* * * * * *

_Requiem_

"There was an awful row in the Bazaar last night," said Mr. Ephraim
Perkins to his spouse facing him across the breakfast table. "They
killed a woman and burned her house down."

"Really, dear?" said Mrs. Ephraim Perkins, rasping butter on a piece of
toast. "These natives want a firm hand over them. Poor thing! They
usually stab each other in the East, don't they?"

"Yes; I think so. But they threw this one into a lions' den."

"Now, that's exaggeration, Ephraim." The knife never stopped its
rasping. "They would not be allowed to keep wild beasts in a populated
quarter."

"Stranger things happen in the native quarter, Maria," misquoted Mr.
Perkins, "than are dreamt of by the Government official."

True words!

If we dared penetrate the labyrinths of the bazaar and stir with
foolish finger the dust which lies thick upon immemorial custom, what
should we not find?

But having a meed of wisdom in the full measure of our imperial
insularity, we do not pry with foolish fingers; guessing, even knowing
of the wild beasts in those labyrinths, we draw a glove upon the hand