w much money would, we wonder,
induce them to return to Africa without ever having seen their homes?
Judging from their faces, we should think the world would not be
sufficient, not even to induce them to return to Bagamoyo. What bright,
joyous faces they wore! What flashing eyes! Men turned round in the
streets to look at them, and talked to their companions, with smiles,
about their looks. They saw several whom they knew, but they were too
impatient, so near home, to stop to talk to any one, and they paced
determinedly towards home; they passed the Arab, the Hindoo, the Negro
quarter; crossed the bridge, and were among the gardens of the rich
Arabs. Once outside the city, the capital of the island, they broke
into a run; but as they drew near their homes they sobered down, became
exceedingly agitated, and pale in the face.

Abdullah suddenly shouted, "There, Selim, is my home! As thou hast to
pass it, come with me."

Selim consented, and accompanied his friend to the door, gave him one
last embrace, bade him come round and see him soon; and then bounded off
towards his own stately mansion, accompanied by Simba, Moto, and Niani.

He saw the mangoe trees, the orange-groves, the cinnamon and the slender
clove trees. Soon he saw the house itself, looming large and white
between the trees; he saw the latticed windows, which he had often
pictured to himself in the depths of the African wilderness; he saw the
cupola of the Arab temple, which his father, Amer, had erected; he saw
the walls of the courtyard; he cast one glance at the blue sea, and the
spot consecrated by happy associations, where his father and kinsmen had
often sat, gazing upon the sea; and then burst through the door of the
courtyard, dashed breathlessly across it, and through the great carved
door of the mansion, up the stairs, and into the harem, where he saw a
woman seated on the divan, near the lattice, looking out. One
penetrating glance assured him that she was Amina, his mother! She
looked up and saw her son, Selim! returned to her heart and love! from
Negro-land.

Let us drop a kindly veil over the solemn and affecting meeting of
mother and son, feeling assured that the joy of both was indescribable;
that they interchanged the most endearing phrases; that they embraced
each other as loving mother and loving son, long parted, would; that
while he sat by her side he poured into her ears the sad tale of woe,
bereavement, suffering, privatio