The Pacha of Many Tales

Every one acquainted with the manners and customs of the East must be aware, that there is no situation of eminence more unstable, or more dangerous to its possessor, than that...

The pacha called for coffee, and in a few minutes, accompanied, as before, by Mustapha and the armed slaves, was prowling through the city in search of a story-teller. He was ag...

The slave was ordered into the pacha's presence. He was a dark man with handsome features, and he walked in with a haughty carriage, which neither his condition nor tattered gar...

"Perfectly well," replied the pacha, "you left off at the beginning of your story; but I hope you will finish it this evening, as I have already forgotten a great deal of what y...

Among those who used to repair to Mustapha when he exercised his former profession, was a French renegade, a man of considerable talent and ready invention, but a most unprincip...

"Mashallah! How wonderful is God! Did the Caliph Haroun ever hear such stories?" observed the pacha, taking the pipe from his mouth, as he was indulging in company with Mustapha...

"Khoda shefa midêhed--God gives relief!" cried the pacha, as the divan closed: and, certainly, during its continuance many had been relieved of their worldly goods, and one or t...

The next morning the pacha observed to Mustapha, "I have been thinking whether, as we have no story, it would not be as well to let the Greek finish the story of yesterday eveni...

"Hham d'illah! Praise be to God!" exclaimed the pacha, as the divan closed. "This is dry work, hearing petitions for three hours, and not a sequin to my treasury. Mustapha, has...

Your highness may imagine, that I ought to have been pretty well tired of going to sea, after so many mishaps; but there is a restlessness attending a person who has once been a...

The next morning the pacha hurried over the business of the day, for Mustapha had intimated that the renegade considered his fifth voyage to be one of great marvels. Selim was i...

On the ensuing day, after the usual business of the divan had been gone through, the renegade was called in, and taking his seat, commenced the narrative of his sixth voyage.

Your highness will be surprised at the unheard-of adventures that occurred to me in my last voyage, and I think I can boldly assert that no man, either before or since, has expl...

"Mustapha," said the pacha, taking his pipe out of his mouth, after half an hour's smoking in silence, "I have been thinking it very odd that our holy prophet (blessed be his na...

On the ensuing day, the pacha was sitting at his divan, according to his custom, Mustapha by his side, lending his ear to the whispers of divers people who came to him in an att...

The next morning the pacha and his minister, after the business of the divan, with their heads aching from the doubts of Hudusi, or the means that they had taken to refute them,...

"Mashallah! God be praised! we are rid of that fellow and his doubts. I have been thinking, Mustapha, as I smoked the pipe of surmise, and arrived at the ashes of certainty, tha...

The departure of the caravan was delayed for two or three days by the vizier upon various pretexts--although it was his duty to render it every assistance--that Menouni might af...

"These are great words, and spiced with wisdom. O pacha! doth not Hafiz say, 'Every moment you enjoy, count it gain.' Who can say what will be the event of anything?"

"Mustapha," said the pacha, "I feel as the caliph Haroun Alraschid, in the tale of Yussuf, related by Menouni, full of care; my soul is weary--my heart is burnt as roast meat."

As I stated to your highness last evening when I broke off my narrative, I was in the highest favour with the sultan, who made me his confidant. He had often mentioned to me the...

Although the pacha, with the usual diplomacy of a Turk, had, so far from expressing his displeasure against Mustapha, treated him with more than usual urbanity, he had not forgo...