A real sorrow overhung the house of Yûsuf; for the old Pasha was fast sinking to the grave. Hamdi, the hot disciple of Arâbi, the poet of rebellion, author of the famous calls to patriotism which were printed every week in the official journal, was bowed down by grief. He thought his siding with the malcontents had killed his father.

“But what was I to do?” he asked of Barakah, to whom, as an old friend, he took his troubles. “Their cries had fired my spirit. I could not keep silent. Na’imah tells me not to worry, yet I feel most guilty.”

Yûsuf, too, was downcast and repentant.

“We have been like fools,” he sighed, “wasting in vanity the precious hours we might have spent with him⁠—as if we thought that he would live forever. Now the end draws near, we can but beat our breasts and curse our folly.”