anchor in bay of Algiers.
I gits leave go ashore wi' tothers, runs right away to our Dey, who
gits awrful waxy, sends for Breetish cap'n, 'splain that I's the son of
a Turk by a Algerine moder an' wery nigh or'er the cap'n's head to be
cutted off."

"You don't say so?"

"Yis, it's troo. Wery near declare war with England acause of that,"
said Ali, with an air of importance. "But the Breetish consul he
interfere, goes down on hims knees, an' beg the Dey for to parding hims
nation."

"He must ha' bin a cowardly feller, that consul!"

"No," said the interpreter sternly, "him's not coward. Him was my
master, Kurnil Langley, an' only do the right ting: humbil hisself to
our Dey w'en hims contry do wrong.--Now, here we is comin' to
Bab-el-Oued, that means the Water-gate in yoor lingo, w'ere the peepils
hold palaver."

This in truth appeared to be the case, for many of the chief men of the
city were seated under and near the gate, as the two drew near, smoking
their pipes and gossiping in the orthodox Eastern style.

The big Irishman attracted a good deal of notice as he passed through
the gates; but Turks are grave and polite by nature: no one interrupted
him or made audible comments upon his somewhat wild and unusual
appearance.

Passing onwards, they entered the town and traversed the main street
towards the Bab-Azoun gate, which Ali explained to his companion was the
Gate of Tears, and the place of public execution.

Here they came suddenly on the body of a man, the feet and limbs of
which were dreadfully mangled, showing that the miserable wretch had
perished under the bastinado.

At the time we write of, and indeed at all times during Turkish rule,
human life was held very cheap. For the slightest offences, or
sometimes at the mere caprice of those in power, men were taken up and
bastinadoed in the open streets until they died from sheer agony, and
their relations did not dare to remove the bodies for burial until their
tyrants had left the scene. Cruelty became almost the second nature of
the people. Theft was checked by the amputation of the first joint of
the fore-finger of the right hand for the first offence. For the
second, the whole hand was sacrificed, and for the third, the head
itself was forfeited. Sometimes, in cases of capital punishment,
decapitation was performed by degrees! and other refinements too
horrible to mention were constantly practised.

While the interpreter was explaining