hin doors, we are told, nor did he once dine out of the Hermitage.
Even his hair, a fantastic fatuity behind a push-cart, he did not take
the trouble to cut or trim. It must have helped his business. But this
constancy, never before sustained to such a degree, must soon cease,
having laid up, thanks to his push-cart and the people of the Bronx,
enough to carry him, not only to Baalbek, but to _Aymakanenkan_.

CHAPTER III

THE FALSE DAWN

What the Arabs always said of Andalusia, Khalid and Shakib said
once of America: a most beautiful country with one single vice--it
makes foreigners forget their native land. But now they are both
suffering from nostalgia, and America, therefore, is without a
single vice. It is perfect, heavenly, ideal. In it one sees only the
vices of other races, and the ugliness of other nations. America
herself is as lovely as a dimpled babe, and as innocent. A dimpled
babe she. But wait until she grows, and she will have more than one
vice to demand forgetfulness.

Shakib, however, is not going to wait. He begins to hear the call of
his own country, now that his bank account is big enough to procure
for him the Pashalic of Syria. And Khalid, though his push-cart had
developed to a stationary fruit stand,--and perhaps for this very
reason,--is now desirous of leaving America anon. He is afraid of
success overtaking him. Moreover, the Bronx Park has awakened in him
his long dormant love of Nature. For while warming himself on the
flames of knowledge in the cellar, or rioting with the Bassarides of
Bohemia, or canvassing and speechifying for Tammany, he little thought
of what he had deserted in his native country. The ancient historical
rivers flowing through a land made sacred by the divine madness of the
human spirit; the snow-capped mountains at the feet of which the lily
and the oleander bloom; the pine forests diffusing their fragrance
even among the downy clouds; the peaceful, sun-swept multi-coloured
meadows; the trellised vines, the fig groves, the quince orchards, the
orangeries: the absence of these did not disturb his serenity in the
cellar, his voluptuousness in Bohemia, his enthusiasm in Tammany
Land.

And we must not forget to mention that, besides the divine voice of
Nature and native soil, he long since has heard and still hears the
still sweet voice of one who might be dearer to him than all. For
Khalid, after his return from Bohemia, continued to curse the huris in
his