'
'Active work!'
'Ah! those were times! If the Pasha had taken M. de Sidonia's advice, in
'41, something would have happened in this city----' And here Baroni
pulled up: 'Your lordship's pipe draws easy?'
'Very well. And when was your first visit here, Baroni?'
'When M. de Sidonia travelled. I came in his suite from Naples, eighteen
years ago, the next Annunciation of our blessed Lady,' and he crossed
himself.
'You must have been very young then?'
'Young enough; but it was thought, I suppose, that I could light a pipe.
We were seven when we left Naples, all picked men; but I was the only
one who was in Paraguay with M. de Sidonia, and that was nearly the end
of our travels, which lasted five years.'
'And what became of the rest?'
'Got ill or got stupid; no mercy in either case with M. de Sidonia,
packed off instantly, wherever you may be; whatever money you like,
but go you must. If you were in the middle of the desert, and the least
grumbling, you would be spliced on a camel, and a Bedouin tribe would
be hired to take you to the nearest city, Damascus or Jerusalem, or
anywhere, with an order on Signor Besso, or some other signor, to pay
them.'
'And you were never invalided?'
'Never; I was young and used to tumble about as long as I can remember
day; but it was sharp practice sometimes; five years of such work as few
men have been through.
Pages:
248
249
250
251
252
253
254
255
256
257
258
259
260
261
262
263
264
265
266
267
268
269
270
271
272