I was weary of looking in the
morning, on things from which I had turned away weary in the evening. I,
therefore, was, at last, willing to observe the stars, rather than do
nothing, but could not always compose my thoughts, and was very often
thinking on Nekayah, when others imagined me contemplating the sky. Soon
after the Arab went upon another expedition, and then my only pleasure
was to talk with my maids, about the accident by which we were carried
away, and the happiness that we should all enjoy at the end of our
captivity."
"There were women in your Arab's fortress," said the princess, "why did
you not make them your companions, enjoy their conversation, and partake
their diversions'? In a place, where they found business or amusement,
why should you alone sit corroded with idle melancholy? or, why could
not you bear, for a few months, that condition to which they were
condemned for life?"
"The diversions of the women," answered Pekuah, "were only childish
play, by which the mind, accustomed to stronger operations, could not be
kept busy. I could do all which they delighted in doing by powers merely
sensitive, while my intellectual faculties were flown to Cairo. They
ran, from room to room, as a bird hops, from wire to wire, in his cage.
They danced for the sake of motion, as lambs frisk in a meadow.
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