to prayers, when a black servant, about fifteen years
old, stood before Hartley, and pronounced these words,
deliberately, and twice over,—“Thus
says Barak el Hadgi, the watcher in the Mosque:
He that would see the sun rise, let him turn towards
the east.” He then left the caravanserai;
and it may be well supposed that Hartley, starting
from the carpet on which he had lain down to repose
himself, followed his youthful guide with renewed
vigour and palpitating hope.
’Twas the hour when rites unholy
Call’d each Paynim voice
to prayer,
And the star that faded slowly,
Left to dews the freshened
air.
Day his sultry fires had wasted,
Calm and cool the moonbeams
shone;
To the Vizier’s lofty palace
One bold Christian came alone.
THOMAS CAMPBELL. Quoted
from memory.
The twilight darkened into night so fast, that it
was only by his white dress that Hartley could discern
his guide, as he tripped along the splendid Bazaar
of the city. But the obscurity was so far favourable,
that it prevented the inconvenient attention which
the natives might otherwise have bestowed upon the
European in his native dress, a sight at that time
very rare in Seringapatam.
The various turnings and windings through which he
was conducted, ended at a small door in a wall, which,
from the branches that hung over it, seemed to surround
a garden or grove.
The postern opened on a tap from his guide, and the
slave having entered, Hartley prepared to follow,
but stepped back as a gigantic African brandished
at his head a scimetar three fingers broad. The
young slave touched his countryman with a rod which
he held in his hand, and it seemed as if the touch
disabled the giant, whose arm and weapon sunk instantly.
Hartley entered without farther opposition, and was
now in a grove of mango-trees, through which an infant
moon was twinkling faintly amid the murmur of waters,
the sweet song of the nightingale, and the odours
of the rose, yellow jasmine, orange and citron flowers,
and Persian narcissus. Huge domes and arches,
which were seen imperfectly in the quivering light,
seemed to intimate the neighbourhood of some sacred
edifice, where the Fakir had doubtless taken up his
residence.
Hartley pressed on with as much haste as he could,
and entered a side-door and narrow vaulted passage,
at the end of which was another door. Here his
guide stopped, but pointed and made indications that
the European should enter. Hartley did so, and
found himself in a small cell, such as we have formerly
described, wherein sate Barak el Hadgi, with another
Fakir, who, to judge from the extreme dignity of a
white beard, which ascended up to his eyes on each
side, must be a man of great sanctity, as well as
importance.
