welcomes us at the door and leads us to a platform in the centre, furnished with a Turkish rug, which Shakib will present to the landlord as a farewell memento.
And here are our three Syrians making ready for the voyage. Shakib is intoning some verses of his while packing; Im-Hanna is cooking the last dish of mujaddara ; and Khalid, with some vague dream in his eyes, and a vaguer, far-looming hope in his heart, is sitting on his trunk wondering at the variety of things Shakib is cramming into his. For our Scribe, we must not fail to remind the Reader, is contemplating great things of State, is nourishing a great political ambition. He will, therefore, bethink him of those in power at home. Hence these costly presents. Ay, besides the plated jewellery—the rings, bracelets, brooches, necklaces, earrings, watches, and chains—of which he is bringing enough to supply the peasants of three villages, see that beautiful gold-knobbed ebony stick, which he will present to the vali , and this precious gold cross with a ruby at the heart for the Patriarch, and these gold fountain pens for his literary friends, and that fine Winchester rifle for the chief of the tribe Anezah. These he packs in the bottom of his trunk, and with them his precious dilapidated copy of al-Mutanabbi, and—what MS. be this? What, a Book of Verse spawned in the cellar? Indeed, the very embryo of that printed copy we read in Cairo, and which Shakib and his friends would have us translate for the benefit of the English reading public.
For our Scribe is the choragus of the Modern School of Arabic poetry. And this particular Diwan of his is a sort of rhymed inventory of all the inventions and discoveries of modern Science and all the wonders of America. He has published other Diwans, in which French morbidity is crowned with laurels from the Arabian Nights . For this Modern School has two opposing wings, moved by two opposing forces, Science being the motive power of the one, and Byron and De Musset the inspiring geniuses of the other. We would not be faithful to our Editorial task and to our Friend, if we did not give here a few luminant examples of the