her sect; and though he could find no flaw in her beauty, he insisted on
it that she was proud and ungracious, and incapable of winning any man's
love; only the child, little Mary--she, to be sure, was very fond of her.
It was no secret that even her uncle's wife, worthy Neforis, did not care
for her haughty niece and only suffered her to please the invalid. And
what business had a Melchite at Memphis, under the roof of a good
Jacobite? Every word the dragoman spoke breathed the scorn which a mean
and narrow-minded man is always ready to heap on those who share the
kindness of his own benefactors.

But this beautiful and lofty-looking daughter of a great man had
conquered the merchant's old heart, and his opinion of her was quite
unmoved by the Memphite's strictures. It was ere long confirmed indeed,
for Philip, the leech whom the guide had been to find, and whose
dignified personality inspired the Arab with confidence, was a daily
visitor to the governor, and he spoke of Paula as one of the most perfect
creatures that Heaven had ever formed in a happy hour. But the Almighty
seemed to have forgotten to care for his own masterpiece; for years her
life had been indeed a sad one.

The physician could promise the old man some mitigation of his
sufferings, and they liked each other so well that they parted the best
of friends, and not till a late hour.

CHAPTER III.

The Mukaukas' barge, urged forward by powerful rowers, made its way
smoothly down the river. On board there was whispering, and now and again
singing. Little Mary had dropped asleep on Paula's shoulder; the Greek
duenna gazed sometimes at the comet which filled her with terrors,
sometimes at Orion, whose handsome face had bewitched her mature heart,
and sometimes at the young girl whom she was ill-pleased to see thus
preferred by this favorite of the gods. It was a deliciously warm, still
night, and the moon, which makes the ocean swell and flow, stirs the tide
of feeling to rise in the human breast.

Whatever Paula asked for Orion sang, as though nothing was unknown to him
that had ever sounded on a Greek lute; and the longer they went on the
clearer and richer his voice grew, the more melting and seductive its
expression, and the more urgently it appealed to the young girl's heart.
Paula gave herself up to the sweet enchantment, and when he laid down the
lute and asked in low tones if his native land was not lovely on such a
night as this, or whic