all her anything but `cook?'
But I'm glad you have told me, for I'll regard her now with increased
respect from this day forth."

"Das right, Geo'ge. You can't pay 'er too much respec'. Now we'll go
an' look at de works."

The part of the wall which the slaves were repairing was built of great
blocks of artificial stone or concrete, which were previously cast in
wooden moulds, left to harden, and then put into their assigned places
by slave-labour. As Foster was watching the conveyance of these blocks,
it suddenly occurred to him that Hester Sommers's father might be
amongst them, and he scanned every face keenly as the slaves passed to
and fro, but saw no one who answered to the description given him by the
daughter.

From this scrutiny he was suddenly turned by a sharp cry drawn from one
of a group who were slowly carrying a heavy stone to its place. The cry
was drawn forth by the infliction of a cruel lash on the shoulders of a
slave. He was a thin delicate youth with evidences of fatal consumption
upon him. He had become faint from over-exertion, and one of the
drivers had applied the whip by way of stimulus. The effect on the poor
youth was to cause him to stumble, and instead of making him lift
better, made him rest his weight on the stone, thus overbalancing it,
and bringing it down. In falling the block caught the ankle of the
youth, who fell with a piercing shriek to the ground, where he lay in a
state of insensibility.

At this a tall bearded man, with heavy fetters on his strong limbs,
sprang to the young man's side, went down on his knees, and seized his
hand.

"Oh! Henri, my son," he cried, in French; but before he could say more
a whip touched his back with a report like a pistol-shot, and the torn
cotton shirt that he wore was instantly crimsoned with his blood!

The man rose, and, making no more account of his fetters than if they
had been straws, sprang like a tiger at the throat of his driver. He
caught it, and the eyes and tongue of the cruel monster were protruding
from his head before the enraged Frenchman could be torn away by four
powerful janissaries. As it was, they had to bind him hand and foot ere
they were able to carry him off--to torture, and probably to death. At
the same time the poor, helpless form of Henri was borne from the place
by two of his fellow-slaves.

Of course a scene like this could not be witnessed unmoved by our
midshipman. Indeed he would infallibly h