I have ridden in a caique upon the waters of the Bosphorus, and looked upon the capital of the Soldan of Turkey.

As seen from those blue waters, with palace and pinnacle, with gilded dome and towering cypress, it seemeth a very Paradise of Mahound: but, enter the city, and it is but a beggarly labyrinth of rickety huts and dirty alleys, where the ways are steep and the smells are foul, tenanted by mangy dogs and ragged beggars--a dismal illusion! Life is such, ah, well-a-day! It is only hope which is real, and reality is a bitterness and a deceit.
Perhaps a man with Ivanhoe's high principles would never bring himself to acknowledge this fact; but others did for him.

He grew thin, and pined away as much as if he had been in a fever under the scorching sun of Ascalon.

He had no appetite for his meals; he slept ill, though he was yawning all day.

The jangling of the doctors and friars whom Rowena brought together did not in the least enliven him, and he would sometimes give proofs of somnolency during their disputes, greatly to the consternation of his lady.