cheap. The house that Arthur took was situated in large gardens or
pleasure-grounds of the natural wilderness type that one finds in
the East, shrubberies relegated to certain limits, but within those
limits left absolutely to their own device and will, with the
exception of arched and shaded paths cut under the thick intertwined
leafage.

This whole place, with horses at his command, and seven servants,
with the whole expense of boarding, cost him, he has told me,
£40 for the entire six weeks that he was there; for he was very
weary of his rough tramping life, and resolutely determined to
recruit his energies by some deliberate luxury, a recipe far more
useful than the normal Englishman is at all inclined to admit,
thinking, as he does so erroneously, that "overtasking the body is
the best restorative for the overworked mind, and _vice versâ_,"
as Arthur said once, "whereas the two instruments, so to speak, have
but one blade though two handles."

The heat of the day was rather overpowering; that period he usually
spent dozing or reading in the court of the house, which was occupied
by a cool flashing fountain in the centre of an oasis of marble
pavement, streaked and veined. About seven it became cooler, and
then in the light native costume he used to ride leisurely about the
picturesque city or among the delightful houses scattered about in
the outskirts like his own.

One evening he was riding in this fashion down a lane running between
high brick walls, fringed with feathery trailing shrubs or gorgeous
red and white flowers, whose fragrance literally streamed into the
evening air, in that delicate dusk when the senses are lulled into