A DISAPPOINTMENT Considering that I had bought a house and land exactly to my taste, and likely, as Rashid declared, to raise our honour in the country, I felt that I had earned the right to take a holiday.

Whenever I have done anything decisive it is my instinct to withdraw myself a little from the scene of action and inure myself by contemplation to the new position of affairs.

Accordingly, having surveyed the house and land as owner, I set off with Rashid upon a ten days' journey beyond the reach of telegrams and letters.
At the end of the ten days we rode into Beyrout, and put up at a little hostelry, which we frequented, built out on piers above the sea.

There I found two letters waiting for me, one from the great Druze chief who sold to me my house and land.
'Never,' he wrote, 'have I had to endure such disrespect and ignominy.

It is not at all what I expected from your friendship.