"You have a good seat and a good horse," said the chief smiling, as he shook the dust from his burnoose. "This, our guest, is placed in your charge, you will protect him against friend or foe, until I relieve you. Have I not put confidence in you? and is it not well placed?"
Ayoub bowed to his horse's crest. "There is not an Arab who would not risk his life for the guest of our chief: therefore, O Sheik, friends we fear not: and may the Prophet put him in danger of an enemy, that I may prove myself worthy of your trust."
"Avert the omen!" said the Sheik, "I shall be satisfied without such proof. May your prayer not be granted!"
Ayoub was a small, neat figure, with a pair of formidable moustaches, a pointed beard, but no whiskers; he had formerly lived in Marocco, taking service under the Sultan, there he had been obliged to adopt the caftan and turban, but had very soon returned to the independence of the Desert; this, however, had given him more neatness in his dress, and an affectation of knowledge bordering on conceit. He was a great talker, which was facilitated, as his comrades jokingly assured him, by the absence of several teeth, lost in some fray; he was well knit, though short, and when laughed at for his size, he was always ready with a proverb, as "Iron is sold by the quintal, steel by the ounce." The only peculiarity about him in other respects, was that he carried a brace of small pocket pistols in his belt, this joined to his being a good rifle-shot, had acquired him the surname "Er Rami, the Marksman."
"My name," said he in answer to Yusuf's inquiry, "your lord's name (may peace attend it!) is Ayoub Ibn Aisa Ibn Yarib Sebaïe, they choose to call me Er Rami, to laugh at my beard, because I carry these children of the gun; but when they have seen them bite, young as they are, they do not laugh at them in the hand of an enemy. Then they open the mouth of astonishment. A Christian gave them to me, may the Prophet enlighten him before his death! They are good men, the Christians, men of trust, they would not break their word to save a ship. The Moors are not worthy to be their grooms; but give me your ear," said he, leaning from his saddle towards Yusuf, apparently to whisper his secret, when he shouted out, "they eat pig!"