At these words the fathers of the fifty boys cried out aloud, the mothers repeated their exclamations an octave higher, whilst the rest, without knowing the cause, soon drowned the voices of both with still louder lamentations of their own.

“Our Caliph,” said they—­and the report soon circulated—­“Our Caliph has played us this trick to gratify his accursed Giaour.  Let us punish him for his perfidy! let us avenge ourselves! let us avenge the blood of the innocent! let us throw this cruel prince into the gulf that is near, and let his name be mentioned no more!”

At this rumour and these menaces, Carathis, full of consternation, hastened to Morakanabad, and said:  “Vizir, you have lost two beautiful boys, and must necessarily be the most afflicted of fathers, but you are virtuous; save your master.”

“I will brave every hazard,” replied the vizir, “to rescue him from his present danger, but afterwards will abandon him to his fate.  Bababalouk,” continued he, “put yourself at the head of your eunuchs; disperse the mob, and, if possible, bring back this unhappy prince to his palace.”  Bababalouk and his fraternity, felicitating each other in a low voice on their disability of ever being fathers, obeyed the mandate of the vizir; who, seconding their exertions to the utmost of his power, at length accomplished his generous enterprise, and retired as he resolved, to lament at his leisure.

No sooner had the Caliph re-entered his palace than Carathis commanded the doors to be fastened; but, perceiving the tumult to be still violent, and hearing the imprecations which resounded from all quarters, she said to her son:  “Whether the populace be right or wrong, it behoves you to provide for your safety; let us retire to your own apartment, and from thence through the subterranean passage, known only to ourselves, into your tower; there, with the assistance of the mutes who never leave it, we may be able to make some resistance.  Bababalouk, supposing us to be still in the palace, will guard its avenues for his own sake; and we shall soon find, without the counsels of that blubberer Morakanabad, what expedient may be the best to adopt.”

Vathek, without making the least reply, acquiesced in his mother’s proposal, and repeated as he went:  “Nefarious Giaour! where art thou! hast thou not yet devoured those poor children? where are thy sabres? thy golden key? thy talismans?”

Carathis, who guessed from these interrogations a part of the truth, had no difficulty to apprehend in getting at the whole, as soon as he should be a little composed in his tower.  This princess was so far from being influenced by scruples that she was as wicked as woman could be, which is not saying a little, for the sex pique themselves on their superiority in every competition.  The recital of the Caliph, therefore, occasioned neither terror nor surprise to his mother; she felt no emotion but from the promises