There is a book, I have a book, printed in 1806. It was compiled (rather than written) by a country clergyman, who had before him (so he tells me on the title page) these objects:—"To increase knowledge, to promote virtue, to discourage vice, and to furnish Topics for Innocent and Ingenious Conversation."

On the 208th page I find this passage:

The Pacha Achmet Boulee Bey, Governor of Egypt, was remarkable for a great sensibility of heart. The pleasures permitted to him by law were far from satisfying him. He wanted to meet with a return of love, and had assembled, at a very considerable expense, a numerous seraglio, in hopes of meeting a beauty not only capable of inspiring love but of feeling all its force and impulse. Not one of this disposition did he find among twelve hundred Circassian, Georgian and Greek ladies whom he had purchased at different times.

Oh, admirable excerpt! Oh, Divine anecdote! Oh, perfect theme!

What! You also, Achmet? You also, Boulee? You set out upon that quest, there, among the Levantines so many years ago—and with what advantages!... You also failed?... My soul is fired to exalt the high complaint of man. But stay. First let me savour, point by point, that complete, that inimitable, text.

This Governor of Egypt "was remarkable for a great sensibility of heart." More sensible than the mass of us, was he? Greater in him than in you and me, my brothers, the hunger for the answering tone, for the echo to the soul? Yes, it would seem so. A more active hunger, at least; for it produced action, as we see farther on: he did not dream, he did. He did not ache forlorn, he sought: he hunted. Hence was he "remarkable." All men have wasted for the home of the spirit, for the completion of their being. All, all have waited in vain for the woman that should call them by their name. But in varying degrees. He was at the head of the chase. For him it was a rage, a fury, a crusade. He did not wait, he plunged, he charged. He would discover. He put it to trial and reached the limit of effort. He is our master and our exemplar. My homage is to Achmet Boulee Bey.

"The pleasures permitted him by law were far from satisfying him." There comes in the minor note. After that grand opening, after that crash upon the organ, "remarkable"—even among lovers, still questing lovers—the tone softens to our common dream. It is the weeping of Achilles, it is the sleep of Charlemagne, it is the dog of Ulysses—it is that domestic lesser something in the hero which is common to us all. There are laws: especially laws divine. They permit us this and that—the more gratitude to them. But, oh! my friends, the things they fend away! "Visitors are requested not to touch," says the ordinance in the bazaar; though it also has a sign above it "Entry free," and the same is true of this world. You may desire—desire is put quite lavishly at your disposition. But when it comes to enjoyment, there are restrictions, little friend.

Achmet was, I take it, from his name, employment and longitude (and latitude) (30° 2" N., 31° 16" E.—or thereabouts—I date from Greenwich, not from Paris or the Azores) a servant of Mahound and his law, the Mahoundish law. He might drink no wine—except champagne, if you call that a wine. No liqueur except crÊme de Menthe. No beer of the Franks. He might not (I understand—but this may be mere legend) exceed four wives. The pastime of divorce was open to him only under certain limitations: for instance, he had to return the dowers. He was under the law. And though this same law gave him much to delight his soul, gardens and good food, adventure, praise and a sort of monotonous music sung through the nose, horseback riding and camel-back riding, the dawn, the sea, the moon, and day and night, and the iron titles of the night—yet was he not satisfied. Nay, these things were far from satisfying him, says the text. For he desired what the law does not forbid, indeed, but also cannot give. He sought the great human converse, the plenitude, the deep embrace. Therefore, did his great soul starve and weaken, and attempt recovery again if only to pursue what never yet was attained: the quarry that fails the hunter, the pearl that slips back into the sea. The law did its best. It said: "I am for your good. I desire your happiness. Come, you may play with dolls and go a walk after lessons," but he turned away and sickened. "He was far from satisfied." He had heard the fairy horn. He had caught the savour of what content might be: a hint, a summons; and "he was far from satisfied."

"He wanted to meet with a return of love." Only that? My word, Achmet, you were easily pleased! You desired the wealth that is beyond the world: not only did you desire it, you claimed it as a matter of course. You wondered why you had it not, you thought it your due: your rightful food—this thing unknown to all the exiled sons of Pithecanthropus, this lost serene of Eden! The simple words give it in its high simplicity. "He wanted." Well! We also want, and we may go on wanting.

But you did not stand halted in mere wanting, strong soldier of the Nile. You struck spurs and rode. You are a model for us here. You set out to conquer and to hold. Life passes while we seek here and there forlornly; and how many little experiments must be tried, each separate, each ending in despair, before the first hint of achievement comes to us. We, the lesser ones, have ourselves to thank for such poor spoil, after such single-handed hunting! Not so you! You swept widely and at once—ranging a vast field, marching on a broad front, taking large sample of the world. Hence those masterly words, that you "had assembled at a very considerable expense a numerous seraglio." What manhood and what courtesy combined; what generosity and largesse, what proper care as well! You did not drive or coerce—for not thus is the unseizable attained. You did not order, no, nor wheedle; and you did not command, though you sat on the throne of a king. You did not coax or threaten, or play a pretended indifference, or protest a passionate worship. You "assembled" them.

And they were ladies. Right, and right, and right again, Achmet! More than right! Twenty thousand times right! If the Thing can be found at all there must be something of leisure perhaps and certainly of equality. Ladies for love, not women: oh! yes! No doubt at all! And so for you, my Lord, they had to be "Ladies." And you "purchased them." Right again! You went about it in the honourable way, with no misunderstanding, no room for false issues on either side: an honourable price was honourably paid. That, if anything, should open the door of the treasure house. You paid high, you paid well. You were at a charge. You made yourself the poorer to make yourself the richer. You proved to them as to the whole world that you held them dearly indeed—"at a considerable expense."

You acted with discretion and with a fine distinction. You purchased not in bulk or by contract, but neatly, carefully, "at different times." You weighed each opportunity, you gauged each transaction.

Achmet, your perseverance alone should have made you the one, the satisfied of lovers. Into how many eyes you looked! How many whispering voices you gauged! The sincerity of how many protestations did you not search with the white-hot flame of your own profound and tortured spirit! Is it she, or she? Is she here at last ...? Twelve hundred of them—the splendid tale, the royal regiment of many and many, and more still, the dwindling perspective of research. "Who knows?" you said. "At last, as the feet stumble in the final excess of weariness, the fountain may be heard ... at last." You deserved it beyond all men, Boulee, and as we read we expect, breathless, the climax of your surpassing endeavour, we expect to hear at the very end the low tones of the beloved voice that answers, "Que tu perdes ou que tu gagnes, tu les aura toujours." Your reward is upon you. You shall be greeted with the divine reply, "Tecum vivere amem, tecum obeam libens."

Achmet, take your ease. To one man Paradise shall be restored, and one man shall be, once in the story of the race, secure. One man shall make harbour. One man shall rest in his home.

* * * * *

But what is this comes at the close of all? Wind of death! I know that chill—and Achmet knew it, too. Alas! Boulee! "Not one of this disposition did he find."

They were twelve hundred, come from the tenderest and the best; chosen out of all the Orient; patiently comprehended one by one; approached, protected, adored each in holy turn, "in hopes of meeting one not only capable of inspiring love but of feeling all its force and impulse" in her own breast.... Mortality returns: "Not one of this disposition did he find."