bound her to teaching for years, and be freed of a debt she has paid off in full. Tomorrow he returns, and life will return to the house, and the ringing of laughter will echo through its air.

Where are the father's eyes, to see — and where is he, to pour upon his two children a flood of blessings?...

And Mukhtar, Mukhtar... still free and unattached!... And why should she not be frank with herself and say that her heart still holds much love, and much admiration, and much hope?

Tomorrow, tomorrow... and with these same dreams into the near tomorrow.

And Sameh returned! He returned with gold-rimmed spec-tacles on his eyes, in his right hand the diploma of medicine — and on his left arm hung a young wife!!

Ayda was thunderstruck, beside

herself... A wife — when he himself still needs her care, her help, and her watchfulness... Truly, Sameh, your share of tact is small and meager; such selfish-ness Ayda never knew of you, and never counted it a trait in you...

Sameh begs pardon at length, explaining the motives of the marriage: he feared that some plucker might reach the charming flower before him, so he hastened to be the first at the plucking!... And he hopes his good sister will see in his wife a new sister who will be a help to her in life.

Never mind, Sameh, never mind: the heart that had room for you will not find its inmost chambers too narrow for your wife...

As for this new intruder, Mona — how like she was to false gold coated with a thin layer of glitter that much rubbing wears away, until the blackness soon shows in its true state, without embroidery or sham... Indeed, scarcely had a

few months of her residence in the marital home passed before she began to reproach Sameh with the sister's favor over him and his submission to a female who ruled over his affairs.

Fie upon spite — how it gnaws like the woodworm in the vessel of happiness; and oh, these people — how they measure people only by the measures of material things!...

As for Ayda, she shut her eye and stopped her ear: she neither sees nor hears. What is this interloper to her, busied as she is, away from her, with Mukhtar — who had dazzled her when, after Sameh's homecoming, he came again to frequent them, in the radiance of distinction, charm, and manliness.

As for poor Sameh, his wife's obstinacy cut him to the quick — her insistence in demanding the new: a new dwelling, new dress, new furniture, as though she did