Tancred - Benjamin Disraeli (little readers txt) 📗

who, from soup to coffee, from egg to apple, will tell anecdotes, indulge in jests, or, in a tone of levity approaching to jesting, pour forth garrulous secret history with which everyone is acquainted, and never say a single thing which is new that is not coolly invented for the occasion.

The princes of the Houses of Shehaab, Kais, and Assaad, and Abdullah, the Habeish and the Eldadah, the great Houses of the Druses, the Djinblat and the Yezbek, the Abuneked, the Talhook, and the Abdel-Malek, were not of this school. Silently, determinedly, unceasing, unsatiated, they proceeded with the great enterprise on which they had embarked. If the two nations were indeed to be united, and form a great whole under the sceptre of a Shehaab, let not this banquet pass like the hypocritical hospitality of ordinary life, where men offer what they desire not to be accepted by those who have no wish to receive. This, on the contrary, was a real repast, a thing to be remembered. Practice made the guests accustomed to the porcelain of Paris and the goblets of Prague. Many was the goodly slice of wild boar, succeeded by the rich flesh of the gazelle, of which they disposed. There were also wood-pigeons, partridges, which the falconers had brought down, and quails from the wilderness. At length they called again for rice, a custom which intimated that their appetite for meat was satisfied, and immediately Nubian slaves covered them with towels of fine linen fringed with gold, and, while they held their hands over the basin, poured sweet waters from the ewer.

In the meantime, Butros Keramy opened his heart to Rafael Farah.

'I begin,' said Butros, quaffing a cup of the Vino d'Oro, 'to believe in nationality.'

'It cannot be denied,' said Rafael Farah, judiciously shaking his head, 'that the two nations were once under the same prince. If the great powers would agree to a Shehaab, and we could sometimes meet together in the present fashion, there is no saying, prejudices might wear off.'

'Shall it ever be said that I am of the same nation as Hamood Abuneked?' said Butros.

'Ah! it is very dreadful,' said Rafael; 'a man who has burned convents!'

'And who has five hundred Maronite horns in his castle,' said Butros.

'But suppose he restores them?' said Francis El Kazin.

'That would make a difference,' said Rafael Farah.

'There can be no difference while he lives,' said Butros.

'I fear 'tis an affair of blood,' said Rafael Farah.

'Taking horns was never an affair of blood,' said Francis El Kazin.

'What should be an affair of blood,' said Butros, 'if----'

'But nothing else but taking horns can be proved,' said Francis El Kazin.

'There is a good deal in that!' said Rafael Farah.

After confectionery which had been prepared by nuns, and strong waters which had been distilled by the hands of priors, the chieftains praised God, and rose, and took their seats on the divan, when immediately advanced a crowd of slaves, each bearing a nargileh, which they presented to the guests. Then gradually the conversation commenced. It was entirely confined to the exploits of the day, which had been rich in the heroic feats of forest huntsmen. There had been wild boars, too, as brave as their destroyers; some slight wounds, some narrow escapes. Sheikh Said Djinblat inquired of Lord Montacute whether there were hyenas in England, but was immediately answered by the lively and well-informed Kais Shehaab, who apprised him that there were only lions and unicorns. Bishop Nicodemus, who watched the current of observations, began telling hunting stories of the time of the Emir Bescheer, when that prince resided at his splendid castle of Bteddeen, near Deir el Kamar. This was to recall the days when the mountain had only one ruler, and that ruler a Shehaab, and when the Druse lords were proud to be classed among his most faithful subjects.

In the meantime smoking had commenced throughout the castle, but this did not prevent the smokers from drinking raki as well as the sober juice of Mocha. Four hundred men, armed with nargileh or chibouque, inhaling and puffing with that ardour and enjoyment which men, after a hard day's hunting, and a repast of unusual solidity, can alone experience! Without the walls, almost as many individuals were feasting in the open air; brandishing their handjars as they cut up the huge masses of meat before them, plunging their eager hands into the enormous dishes of rice, and slaking their thirst by emptying at a draught a vase of water, which they poured aloft as the Italians would a flask of wine or oil.

'And the most curious thing,' said Freeman to Trueman, as they established themselves under a pine tree, with an ample portion of roast meat, and armed with their traveling knives and forks, 'and the most curious thing is, that they say these people are Christians! Who ever heard of Christians wearing turbans?'

'Or eating without knives and forks?' added True-man.

'It would astonish their weak minds in the steward's room at Bellamont, if they could see all this, John,' said Mr. Freeman, pensively. 'A man who travels has very great advantages.'

'And very great hardships too,' said Trueman. 'I don't care for work, but I do like to have my meals regular.'

'This is not bad picking, though,' said Mr. Freeman; 'they call it gazelle, which I suppose is the foreign for venison.'

'If you called this venison at Bellamont,' said Trueman, 'they would look very queer in the steward's room.'

'Bellamont is Bellamont, and this place is this place, John,' said Mr. Freeman. 'The Hameer is a noble gentleman, every inch of him, and I am very glad my lord has got a companion of his own kidney. It is much better than monks and hermits, and low people of that sort, who are not by no means fit company for somebody I could mention, and might turn him into a papist into the bargain.'

'That would be a bad business,' said Trueman; 'my lady could never abide that. It would be better that he should turn Turk.'

'I am not sure it wouldn't,' said Mr. Freeman. 'It would be in a manner more constitutional. The Sultan of Turkey may send an Ambassador to our Queen, but the Pope of Rome may not.'

'I should not like to turn Turk,' said Trueman, very thoughtfully.

'I know what you are thinking of, John,' said Mr. Freeman, in a serious tone. 'You are thinking, if anything were to happen to either of us in this heathen land, where we should get Christian burial.'

'Lord love you, Mr. Freeman, no, I wasn't. I was thinking of a glass of ale.'

'Ah!' sighed Freeman, 'it softens the heart to think of such things away from home, as we are. Do you know, John, there are times when I feel very queer, there are indeed. I catched myself a singing "Sweet Home" one night, among those savages in the wilderness. One wants consolation, John, sometimes, one does, indeed; and, for my part, I do miss the family prayers and the home-brewed.'

As the twilight died away, they lighted immense bonfires, as well to cheer them during their bivouac, as to deter any adventurous panther, stimulated by the savoury odours, or hyena, breathing fraternal revenge, from reconnoitring their encampment. By degrees, however, the noise of the revellers without subsided, and at length died away. Having satisfied their hunger, and smoked their chibouques, often made from the branch which they had cut since their return from hunting, with the bud still alive upon the fresh green tube, they wrapped themselves in their cloaks and sheepskins, and sunk into a deep and well-earned repose.

Within, the Sheikhs and mookatadgis gradually, by no means simultaneously, followed their example. Some, taking off their turbans and loosening their girdles, ensconced themselves under the arcades, lying on their carpets, and covered with their pelisses and cloaks; some strolled into the divaned chambers, which were open to all, and more comfortably stowed themselves upon the well-stuffed cushions; others, overcome with fatigue and their revel, were lying in deep sleep, outstretched in the open court, and picturesque in the blazing moonlight.

The hunting party was to last three days, and few intended to leave Canobia on the morrow; but it must not be supposed that the guests experienced any very unusual hardships in what the reader may consider a far from satisfactory mode of passing their night. To say nothing of the warm and benignant climate, the Easterns have not the custom of retiring or rising with the formality of the Occidental nations. They take their sleep when they require it, and meet its embrace without preparation. One cause of this difference undoubtedly is, that the Orientals do not connect the business of the toilet with that of rest. The daily bath, with its elaborate processes, is the spot where the mind ponders on the colour of a robe or the fashion of a turban; the daily bath, which is the principal incident of Oriental habits, and which can scarcely be said to exist among our own.

Fakredeen had yielded even his own chambers to his friends. Every divan in Canobia was open, excepting the rooms of Tancred. These were sacred, and the Emir had requested his friend to receive him as a guest during the festival, and apportion him one of his chambers. The head of the House of Talhook was asleep with the tube of his nargileh in his mouth; the Yezbek had unwound his turban, cast off his sandals, wrapped himself in his pelisses, and fairly turned in; Bishop Nicodemus was kneeling in a corner and kissing a silver cross; and Hamood Abu-neked had rolled himself up in a carpet, and was snoring as if he were blowing through one of the horns of the Maronites. Fakredeen shot a glance at Tancred, instantly recognised. Then, rising and giving the salaam of peace to his guests, the Emir and his English friend made their escape down a corridor, at the bottom of which was one of the few doors that could be found in the castle of Canobia. Baroni received them, on the watch lest some cruising Sheikh should appropriate their resting-place. The young-moon, almost as young and bright as it was two months before at Gaza, suffused with lustre the beautiful garden of fruit and flowers without. Under the balcony, Baroni had placed a divan with many cushions, a lamp with burning coffee, and some fresh nargilehs.

'Thank God, we are alone!' exclaimed Fakredeen. 'Tell me, my Tancred, what do you think of it all?'


CHAPTER XLIV.


Fakredeen's Debts


IT HAS been a great day,' said Tancred 'not to be forgotten.'

'Yes; but what do you think of them? Are they the fellows I described; the men that might conquer the world?'

'To conquer the world depends on men not only being good soldiers, but being animated by some sovereign principle that nothing can resist,' replied Tancred.

'But that we have got,' rejoined Fakredeen.

'But have they got it?'

'We can give it to them.'

'I am not so sure of that. It seems to me that we are going to establish a theocratic equality by the aid of the feudal system.'

'That is to say, their present system,' replied Fakredeen. 'Islamism was propagated by men who were previously idolaters, and our principle may be established by those whose practice at the present time is directly opposed to it.'

'I still cling to my first idea of making the movement from the desert,' said Tancred: 'the Arabians are entirely unsophisticated;