“Three weeks so passed in these monotonous grass lands among the nomad tribes, the road went forward to the east rising all the way, and the soil grew drier and drier. We reached the wells of Ayn-Ayoub and filled our skins with water, we traversed the desert belt and camped near the summit: at daybreak we came to the escarpment and saw the wooded slopes falling away in cascading forests at our feet to where, far below, lay the splendid plain of Dirak and in its midst, far off and dark in outline against the burning dawn, the battlements and mosques, the minarets and tapering cypress points of its capital Misawan.
“What joy was mine to fall by gentle gradations down the declivities of those noble woods into the warm fields of the fortunate state! At every hour of my advance new delights met my eye! Great country houses standing in magnificent parks with carefully tended lawns all about, poor men who saluted low as I passed and rich men here and there who glanced a moment in haughty ease, fine horses passing at the trot mounted by subservient grooms, and, continually, posts bearing such notices as ‘Anyone treading on this Lord’s ground will be bowstrung.’ ‘No spitting.’ ‘One insolent word and to jail with you!’: While at every few hundred yards an armed man, before whom the poorer people cowered, would frown at the slaves at the head of my column, and then, seeing my finely mounted guard and my own immutable face and shining garments coming up behind them, would smile and bow and hint at a few small coins—which I gave.
“In truth the learned man had not deceived me! This land of Dirak was a Paradise!
“I rode into the city like a king (as I was—for my wealth made me one in such a state) and took for the night a lodging in an immense building, which called itself a caravanserai, but was, to the caravanserais of my experience, as the sultan’s palace to a horse.
“There, in an apartment of alabaster and beaten silver, I eat such viands as I had not thought to be on this earth, while well-drilled slaves, trained by long starvation to obedience, moved noiselessly in and out or played soft music hidden behind a carven screen.
“Oh! Dirak! Dirak! … but I must conclude. … The matter was not long. With my gold I purchased my palace in the midst of this city of Misawan, entertained guests who asked nothing of my origin, bought (after a careful survey of prices) the excellent post of chief sweeper to His Majesty (which carried with it the conduct of the treasury) and paid for a few laws which happened to suit my convenience, such as one to prevent street cries and another for the strangling of the redheaded poor: it is a colour of hair I cannot abide.
“From time to time I paid my respects to that puppet called the sultan and bowed low in the ceremonies of the court.
“I had no occasion to hide my wealth since wealth was here immune and the criterion of honour. I displayed it openly. I boasted of its amount. I even exaggerated its total. I was, within two years, the chief man in the state.
“Yet (such is the heart of man!) I was not wholly satisfied. Of my vast fortune not a hundredth had been consumed. None the less I could not bear to let it lie idle. I was determined to do business once again!—By the Infinite Mercy of Allah the opportunity was vouchsafed.
“There lay on the confines of Dirak another state, called Har, very different. In this the sultan was the wealthiest man in the community and a tyrant. Moreover it differed from Dirak in this important particular, that whereas in Dirak all office was obtained by purchase, in Har all office was obtained by inheritance, so that between the two lay the unending and violent quarrel between trickery and pride.
“One day—I had been the greatest man in Dirak for already two years more—the Sultan of Har, wickedly, insolently, and not having the fear of God before his eyes, demanded satisfaction of the Sultan of Dirak for a loss sustained at dice by his grand almoner’s nephew at the hands of that noble in Dirak called the lord persecutor of games of chance—which are, in Dirak, strictly forbidden by law.
“In vain did the Sultan of Dirak implore the aid of his nobles: they assured him that none would dare attack his (and their) omnipotent state.
“On the third day the Sultan of Har crossed the frontier with one million, two hundred thousand and fifty-seven men, ninety-seven elephants, and two catapults. On the tenth he was but three days’ march from Misawan.
“The unfortunate Sultan of Dirak, pressed by his enemy, was at his wits’ end for the ready money wherewith to conduct the war. He had already so severely taxed his poor that they were upon the point of rebellion, while the rich were much rather prepared to make terms with the enemy or to fly than to support his whim of honour, patriotism and the rest.
“Musing upon the opportunity thus afforded, and recognizing in it once more that overshadowing Mercy which had so marvellously aided my every step in life, I came into the street upon a horse and in my noblest garments. I was careful to throw largesse to the crowd, at an expense which I had previously noted in a little book (your father has, my dear nephews, trained
