Osmyn; who was pleased with an opportunity of recommending himself to Almoran, by praising an act of generous virtue which he supposed him now to exert in favour of his brother, received the command with a look, that expressed not only approbation but joy:  ’Let the sword of destruction,’ said he, ’be the guard of the tyrant; the strength of my lord shall be the bonds of love:  those, who honour thee as Almoran, shall rejoice in thee as the friend of Hamet.’  To Almoran, who was conscious to no kindness for his brother, the praise of Osmyn was a reproach:  he was offended at the joy which he saw kindled in his countenance, by a command to shew favour to Hamet; and was fired with sudden rage at that condemnation of his real conduct, which was implied by an encomium on the generosity of which he assumed the appearance for a malevolent and perfidious purpose:  his brow was contracted, his lip quivered, and the hilt of his dagger was again grasped in his hand.  Osmyn was again overwhelmed with terror and confusion; he had again offended, but knew not his offence.  In the mean time, Almoran recollecting that to express displeasure against Osmyn was to betray his own secret, endeavoured to suppress his anger; but his anger was succeeded by remorse, regret, and disappointment.  The anguish of his mind broke out in imperfect murmurs:  ’What I am, said, he, ’is, to this wretch, the object not only of hatred but of scorn; and he commends only what I am not, in what to him I would seem to be.

These sounds, which, tho’ not articulate, were yet uttered with great emotion, were still mistaken by Osmyn for the overflowings of capricious and causeless anger:  ‘My life,’ says he to himself, ’is even now suspended in a doubtful balance.  Whenever I approach this tyrant, I tread the borders of destruction:  like a hood-winked wretch, who is left to wander near the brink of a precipice, I know my danger; but which way soever I turn, I know not whether I shall incur or avoid it.’

In these reflections, did the reign and the slave pass those moments in which the sovereign intended to render the slave subservient to his pleasure or his security, and the slave intended to express a zeal which he really felt, and a homage which his heart had already paid.  Osmyn was at length, however, dismissed with an assurance, that all was well; and Almoran was again left to reflect with anguish upon the past, to regret the present, and to anticipate the future with solicitude, anxiety, and perturbation.

He was, however, determined to assume the figure of his brother, by the talisman which had been put into his power by the Genius:  but just as he was about to form the spell, he recollected, that by the same act he would impress his own likeness upon Hamet who would consequently be invested with his power, and might use it to his destruction.  This held him some time in suspense:  but reflecting that