It was not easy to realise that the man who spoke so brightly and lightly
about trivial affairs had one of the keenest intellects in the country,
that he had the secret history of its political intrigues at his fingers'
ends, that he was the trusted agent of the British Government, and lived
and throve surrounded by enemies. As far as was consistent with courtesy I
tried to direct his reminiscences towards politics, but he kept to purely
personal matters, and included in them a story of his attempt to bribe a
British Minister,[42] to whom, upon the occasion of the arrival of a
British Mission in Marrakesh, he went leading two mules laden with silver.
"And when I came to him," said the old man, "I said, 'By Allah's grace I
am rich, so I have brought you some share of my wealth.' But he would not
even count the bags. He called with a loud voice for his wife, and cried
to her, 'See now what this son of shame would do to me. He would give me
his miserable money.' And then in very great anger he drove me from his
presence and bade me never come near him again bearing a gift. What shall
be said of a man like that, to whom Allah had given the wisdom to become a
Bashador and the foolishness to reject a present? Two mules, remember, and
each one with as many bags of Spanish dollars as it could carry.
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