that
ye should a know'd me at all, at all."

"I did not know you until you spoke," rejoined Jim. "Then I couldn't
doubt that it was you who stood before me, when I heard our father's
broad Scotch, our mother's Irish brogue, and the talk of the cockneys
amongst whom your earliest days were passed, all mingled together."

"You see, Master Colly," said Bill, turning to the young Scotchman, "my
brother Jim has had the advantage of being twelve years younger than I;
and when he was old enough to go to school, I was doing something to
help kape him there, and for all that I believe he is plased to see me."

"Pleased to see you!" exclaimed Jim. "Of course I am."

"I'm sure av it," said Bill. "Well, then, brother, go ahead, an' spin
us your yarn."

"I have no one yarn to spin," replied Jim, "for a narrative of my
adventures in the desert would consist of a thousand yarns, each giving
a description of some severe suffering or disappointment. I can only
tell you that it seems to me that I have passed many years in travelling
through the sands of the Saara, years in cultivating barley on its
borders, years in digging wells, and years in attending flocks of goats,
sheep, and other animals. I have had many masters, all bad, and some
worse, and I have had many cruel disappointments about regaining my
liberty. I was once within a single day's journey of Mogador; and was
then sold again and carried back into the very heart of the desert. I
have attempted two or three times to escape; but was recaptured each
time, and nearly killed for the unpardonable dishonesty of trying to rob
my master of my own person. I have often been tempted to commit
suicide; but a sort of womanly curiosity and stubbornness has prevented
me. I wished to see how long Fortune would persecute me; and I was
determined not to thwart her plans by putting myself beyond their reach.
I did not like to give in: for anyone who tries to escape from trouble
by killing himself shows that he has come off sadly worsted in the war
of life."

"You are quite right," said Harry Blount; "but I hope that your hardest
battles in that war are now over. Our masters have promised to carry us
to some place where we may be ransomed by our countrymen, and you of
course will be taken along with us."

"Do not flatter yourselves with that hope," said Jim. "I was amused
with it for several years. Every master I have had gave me the same
promise, and here I am yet. I did th