He tried to remember if he had ever seen the cottage with his waking eyes, and where he had seen it, and to recall the voice of Naomi as he had heard it in his dream, that he might know if it was the same as he used to think he heard when he sat by her in his stolen watches of the night while she lay asleep.

Sometimes when he reflected he thought he must be growing childish, so foolish was his joy in looking forward to the night--for he had almost grown in love with it--that he might dream his dream again.
But it was a dear, delicious folly, for it helped him to bear the troubles of his journey, and they were neither light nor few.

After passing through El Kasar he had been robbed and stripped both of his small remaining moneys and the better part of his clothes by a gang of ruffians who had followed him out of the town.

Then a good woman--the old wife, turned into the servant of a Moor who had married a young one--had taken pity on his condition and given him a disused Moorish jellab.

His misfortune had not been without its advantage.