Page:Memoirs of the Lady Hester Stanhope.djvu/154

 shall take to them two bottles of red wine, and two bottles of vino d'oro" (ding, ding.) "Zezefôon, tell Mohammed to get out four bottles of wine, two of each sort; of my wine—you understand—and he is to put them in a basket, and be ready to go with the doctor to Jôon." Then, addressing herself again to me, "You must say to them that I am very sorry I can't see them, but that I am not very well, and that I beg their acceptance of a little wine, which, perhaps, they might not find where they sleep to-night. Say to them, I should be very much pleased to talk over their journey to Palmyra with them; and add that the respect I bear to all the French makes me always happy to meet with one of their nation. Say that the wine is not so good as I could wish it to be, but that, since Ibrahim Pasha and his soldiers have been in the country, they have drunk up all the good, and it is now very difficult to procure any. If they talk about Ibrahim Pasha, say that I admire his courage, but cannot resp ect him; that I am a faithful subject of the Sultan, and shall always be so, and that I do not like servants that rise against their masters; for whether Cromwells, or Buonapartes, or people in these countries, it never succeeds. If they allude to the horrors of the recruiting service, and to the nizàm troops, tell them that I never interfere in matters like that; but that, when heads were to be saved and the