“That little she-devil who has taken a fancy to Will,” said Fred with a grin, “is capable of more atrocities than all the Turks between here and Stamboul!  She looks to me like Santanita, Cleopatra, Salome, Caesar’s wife, and all the Borgia ladies rolled in one.  There’s something added, though, that they lacked.”

“Youth,” said I.  “Beauty.  Athletic grace.  Sinuous charm.”

“No, probably they all had all those.”

“Then horsemanship.”

“Perhaps.  Didn’t Cleopatra ride?”

“Then what?” said I, puzzled.

“Indiscretion!” he answered, jerking loose the catch of his infernal instrument.

“Don’t be afraid, old ladies,” he said, glancing at the harridans between us.  “I’m only going to sing!”

He makes up nearly all of his songs, and some of them, although irreverent, are not without peculiar merit; but that was one of his worst ones.

The preachers prate of fallen man
And choirs repeat the chant,
While unco’ guid with unction urge
Repression of the joys that surge,
And jail for those who can’t. 
The poor deluded duds forget
That something drew the sting
When Adam tiptoed to his fall,
And made it hardly hurt at all. 
Of Mother Eve I sing!

Chorus
Oh, Mother Eve, dear Mother Eve,
The generations come and go,
But daughter Eve’s as live as you
Were back in Eden years ago!

Oh, hell’s not hell with Eve to tell
Again the ancient tale,
But Eden’s grassy ways and bowers
Deprived of Eve to ease the hours
Would very soon grow stale! 
Red cherry lips that leap to laugh,
And chic and flick and flair
Can make black white for any one—­
The task of Sisyphus good fun! 
So what should Adam care!

Chorus
Oh, daughter Eve, dear daughter Eve,
The tribulations go and come,
But no adventure’s ever tame
With you to make surprises hum!

Chapter Five “Effendi, that is the heart of Armenia burning.”

THE PATTERAN

(I)

Aye-yee—­I see—­a cloud afloat in air af amethyst
I know its racing shadow falls on banks of gold
Where rain-rejoicing gravel warms the feeding roots
And smells more wonderful than wine. 
I know the shoots of myrtle and of asphodel now stir the mould
Where wee cool noses sniff the early mist. 
Aye-yee—­the sparkle of the little springs I see
That tinkle as they hunt the thirsty rill. 
I know the cobwebs glitter with the jeweled dew. 
I see a fleck of brown—­it was a skylark flew
To scatter bursting music, and the world is still
To listen.  Ah, my heart is bursting too—­Aye-yee!

Chorus: 
(It begins with a swinging crash, and fades away.)

Aye-yee, aye-yah—­the kites see far
(But also to the foxes views unfold)—­
No hour alike, no places twice the same,
Nor any track to show where morning came,
Nor any footprint in the moistened mould
To tell who covered up the morning star. 
      Aye-yee—­aye-yah!