s."

Yussuf turned to the country people again and delivered himself of his
message, after which several of the people spoke, and there was another
laugh.

"Well, what do they say now?"

"They ask why you want to know all this, effendi," replied Yussuf. "It
is of no use to argue with these people. They have no knowledge
themselves, and they cannot understand how Frankish gentlemen can find
pleasure therein. I have travelled greatly with Englishmen, and it is
so everywhere. I was with an effendi down in Egypt, where he had the
sand dug away from the mouth of a buried temple, and the sheik and his
people who wandered near, came and drove us away, saying that the
English effendi sought for silver and gold. It was the same among the
hills of Birs Nimroud, where they dig out the winged lions and flying
bulls with the heads of men, and the stones are covered with writing.
When we went to Petra, four English effendis and your servant, we were
watched by the emir and his men; and it was so in Cyprus, when the
effendi I was with--an American excellency--set men to work to dig out
the carved stones and idols from a temple there--not beautiful, white
marble stones, but coarse and yellow and crumbling. It is always a
fight here in these lands against seeking for knowledge, effendi. It is
a thing they cannot understand."

"What shall we do, then?"

"What they do, effendi, half their time--nothing."

"But they will be a nuisance," cried the professor.

"Yes, effendi," said the guide, with a shrug of the shoulders. "So are
the flies, but we cannot drive them away. We must be content to go on
just as if they were not here."

The professor saw the sense of the argument, and for the next four hours
the party were busy on that hill-slope climbing amongst the stones of
the ancient city--one which must have been an important place in its
day, for everywhere lay the broken fragments of noble buildings which
had been ornamented with colonnades and cornices of elaborate
workmanship. Halls, temples, palaces, had occupied positions that must
have made the city seem magnificent, as it rose up building upon
building against the steep slope, with the little river gurgling swiftly
at the foot.

There were the remains, too, of an aqueduct, showing a few broken arches
here and there, and plainly teaching that the water to supply the place
had been mainly brought from some cold spring high up in the mountains.

And all the time,