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He placed the basket on the ground and, with the lantern hung over his arm, unfastened the manacles of my wrists. In the basket were a boule of black bread and a stone jar of water. I eagerly grasped the jar, and never in my life has anything passed my lips that tasted so sweet as that draught. "Don't drink too much at one time," said the guard, not unkindly. "It might drive you mad.
Long before this it had been ascertained that there were but four keys for the purpose of locking and unlocking the prisoners' manacles; one being held by the captain, while the other three were distributed in turn among the soldiers, being given to three different men every day, for the better security of the prisoners, and to make sure that there could be no tampering with the guards.
To see me, scarred, with manacles on my wrists and gyves on my ankles, weaponless, with an ape on my shoulder, was such a sight as the Scots Guard had never beheld before, and carrying me to the smith's, they first knocked off my irons, and gave me wine, ere they either asked me for my tale, or told me their own, which was a heartbreak to bear.
If the dead can hear he had listened many a time to the rattle of their manacles upon the stairs, to the drowsy hum of the trial and the buzz of the garrulous spectators; to the moaning, or the gibing, or the praying in the bolted cells where those whom kindred fate had given a little lease upon life lay waiting for the terrible pronouncement.
Water of Ghadames unhealthy. Manacles for Slaves. Second Meeting with the Giant. The Souafah, and Tuggurt. Visit from the Giant. Serpents and Scorpions, the Banditti of The Desert. Toys Prohibited. The Wahabites. How Moslems despise Jews. 3rd. THE Ayed عيد, succeeding Ramadan, is ushered in with a cold morning, the first cold morning I have felt in The Desert.
When they threatened and blustered we fawned and cringed, until they knew and avowed their belief that the crack of a slave whip would bring the north to its knees. All they asked we granted, more than they demanded we offered. We held out our wrists for manacles.
"I have no weapons," replied Beauvallon. "I have no sinister designs. I know not why I am arrested. Acquaint me with the charge, and confront me with my accusers." "Seize upon the prisoner!" cried Dumart to his satellites. And he breathed freer when he saw the merchant in the gripe of two muscular ruffians, whose iron hands compressed his wrists as if they were manacles.
With speed and promptitude he drew a small key from his pocket, and in an instant the manacles were removed from my hands. How my heart bounded within me as my wrists were released from the iron gripe of the shackles! The first step toward freedom was made my self-reliance returned, and I felt assured of success. 'Now for the weapon, said I.
I will not say that the servants' chains fell off and their manacles were burst, for there is no evidence that Jewish servants ever felt the weight of iron chains, and collars, and handcuffs; but I do say that even the man who had voluntarily sold himself and the heathen who had been sold to a Hebrew master, were set free, the one as well as the other.
And while he slept came the three, very silent and treading very soft, to look down upon his sleeping face and the manacles that gleamed upon his wrists; and behold, even as he slept, he groaned and writhed, his tender lips grown fierce, a relentless, down-curving line his jaws grim set, and between his frowning brows a lock of silky hair that gleamed snow-white among the yellow.
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