Page:The Count of Monte-Cristo (1887 Volume 2).djvu/86

66 Neapolitan spring for a Lapland winter—to quit paradise for earth—heaven for hell! Taste the hashish, guest of mine—taste the hashish."

Franz's only reply was to take a tea-spoonful of the marvelous preparation, about as much in quantity as his host had eaten, and lift it to his mouth.

"Diable!" he said, after having swallowed the divine preserve. "I do not know if the result will be as agreeable as you describe, but the thing does not appear to me as succulent as you say."

"Because your palate has not yet attained the sublimity of the substance it tastes. Tell me, the first time you tasted oysters, tea, porter, truffles, and sundry other dainties which you now adore, did you like them I Could you comprehend how the Romans stuffed their pheasants with assafoetida, and the Chinese eat swallows' nests? Eh! no! Well, it is the same with hashish; only eat it for a week, and nothing in the world will seem to you to equal the delicacy of its flavor, which now appears to you sleepy and distasteful. Let us now go into the chamber beside you, which is your apartment, and Ali will bring us coffee and pipes."

They both arose, and whilst he who called himself Sindbad, and whom we have occasionally named so, that we might, like his guest, have some title by which to distinguish him,—gave some orders to the servant, Franz entered the adjoining apartment.

It was more simply yet still richly furnished. It was round, and a large divan completely incircled it. Divan, walls, ceiling, floor, were all covered with magnificent skins as soft and downy as the richest carpets; there were skins of the lions of Atlas with their large manes, skins of the Bengal tigers with their warm stripes; skins of the panthers of the Cape, spotted beautifully, like those that appeared to Dante; skins of the bears of Siberia, the foxes of Norway. And all these skins were strewn in profusion one on the other, so that it seemed like walking over the most mossy turf, or reclining on the most luxurious bed.

Both laid themselves down on the divan; chibouques with jasmine tubes and amber mouth-pieces were within reach, and all prepared so that there was no need to smoke the same pipe twice. Each of them took one, which Ali lighted, and then retired to prepare the coffee.

There was a moment's silence, during which Sindbad gave himself up to thoughts that seemed to occupy him incessantly, even in the midst of his conversation; and Franz abandoned himself to that mute reverie, into which we always sink when smoking excellent tobacco, which seems to remove with its fume all the troubles of the mind, and to give the smoker in exchange all the visions of the soul. Ali brought in the coffee.

"How do you take it?" inquired the unknown,—"à la Française or