And so Benjie was apprenticed to be a barber, for, as I made the observe, “Commend me to a safe employment, and a profitable.  They may give others the nick, and draw blood, but catch them hurting themselves.  The foundations of the hair-cutting and the shaving line are as sure as that of the everlasting rocks; beards being likely to roughen, and heads to require polling as long as wood grows and water runs.”

Benjie is now principal shop-man in a Wallflower Hair-Powder and Genuine Macassar Oil Warehouse, kept by three Frenchmen, called Moosies Peroukey, in the West End of London.  But, though our natural enemies, he writes me that he has found them agreeable and shatty masters, full of good manners and pleasant discourse, and, except in their language, almost Christians.

I aye thought Benjie was a genius, and he is beginning to show himself his father’s son, being in thoughts of taking out a patent for making a hair-oil from rancid butter.  If he succeeds it will make the callant’s fortune.  But he must not marry Madamoselle Peroukey without my special consent, as Nance says that her having a French woman for a daughter-in-law would be the death of her.

As for myself, I have now retired from business with my guid wife Nanse to our ain cottage at Lugton, with a large garden and henhouse attached, there to spend the evening of our days.  I have enjoyed a pleasant run of good health through life, reading my Bible more in hope than fear; our salvation, and not our destruction, being, I should suppose, its purpose.  And I trust that the overflowing of a grateful heart will not be reckoned against me for unrighteousness.

* * * * *

JAMES MORIER

The Adventures of Hajji Baba of Ispahan

“Hajji Baba” stands by itself among the innumerable books written of the East by Europeans.  For these inimitable concessions of a Persian rogue are intended to give a picture of Oriental life as seen by Oriental and not by Western eyes—–­to present the country and people of Persia from a strictly Persian standpoint.  This daring attempt to look at the East from the inside, as it were, is acknowledged to be successful; all Europeans familiar with Persia testify to the truth, often very caustic truth, of James Morier’s portraiture.  The author of “The Adventures of Hajji Baba of Ispahan” was born about 1780, and spent most of his days as a diplomatic representative of Great Britain in the East.  He first visited Persia in 1808-09, as private secretary to the mission mentioned in the closing pages of “Hajji Baba.”  He returned to Persia in 1811-12, and again in 1814, and wrote two books about the country.  But the thoroughness and candour of his intimacy with the Persian character were not fully revealed until the publication of “Hajji Baba” in 1824.  So popular was the work that Morier wrote an amusing sequel to it entitled “Hajji Baba in England.”  He died on March 23, 1849.

I.—­The Turcomans