“Bear witness, O Roumi,” cried the aged official of the mosque. “Earnestly I seek permission to impart unto thee that knowledge which thou seekest;” and, taking from a niche in the wall a great golden goblet, filled to the brim with water, he placed it upon the little inlaid table in the centre of the sanctuary. Advancing to the altar, he took from it the crystal lamp and held it over the goblet. In his hand was a lump of yellow wax, and, uttering an incantation in a language unknown to me, save that the words abarkan (black), adhu (wind), and thamat’t’uth (woman), I distinguished as being in the Kabyle tongue, he presently melted the wax in the flame, and allowed the liquid drops to fall into the water. Breathless, and with eager eyes, he gazed into the bright goblet, watching each drop as it fell and hardened, until suddenly his contenance relaxed, and he ejaculated—
“Yes! Thou mayest know! The key to the Great Mystery may now be given into thy keeping.”
Casting the wax down, he replaced the lamp, for the ceremony was over. By the formation of the drops in the water, he had become convinced that he might, without harm accruing, divulge the secret locked in his heart. On putting the lamp back into its place, he took from the altar a crystal mirror, about a foot square, in a broad frame of solid gold, delicately chased. Placing it in my hands, he said—
“Breathe upon this; then tell me what thou seest.”
I dimmed the surface with my breath, as he had commanded, and, lo! in an instant there appeared a picture that entranced me.
“What seest thou?” he inquired.
“There is revealed unto me a landscape, strange and weird,” I answered. “By what magic is this effect produced?”
“Describe what is therein revealed,” he urged.
“I see the Desert at sunset,” I said. “The sky is ablaze, and against it there riseth from the sea of burning sand a single mountain, shaped like a camel’s hump. It is far distant, and growing purple in the evening hour, but I can distinguish upon its summit three giant palms. In its side there is apparently a cave.”
“And in the foreground?”