shoulders drew up a little farther, so that he seemed more like a man
among men. His hands fell on his hips as, in his mess, an officer with
no pockets drops his knuckles on his waist-line for a stand-at-ease.

The egregious Selamlik Pasha stood high in favour with the Khedive: was
it not he who had suggested a tax on the earnings of the dancing girls,
the Ghazeeyehs, and did he not himself act as the first tax-gatherer?
Was it not Selamlik Pasha also who whispered into the ear of the
Mouffetish that a birth-tax and a burial-tax should be instituted?
And had he not seen them carried out in the mudiriehs under his own
supervision? Had he not himself made the Fellaheen pay thrice over for
water for their onion-fields? Had he not flogged an Arab to death with
his own hand, the day before Fielding's and Dicky's arrival, and had he
not tried to get this same Arab's daughter into his harem--this Selamlik
Pasha!

The voice of the Lost One suddenly rose shrill and excited, and he
shouted at the Pasha. "Swine! swine! swine! . . . Kill your slaves
with a kourbash if you like, but a bullet's the thing for a waler!--Swine
of a leper!"

The whole frame of the Lost One was still, but the voice was shaking,
querulous, half hysterical; the eyes were lighted with a terrible
excitement, the lips under the grey moustache twitched; the nervous
slipshod dignity of carriage was in curious contrast to the disordered
patchwork dress.

The trouble on Fielding's face glimmered with a little ray of hope now.
Dicky came over to him, and was about to speak, but a motion of
Fielding's hand stopped him. The hand said: "Let them fight it out."