This was the reason
why the Jew was willing to sell them to me so cheap; and it was for this
reason that he would not stay at Grand Cairo himself to reap the profits
of his speculation. Indeed, if I had paid attention to it at the proper
time, a slight circumstance might have revealed the truth to me. Whilst
I was bargaining with the Jew, before he opened the chest, he swallowed a
large dram of brandy, and stuffed his nostrils with sponge dipped in
vinegar; he told me, he did to prevent his perceiving the smell of musk,
which always threw him into convulsions.
"The horror I felt when I discovered that I had spread the infection of
the plague, and that I had probably caught it myself, overpowered my
senses--a cold dew spread over all my limbs, and I fell upon the lid of
the fatal chest in a swoon. It is said that fear disposes people to take
the infection; however this may be, I sickened that evening, and soon was
in a raging fever. It was worse for me whenever the delirium left me,
and I could reflect upon the miseries my ill-fortune had occasioned. In
my first lucid interval I looked round, and saw that I had been removed
from the khan to a wretched hut. An old woman, who was smoking her pipe
in the farthest corner of my room, informed me that I had been sent out
of the town of Grand Cairo by order of the cadi, to whom the merchants
had made their complaint.
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