Little Lucy's Wonderful Globe

a loose purple satin sort of pelisse over a white silk embroidered vest, tied in with a sash, striped with all manner of colours, also immense wide white muslin trousers, out of which peeped a pair of brown bare feet, which, however, had a splendid pair of slippers curled up at the toes.

The owner seemed to be very little older than Lucy, and sat gravely looking at her for a little while, then clapped her hands. A black woman came, and the young Turkish maiden said, 'Bring coffee for the little Frank lady.'

So a tiny table of mother-of-pearl was brought, and on it some exquisite little striped porcelain cups, standing not in saucers, but in silver filigree cups into which they exactly fitted. Lucy remembered her Chinese experience, and did not venture to ask for milk or sugar, but she found that the real Turkish coffee was so pure and delicate that she could bear to drink it without.

[Illustration: 'Married! Oh, no, you are joking.'

Page 86.]

'Where are your jewels?' then asked the little hostess.

'I'm not old enough to have any?'

'How old are you?'

'Nine.'

'Nine! I'm only ten, and I shall be married next week--'

'Married! Oh, no, you are joking.'

'Yes, I shall. Selim Bey has paid my father the dowry for me, and I shall be taken to his house next week.'

'And I suppose you like him very much.'

'He looks big and tall,' said the child with exultation. 'I saw him riding when I went with my mother to the Sweet Waters. 'Amina,' she said, 'there is your lord, in the Frankish coat-with the white horse.''

'Have you not talked to him?'

'What should I do that for?'

'Aunt Bessie used to like to talk to nobody but Uncle Frank before they were married.'

'I shall talk enough when I am married. I shall make him give me plenty of sweetmeats, and a carriage with two handsome bullocks, and the biggest Nubian black slave in the market to drive me to Sweet Waters, in a thin blue veil, with all my jewels on. Father says that Selim Bey will give me everything, and a Frank governess. What is a governess? Is it anything like the little gold case you have round your neck?'

'My locket with Mamma's hair? Oh, no, no,' said Lucy, laughing; 'a governess is a lady to teach you.'

'I don't want to learn any more,' said Amina, much disgusted; 'I shall tell him I can make a pillau, and dry sweetmeats, and roll rose-leaves. What should I learn for?'

'Should you not like to read and write?'

'Teaching is only meant for men. They have got to read the Koran, but it is all ugly letters; I won't learn to read.'

'You don't know how nice it is to read stories, and all about different countries. Ah! I wish I was in the schoolroom, at home, and I would show you how pleasant it is.'

And Lucy seemed to have her wish all at once, for she and Amina stood in her own schoolroom, but with no one else there. The first thing Amina did was to scream, 'Oh, what shocking windows! even men can see in; shut them up.' She rolled herself up in her veil, and Lucy could only satisfy her by pulling down all the blinds, after which she ventured to look about a little. 'What have you to sit on?' she asked, with great disgust.

'Chairs and stools,' said Lucy, laughing and showing them.

'These little tables with four legs! How can you sit on them?'

Lucy sat down and showed her. 'That is not sitting,' she said, and tried to curl herself up cross-legged; 'I can't dangle down my legs.'

'Our governess always makes us write out a tense of a French verb if she sees us sitting with our legs crossed,' said Lucy, laughing with much amusement at Amina's attempts to wriggle herself up on the stool whence she nearly fell.

'Ah, I will never have a governess!' cried Amina. 'I will cry, and cry, and give Selim Bey no rest till he promises to let me alone. What a dreadful place this is! Where can you sleep?'

'In bed, to be sure' said Lucy.

'I see no cushions to lie on.'

'No; we have bedrooms, and beds there. We should not think of taking off our clothes here.'

'What should you undress for?'

'To sleep, of course.'

'How horrible! We sleep in all our clothes wherever we like to lie down. We never undress but for the bath. Do you go to the bath?'

'I have a bath every morning, when I get up, in my own room.'

[Illustration: 'I will show you where you live. This is Constantinople.'

Page 92.]

'Bathe at home! Then you never see your friends? We meet at the bath, and talk and play and laugh.'

'Meet bathing! No, indeed! We meet at home, and out of doors,' said Lucy; 'my friend Annie and I walk together.'

'Walk together! what, in the street? Shocking! You cannot be a lady.'

'Indeed I am,' said Lucy, colouring up. 'My Papa is a gentleman. And see how many books we have, and how much we have to learn! French, and music, and sums, and grammar, and history, and geography.'

'I will not be a Frank! No, no! I will not learn,' said the alarmed Amina on hearing this catalogue poured forth.

'Geography is very nice,' said Lucy; 'here are our maps. I will show you where you live. This is Constantinople.'

'I live at Stamboul,' said Amina, scornfully.

'There is Stamboul in little letters below-look.'

'That Stamboul! The Frank girl is false; Stamboul is a large, large, beautiful place; not a little black speck. I can see it from my lattice. White houses and mosques in the sun, and the blue Golden Horn, with the little caiques gliding.'

Before Lucy could explain, the door opened, and one of her brothers put in his head. At once Amina began to scream and roll herself in the window curtain. 'A man in the harem! Oh! oh! oh! Were there no slippers at the door?' And her screaming brought Lucy awake at Uncle Joe's again.

CHAPTER XI. SWITZERLAND.

'I LIKED the mountain girl best of all,' thought Lucy. 'I wonder whether I shall ever get among the mountains again. There's a great stick in the corner that Uncle Joe calls his alpenstock. I'll go and read the names upon it. They are all the mountains where he has used it.'

She read Mount Blanc, Mount Cenis, the Wengern, and so on; and of course as she read and sung them over to herself, they lulled her off into her wonderful dreams, and brought her this time into a meadow, steep and sloping, but full of flowers, the loveliest flowers, of all kinds, growing among the long grass that waved over them. The fresh clear air was so delicious that she almost hoped she was gone back to her dear Tyrol; but the hills were not the same. She saw upon the slope quantities of cows, goats, and sheep, feeding just as on the Tyrolese Alps; but beyond was a dark row of pines, and up above, in the sky as it were, rose all round great sharp points-like clouds for their whiteness, but not in their straight jagged outlines; and here and there the deep grey clefts between seemed to spread into white rivers, or over the ruddy purple of the half-distance came sharp white lines darting downwards.

As she sat up in the grass and looked about her, a bark startled her. A dog began to growl, bark, and dance round her, so that she would have been much frightened if the next moment a voice had not called him off-'Fie, Brilliant, down; let the little girl alone. Fi donc. He is good, Mademoiselle, never fear. He helps me keep the cows.'

[Illustration: 'I cut it out with my knife, all myself.'