d my duty forbids
me to speak further."

For some minutes they were both silent, when Amine resumed--

"You were so anxious to possess that relic, that I cannot help
thinking it has connection with the mystery. Is it not so?"

"For the last time, Amine, I will answer your question--it has to do
with it: but now no more."

Philip's blunt and almost rude manner of finishing his speech was not
lost upon Amine, who replied,

"You are so engrossed with other thoughts, that you have not felt the
compliment shown you by my taking such interest about you, sir."

"Yes, I do--I feel and thank you too, Amine. Forgive me, if I have
been rude; but recollect, the secret is not mine--at least, I feel as
if it were not. God knows, I wish I never had known it, for it has
blasted all my hopes in life."

Philip was silent; and when he raised his eyes, he found that Amine's
were fixed upon him.

"Would you read my thoughts, Amine, or my secret?"

"Your thoughts perhaps--your secret I would not; yet do I grieve
that it should oppress you so heavily as evidently it does. It must,
indeed, be one of awe to bear down a mind like yours, Philip."

"Where did you learn to be so brave, Amine?" said Philip, changing the
conversation.

"Circumstances make people brave or otherwise; those who are
accustomed to difficulty and danger fear them not."

"And where have you met with them, Amine?"

"In the country where I was born, not in this dank and muddy land."

"Will you trust me with the story of your former life, Amine? I can be
secret, if you wish."

"That you can be secret perhaps, against my wish, you have already
proved to me," replied Amine, smiling; "and you have a claim to know
something of the life you have preserved. I cannot tell you much, but
what I can will be sufficient. My father, when a lad on board of a
trading vessel, was taken by the Moors, and sold as a slave to a
Hakim, or physician, of their country. Finding him very intelligent,
the Moor brought him up as an assistant, and it was under this man
that he obtained a knowledge of the art. In a few years he was equal
to his master; but, as a slave, he worked not for himself. You know,
indeed it cannot be concealed, my father's avarice. He sighed to
become as wealthy as his master, and to obtain his freedom; he became
a follower of Mahomet, after which he was free, and practised for
himself. He took a wife from an Arab family, the daughter of a chief
whom he had res