our part, we have had enough of this painful task. And truly, we have
never before undergone such trials in sailing between--but that
Charybdis and Scylla allusion has been done to death. Indeed, we love
America, and in the course of our present task, which we also love, we
had to suffer Khalid's shafts to pass through our ken and sometimes
really through our heart. But no more of this. Ay, we would fain set
aside our pen from sheer weariness of spirit and bid the Reader, too,
farewell. Truly, we would end here this Book of Khalid were it not
that the greater part of the most important material in the K. L. MS.
is yet intact, and the more interesting portion of Shakib's History is
yet to come. Our readers, though we do not think they are sorry for
having come out with us so far, are at liberty either to continue with
us, or say good-bye. But for the Editor there is no choice. What we
have begun we must end, unmindful of the influence, good or ill, of
the Zodiacal Signs under which we work.

"Our Phoenician ancestors," says Khalid, "never left anything they
undertook unfinished. Consider what they accomplished in their days,
and the degree of culture they attained. The most beautiful
fabrications in metals and precious stones were prepared in Syria.
Here, too, the most important discoveries were made: namely, those of
glass and purple. As for me, I can not understand what the Murex
trunculus is; and I am not certain if scholars and archaeologists, or
even mariners and fishermen, will ever find a fossil of that
particular species. But murex or no murex, Purple was discovered by my
ancestors. Hence the purple passion, that is to say the energy and
intensity which coloured everything they did, everything they felt and
believed. For whether in bemoaning Tammuz, or in making tear-bottles,
or in trading with the Gauls and Britons, the Phoenicians were the
same superstitious, honest, passionate, energetic people. And do not
forget, you who are now enjoying the privilege of setting down your
thoughts in words, that on these shores of Syria written language
received its first development.

"It is also said that they discovered and first navigated the Atlantic
Ocean, my Phoenicians; that they worked gold mines in the distant isle
of Thasos and opened silver mines in the South and Southwest of Spain.
In Africa, we know, they founded the colonies of Utica and Carthage.
But we are told they went farther than this. And according to