still covered with a cold wet cloth, I called up all my daring, and
before the lad was aware I dealt him a slap on the cheek.

It was not a hard blow, but the lad seemed as much amazed as though the
earth had opened at his feet. His dark face turned ashen-grey and his
great eyes looked at me in tearful enquiry, but so grievously that I
already rued my unseemly deed.

Soon, however, I had cause to be glad; the youth's demeanor won his
cause. Uncle Christian had only desired to prove him. He knew men well,
and he knew that youths of various birth take a blow in the face in
various ways; now, the Emir's son had demeaned him as one of his rank,
and had stood the ordeal! So my aunt Jacoba told him, for she had at
once seen through Uncle Christian's purpose, and presently Jost Tetzel
himself, though ill-pleased and sullen, confessed his error. Then, when
they had promised the youth that he should be spared all further ill-
usage, he opened the lining of his garment and showed us a gem which his
mother had privily hung about his neck, and which was a lump or tablet of
precious sky-blue turkis-stone, as large as a great plum, whereon was
some charm inscribed in strange, outlandish signs which the Jewish Rabbi
Hillel, when he saw it, declared to be Arabic letters.

The bear-leader had called the lad Beppo; but his real name was a long
one and hard to utter, out of which my forest uncle picked up two
syllables for a name he could speak with ease, calling him Akusch.

With Cousin Maud's assent the black youth was attached to my service as
Squire, inasmuch as it was I who at first had "dubbed him knight;" and
when I gave him to understand this he could not contain himself for joy,
and from that hour he ever proved my most ready servant, ever alert and