Mrs Langley and Agnes go out to Dinner.  
An agreeable surprise is something like sunshine in November; it warms up the constitution, mentally and physically.
 
Such a surprise did Mrs Langley receive the morning that followed the evening on which Achmet Dey and his Sultana held their private conversation on the affairs of state. “Agnes!” she exclaimed, reading a note with elevated eyebrows, “just fancy! here is an invitation for you and me to dine with the Dey’s wife or wives!”
 
“Oh! won’t that be delightful?” cried Agnes, coming from the court into the room where her mother sat, with such a bound, that she filled with sympathetic excitement the heart of the small negro girl from beyond the Zahara, and caused her to rock the cradle too violently.
 
“There, you’ve bumped it again; I knew you would!” said Mrs Langley, in tones of despair.
 
Poor Zubby’s first awful glance of mingled deprecation and self-reproach was so touching that no one but a hardened monster could have withstood it; but the look, with the feelings which it implied, was short-lived. It passed like a summer cloud, and was replaced by an expression of supreme contentment and self-satisfaction when it became apparent that Master Jim was not going to awake, and that Mrs Langley’s despair was vanishing. Indeed, that lady’s despair was at all times remarkably short-lived. She had been trained in a school of dire adversity ever since the arrival of the coal-black one from beyond the Zahara, and had learned to hope against hope in an extraordinary degree in a case which was absolutely hopeless, for, whatever others might think or hope, Zubby knew herself to be incurable! Not that she was unwilling; on the contrary, there never was a more obliging or amiable creature among the sable daughters of Ham, but she had a tendency to forget herself, (as well as her charge), in moments of sudden emotion or delight, and gave way to burstlets of action, which, if slight, were always inopportune, and sometimes, though not often, disastrous.
 
“We must get ready immediately,” continued Mrs Langley, with a cautioning shake of the head at Zubby, as she turned to Agnes; “because, you know, we may as well take the opportunity to do a little shopping before dinner.”
 
“What! ‘shopping’ in the pirate city?” we hear you exclaim, reader.
 
Yes, there was shopping there in those days, though it did not bear much resemblance to shopping in more civilised lands. There were no wide fronts or plate-glass windows in those days. Indeed, then, as now, a shop in the Moorish town might be fitly described as a hole in the wall. It was, as it were, a deep window without an interior to speak of. A square hole, six feet by six, and from four to ten feet deep, without glazing or protection of any kind from the weather, except, in some cases, an awning, was a fair average shop; one of eight feet frontage was rather a “grand shop,” and one of twelve feet was quite a “bazaar.”
 
Of course such shops were stuffed, like eggs, to an excess of fulness. They gave one the impression that the goods had been packed into smaller space than was possible, and that the introduction of another pin would infallibly explode the whole affair. A passage among the goods in each shop, just big enough to admit an ordinary man, was the scene of action in which the owner disported. This passage did not begin at the street: so much valuable space could not be afforded. A counter laden with small wares had to be leapt in order to gain it, and a rope depending from the ceiling rendered possible the acrobatic feat which was necessary to do so. Purchasers had to stand in the streets and transact business, the said streets being so narrow that there was no room for lobbies or paved foot-paths. While engaged in traffic, buyers were compelled more or less to block the way, and had their garments scraped successively by Turks and Moors and veiled Mohammedan females, by Cabyles from the mountains, negroes from Timbuctoo, white slaves from almost every country in Europe, and donkeys of the most debased and abject type,—these latter, by the way, being quite as capable as the human—though not humane—beings who drove them of going up and down stairs. No slope short of a perpendicular dead wall appeared to be able to stop them, and no wonder, poor wretches! for no torture short of total destruction was spared them.
 
Ah! ye members of the “Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals” in Algiers, forgive us if we interject here the observation that there is earnest need for your activities at the present day!
 
Followed by the faithful though uncontrollable Zubby, with a huge triangular grass basket, Mrs Langley entered the tortuous streets of the city, and proceeded to “shop.”
 
Fear not, reader! It is not our purpose to drag you through the details of the too well-known process. We pass onward to matters more important.
 
Having traversed several streets in which Moors sat cross-legged, embroidering purses and slippers with gold, in holes in the wall so small that a good-sized bust might have objected to occupy them; where cobblers, in similar niches, made and repaired round-toed shoes of morocco leather, and the makers of horn rings for fingers, wrists, arms and ankles wrought as deftly with their toes as with their fingers; where working silversmiths plied their trade in precious metals and gems in a free-and-easy open-air fashion that would have made the mouth of a London thief water; and where idle Arabs sipped coffee and smoked the live-long day, as though coffee and tobacco were the aim and end of life—which latter they proved indeed to many of them,—Mrs Langley with Agnes, followed by Zubby, paused before a niche in which were displayed for sale a variety of curious old trinkets of a nondescript and utterly useless character. In short, it appeared to be an Algerine curiosity-shop. Here, while bargaining with the owner for some small articles, she was surprised to hear a voice at her ear say in French—
 
“Madame, good morning; I have great pleasure in this unexpected meeting.”
 
She turned hastily, and found the Danish consul standing by her side.
 
“Ah, monsieur,” she said, returning his salutation, “it is indeed seldom that I wander alone through this labyrinth, but necessity compels me. An English friend wishes me to send her a few characteristic articles, and I can trust no one to choose them for me. But, you look anxious.”
 
“Yes, excuse me,” replied the Danish consul in haste, glancing round. “I am followed, persecuted I may say. I had intended to call for your husband to-day to beg him to use his influence with the Dey in my behalf, but I cannot—circumstances—in short, will you kindly mention to him that I am in trouble because of the non-payment of the tribute due by our Government, and—”
 
Breaking off suddenly, the Danish consul bowed low and hurried away. Mrs Langley observed that, immediately after, a chaouse, or executioner of the palace, passed her.
 
This incident induced her to conclude her shopping rather quickly, and furnished her with food for thought which entirely engrossed her mind until Agnes exclaimed—
 
“Oh mamma, look! look! they’re going to shave a little boy!”
 
Mrs Langley, directed by Agnes’s finger, looked and found that this was indeed true. A little boy, between eight and nine years of age, was seated in a barber’s shop near them, with a towel about his neck, glancing timidly, yet confidently, in the face of an elderly man who advanced towards him with an open razor, as though about to cut his throat. As it turned out, however, neither throat nor chin were in danger of violation. It was the head that the barber attacked, and this he scraped quite bare, without the aid of soap, leaving only a tuft of hair on the top. This tuft, we have been informed, is meant as a handle by means of which the owner may, after death, be dragged up into heaven! but we rather incline to the belief that it is left for the purpose of keeping the red fez or skull-cap on the head.
 
Be this as it may, no sooner did the urchin behold Mrs Langley, than, casting aside the towel and ignoring the barber, he rushed out and exclaimed—in a compound of French, Arabic, and Lingua Franca, of which we give a free translation—
 
“Oh, missus, me massr, console Dansh, vants see ver moch your hosbund!”
 
“Thank you; I know it,” replied Mrs Langley, giving the boy a small coin and a bright smile.
 
Quite satisfied that he had fulfilled his duty, the urchin returned to the barber and the lady proceeded to the palace.
 
Here she was receiv............