United States or Iceland ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
At length one day they were traversing a wide open plain without either hillocks or bushes, when they saw some objects moving towards them. On they came rapidly, and were soon discovered to be a party of men on the backs of camels. "The camels are of the Bu Saif breed," cried Selim; "we cannot escape them." "Let us stand still and not make the attempt," said Stephen.
The immediate ancestors of this Sheikh were destroyed by old Yousef Bashaw, amongst whom Saif Nasser, grandfather of the Sheikh, and the head of the Oulad Suleiman, was a celebrated warrior. They might claim some connexion with the deposed Shereefian government.
Further, after doing for Manua Sera, they were determined to go on to Ugogo to assist Salem bin Saif and the other merchants on, during which, at the same time, they would fight all the Wagogo who persisted in taking taxes and in harassing caravans.
The Arabs as they heard these words paused for a moment. The horsemen, in the meantime, were pursuing Selim's party; but as no animals were faster than the Bu Saif breed of camels, they failed to overtake them. Roger and Stephen believed that their young friend had made his escape. Each of their assailants now inquired who they were, and where they were going.
His sister Sitt el-Mulk had, in common with the rest of his subjects, incurred his displeasure; and, being fearful for her life, she secretly and by night concerted measures with the emir Saif ed-Dowlah, chief of the guard, who very readily agreed to her plans. Within a week Hakim's son Ali had been raised to the caliphate with the title of Dhahir, at the command of Sitt el-Mulk.
"Well, you shall have them, Samuel, if you declare to me that I hired you myself in this same person, and bargained with you with this same tongue and voice with which I speak to you just now." "That I do declare, unless ye hae twa persons o' the same appearance, and twa tongues to the same voice. But, 'od saif us, sir, do you ken what the auld wives o' the clachan say about you?"
Saif ed-Dowlah, hearing of the death of Muhammed el-Ikshid, and the departure of Ungur, deemed this a favourable opportunity to despoil his brother-in-law; he therefore marched upon Damascus, which he captured; but the faithful Kafur promptly arrived upon the scene with a powerful army, and, routing Saif ed-Dowlah, who had advanced as far as Ramleh, drove him back to Rakkah, and relieved Damascus.
Encouraged by their presence, the Plomerites rose against their foreign oppressors; a war followed, of which the particulars have been disfigured by romance; but the result is undoubted the Abyssinian strangers were driven from the soil of Arabia; the native race recovered its supremacy; and Saif, the descendant of the old Homerite kings, was established, as the vassal or viceroy of Chosroes, on the throne of his ancestors.
They took Aleppo, then in the possession of the Hamdanites, and, encountering Saif ed-Dowlah, overthrew him also. The governor of Damascus, Dalim el-Ukazly, and ten thousand men came to the rescue of the Hamdanites, but Phocas beat a retreat on hearing of his approach. Abu'l-Hasan Ali died in the year 355 of the Hegira. The regent Kafur then ascended the throne, assuming the surname el-Ikshid.
Kandarka came in, and this funny fellow, on seeing me, immediately cried out, "Saif zain," "wahad," which, being interpreted literally, means, "A fine sword!" "one!" but with a more enlarged interpretation and paraphrase, means, "Bring me a fine sword when you come back, a sword which will kill a man with one stroke."
Word Of The Day