DAOUD THE LITTLE.

Wairarapa Standard, Volume I, Issue 38, 23 September 1867, Page 4

DAOUD THE LITTLE.

CHAPTER. I. In the beautiful city of Damascus there once lived a robe-maker of the name of Selim. He had a splendid bazaar in one of the principal streets, and employed a great number of assistants. Amongst these were two youths, nann d Daoud and Youssef. They were good workmen, but flilM re I much in appearance and disposition ; Daoud was quiet and modest, but Youssef was a knave up to anything, and when once the labours of the day . were over, he was always ready for mischief. otaing, however, delighted • him more than to gather round him an assembly of h.is fellow workmen, and to relate to them a n incredible number of tricks and impositions which he had plav’ed off upon his lormer masters, or upon people with whom he had been acquainted. He was very fond, too, of raising a laugh at poor ’ honest Daoud’s expense, and holding him up to the ridicule of his companions. “ There’s poor little Daoud,” lie would say, “ sitting en his shopboard working away with his needle, slaving and toiling, and seeing nothing that is joyous, but Lis gusset and seam. Why, I don’t think he has ever been outside the city gates in his life! Doubtless he know's as much of the world as the fly did, that sat on the axle-tree of the carriage, and shouted out to his companions, when he returned homo from a journey, ‘My stars how we did whizz! ’ ” At this sally there was sure to be a loud laugh at Daoud’s expense, and the little fellow would draw in his head and seem for a time smaller than ever; seem, we say, for he was not so simple as Youssef and his companions thought him. Besides, whatever little peccadilloes he bad been in the habit of committing, he bad not acquired the reputation of a “ knave,’ - and that was some advantage in a city like Damascus the Beautiful. At length a terrible thing happened. Selim, the robemaker, who had for along time been borrowing money at an exoroitant interest of these Giaours, the Jew's, became bankrupt, and his creditors seized on all his stock and sold off every stick. What a variety of rich stuffs, cloths of gold, silver-iaced tunics, and trousers splasho I with scarlet filagree work, there was to be disposed of. However, everything was cleared off, and workmen were turned adritc to shift for themselves, and get masters where best they could.

‘‘l don’t care so much for myself: my hands can always feed my mouth,” said Y ouss'f, with a mock pity; “ but poor little Daoud, what will become of him? Ho must starve. However, poor fellow it won’t cost much to bury him, and alter he has wasted away a little more we can stow him away into a rat’s hole.” Daoud heard what his former comrade said, shrugged up his shoulder, and mads no reply. In fact he was much obliged to Youssef for alluding to the rat’s hole. It gave him a hint. Indeed he was not so badly off as his friend imagined ; for whilst the latter and his companions had spent all they received as fast as they earned it, he had saved up fifty good bright requins in a leathern bag, against a rainy day.

Aow it ofren sorely puzzled Daoud what to do with this treasure. It was too small a sum wherewith to open business, and as for putting it out to interest there was a kind of panic in the money market at that moment, and he did not know waom to trust. So he thougt he would just take Youssefs advice, and stow away, not himself, but his better half, bis leathern purse of sequins, into same secure rat’s hole. However, he decided to wait a day or two, and look about him.

Meanwhile things did not go so well with \ oussef as he expected. Trade was hjui; more failures succeeeded that of fcelim’s, owing to the Jews or to the Giaours, or to a great comet which was at tnat moment in sight, and the streets were thronged with groups of discontented workmen out of employ. Yoassef himself grew thin, and often went to bed without any supper; nay, he could scarcely obtain a copper for a few handfuls of spoiled rice. Daoud on the contrary, became quite fat, for he had no u ? r l c !° arass him, and though he had diminished his store by a few requins, the bag was tolerably nil as yet. It was a mystery, indeed, to Youssef, bow his friend kept his flesh, so he determined to watch bis proceedings.

There was a ruined mosque near the city, and one evening, as Youssef, in a ■*ery melancholy mood, was pacing amongst its crumbling columns and grass-grow pavements, he saw by the light of the moon, which suddenly emerged from a cloud, a man crouching down, utul apparently hiding something in a hole in one of the walls amongst the iyy. How like to Daoud it was, he thought; yet what could he be doing there ? b

loussef was about to call out to him, when second thoughts restrained him, and ne quickly stepped aside behind an old buttress, and hid himself until his former fellow shopman had left the spot; then out he crept, and approaching the place where he had seen Daoud, he stooped under the wall, and groping about for a little time beneath the ivy, he at last put his hand down a rat’s hole. In a moment he felt something like a string, then the top of a hag, and drawing it up, and taking it to the light, he found

to his great delight that it was a moneybag containing forty-five sequins. Where could little Daoud get all this treasure ? Had he turned' robber, or stumbled on some lucky adventure, like those recorded in the legends of the East, that enriched the porters, calendered, one-eyed shoemakers, and bunch-backed tdlors of the days of the renowned Aaron the wise ? What a fool, too, he had been all his life, to have despised the friendship of such a genius as little Daoud ! Forty-five sequins! why, all his tricks and knavery had never procured him half so ranch! However perhaps he might induce Daoud to take him into partnership ; that is if he did not find out who had robbed him. So Youssef, going stealthily home by a roundabout way, arrived near midnight at his lodgings, and hid the bag of seeuins in a hole in the chimney. All the next day Youssef remained within doors; in fact, he felt rather nervous and not guite the thing; and although Daoud was a littleinsignificantlooking fellow whom he had hitherto despised, somehow or other he did not quite like to encounter him, especially when he w r as smarting under the loss of the sequins. As Youssef prepared, however, to get out torvards night fall, and was just thinking of opening the bag and taking out a sequin or two to make a jovial night of it with some boon companions, he heard a tap at his door which startled him. “ Come in,” he said; and in came Daoud.

The little fellow’s appearance was not at all what Youssef expected it would be. He was smirking 1 and smiling, and apparently in a very good humour. “ I will lake a seat, my dear Youssef,” he said, squatting down on an old cushion on the floor, “ for I want your advice, and I feel that, as a friend whom I have known for a great many years, you are a person on whom I can thoroughly rely.’ X oussef nodded, but, wondering what all this could mean, said nothing. “ The fact is, you must know,” said Daoud, laughing, ‘"'l have been rather a penurious fellow—a little miserly, if you like to call it so;; and when you and two or three jolly fellows took the world easily, and very properly enjoyed it, I thought of nsthing but scraping piastre upon piastre, until they became sequins; and I now think of converting my sequins into pieces of gold.” “ His sequins!” thought Youssef. “I wish he may get them! ” “ So I got together between forty and fifty of those little bits,” continued Daoud. “Well then came this affair with the Jews—l mean my masters bankruptcy, and our being turned adrift; and then commenced my troubles, for I did know what to do with these sequins; how to turn them to account, or to what good purpose to apply them. You know 1 was always considered a half silly fellow not fit for business, very bright—eh, Youssef?”

“Yes, I always thought you rather soft, "my dear Daoud,” said Youssef; “but then who can help his deficiencies ?” “True, we can’t help our failings,” replied Daoud! “ hut you can’t think how the disposal of this money has bothered me. Well. I had just settled it all in my own mind, and had just found a nice snug little place in an anancient ruin, near the city—l can’t tell you where, you know,” he said, with a cunning wink ; “ nay, I had even carried my treasure there last night, and thought how very snugly it would rest, and I should be quite easy, when 30, into my room walks a notary this morning, and presents me with a hundred sequins, being the request of some ancient relative whose affairs he had been called in to settle 1 was there ever such an unlucky dog! My troubles were renewed. However, I can stow this treasure were I put the last, and I shall make a point of going to the ruin the first thing to-morrow morning for that purpose. Yet this plan can’t last for ever; so I have been considering, that as you are a clever fellow, and every one thinks that you are sure to do well if you but once get into a decent business, cannot you take care of the one hundred and forty-five sequins n 011 * * tor me?

<( I will certainly try to do so,” replied Youssef, “although it is a great responsibility, and when a man does a favour he always finds people ungrateful.” “That shall never be the case with me,” said Daoud. “in three days I will he here with the notary, to draw up an agreement as regards interest, you know and at the same time I will bring you the whole of the money. Good-bye, for the present dear Youssef.” “ Good-bye,” said Youssef. “Let me open the door for you, my friend.”

“Oh, don’t give yourself that trouble,” said the happy little Daoud, and away he ran.

“ I will go to the ruin and instantly replace the forty-five sequins before he discovers his loss,” said Youssef; “and then I will warrant I’ll find means to appropriate the whole of his capital without any conditions or the aid of his notary.”

Ss saying, as soon as it was dark, Youssef crept out, as he thought unperceived, and deposited Daouds’ little treasure in the very place where he had purloined it. Impatiently he waited for the next day; at length, when some hours had elapsed after the time at which Daoud was to have made his second de-

posit, he again stole to the ruin. But, to his astonishment and rage, he found, ihit instead of the hoavy bag of one hundred sequins, as he expected, the little leather purse was also gone! nothing there; nothing, only a little slip of paper, on which was written, “ Daoud the Small has outwitted Youssef the wise.”

Youssef stamped and raved, and evfeii rolled on the ground in the frensy of his anger and disappointment; all, however, to no purpose; nor did he see anything of the notary, or sequins, nor the conditions as promised on the third day; no, nor Daoud himself, —the latter had left Damascus.

The fact was, that no sooner had the little man, on the first occasion, deposited the bag containing the hard-won savings in the rat’s hole, than he heard a slight noise, and turning round, he caught a glimpse of Youssef before the latter had thought to conceal himself. Daoud, however, did not suspect that he had been himself observed and watched, not indeed until the next day, when having occasion to go to his store sooner than he expected for another sequin or two he discovered that he had been robbed, and his suspicions at once fell upon Youssef. However, he had no.proofs of his dishonesty, and he knew Youssef was far too cunning to be detected with the property. At first, he considered all was irretrievably lost, until bethinking that the thief might be induced to replace the treasure, if be knew it was not missed, in order to grasp an increased sum, he set his wits to work, and conjured up the ghost of a deceased relative, and invoked a mythical notary to his aid. Having recovered his treasure, he lost no time in taking his departure from Damascus, verily believing, that if he remained, Youssef would be certain to adopt some means of repossessing himself of his treasure.