e stone, which I
placed upon another as a memorial, I made the following vow: 'O Ali, if
thou wilt grant to thy humblest and most abject of slaves the pleasure
of reaching my home in safety, I will, on arrival, kill a sheep, and
make a pilau for my friends and family.'

Traversing the outskirts of the city with a beating heart, every spot
was restored to my memory, and I threaded my way through the long
vaulted bazaars and intricate streets without missing a single turn,
until I found myself standing opposite both my father's shop and the
well-known gate of the caravanserai.

The door of the former was closed, and nothing was stirring around
it that indicated business. I paused a long time before I ventured to
proceed, for I looked upon this first aspect of things as portentous
of evil; but recollecting myself, I remembered that it was the
_Sheb-i-Jumah_, the Friday eve, and that probably my father, in his old
age, had grown to be too scrupulous a Mussulman to work during those
hours which true believers ought to keep holy.

However, the caravanserai was open, and presented the same scene to my
eyes which it had done ever since I had known it. Bales of goods heaped
up in lots, intermixed with mules, camels, and their drivers. Groups of
men in various costumes, some seated, some in close conversation, others
gazing carelessly about, and others again coming and going in haste,
with faces full of care and calculation. I looked about for the friend
of my boy-hood the capiji, and almost began to fear that he too had
closed his door, when I perceived his well-known figure crawling quietly
along with his earthen water-pipe, seeking his bit of charcoal wherewith
to light it.

His head had sunk considerably between his shoulders, and reclined more
upon his breast since last I had seen him; and the additional bend in
his knees showed that the passing years had kept a steady reckoning with
him.

'It is old Ali Mohamed,' said I, as I stepped up towards him. 'I should
know that crooked nose of his from a thousand, so often have I clipped
the whisker that grows under it.'

When I accosted him with the usual salutation of peace, he kept on
trimming his pipe, without even looking up, so much accustomed was he
to be spoken to by strangers; but when I said, 'Do not you recognize me,
Ali Mohamed?' he turned up his old bloodshot eye at me, and pronounced
'Friend! a caravanserai is a picture of the world; men come in and go
out of i