ri," retorted Francisco hotly, "I would
teach thee that which would prove anything but a blessing to thy
carcase, thou huge caitiff! I had thought better of thee than thou
didst deserve.--Go, thy bulky presence is distasteful."

"Wherein have I wronged you?" asked the Jew.

"Wronged me!" exclaimed Francisco, with rising wrath, "art thou not hand
and glove with the chief pirate? Thinkest thou that my eyes have lost
their power of vision?"

"Truly I am acquainted with the corsair, though the acquaintance was
none of my seeking," returned the Jew, "for, as I said before, traders
have dealings with many sorts of men; but I did not advise him to attack
you, and I could not hinder him."

"Scoundrel!" exclaimed the padrone, "couldst thou not restrain thine
hand when it knocked the senses out of my boy Mariano? Wouldst have me
believe that thy huge fists are not subject to thy villainous will, or
that they acted as they did by mere accident, instead of aiding to repel
the pirates?"

"I did it to save his life," replied Bacri, "and not only his, but your
own and the lives of all your men. I saw that Mariano was about to
prevail, and if he had slain the corsair chief, not one of you would
have been alive at this moment."

Francisco's wrath when roused was not readily appeased, nevertheless
this statement puzzled him so much that he remained silently gazing at
the Jew, from sheer inability to express his feelings.

"Listen," continued Bacri, drawing nearer, and speaking in a lower tone,
"the man into whose hands you have fallen is Sidi Hassan, one of the
most noted and daring of the pirates on the Barbary coast. Escape from
him is impossible. I know him well, and can assure you that your only
hope of receiving anything that deserves the title of good treatment
depends on your quiet and absolute subjection to his will. Rebellious
or even independent bearing will insure your speedy and severe
humiliation. We `dogs of Jews,'" continued Bacri, with a sad smile,
"may seem to you to hang our heads rather low sometimes, but I have seen
Christian men, as bold as you are, crawl upon the very dust before these
Turks of Algiers."

"Our fate, then," said Francisco, "is, I suppose, and as I half
suspected, to be slavery in that pirates' nest, Algiers?"

"I fear it is," replied the Jew, "unless Providence permits a storm to
set you free; but let me correct your notion of Algiers. A pirates'
nest it undoubtedly is, but there