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Rh sound asleep and snoring loudly through his nose, like a guttural and raucous accompaniment to the little slave girl's dulcet piping—reached the Bazar of the Badakshani Merchants; and the Prince kept on sleeping and snoring although there was a great cheering and huzzaing, and although the stalwart soldiers who preceded the litter made the air ring with defiant and rude shouts as they cleared the way with:

"O thy right!"—yelling as they brought down their long, brass-tipped staves with full force. "O thy left! O thy face! O thy ear! O thy heel!"—suiting the swing of their sticks to the part of Asian anatomy which they were striking—"O thy back, thy back, thy back! Give way, ignoble and unmentionable ones! Give way, sellers of unclean filth! Give way, leprous sons of burnt fathers!"

But, in spite of the soldiers' abuse, the merchants, knowing of old the Prince to be an extravagant spender, crowded about the litter, pushing and jostling each other, heaping their treasures of jewels and brocades and embroideries and perfume and costly rarities about the