in the way of doing his duty,
Haroun could have embraced him in the fulness of his satisfaction.

"But," said Haroun, to turn the conversation, "you have not yet told me
what good or ill-fortune you have met with on this expedition, nor what
ventures you are bringing back with you to Bagdad."

As Haroun said this, his eye rested upon the palanquin which was being
carried by the slaves, and Abdallah, noticing his glance, and guessing
that he was curious to learn something of the occupant, began as
follows:

THE ARAB MERCHANT'S STORY.

"Before setting out on the expedition from which we are now returning,
Ahmed and I consulted long as to the countries we should visit, and
what sort of goods it would be most profitable to bring back with us.
We at length agreed to journey through Egypt into the central parts of
Africa, and bring from thence some of those large and rare specimens of
precious stones of which we had often heard. And we did not doubt if
we could secure some of these that we should be able to dispose of them
to such advantage at the Court of the Caliph as at one stroke to make
our fortune.

"Having agreed upon this plan we purchased and took with us such
articles of merchandize as we judged would sell to the best advantage
in Egypt. In fact, on arriving at Cairo, we remained some time doing a
very profitable trade.

"At length, when the proper time of year came round for commencing our
journey into the interior, we provided ourselves with the articles most
likely to find favour with the natives, and after two months, during
which we travelled very slowly, and suffered many hardships, we reached
the country of a great nation or tribe of Ethiopians, at whose chief
town, Daarkol, we halted awhile, and did some trade by barter, but not
much, the people possessing few things of any value to us except small
quantities of gold dust.

"What we sought of them most eagerly was information concerning that
tribe of whom we had heard, in whose country were found the diamonds,
rubies, sapphires, and other precious stones, to obtain which was the
object of our journey.

"That tribe lived, it appeared, still several hundreds of miles further
up the country, but what annoyed us much more was the information that
they would exchange their precious stones for nothing else than ivory,
of the exact value of which they were very well acquainted.

"This altogether extinguished the hope with which we had started of
mak