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Pealonsy and Revenge

A TALE OF THE EUPHRATES.

Some of our readers will remember that, in 1835, the British Government resolved to send an expedition, commanded by Colonel Chesney, to the Euphrates, for the purpose of exploring that noble river, and ascertaining how far it was practicable to establish a regular steam communication, by meians of it and the Persian Gulf, with India. Accordingly, two steam-vessels of iron were constructed, with every care, at Liverpool, by Laird & Co.; and, in order to facilitate the means of transporting them, they were made so as to be taken asunder and joined together at will. When arrived opposite Bir, on the Euphrates, the workmen, brought from England for the purpose, commenced building, or rather joining together, the various pieces of the steamers, which were intended to be . launched there and brought down the stream to the Persian Gulf. Whilst the i work was in progress, the Government expressed a wish that a few of Colonel Chesney's officers should be sent to explore the country on the banks of the Euphrates, below the encampment formed by the Colonel at Bir; and to ascertain, also, what was the feeling of the Arab tribes towards the English, and whether they were likely tp oppose any very effectual obstacles to the progress of the expedition. Among the officers selected for that purpose was Dr.' Aylmer Staunton, of the Royal Artillery, who was led by the force of circumstances to take an active part in the following romantic adventure while stationed • at Orfa, a city of Arabia, containing about 40,000 inhabitants. The story was published about thirty years ago, from the diary of the author, under the title ot " Scenes in the Desert," and we now reproduce it in a condensed form. Dr. Aylmer says:— . . One evening, whilst sauntering along the margin of the sacred lake at Orfa, I entered one of the many cafes which abound in its neighborhood, and joined the half-dozing and indolent company which reposed round the apartment, surrendering themselves to the intoxicating powers of opium and to-- ■ bacco in all their various forms. I had just seated myself, tailor-like, on one of the rich carpets scattered in profusion on ; the floor, ;and was listlessly gazing through the verandah, which opened on the sacred green, shadowed by the tall mulberries, when my reverie was interrupted by the entrance of a young man, whose abrupt planner and agitated features harmonised but little with the dreamy scene around Mm: There seemed an ill-concealed impatience in his manner, as though he thought night tarried long, and the sha- , dows of evening would never come. I felt a'strange interest in him from the moment of hisf entry. His countenance, though sunburnt, was eminently handsome, and his features, by their regularity, bespoke him a Greek, though his dress and turban marked; him as a Mussulman. He was evidently something above the common, and there was nobility stamped on his expansive forehead, half concealed as it was by the dark clusters of hair, black as the raven's wing, which escaped in profusion from beneath the green folds of his turban. A bright ruby sparkled in its lowest fold on the centre of his brow, and by his side hung his yattaghan in a case richly embossed with gold, whilst the handle of a . dagger sparkling with jewels peeped above the belt which confined round his waist a >ich cashmere robe, set off by a bright orange vest of Damascus silk beneath. _ >When at last the gathering, gloom announced that the reign of night was approaching, the stranger rose and quitted the apartment as abruptly as he had entered it. I observed that he had left his

gold box upon the carpet on which he had been sitting, and, , immediately picking it up, hurried after him and presented it, addressing to him at the same time a few words of Romaic. He had begun to reply in the same language, when, suddenly checking himself, he observed with a smile tnat perhaps French would be equally intelligible to me as it was to himself, for that he was not a native of Greece, as I seemed to suppose. I was fain to linger a little longer in the company of my new acquaintance, whose appearance and manner had inspired me with no little interest; but he broke off our interview hastily, though courteously, and wished me good evening, not, however, without expressing a hope that we might meet again. It was a lovely night, and in the restless mood in which my friend of the green turban had left me, I felt unwilling to return to my quarters, and, tempted by the coolness of the air and beauty of all around, 1 sauntered listlessly along, careless whither my steps might lead. On looking around me I found myself at some distance from the city, and about a quarter of a mile in my front rose, dark and frowning, the ruins of the old Saracenic castle, which crowned a small eminence about a mile from Orfa with its gigantic remains. The moon had arisen in all the unclouded majesty which poets alone dream of in our cold clime, and which king and beggar may alike behold in the gorgeous East, where " nought but God is to be seen in hea. ven." On the plain which skirted the low chain of hills, on one of which the ruins lay hushed in grim repose, like some wild beast of the forest crouched in his lair, were scattered a number of Arab tents, that gleamed white in the pale moonshine.

I had seated myself on one of the massive fragments which old King Time had hurled from a battlement that overhung'" what I presumed to have been the chie court-yard of the castle, and was preparing to moralise on the fleeting nature of everything human and the instability of greatness, when suddenly my meditations were broken in upon by the sound of sobs, and the half-suppressed lamentations of a female. I thought that, mingled with these sounds, I heard the stern tones of a man's voice, as though in anger or reproach. Could it be that some of the former denizens of the place had been permitted to revisit the scenes of their earthly pilgrimage, and were now acting over again some passage of their mortal career ? Or, perhaps (and here I withdrew into the dark shadow of a projecting buttress), I had strayed into the haunt of robbers, and was doomed to atone for my thirst of antiquarian lores with my life. Conjectures, however, were soon ended by my seeing him towards whom my attention had been drawn in the cafe, and in whom I had felt from the first such a strange interest, advancing from a passage I had not before perceived, into the centre of the courtyard, whilst a young female clung passionately to his arm. Never shall I forget the half-stern, half-irresolute expression of his face, as the moonbeams fell, with a sickly play, on those noble features, now black with contending passions that sought a vent for their violence, and anon pale and blanched, as in the marble cheek of death. The moon shone full and clear on the spot where they stood ; and I could see with painful distinctness every motion and hear every word they uttered. But how shall I describe the vision of beauty that clung to him, how echo the accents of her despair ? It seemed as though I had never gazed on woman, or experienced the might and power of beauty before. How X wondered at the heartlessness with which he strove to shake her from him; and, as I drank in the . light of those full, dark, uplifted orbs, from which streamed die heart's rain, and glanced at the lour

raven tresses tlicit floated wildly o'er her shoulders till they almost swept the ground, whilst her disordered garments exposed to the night a heaving bosom that mocked the snow in its whiteness, I thought he who could harm her must be more than fiend. How I longed to know the history of her who had thus risen, as by enchantment, before me. But their language was sealed to me ; though, from the frequent repetition of the word Osman, I gathered that such was the name of him who at once possessed and scorned what at the moment I thought I could have given worlds to cherish and protect; and, in a similar way, I discovered that so much loveliness and sorrow found " a local habitation and a name " in Zoe.

As they spoke in Arabic, I could only understand a word here and there; but the impassioned gestures of Osman, sufficed, in a great measure, to explain the scene. It was evident that he accused Zoe, whilst she seemed to defend herself, and implore forgiveness or mercy. At last I observed him lay his hand on the hilt of his dagger—l felt paralysed. Good Heavens !is he about to murder her? He draws forth the blade, gleaming bright as a toy in the hands of infancy; but the strong arm of him who wields it toys not with it; one hand is twined in her dark locks, the other is raised to strike. " Osman ! Osman!" shrieks the terrified Zoe; and his arm falls again powerless to his side ; another moment his dagger is in its sheath, and he turns hastily to depart. Zoe throws herself before him and clasps his knees, when, horrible, he strikes her to the earth with his clenched fist. For a moment he appears to gaze on her pros, trate form, then gathering his robe tighter round him, darts through the passage by which he had entered, and disappears. With a loud cry I burst from the place of my concealment, but he was—gone. XiOng did I bend in that lonely spot over the inanimate form of lovely Zoe, and exert every effort to recall the fleeting spirit; and when the color at last revisited her pale cheek, and the sigh, with which her bosom heaved at her soul being recalled to this world of woe, parted her exquisitely chiselled lips, I laughed loud and frantically, and, almost unconsciously of what I did, folded her to my breast. When she had somewhat recovered, I was surprised that she sought not to draw her veil, and that she expressed no terror at finding herself alone with me; but what was my amazement when, drawing herself up to her full height, she accosted me in pure French. "Giaour" (such were her words) they say that in your country, though you believe not in Allah, yet that you worship the holy Virgin ; and that if you swear by the blood of her Son, you may be trusted. I, too, am a Christian. Will you swear to do me no injury and hearken to my tale ?" I exclaimed passionately that she had only to ask, for that X was her slave. I

" Listen, then, to my story—l trust

you."

With these words she led the way to the passage by which Osman had departed ; and, after a few minutes, we found ourselves outside the ruins at the base of the ramparts, in a spot which overlooked the plain, and from whence might be discerned the Arab tents that X have described. She sat down; and fixing my eyes on that face whose loot was not of earth, X listened.

" Stranger, I feel that the Virgin, to whom, from this moment, I consecrate myself, will protect me. Know, then, that the blood of the Mussulman flows not in these veins, nor am X yet a daughter of the race whose dwelling-place is the desert, though my home is in yon wild tents that dot the plain. JVfy mother was, like yourself, a native, of Frangueslan, and often lias she spoke to me of the sunny

skies and blue seas of her own Italy, and taught me, as vre sat by the lonely wells in the desert, or in the retirement of the harem, to sing the wild music and impassioned strains of her native land. Early in life she married a Frenchman, a merchant of Marseilles; and, when accompanying him in a voyage to Seville, had the misfortune to be captured by a privateer from Algiers during a calm. My father perished defending his vessel and cargo, and my mother's beauty fetched a high price from a slave merchant at Algiers, who finally brought her to Cairo, where I was born. Often has she told mo of the tears she shed, and the sufferings which her barbarous master made her endure because she had the spirit to resist his odious advances; till at last, to bo revenged more fully upon her, he sold her to Mohammed Akbar, a chief of the Anazeh tribe, at that time in Cairo on business from the Pasha of Aleppo ; but he was defeated in his object, for Mohammed introduced her to his tribe as his wife, and treated her with a kindness to which she had long been a stranger. My mother died about two years ago; her dying request to me was to preserve unsullied the religion of my fathers ; and, at some future period, to escape from the Arabs and fly to her native country. She loved Mohammed, but the memories of her childhood clung to her soul, and she knew that his daughter, Fatima, by a former wife, had vowed an eternal enmity against me, through jealousy of my beauty and hatred of the obstinacy with which I clung to the religion of the holy Mary and her blessed Son.

" It is now about a year since a detach* ment of the great Hadgee caravan, which, for many ages, has paid a fixed tax for the protection of the Anazeh tribe of the Nedgh in passing that part of the route which leads through the Hedga's territory, attempted to resist the payment, confiding in the protection of a strong escort furnished to them by the Pasha of Damascus. The consequence was, an attack by night on the caravan, made by the united force of the Anazehs and some other tribe® with which you are not acquainted. The attack was successful. The escort given by the Pasha either fled at the first onset or remained to share in the plunder! There was, however, one who fought gallantly ; and with his handjar despatched three of our best and bravest men, one of them a nephew of Mohammed Akbar. Overcome by numbers, and covered with wounds, he at last fell, and would have perished, had not our scheik, struck by the gallantry he exhibited, caused him to be brought to his tent; nnd, though his life was despaired of, lavished every attention and care on him. I and Fatirna had, of course, been left behind at the tent, while the warriors sallied forth]J on their expedition. Their return was the signal for feasting and mourning; and when Mohammed l)ore tlic wounded stronffcp amidst the other trophies of his victory, I own that, from the first moment I gazed on his pale and blood-streaked face, I felt a sympathy that afterwards grew, as I watched over him, into intense love. The daughters of other climes would, perhaps, blush at such an avowal, but I gloried in it; and surely to love Osman was an honor.

"Ah! those alone who have sat many a weary hour anxiously gazing on the face of youth, clouded by the shadow of Azraei as he bends over his victim, can alone understand how we come to prize what wo thus restore to existence, and in a measure recreate. It is a feeling that blends the maidens love with the mother's tenderness ; and, oh! when I discovered that Osman was not one of the infidels, but come from the. fairy land ot Greece, where my mother used to say the great and good loved to dwell long before the Kaaba rose at Mecca ; and when I heard him tell me of his fathers halls, and recount his ad ventures, and why he had travelled under the disguise of the Turkish garb; and above all when he made me promise that I would fulfil my sainted mother's last request, and share with him his wealth and honors in Ins native land, how my heart beat whi Ist be spoke ; and how wildly, how madly I loved hun. J

(To be concluded in our next.J

Permanent link to this item
Hononga pūmau ki tēnei tūemi

https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/MIC18711201.2.15

Bibliographic details
Ngā taipitopito pukapuka

Mount Ida Chronicle, Volume II, Issue 144, 1 December 1871, Page 6

Word count
Tapeke kupu
2,756

Pealonsy and Revenge Mount Ida Chronicle, Volume II, Issue 144, 1 December 1871, Page 6

Pealonsy and Revenge Mount Ida Chronicle, Volume II, Issue 144, 1 December 1871, Page 6

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