ves, as one in England might keep a stud farm, and
sells the children as they grow up. The purchaser of the quartette is
going to take them to the North. He will pass the coming night in a
fandak, and leave as soon after daybreak as the gates are opened. Some ten
days' travel on foot will bring him to a certain city, where his
merchandise should fetch four hundred dollars. The lads do not seem to be
disturbed by the sale, or by thoughts of their future, and the dealer
himself seems to be as near an approach to a commercial traveller as I
have seen in Morocco. To him the whole transaction is on a par with
selling eggs or fruit, and while he does not resent my interest, he does
not pretend to understand it.

From the minaret that overlooks the mosque the mueddin calls for the
evening prayer; from the side of the Kutubia Tower and the minaret of Sidi
bel Abbas, as from all the lesser mosques, the cry is taken up. Lepers
pass out of the city on their way to Elhara; beggars shuffle off to their
dens; storks standing on the flat house-tops survey the familiar scene
gravely but with interest. Doubtless the dilals and all who sent their
slaves to the market to be sold this afternoon will respond to the
mueddins' summons with grateful hearts, and Sidi bel Abbas, patron saint
of Red Marrakesh, will hardly go unthanked.

GREEN TEA AND POLITICS

[Illustration: ON THE HOUSE-TOP, MARRAKESH]

CHAPTER VIII

GREEN TEA AND POLITICS

Whither resorting from the vernal Heat
Shall Old Acquaintance Old Acquaintance greet,
Under the Branch that leans above the Wall
To shed his Blossom over head and feet.

_The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam._

He was a grave personable Moor of middle age, and full of the dignity that
would seem to be the birthright of his race. His official position gave
him a certain knowledge of political developments without affecting his
serene outlook upon life. Whether he sat outside the Kasbah of his native
town and administered the law according to his lights, or, summoned to the
capital, rode attended so far as the Dar el Makhzan, there to take his
part in a council of the Sultan's advisers, or whether, removed for a time
from cares of office, he rested at ease among his cushions as he was doing
now, this Moorish gentleman's placid and unruffled features would lead the
Western observer to suppose that he was a very simple person with no sort
of interest in affairs. I had o