VII. Catastrophes upon Catastrophes.

ENTIRELY astonished was Tartarin before his Moorish dwelling when he stopped.

Day was dying and the street deserted. Through the low pointed-arch doorway which the negress had forgotten to close, laughter was heard; and the clink of wine-glasses, the popping of champagne corks; and, floating over all the jolly uproar, a feminine voice singing clearly and joyously:

“Do you like, Marco la Bella, to dance in the hall hung with bloom?”

“Throne of heaven!” ejaculated the Tarasconian, turning pale, as he rushed into the enclosure.

Hapless Tartarin! what a sight awaited him! Beneath the arches of the little cloister, amongst bottles, pastry, scattered cushions, pipes, tambourines, and guitars, Baya was singing “Marco la Bella” with a ship captain’s cap over one ear. She had on no blue vest or bodice; indeed, her only wear was a silvery gauze wrapper and full pink trousers. At her feet, on a rug, surfeited with love and sweetmeats, Barbassou, the infamous skipper Barbassou, was bursting with laughter at hearing her.

The apparition of Tartarin, haggard, thinned, dusty, his flaming eyes, and the bristling up fez tassel, sharply interrupted this tender Turkish-Marseillais orgie. Baya piped the low whine of a frightened leveret, and ran for safety into the house. But Barbassou did not wince; he only laughed the louder, saying:

“Ha, ha, Monsieur Tartarin! What do you say to that now? You see she does know French.”

Tartarin of Tarascon advanced furiously, crying:

“Captain!”

“Digo-li que vengue, moun bon! — Tell him what’s happened, old dear!” screamed the Moorish woman, leaning over the first floor gallery with a pretty low-bred gesture!

The poor man, overwhelmed, let himself collapse upon a drum. His genuine Moorish beauty not only knew French, but the French of Marseilles!

“I told you not to trust the Algerian girls,” observed Captain Barbassou sententiously! “They’re as tricky as your Montenegrin prince.”

Tartarin lifted his head

“Do you know where the prince is?”

“Oh, he’s not far off. He has gone to live five years in the handsome prison of Mustapha. The rogue let himself be caught with his hand in the pocket. Anyways, this is not the first time he has been clapped into the calaboose. His Highness has already done three years somewhere, and — stop a bit! I believe it was at Tarascon.”

“At Tarascon!” cried out her worthiest son, abruptly enlightened. “That’s how he only knew one part of the Town.”

“Hey? Of course. Tarascon — a jail bird’s -eye view from the state prison. I tell you, my poor Monsieur Tartarin, you have to keep your peepers jolly well skinned in this deuce of a country, or be exposed to very disagreeable things. For a sample, there’s the muezzin’s game with you.”

“What game? Which muezzin?”

“Why your’n, of course! The chap across the way who is making up to Baya. That newspaper, the Akbar, told the yarn t’other day, and all Algiers is laughing over it even now. It is so funny for that steeplejack up al............