a leash; or if the knife, he hangs it round his neck: and with any one of these potent talismans, of which each bears its own degree of honor, the stranger passes through the region of the twelve tribes, not only unscathed, but as the guest of Bou-Akas, treated with the utmost hospitality. When the traveller is about to leave Ferdj' Onah, he consigns the knife, the dog, or the gun to the care of the first Arab he meets. If the Arab is hunting, he leaves the chase; if laboring in the field, he leaves his plough; and, taking the precious deposit, hastens to restore it to the Bou-Akas.
The black-handled knife is so well known, that it has given the surname of "Bou-Djenoni, the man of the knife," to its owner. With this implement he is accustomed to cut off heads, whenever he takes a fancy to perform that agreeable office with his own hand.