After we were settled, and the sheikh’s cachinnations had ceased, he clapped his hands; on which one black damsel brought him in his hookah, while another appeared with a piece of charcoal to light it. He did not, however, hand us his pipe.
“You are hungry, strangers,” he next observed.
“Yes, indeed we are, and very thirsty too,” said Halliday, who had not attempted to speak till now.
“I forgot,” said the sheikh; and calling to the black damsels, he ordered them to bring us food and water. In a short time one of them returned with a large bowl of couscoussu, a sort of porridge made of wheat beaten into powder. We had our fingers only to eat it with.
“Set to, strangers,” said the sheikh, nodding; but he took none of the food himself.
“It is not bad stuff when a fellow is hungry,” observed Halliday, stuffing the porridge into his mouth as fast as he could lift it with his fingers; “but it’s very flavourless; I wish we had some salt to put into it.”
“So do I, for more reasons than one,” I answered. “I do not quite like the appearance of things.”
“But he seems to be a pretty good-natured kind of fellow; perhaps he does not know we like our food salted,” said Halliday.
“We must take people as we find them; and I hope he has not omitted the salt intentionally, though I suspect he has not made up his mind whether to trust us or not,” I observed.
We all did justice to the sheikh’s couscoussu, however; for, notwithstanding its want of salt, we had eaten no food so wholesome since we were on board the Spanish ship. Another girl next brought in an earthen jar of water, which we in a few minutes completely emptied.