s
that."

"If I am not mistaken, it was Alessandria!"

"Alessandria!" cried the sheik. "It was my son! Where is he living? Did
you not say that he was called Kairam? Has he dark eyes and brown
hair?"

"He has, and in confidential moods he called himself Kairam, and not
Almansor."

"But, Allah! Allah! Yet, tell me: his father bought him before your
eyes, you said. Did he say it was his father? Is he not my son!"

The slave answered: "He said to me: 'Allah be praised; after so long a
period of misfortune, there is the market-place of my native city.'
After a while, a distinguished-looking man came around the corner, at
whose appearance Almansor cried: 'Oh, what a blessed gift of heaven are
one's eyes! I see once more my revered father!' The man walked up to
us, examined this and that one, and finally bought him to whom all this
had happened; whereupon he praised Allah, and whispered to me. 'Now I
shall return to the halls of fortune; it is my own father that has
bought me.'"

"Then it was not my son, my Kairam!" exclaimed the sheik in a tone of
anguish.

The young slave could no longer restrain himself. Tears of joy sprang
into his eyes; he prostrated himself before the sheik, and said: "And
yet it is your son, Kairam Almansor; for you are the one who bought
him!"

"Allah! Allah! A wonder, a miracle!" cried those present, as they
crowded closer. But the sheik stood speechless, staring at the young
man, who turned his handsome face up to him. "My friend Mustapha!" said
the sheik at last to the old man, "before my eyes hangs a veil of tears
so that I cannot see whether the features of his mother, which my
Kairam bare, are graven on the face of this young man. Come closer and
look at him!"

The old dervish stepped up, examined the features of the young man
carefully, and laying his hand on the forehead of the youth, said:
"Kairam, what was the proverb I taught you on that sad day in the camp
of the Franks?"

"My dear master!" answered the young man, as he drew the hand of the
dervish to his lips, "it ran thus: _So that one loves Allah, and has a
clear conscience, he will not be alone in the wilderness of woe, but
will have two companions to comfort him constantly at his side._"

The old man raised his eyes gratefully to heaven, drew the young man to
his breast, and then gave him to the sheik, saying: "Take him to your
bosom; as surely as you have sorrowed for him these ten years, so
surely is he your son!"