own below the village
caught his eye, and he sat up, forgetting our dilemma.

'A marvel!' he exclaimed after a moment spent in gazing. 'Never, I
suppose, since first this village was created, have two Franks
approached it in a single day before. Thou art as one of us in outward
seeming,' he remarked to me; 'but yonder comes a perfect Frank with
two attendants.'

We looked in the direction which his finger pointed, and beheld a man
on horseback clad in white from head to foot, with a pith helmet and
a puggaree, followed by two native servants leading sumpter-mules.

'Our horses are in need of water,' growled Rashid, uninterested in the
sight. 'It is a sin for those low people to refuse it to us.'

'Let us first wait and see how this newcomer fares, what method he
adopts,' replied Suleyman, reclining once more at his ease.

The Frank and his attendants reached the outskirts of the village, and
headed naturally for the spring. The fellahin, already put upon their
guard by Rashid's venture, opposed them in a solid mass. The Frank
expostulated. We could hear his voice of high command.

'Aha, he knows some Arabic. He is a missionary, not a traveller,' said
Suleyman, who now sat up and showed keen interest. 'I might have known
it, for the touring season is long past.'

He rose with dignified deliberation and remounted. We followed him as
he rode slowly down towards the scene of strife. When we arrived, the
Frank, after laying about him vainly with his riding-whip, had drawn
out a revolver. He was being stoned. His muleteers had fled to a safe
distance. In another minute, as it seemed, he would have shot some
person, when nothing under Allah could have saved his life.

Suleyman cried out in English: 'Don't you be a fool, sir! Don't you
fire!'

The Frank looked round in our direction, with an angry face; but
Suleyman bestowed no further thought on him. He rode up to the nearest
group of fellahin, crying aloud:

'O true believers! O asserters of the Unity! Bless the Prophet, and
inform me straightway what has happened!'

Having captured their attention by this solemn adjuration, he
inquired:

'Who is the chief among you? Let him speak, him only!'

Although the crowd had seemed till then to be without a leader, an old
white-bearded man was thrust before him, with the cry:

'Behold our Sheykh, O lord of judgment. Question him!'

Rashid and I heard nothing of the conversation which ensued, except
the tone of the t