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The Sultan's officials returned to the ship and showed the royal order to the captain. "He is the master," said the good man, and desired that I should be sent for. Then they put on me the gorgeous robe and rowed me to land, where I was placed on the horse and led to the palace. Here the Sultan was awaiting me in great state surrounded by his court.
But quickly recovering his presence of mind, he replied to the king that he would willingly confirm the privileges that had been accorded to the house of France by his predecessors; that he might therefore consider his first demand granted; that the investiture of the kingdom was an affair that required deliberation in a council of cardinals, but he would do all he possibly could to induce them to accede to the king's desire; lastly, he must defer the affair of the sultan's brother till a time more opportune for discussing it with the Sacred College, but would venture to say that, as this surrender could not fail to be for the good of Christendom, as it was demanded for the purpose of assuring further the success of a crusade, it would not be his fault if on this point also the king should not be satisfied.
Finding a credulous listener, he read and expounded a passage relating to a European woman who was to come and live on Mount Lebanon at a certain epoch, and obtain power and influence greater than a sultan's.
On these conditions I am ready to bestow the princess my daughter upon him; therefore, good woman, go and tell him so, and I will wait till you bring me his answer." Aladdin's mother prostrated herself a second time before the sultan's throne, and retired. On her way home, she laughed within herself at her son's foolish imagination.
When we reached the outskirts of the town, about half a mile from the Datu's, we came to the Sultan's residence, where he was prepared to receive us in state. His house is constructed in the same manner as that of the Datu, but is of larger dimensions, and the piles are rather higher. Instead of steps, we found a ladder, rudely constructed of bamboo, and very crazy.
The administration settled down to lifeless routine and lapsed into corruption: the national army was starved: the depreciation of the currency grew worse as the revenue declined and the sultan's household and personal extravagance increased. Encouraged by the inertia of the imperial Government, the Christians of the European provinces waxed bold.
Saladin, with a princely generosity, invited many of the Christians to visit Jerusalem; and several of the leaders took advantage of his offer to feast their eyes upon a spot which all considered so sacred. Many of them were entertained for days in the Sultan's own palace, from which they returned with their tongues laden with the praises of the noble infidel.
Besides the loveliness of the situation, the little mountain-sheltered inlet makes an excellent anchorage for shipping; and during the late war, at the well-remembered crisis when the Russian armies were bearing down on Constantinople and the British fleet received the famous order to pass through the Dardanelles with or without the Sultan's permission, the head-waters of the Ismidt gulf became, for several months, the rendezvous of the ships.
The disputed territory between the two rivers once more passed into the hands of the Muhammadans. Goa also remained in the Bijapur Sultan's possession. The last historical event in the reign of Yusuf Adil Shah of Bijapur, as narrated by Firishtah, is as follows: "In the year 915, the Christians surprised the town of Goa, and put to death the governor with many mussulmauns.
The Sultan's palace, a large modern building on the familiar Arab lines, lies in a treeless and gardenless waste enclosed by high walls and close above the blue Atlantic. The sun was already beating down on the great plain thronged with horsemen and with the native population of Rabat on mule-back and foot.
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