"God is supreme!" ejaculates a bystander.
"But these infidels of Nazarenes know nothing of Him. His curse be on them!" answers the policeman. "They made us ride the poor man round the town on a bare-backed donkey, with his face to the tail, and all the way two of us had to thrash him, crying, 'Thus shall be done to the man who robs a consul!' He was ready to faint before we got him up here. God knows _we_ don't want to lash him again!"
Next day as we pass the gaol we stop to inquire after the prisoner, but the poor fellow is still too weak to receive the balance due, and so it is for several days. Then they tell us that he has been freed from them by God, who has summoned his spirit, though meanwhile the kindly attentions of a doctor have been secured, and everything possible under the circumstances has been done to relieve his sufferings. After all, he was "only a Moor!"
The Greek consul reported that the condition of the Moorish prisons was a disgrace to the age, and that he had himself known prisoners who had succumbed to their evil state after receiving a few strokes from the lash.
A statement of claim for a thousand dollars, alleged to have been robbed from his house, was forwarded by courier to his chief, then at Court, and was promptly added to the demands that it was part of His Excellency's errand to enforce.
"My heart burns, but my lips will not give utterance."
Crouched at the foreigner's feet lay what appeared but a bundle of rags, in reality a suppliant Moor, once a man of wealth and position. Hugging a pot of butter brought as an offering, clutching convulsively at the leg of the chair, his furrowed face bespoke past suffering and present earnestness.
"God bless thee, Bashador, and all the Christians, and give me grace in thy sight!"
"Oh, indeed, so you like the Christians?"
"Yes, Bashador, I must love the Christians; they have justice, we have none. I wish they had rule over the country."
"Oh yes, I am, I am a háj (pilgrim to Mekka), and I love my own religion, certainly I do, but none of our officials follow our religion nowadays: they have no religion. They forget God and worship money; their delight is in plunder and oppression."
"You appear to have known better days. What is your trouble?"