Bedouin Tribes of the Euphrates Vol 2 - The Search For Mecca

lO Bedoidn Tribes of the EiLphrates. [ch. xvi.
Tiirkisli is to Arabic, in public estimation, that
French is to Turkish, the language of the superior
race. Although the Valy took his departure next
morning, the prestige of our reception remained
and Huseyn was again all that we could wish.
We had not, hitherto, ventured to breathe a word
of the negotiation intrusted to us by Faris, although
the Mollah, who was constantly in and out of the
house, had hinted more than once that it was time
to begin. But we had felt that, until our own
character was cleared up, we should only be prejudicing
our friend's interests by advocating them.
Now however there was no such reason to deter
us, and we took advantage of the first opportunity
to open the subject. Zakki Bey, the Pasha's eldest
son, had arrived with the Valy ;
and Ave found him
a nice boy of eighteen or twenty, with a good ingenuous
countenance, pretty manners, and a fair
education. He was a Kdtih, or clerk in the " Chamber
of Writing," a public ofiice at Aleppo ; and with
him we speedily made friends. It was no difficult
matter to interest him in the cause of the Bedouins,
for these to a youth of any imagination must always
have a certain attraction ; and he knew of his
father's recent overtures to Faris, and of the
friendship which had been begun between them.
official
" My father," he said quite simply, "is as a father
to all these people. The Bedouins are his children,
and I know that Faris is his especial favourite. If
he would allow me, I would go myself to see your